• I’ve finished my time w/Musika
• I’ve almost completely run out of money, so therefore…
• I’ve been sending resumes out for another project
• I’ve joined an independent game company “Kagero Studios” as a typographer; I’m currently in the middle of making a custom font for Kagero to use
• I’ve started work on a new Sphere menu project “NeoLogiX Menu System v3″ (aka NMenu3)

So, yea, that’s what’s been happening lately. I’ve also been experimenting w/some software and learning Objective-C (and eventually Cocoa) so I can improve my Mac programming and eventually fully port VGMTool and such.

Darkness and Starlight rearranges some of the more obscure Final Fantasy tracks, with the title track 9th in the 10 track playlist. For the hardcore completists who just want every single Squaresoft album, this album is worth it, but just barely. For the casual listener, you pretty much just want one or two tracks.

The breakdown:

“Bombing Mission” has always been my favorite FF7 track. The remix is ok, but I actually prefer the Crisis Core version. I think I’ll just leave it alone for now.

“Neo EXDEATH” sounds awesome rearranged and might fit into FF8, replacing The Extreme if it was to do so. Speaking of which…

“The Extreme” is meh in my opinion. It’s pretty much a reinstrumentation of the original, with maybe a small solo near the end.

I have fond memories of “Premonition.” It was the second song I recorded from the TV speaker to an audio cassette (“Force Your Way” being the first). The solo makes this song listenable, but otherwise I’d skip it.

“Darkness and Starlight” is the English name of the “Aria di mezzo carattere” from Final Fantasy VI. The name comes from the English lyrics, and the song does not disappoint. The Black Mages themselves sing the song, one as the spoken word narrator, one as Draco, knight of the western kingdom Garou, one as Maria, his lady love torn away from him at war’s end, and one as the eastern Prince Lars (everyone mistransliterates it as Ralse, but it’s really quite simple to make it Lars, and Square “fixes” it in FF12 with Larsa). The tale itself when narrated is pretty epic, and I would love to see a feature-length film made of it. This remix was on my evening playlist until I found the Final Fantasy – More Friends version with a full orchestra and English lyrics. Sorry Japan.

The rest of the album is pretty meh – two FF9 tracks (I’ve made my stance on FF9 pretty clear in the past), a previously unreleased FF3 track, an FFXI track (I’ve never played XI, so I don’t know it or its music), and an original track (too short for me to enjoy it). I wouldn’t spend more than US $10 on this album. MAXIMUM.

5/10

The track listing:

1. “Opening ~ Bombing Mission” Final Fantasy VII 4:39
2. “Neo EXDEATH” Final Fantasy V 4:39
3. “The Extreme” Final Fantasy VIII 5:51
4. “Assault of the Silver Dragons” Final Fantasy IX 5:01
5. “KURAYAMINOKUMO” Final Fantasy III 4:56
6. “Distant Worlds” Final Fantasy XI 7:32
7. “Premonition” Final Fantasy VIII 5:23
8. “Grand Cross” Final Fantasy IX 5:34
9. “Darkness and Starlight” Final Fantasy VI 15:32
10. “Life ~ in memory of KEITEN ~” 1:38

What a shame…

To recap, The Skies Above is similar to the first album in that the same people (plus a couple of surprise extras) rearrange classic, present, and eventually future Final Fantasy tracks, though where the first one was just battle themes this one adds a few non-battle tracks. The games not featured in the first album come in full force for this one, and this album features not one but two tracks with…wait for it…LYRICS! Yes, it’s time to hear some singing on this album.

The breakdown:

“Zeromus” is fantastic, featuring a loop that many Final Fantasy IV fans wished the original had. The “Jump” sawtooth makes a glorious return in a solo showing off keyboardist Fukui’s chops, as well as his skill with the keyboard’s pitch and mod wheels. Possibly the most requested song not on the first album. Love it.

“Otherworld” is one of the two songs arranged with sung lyrics. While the instrumentation was fine by me, I wasn’t fond of the bubblegum factor introduced into the lyrics by the vocal talents of Hamano Kazco. As such, my morning playlist has the original version instead. Sorry, Kazco.

“Battle with the Four Fiends” has a classic Metallica flair to it, and may very well be my favorite track on this album. I can’t even put into words how much I love this song.

“The Skies Above” is the other song arranged with lyrics. For J-Pop fans, Tomoaki Watanabe (aka mr.goo) was tapped for the new vocals. With a powerful, booming voice, he does the lyrics proud and IMO would only be beat by a Bruce Dickinson-like singer instead (at least, that’s how I sing it in my head ;) ). A true rock ballad, this may be the most epic song Uematsu ever wrote and had arranged.

I’m half and half on the rest of the album, but overall the tracks that should’ve been in the first album but weren’t make this album listenable. As a bonus, we get a Japanese pro-wrestler’s theme along with the Final Fantasy fare (try saying that one three times fast :P ). There’s still one or two songs fans clamor for that aren’t in this one or the first one, but that’s probably one of the reasons why the Black Mages made a third album.

