The timing of Pokémon music releases can be strange. Sometimes we wait years before Nintendo and The Pokémon Company release a full OST. But with Pokémon Legends: Z-A, the turnover was relatively quick! Nintendo Switch Pokémon Legends: Z-A + Mega Dimension Super Music Complete is a 5 CD set that reached online retailers only four months after the roll-out of the Mega Dimension DLC! Compared to the wait time we had for Pokémon Sword & Shield (five years), that’s not bad at all.
You can plainly see in the album information section that the list of composers and arrangers for this album is massive. Fully separate teams of musicians worked on Legends: Z-A. The end result? A pretty wild mix in terms of genre, but with a persistent mark of excellence in overall production.
The most immediate star of the show is the overworld town theme, in both its day and night variations. “Lumiose City” features a sax performance by Carlos Eiene (a.k.a. insaneintherainmusic). The energy Carlos brings to Legends: Z-A helps to shape the overall soundscape, similar to Toby Fox’s contribution of the “Area Zero” theme in Scarlet & Violet. This is a lengthy track too, with each variant clocking in at eight minutes. If you’ve spent any time with this game, I’m certain that this pleasant, jazzy theme stood out to you. If you’ve beaten the game, it’s probably stuck in your head by now. I happily sing the melody in my head when I’m relaxing. And just as I tire of the day version, it switches to that sweet cityscape nightlife variant “Lumiose City (Night),” and my mood lights up just like Paris at night! Variants of this city theme play out in the energetic “Wild Zone” exploration and battle themes as well!
Next up, we have a massive set of contributions from SuperSweep! Shinji Hosoe, Ayako Saso, Teruo Taniguchi, and Takahiro Eguchi team up to handle a sizeable portion of this massive OST. The original duo (Hosoe and Saso) handled many character themes (and their associated battle music): Team MZ, Canari/DYN4M0, Ivor/Justice, Corbeau/Rust, and more are handled by these capable composers. These characters are colorful with outsized personalities, and the music from Hosoe and Saso really lands here. The electro-sugar-surge for Canari and the organized crime vibe for Corbeau are perfect. Additional kudos to Ayako Saso for handling the now-iconic “Battle! (Rogue Mega Pokémon)” and all of the Zygarde battle themes.
Takahiro Eguchi had fewer contributions, but they are some of my favorites: character and battle themes for Jacinthe and Lysandre. The pristine veneer hiding the savagery of Jacinthe’s insatiable hunger for battle, as well as her big-brother-esque use of the hologram system, matches seamlessly with Eguchi’s elegant melody. As for Lysandre? The old leader of Team Flare may be far less imposing than in X & Y, but his hidden complex motives in Legends Z-A are enhanced by Eguchi’s versatile motif.
As for Teruo Taniguchi? He took on the thankless work of the game’s many musical stings and jingles. He composed some new ones and arranged plenty of the classics first written by Junichi Masuda and others. If you rest and heal your party, or level up, or evolve, or rank up? That’s all Taniguchi, baby! I love how well the sound design with these jingles is consistent with the overall soundscape of Z-A.
All other music here? It’s the work of the Game Freak in-house team. And they are an absolute FORCE to be reckoned with! Their work on Legends Arceus and Scarlet & Violet was some of the best they’ve ever done. Now, Pokémon Legends: Z-A is certainly inferior to those two games, and I think the same is true about the corresponding soundtracks. But the quality gap is smaller with the OSTs than the games themselves. The Game Freak musicians did a great job with the key cutscene music, the reworks of classic Junichi Masuda themes, the tournament themes, the finale, and the entire Mega Dimension DLC scenario (the entirety of disc four). As I said earlier, the cohesive soundscape is very impressive, especially when you consider the number of composers, arrangers, and performers who collaborated on this one!
While Pokémon Legends: Z-A + Mega Dimension Super Music Complete is not the strongest Pokémon soundtrack of the past decade, it sports a handful of truly impressive musical numbers and some strong character/battle motifs. If that sounds like something you’d like, and/or you want to keep your Pokémon music collection current, pick this up before it goes out of print!
