Archives

Dear Falcom, why not let sleeping dinosaurs lie? A full decade passed after Falcom released one of their least-known games, “Dinosaur,” to the Japanese public. The game itself was mediocre, and the soundtrack was (in this reviewer’s opinion) downright awful. But a PC remake was on the horizon, perhaps as a method for Falcom to… Read More »

One of Falcom’s best “promotional” CDs, this soundtrack was for Falcom Classics II, a collection of games for the Sega Saturn. The first Falcom Classics actually had a CD printed and published separately. Not so with Falcom Classics II. What was to be found on this collection? Well, other “part 2” games, that’s what: Ys… Read More »

Falcom’s JDK Band made a revival in 2008 with a whole new lineup, like a Japanese version of Menudo. Falcom’s obvious attempt to make JDK Band look more young and hip (see cover art) may turn off old-school fans, but the new image has little to do with the quality of the music. It’s time… Read More »

This Falcom promo CD shipped with the PSP version of The Legend of Heroes: Sora no Kiseki SC (Second Chapter). It includes musical arrangements for demos, trailers, and a couple of bonus tracks, none of which had ever been released before. The first three tracks are classic Ys tunes. The arrangement of “Feena” is strong.… Read More »

This promotional album (a preorder bonus for a 1994 remake of Legend of Heroes III) contains unused tracks from both Legend of Heroes III and Brandish 3. The Brandish 3 tracks contain familiar melodies, but the songs themselves are unused “versions” of the songs. Different synths, different tempo, different track length…just little changes. But what… Read More »

It’s the gaiden of all gaidens! Romancia is a cute side-story from Falcom’s Sorcerian series, which is itself part of the Dragon Slayer family of games. This eight-track arranged album covers the music from this light-hearted piece of Falcom fantasy. What makes the album appealing? Well, for starters, it’s one of Falcom’s earliest releases. That… Read More »

Hiroshi Nishizawa released his own contributions to the Sorcerian series in an independently-published two disc set in 2000. The album maintained a low profile until recently, likely due to the revived interest in the series thanks to Sega’s Sorcerian Mega Drive Version OST. What is Selected Sorcerian, you ask? These were actually add-ons to Falcom’s… Read More »

Vantage Master was released in the latter half of the 1990s by Falcom. The closing thing it had to an OST was a promotional/preorder item that came with the game, and track 1 was a “data track,” holding other bonuses on it. Now, for the first time, the Vantage Master OST appears in full. And… Read More »

I was always a fan of the music of the original Zwei. Not in the typical sense, I didn’t put the whole album on at once. It was a soundtrack I approached in more of a piecewise fashion, certain songs for certain situations. Overall it was pretty relaxing, a huge departure for Falcom, and was… Read More »

Note: regarding the title Kimino Yusha, we acknowledge that it would make most literal sense to romanize the title as “Kimi no Yuusha,” but the game’s logo comes with its own romanization, so we’ll leave it at that. For those interested in knowing, “Kimo no Yuusha” can be translated as “Your Hero.” SNK (now SNK… Read More »

Dungeons & Dragons: Shadow Over Mystara was originally a Capcom-developed Beat ’em Up / RPG arcade game, but eventually found its way onto the Sega Saturn, although only in Japan (the console iteration combining even more RPG elements to the Beat ’em Up genre). This cross-cultural oddity spawned a soundtrack, composed by Masato Koda. Even… Read More »

Mitsuda’s musical career has been up and down for the last five years (though most people would say far more “down” than “up”). A recent achievement of his was the Soma Bringer OST, three discs of classic-style Mitsuda for the Nintendo DS RPG. Now, Mitsuda is at it again on the DS, this time it’s… Read More »

Last year Square Enix released their hopefully successful new IP The Last Remnant to mixed reviews. One of the aspects of the game that everyone agreed on as high quality though was its soundtrack. Not only is this one of the best soundtracks from last year, but it also rivals their bigger named franchises. Even… Read More »

Akihiko Mori’s score for the Super Famicom RPG Mystic Ark (a spiritual sequel to Elnard, a.k.a. “The 7th Saga”) matches the strange grandeur of the game and its concept art. Can something be simultaneously quirky and epic? The Mystic Ark soundtrack proves that, yes, it can be done. Many import RPG Fans have praised Mystic… Read More »

Time Hollow is a visual novel by Konami for the Nintendo DS that fell under the radar in 2008. It was not the greatest visual novel, but it did have a decent story and beautiful visual design. The opening anime sequence was excellent. Adding to that opening scene’s excellence was one of the best opening… Read More »

Rie Sugimoto, the winner of Falcom’s “Miss Lilia” contest, released a series of albums during the 90s with Falcom. Celceta is the third album. For more information on the history of Rie and Falcom, see the review for Lilia, the first album. About six months after Krelia comes another album, featuring everyone’s favorite (er, only)… Read More »

Rie Sugimoto, the winner of Falcom’s “Miss Lilia” contest, released a series of albums during the 90s with Falcom. Celceta is the fourth and last truly Falcom-related album, though Rie continued to put out releases until 1999. For more information on the history of Rie and Falcom, see the review for Lilia, the first album.… Read More »

Falcom, the source of much awesome from the late 1980s on, was at one point almost more of a record label than a game studio. In 1990, Falcom was right in the middle of a myriad of new, exciting projects, ranging from the takeoff of their Legend of Heroes series to a third successful Special… Read More »

Before the moniker “Sound Team JDK” came into being, Falcom had already a few soundtracks. One of them is All Sounds of Sorcerian, the first Sorcerian CD to hit the market. With the composer listed as “Falcom Music Staff,” and opening/ending arrangements by Masami Sakaide, this Sorcerian album falls outside the bounds of the many… Read More »

Note: we took the liberty of fixing English spelling errors from “Behaind” to “Behind,” and from “Deamon” to “Daemon,” in the tracklist. Here’s an interesting treat that came out of left field. Sega released the soundtrack for their version of the Falcom classic, “Sorcerian.” The Mega Drive port of the game came with a significant… Read More »

Somehow, unintentionally, I saved the best for last. Slowly, I have collected all of Falcom’s “MIDI Collection” albums and have taken the time to digest each one. This semi-rare series of albums from Falcom featured a data-and-audio CD, where track 1 was the “data track” (filled with actual MIDI files and some artwork), and the… Read More »

Though no one can forget the incredible music written for Ys and Ys II, there is no question in my mind that the “underdog” accomplishment for Falcom was the original set of songs written for Sorcerian. According to this album, “Music From Sorcerian,” there were a total of 58 written, and they are all wonderful… Read More »

Rie Sugimoto, the winner of Falcom’s “Miss Lilia” contest, released a series of albums during the 90s with Falcom. Krelia is the second album. For more information on the history of Rie and Falcom, see the review for Lilia, the first album. Following the cheesy Lilia comes a full-length album, Krelia. I know I said… Read More »

Wow, what a surprise this was! My personal discovery of Tokyo Majin Gakuen came as a result of back-tracking. I had heard of Tenshou Gakuen Gekkouroku at the time of its release, since the composer was the prolific Motoi Sakuraba. But I took interest in the series when Idea Factory published Kamiyo Gakuen Makorouku. From… Read More »

VGM collectors know one thing for certain about Tokimeki Memorial CDs: they are just like sugary sweets. They should only be used sparingly, yet they are in plentiful supply, making it hard to avoid (though the metaphor breaks down when you compare desire for sugar to desire for Tokimeki CDs). I can only take so… Read More »