
Reacting To Video Game Music! | Final Fantasy III – The Dark Crystals
Jesse’s Auditorium
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#FinalFantasy #FF3 #Reaction
18.01.2023
This series has always had great music but if you want some from the first one my personal favorites are Gulug/Gurug volcano and Matoya's cave both got reused later matoya's as the mushroomery in xiv and Gulug in IX. As mentioned the bigger issue for this format is that they are short looping tracks due to hardware limitations of the time.
If I'm correct, in those early Final Fantasy games Nobuo Uematsu played all songs.
The 14 renditions of 3's music – like pretty much all the remixes they've done – is god tier.I hope they get to doing XI's music at some point, since they left it out during Eureka for whatever reason. The remix of 4's boss battle theme nearly sent me out of my chair :OIt is my fervent hope that just once, we will get Soken, Uematsu and Mizuta together for a collab
We never got FF3 in it's original form over here in the States. The FF3 we got was actually FF5. We eventually got FF3 in the DS remake in the mid to late 2000s. It's a good game, and it improved a lot of things introduced in the first 2 games, but it didn't live up to what came after with 4, 6, and 7.
There's some really cool tracks that you can get along with the remastered versions of the older FF games (FF1-6), they're called time-lapse versions of the songs. Hearing the transition from the old pixel sound to the modern done version is so satisfying. Unfortunately they only did it on a few songs in each game. Would highly recommend listening to those if you get the chance.
Ah, I was wondering which track it is as FF14 has a fair share of FF3 themes remade but sometimes the glory of 8-bit is just amazing <3 I love this track a lot despite it being quite simple and short 🙁
My brain went to that game Paper Boy for some reason.
Dark, tense, and happy is spot on. It plays at the final leg of a long, brutal final dungeon crawl, and it gives you this sense of hope and anticipation for the final confrontation. They did some really nice remastered versions of this in the DS version of FF3 and the more recent pixel remaster.
1, 2, and 3 were on the NES, so you can expect similar chiptune style tones out of those.
4, 5, and 6 were on the SNES, so anything up to and including something like Dancing Mad is fair game.
Glad to see the seal cracking open on the old FF games. FF3 was actually from 1990, The title screen on that video is actually from FF6 – originally released as FF3 in the USA in 1994.
I think a lot of us would love to see you react to the older games. I know I definitely would, but the songs are so short (even some memorable ones are just 20 second loops), there's a tendency to recommend songs with more individual impact.
If you're up to it though, I'm pretty sure the FF1 ost is between 30min – 1 hour total depending on how often you loop the song. It'd be fun hearing you chart his career in reverse.
Yeah, FF has some PEAK music you've yet heard, I'm getting tired of you always getting FF XIV, I love XIV, but the other mainline series and Spinoff have bangers too. And seeing how XIV soundtrack is FULL of Remixes of the older songs? It speaks for itself.
Oh no, don't worry, you just haven't heard enough Nobuo Uematsu 8-bit. Nobody sounds like him.
FF3 is a terrible game, but also my first true RPG and one of my favorite experiences to head back to. And after conquering the Labyrinth and completing the Crystal Tower (skipping Eureka because dear god it sucks), I always felt like the World of Darkness is a victory lap of sorts. Most the enemies in it aside from the final boss who spams one attack, three if you’re on DS, and the boss literally right before, are quite easy compared to the Tower, but don’t let you relax. You’re in the final stretch of your journey, in the domain of a world-ending threat. And you hear this. A melancholy of despair and triumph. Of Darkness and Light. And while I think that the final boss track is amazing in 3’s DS remake (made by the same guys who made Bravely but well before Revo) is much better, this has a really nice charm as well
My second favorite FF alongside ff9 🧡🧡.
Actually I don't want to rate them. FF6 and FF9 have this "creator dedication and love " feeling to them
Edit : I thought he was reacting to FF6 actually…Seriously, some people should recommend a tlink with more consideration to reactors. They are the same whot recommend bad live versions (hello xenosaga 3 godsibb)
If you want THE BEST Dancing Mad cover I've ever heard (by light-years), check out "Final Fantasy VI – Dancing Mad (Symphonic Arrange)" by "상록수" here on Youtube. Seriously, it gives me chills every single time.
I'd love for a reaction to it, even if it's just the occasional comment, if you're going to watch it anyway.
