Tecmo’s “Wind of Nostalgeo” (their first proper RPG in decades) had a promotional soundtrack released alongside the game in Japan. The game’s music was outsourced to the T’s Music team, who have been doing soundtracks for games whose developers don’t have a dedicated sound team for at least a decade.
The promo CD offers ten pieces from the full score, so don’t think this is a comprehensive soundtrack. It’s just some hand-picked tunes that are key to the game. Basic and boss battle themes, some town themes, airship music, and a fantastic dungeon theme (The Tower of Babel). Since T’s Music consists of many composers, we can’t know which individuals worked on which tracks. And it might help explain the “hit-or-miss” nature of the pieces. But let me say this: there are some songs on here that really do rival the “nostalgic” classics in the world of RPGs.
Tower of Babel sounds like something straight out of Chrono Trigger. The track uses steel drums, tabla drums, orchestra bells and chimes, and a staccato “oh” vocal synth. Played out in a mid-tempo 3/4, the piece is an incredible effective bit of mood music. It’s not easy to synthesize tabla drums, but they got it nearly perfect on this track.
Theme of the Sky sounds like your typical “airship taking off for flight in an RPG” song. You’ve played Final Fantasy games for SNES, haven’t you? You’ll get that same impression from this piece. The composers really are playing to our sense of nostalgia with this soundtrack… and, so it seems, the whole game will do the same thing. Indeed, with Ignition Entertainment publishing the game in North America, they’ve retitled it to simply be called “Nostalgia.” You’re playing to my sensibilities, guys, and I don’t mind it one bit!
It’s a shame that a full-out, retail-availability soundtrack wasn’t published for this game. This promo CD, which came only as a disc in an unmarked sleeve, will likely become a collector’s item for importers. But if it doesn’t, it will only because someone came to their senses and gave us a full soundtrack. The future holds many unknowns. But for now, I’m content to live in the past. More nostalgia, please!
