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  #1  
Old Sep 11, 2021, 01:30 PM
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Mac_Tear Mac_Tear is offline
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVBiecFpdnw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYYoCdX3gQc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPJbQtKaX7w

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dephRpuTQxY

Sooooo ... can we just talk about the newly arranged music here and how awesome it is, please? I mean, this violin work here is amazing, I love it!

FFIII already had a great remastered soundtrack, but I think this one even tops it ... I can't wait for FFV and VI pixel remasters to be honest! Glad, Uematsu supervised these projects, his original created atmosphere is all present, only with superior quality.
I'm really buffed here and didn't expect that much quality to be honest ...

This is exactly, what I like about these remastered soundtracks - the reorchestration is identical to the original, without too much experimentation, and relys on quality arrangements and live performances. Simple, but very effective!

Last edited by Mac_Tear; Sep 11, 2021 at 01:34 PM.
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  #2  
Old Sep 12, 2021, 04:06 AM
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TerraEpon TerraEpon is offline
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Please don't use the word 'remastered' when talking about these. It's wrong. They are new arrangements.

Remastered would mean using the original recordings and given them a new master, which obviously this isn't.
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Old Sep 12, 2021, 10:02 AM
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《J》 《J》 is offline
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How much of this is even live performances to begin with, anyway? Not that I mind too much, so long as the arrangements are good, but the violin in that Battle 2 arrangement sounds like SWAM Violin to me, which can be convincing enough when programed well. The electric guitar in stuff like Battle 1 sounds like Heavier7strings.

Not really feeling the Pixel Remaster soundtrack for IV too much, the arrangements in III were better.

"Uematsu supervising" sounds like Squeenix just plastering Uematsu's name for brownie points and using his reputation as a selling point, regardless of quality. Uematsu probably just heard whatever they sent him and simply nodded in approval.
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Old Sep 12, 2021, 01:29 PM
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Psychonotes Psychonotes is offline
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I'm not digging it.

These arrangements sound like reasonable re-interpretations for an arranged album but are in no way "identical" to the originals; far too many personal, idiosyncratic musical choices have been inserted by the arrangers to claim that these are representative of the original sound and reproduce its intent.

For example, the original Mysidia theme was a melodic exchange between xylophone and flute. This arrangement of Mysida removes the contrasting "dialogue" aspect of the melodic instrumentation entirely, replacing both original instrument choices with a rustic fiddle (a fairly annoying-sounding one, to my ears) taking the melody all the way through. This is not a subtly enhanced version of the OST track; it's someone's personal arrangement project.
The boss battle theme, as another example, has too many alterations and added gestures made to claim it's simply reproducing the original music with higher sample fidelity. Right at the start, the arranger reinterprets the iconic FF two-note battle bassline as an electric guitar riff, which changes the vibe and is a choice I don't agree with, and then substitutes solo violin for the original's string section to carry the melody, which is a choice I hate. He then throws in a hammond organ, almost like a winking meta-reference to Uematsu's penchant for using it in other works, that was never present in this track and adds a different color that wasn't there.
I don't think these are bad tracks overall, but they add up to a very different vision of the OST, far too heavily inflected by the arrangers' own tastes.

I suppose I'm not the audience here, as I'm not really interested in these pixel remasters. To me, they look inferior to the originals across the board, but I appreciate that Square is at least trying to faithfully reproduce the original sprite-based visual aesthetic. But I think the modern, pseudo-realistic sampled library sound clashes terribly with that vintage, low-res aesthetic (in the same way the awful high-res font does.)
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Old Sep 13, 2021, 03:50 AM
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Zanasea Zanasea is offline
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I reported about the process behind the new arrangements in this Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/jkermarrec/statu...66787336769537

As you can see, Hidenori Miyanaga definitely consulted with Nobuo Uematsu, but it seems it was just some global advice about what he couldn't do at the time that they could try and "fix" this time around. Miyanaga and his sound team simply tried to elaborate on Uematsu's thoughts when they wrote down their orders for the arrangers. So I guess "supervising" is a bit too strong of a word, maybe it would be wiser to talk about advice giving.