7/10

The track listing:

1. “The Rocking Grounds” Final Fantasy III 3:56
2. “Zeromus” Final Fantasy IV 3:56
3. “Vamo’ alla Flamenco” Final Fantasy IX 4:25
4. “Hunter’s Chance” Final Fantasy IX 4:44
5. “Otherworld” Final Fantasy X 3:14
6. “Matoya’s Cave” Final Fantasy I 4:44
7. “The Man with the Machine Gun” Final Fantasy VIII 4:17
8. “Maybe I’m a Lion” Final Fantasy VIII 5:34
9. “Battle with the Four Fiends” Final Fantasy IV 3:58
10. “The Skies Above” Final Fantasy X 7:18
11. “Blue Blast – Winning the Rainbow” 4:49

Finally – Darkness and Starlight…

To remind y’all if y’all forgot, or to educate y’all if y’all didn’t know, The Black Mages (by the group of the same name led by Square-Enix composers Nobuo Uematsu and Tsuyoshi Sekito) was an album of remixes of assorted battle themes from many console Final Fantasies. IMO, this album had more hits than misses, and more than the second album, The Skies Above. I do have tracks from all three albums on my two daily playlists (one for morning to keep me awake on the train and time my trip to work, and one for evening to keep me entertained and time my trip home), so it’s not as if I don’t appreciate a song just because it’s on a particular album.

The breakdown:

“Dancing Mad” is a masterpiece worthy of the full-length OST version and, if split and looped properly, could easily replace it in any Final Fantasy VI remake.

“Clash on the Big Bridge” is arguably the best track on the album, and hearing it makes you think you’re fighting Gilgamesh for the umpteenth time without skipping a beat.

I’m personally a fan of “Force Your Way” for two reasons: 1. it was the first BM song I ever listened to (back when it and “Those Who Fight Further” were available for free download from Square’s old site); 2. the original FF8 version was the first song I ever tried to record straight from the TV to an audiocassette (by plugging a microphone into a tape recorder and holding it up to the TV speaker during a boss battle).

“Fight with Seymour” surprised me the first time I listened to it; I totally didn’t remember what the original sounded like when I played FFX, but I re-listened to it after the remix and I would change the instrumentation of the remix based on the original (ie, use the original choir ahhs and organ).

“Battle Scene” (FF) is a long overdue update of the original, though there are a few spots here and there that could’ve been split instead of overlapping.

The rest, while they were nice to have, weren’t the best arrangements they could’ve made. Overall, love the instrumentation, though – the guitars were biting (and I STILL don’t know what the gear setups were :/ ), the drums were hard (as opposed to the more classic sounding drums of the later albums), the organs were very Hammy (Uematsu is a musical mad scientist; maybe he titled “Dancing Mad” after himself?), and the synthesizers very synthy (the “Jump” sawtooth makes an updated appearance). It’s a shame there were some glaring absences, but fortunately some of them are answered in the later albums.

8/10

The track listing:

1. “Battle Scene” Final Fantasy I 4:19
2. “Clash on the Big Bridge” Final Fantasy V 4:16
3. “Force Your Way” Final Fantasy VIII 3:51
4. “Battle Scene II” Final Fantasy II 3:52
5. “The Decisive Battle” Final Fantasy VI 4:02
6. “Battle” Final Fantasy VI 3:21
7. “J-E-N-O-V-A” Final Fantasy VII 6:08
8. “Those Who Fight Further” Final Fantasy VII 4:25
9. “Dancing Mad” Final Fantasy VI 12:04
10. “Fight With Seymour” Final Fantasy X 5:05

Next up – The Skies Above…

Still haven’t beaten them, but I had Yiazmat down to ~4 million before it started killing me every other attack. I haven’t even tried Omega yet, but I will. Eventually.

Final Fantasy XII by the numbers…

• Audio: FX – 7/10, Music – 9/10
  The sound effects are what we’ve come to expect from Square-Enix and the Final Fantasy series – somehow fantastical and works with whatever it’s for, but it seems like they’ve been reusing certain sounds since VII (yes, even the PS2 FFs). The music has the best instrumentation of all the FFs I’ve ever played since FF8, and somehow even tops Kingdom Hearts II’s synthesizer programming; the strings sound like strings, the brasses like brasses (even the tuba, which is hard for me to find in a Square game), the harps don’t sound like synthetic pieces of crap (FF9, I’m looking at you), and GUITARS, oh the guitars…*mwah*
• Graphics: 8.5/10
  Best 3D graphics for a Final Fantasy so far. I have no doubt with the PS3′s power FFXIII will have XII’s cutscene graphics as its in-game resolution. To be fair, I’m also a fan of FFT’s style of pixel sprite art, so eh…
• Gameplay: 7/10
  The controls are pretty responsive, but sometimes even running seems slow paced. The new Gambit system seems like a tech demo for a logic system they probably want to put into another ARPG (or FFXIII), but I like not having to repeatedly press buttons to assign my charas commands. Level grinding is a cinch if you have the right equipment, gambits, and know where/when to do it; I left my PS2 on overnight so that I could level up while I slept. It took a few nights before everyone was maxed and it still doesn’t yet help against Yiazmat, but the rest of the game became pretty easy as well since I didn’t have to worry about experience.
• Story: 6.5/10
  The plot is relatively convoluted and hackneyed, but it IS a Final Fantasy. Neighboring nations are at war, political treachery is abound, and the ways of life for many people and professions are being threatened by the rise of this power-hungry pseudo-empire. Sounds a lot like Final Fantasy VI…
• Overall: 7.5/10
  Overall, it still amounts to an enjoyable Final Fantasy experience for me. It took a few games to get the taste of IX out of my mouth, but thanks to the 1-2-3 combo of FFX, X-2, and XII, I’ve been able to go back to enjoying the general FF experience – epic soundtracks, stunning visuals, and trendsetting gameplay that always somehow resets the standard for what an RPG should be.

Next up are the DS Final Fantasies – Revenant Wings, Tactics A2, and Ring of Fates. Now if only FFXIII were on the PS2…