NBGI-0010: Tekken

[Brad Evans II]

This is probably a dumb question, but is the PS1 rendition of this score only available via this DL, or is there a pressing on a disc? I watched some video of the PS1 game and that version of the audio caught my ear compared to the arcade verison. Did the PS1 port possibly use redbook?

[_if]

It appears this is the only release of the PlayStation soundtrack, but the game did indeed use CD audio for music. The only exceptions are the music used in pre-rendered video clips, which in this release are tracks 15 and 28. However, there's still one more in the game not included on this album, from the video that plays first thing after starting up the game and going through the Galaga loading screen mini-game. If you own the game, you almost own a physical copy of this album, but not quite, even apart from those two tracks not being playable in a CD player and the tracks being in a different order. Believe it or not, I'm not a Tekken series fan or a big fan of this soundtrack, but I am an audio nerd and have enough interest in Namco's '90s sound team to have bought the soundtrack multiple times and to check out the differences between different versions, so I'll do an info dump here.

The aforementioned movie tracks are slightly different from their in-game versions, as "Opening" doesn't have the voice saying "Tekken" at the end and "Ending" sustains its final chord several seconds longer. Some tracks are also edited differently. On the game disc, stage themes usually play past two loops and then quickly fade out at some inconsistent point thereafter. A handful of tracks on this album have proper custom endings instead and the others fade after two loops. "Monument Valley, U.S.A." is also extended and slightly different past the point the game version fades out (it removes that rattlesnake-sounding percussion the first loop has and sprinkles in some other percussion in a few places), and "Name Entry" is extended with nearly 30 seconds of synth pad vamping at the beginning and then a loop and fade. The album is also generally louder, with tracks typically boosted by around 2 to 3 decibels. It otherwise sounds very similar to the game audio.

The PlayStation game also includes the original arcade soundtrack, as this album does, but most tracks in-game fade earlier or cut off abruptly and it's missing the opening music. This album's arcade tracks basically match the timing of the Game Sound Express Vol. 17 CD and the British CD, which are essentially identical in mastering, though not quite bit-identical, aside from the extra remixes on the British version. So Game Sound Express was likely used as the source here, although the volume has been boosted as well, and to a slightly greater degree than the PlayStation arrangements on this album were.

All this is to say that they didn't lazily rip the game CD and then throw it on iTunes. For the PlayStation tracks, this album must go back to the musicians' original project files as the source. That's similar to the iTunes-exclusive Soul Edge, which is the "Arrange Version" synth upgrade made for the PlayStation version of Soul Edge/Soul Blade, but has better sound quality than the game's XA audio (although it unfortunately lacks two stage themes). While I wish they would have done CD releases as well, Namco's sound people should get some credit for the effort they made in getting many of their soundtracks on iTunes, including internationally - some never before released - and pricing them so nicely on top of that.

[Brad Evans II]

Thanks for it the info. I'm just kind of getting around to checking out Tekken as a franchise when it comes to music, so I'm looking into all the games right now.

Tekken 3 probably has probably garnered the most attention from me however, being the game in the franchise I spent the most time with when younger. That said, I know graphics aren't everything, but the improvements from Tekken through Tekken 3 are rather astounding in my opinion. Namco was able to get a ton of millage out of the PS1 IMO.

[MOV_Games]

Actually, some of Tekken 1's Arranged OST did make it onto the two Strike Fighting Tekken 2 releases, and not just the tracks that were reused in Tekken 2 either as one of them has the Venezia stage theme that was not reused in 2. The Name Entry theme is definitely the same on Strike Fighting as it is here with the extended intro (which WAS used in Tekken 1 as the Redbook track which is the Ending and Name Entry themes combined has some of it when the crossfade happens).

Not just that, but this ITunes release does have a very notable change in both versions of Chicago, U.S.A; the "one, two three, FOUR" is cut out in both versions possibly due to copyright issues with the original Tekken announcer voice. It's quite a sloppy cut too, the Arcade version simply has the section with the countdown snipped out of it, while the PS ver still has sort of a "onOUR" merged bit left in there. The tracks are like this in Tekken Tag 2 and Tekken 7 (PS4 ver) too.

[Brad Evans II]

Originally Posted by _if

The PlayStation game also includes the original arcade soundtrack, as this album does, but most tracks in-game fade earlier or cut off abruptly and it's missing the opening music. This album's arcade tracks basically match the timing of the Game Sound Express Vol. 17 CD and the British CD, which are essentially identical in mastering, though not quite bit-identical, aside from the extra remixes on the British version. So Game Sound Express was likely used as the source here, although the volume has been boosted as well, and to a slightly greater degree than the PlayStation arrangements on this album were.

All this is to say that they didn't lazily rip the game CD and then throw it on iTunes. For the PlayStation tracks, this album must go back to the musicians' original project files as the source. That's similar to the iTunes-exclusive Soul Edge, which is the "Arrange Version" synth upgrade made for the PlayStation version of Soul Edge/Soul Blade, but has better sound quality than the game's XA audio (although it unfortunately lacks two stage themes). While I wish they would have done CD releases as well, Namco's sound people should get some credit for the effort they made in getting many of their soundtracks on iTunes, including internationally - some never before released - and pricing them so nicely on top of that.

I got a copy of the game for $7 and change and yeah, not that I doubted you, but this is pretty much the case. Even though I have the game disc, I'll probably pick up the DL as well, I have about $12 chilling out on my itunes account that I have no other plans for anyway. Additionally, if I do plan on getting a physical copy of the arcade audio, I probably will pick up the Game Sound Express; it's not rare or overly expensive from what I've seen. Still, the Tekken 3 and 2 soundtracks are higher on my list right now.