In any case, I'm very fond of the new soundtracks, and I'm especially enthusiastic about FInal Fantasy III, even more than FFIV. There was no way to do something that would appeal to everyone, and I'm fine with them taking bold decisions.
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Old Sep 13, 2021, 12:12 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Zanasea View Post
I reported about the process behind the new arrangements in this Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/jkermarrec/statu...66787336769537

As you can see, Hidenori Miyanaga definitely consulted with Nobuo Uematsu, but it seems it was just some global advice about what he couldn't do at the time that they could try and "fix" this time around. Miyanaga and his sound team simply tried to elaborate on Uematsu's thoughts when they wrote down their orders for the arrangers. So I guess "supervising" is a bit too strong of a word, maybe it would be wiser to talk about advice giving.

In any case, I'm very fond of the new soundtracks, and I'm especially enthusiastic about FInal Fantasy III, even more than FFIV. There was no way to do something that would appeal to everyone, and I'm fine with them taking bold decisions.
Very interesting report! Thank you very much for sharing this. I'm happy Uematsu was involved in this project at all, even if his role was quite limited. Plus, they hired a bunch of prolific arrangers. I'm excited how the remaining two soundtracks will turn out, as they're some of my favorites from the entire series.

Sure, there are always people, who complain about everything, but as for me, I'm perfectly fine with what I heard so far, especially of FFIII and this one.
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Old Sep 14, 2021, 04:06 AM
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TerraEpon TerraEpon is offline
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If they do release the 'pixel remaster' soundtracks, it'll be interesting to see how things are credited.
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  #8  
Old Sep 14, 2021, 04:36 AM
zierts zierts is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TerraEpon View Post
If they do release the 'pixel remaster' soundtracks, it'll be interesting to see how things are credited.
I transcribed the game credits in this post. They are pretty comprehensive, the only thing really missing is per-track arranger credits.
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Old Sep 15, 2021, 02:38 PM
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Jormungand Jormungand is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Psychonotes View Post
The boss battle theme, as another example, has too many alterations and added gestures made to claim it's simply reproducing the original music with higher sample fidelity. Right at the start, the arranger reinterprets the iconic FF two-note battle bassline as an electric guitar riff, which changes the vibe and is a choice I don't agree with, and then substitutes solo violin for the original's string section to carry the melody, which is a choice I hate. He then throws in a hammond organ, almost like a winking meta-reference to Uematsu's penchant for using it in other works, that was never present in this track and adds a different color that wasn't there.
I don't think these are bad tracks overall, but they add up to a very different vision of the OST, far too heavily inflected by the arrangers' own tastes.
Thank you Psychonotes, I find this to be a very astute and articulate breakdown. These additions and substitutions make it clear that the music direction for FF4 wasn't merely to produce live versions of the original arrangements. With FF1-3 it is ambiguous how well the new tracks would have matched Uematsu's original intent (outside of FF3 Legend of the Eternal Wind), because they obviously were not instrumental to begin with. Despite my general enthusiasm for the FF1-3 soundtrack remakes, I had worried about that the treatment for FF4 may be divergent. That is--if I had gone into the Pixel Remasters hearing FF1-3 and thinking they are extremely faithful to the original intent of Uematsu (my own fault), I might have expected the same for FF4-6. I'm not saying we are owed that; just that I set up the wrong expectations for myself.

I haven't listened to much yet as I plan to play the games 100 years down the line when they come to console; but I did sample that boss theme (and Mysidia too--seems like they wanted to dip into the sound of Celtic Moon) and it really does have a different identity than the original. I still have hope for the rest of the OST which I won't spoil myself on yet, but y'all who have heard it are free to spoil it for me.

And I just want to repeat this:
Quote:
the arranger reinterprets the iconic FF two-note battle bassline as an electric guitar riff, which changes the vibe and is a choice I don't agree with
This is very on-point. I have observed that the remade battle themes throughout FF1-4 are way too heavy on the electric guitar stuff! Such riffs don't automatically make something sound like a battle, or "cool", or whatever the intent was. It's a completely mismatched energy.

Again, I'm not suggesting we are owed something specific here; recreating FF1-6 with (mostly) live instrumentation is a colossal undertaking. But I admit I wanted, finally, a "Definitive Edition" version of the FF1-6 OSTs, borrowing Xenoblade's language. i.e. same arrangements with live instrumentation. Simple, but it would sound soooo good.

That said, I'm 100% on board with more Pixel Remaster style games of Square's 2D library--just go a little lighter on the music arrangements, please!
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