One of the first RPGs released for the PS2 was based on the “Orphen” anime. Known as “Orphen: Scion of Sorcery” in the US, the PS2 game “Sorcerous Stabber Orphen” was an underwhelming release for Sony’s then-new console. The game’s music features an extreme and unashamed focus on one genre: techno.
In fact, this “Perfect Soundtrack” collection is split. The first disc is the OST, and the second disc is a techno arranged album. The second disc, though only 8 tracks long, takes up more disc space than its OST counterpart. So, as is standard for the genre, there’s plenty of repetition on disc two to keep things lengthy.
I was initially impressed by the quality of the album. The remixed opening “finished symphony” caught me off guard: it was simple, but it was beautiful. I’m not saying I love when people’s original work is turned into a standard techno piece, but performer “Hybrid” (Sacha Puttnam) remixed it well. The next few tracks also won my favor: good prologue music, a decent battle theme, and a good environment piece (track 6). I thought to myself, “if this quality is found throughout the entire disc, then I have stumbled upon quite the treasure!”
A treasure, this album is not.
Looking for bland, mundane, run-of-the-mill background music for your videogame? Check! It’s all here, fillin’ up the disc in a way that only “filler” music can. A few songs stand out…very few. However, both the “boss” and “last boss” music left much to be desired. And what about the end of the disc? “Ido’s Theme” was a nice touch, but the rest was bad. One song, in particular was really bad.
“Touch Me” is a stupid song. The remix is stupid, and I assume the original is crap as well. A girl sings phrases like “Touch Me, Forever” and some crappy techno fills the soundscape. The vocalist is pretty bland as well.
The first disc also includes a bonus video. Using a small snippet of the first track from disc two, in-game scenes and anime cutscenes from Orphen are merged into an epilepsy-inducing professional AMV. It’s cute, but not an entirely worthwhile bonus.
Disc two is the techno portion. I’m not a huge fan of the techno-remix scene, and I generally fear any album with an artist named “DJ ____” performing…but I’ve come to live with it, and I think I can judge whether a remix is done with talent or just standard hack stuff. This, for the most part, is standard hack stuff.
Now, different people work on each track, and there were a few good ones (Celfy’s Theme stood out as a decent mix, worthy at least of being on a DDR game!). But most of them were pure crap. I’d liken this disc to Parasite Eve Remixes: a few tracks worth listening to, but the rest is just plain bad. Generally, tonality can help a song, because listening to the same beats over and over can just give you a headache.
All in all, the soundtrack showed a bit of potential but ultimately fell on its face, much like the PS2 game did. I’d guess that only fans of the Anime series would even bother hunting this album down, but if for some reason you would want it, it’s old enough to be declared “used store” obscure.