Enjoy! 🙂
If you would like to hear a modern version of this, it's been redone in FFXIV for the Crystal Tower raids, and sounds great.
Surprised that this was requested before Eternal Wind, arguably a top 10 FF song
Pokemon ?
FF4 is the first game in the series to hit the SNES sound chip and also widely loved as one of the best FF soundtracks in the series. 6 to me has the best soundtrack though.
I'm amazed not many people are suggesting the older games. FF6, in particular (you already listened to Dancing Mad) has a ridiculously large score, and a lot of fans consider it Uematsu's magnum opus. The pixel remaster versions of 1-6 are absolutely amazing, with fully remastered music, and they went overboard on FF6's score.
I'd suggest the Final Fantasy 30th Anniversary Celebration Battle Medley. It contains the main battle themes from games 1-15 in an orchestrated form. It's quite lovely.
This song, like many Final Fantasy songs… lol… made its way into FFXIV in the form of a song called "Blind to the Darkness" AKA: The World of Darkness theme. So if you'd like to hear a modern take on this song, I'd recommend this version! It might be worth it to check for newer versions of these old chiptune songs, in case you'd rather do a reaction to something that isn't chiptunes (Not that the original chiptunes aren't awesome! They're incredible for their time and the available technology used to write them! But sometimes it's really nice to hear a really good remixed version to really bring it to life.)
As much as people like to hate on the FF Pixel Remasters, they have some fantastic updated music in them. Unfortunately the songs from them can be very hard to find if you don't own the games to use the Sound Test mode.
there's an awesome arrangement of this in FF14 in the crystal tower raid
Part of why earlier games aren’t recommended is that they weren’t localized to the US till years later and so many of us didn’t get to play them or grow up with them. Ff 2, 3, and 5 weren’t localized till the playstation 1 era, though there was a finished English translation of ff2 that was never released. 2 was released as part of and ff1 and 2 remake (with remade music) and ff5 came out with a remaster of ff4, and 6 had a stand alone remaster. The SNES games were more faithful to the originals. Even more so than the US SNES releases. Ff3 we didn’t get till the Nintendo DS with. 3D remake. My sister had all the FF OSTs so I heard all the music before I played many of the games. But that is why you don’t see as many recommendations. Though you can enjoy the. With the HD pixels remasters now close to their full original style.
Also, there is a Version of this in FFXIV for the World of Darkness raid. It’s an interpretation of the last 3 ff3 dungeons in 14 with a story inspired by 3.
Also, I saw a video the other day about how pokemon music was composed and it talks about how arpeggiation made it possible to make complex music on the limited chip tune channels as the Gameboy had only 4 channels.
Good news everyone! you can hear the full orchestration in FF14
Hearing this I realized I'd never heard this original version. The original Final Fantasy III was never officially released in the west. There was a DS remake that eventually ended up on mobile and PC and that's what I know. FFIII was only released in its more original form in the last couple years with the pixel remasters Square did. So, this was neat to hear! Though as at least one commenter has said I'm also surprised to see this before Eternal Wind.
It was neat to see you hear something older. Plenty of us got to grow up with it and see the gradual change, so getting the different trajectory that you're getting was fun to see.
Hopefully some more older FF music will come along too especially the SNES era ones, 4-6.
Funny how I didn't get to finish III so I hear this and go "Oh, I know this from XIV quite well huh"
I hear the modernized song almost daily in ff14, had no idea this was the origin hahaha love it.
my favorite part is recognizing I've been hearing its FF14 counterpart for years
Blind to the Dark, from World of Darkness
Bro I looked through your Nier Replicant Reactions and I didn't see a single reaction on Ashes of Dreams, the best Nier replicant song, man you gotta drop what your doing and lookup the video " Nier Replicant – Ashes for Dreams ( tradução) " That's the best version of Ashes of Dreams.
Of the 2d games 5 and 6 have the best soundtrack…4 is good too…1 has some iconic songs but there weren't much of a variety of tracks maybe 5 or 6 the whole game
Should have paired this with the FF14 version that plays during the World Of Darkness Alliance Raid.
Well, i think you can give those FF a go. From 1 to 5. You should find great gems !!!
"Blind to the darkness" ffxiv. Remake of this song.
Anyone else get world of darkness vibes from ff14.
Final Fantasy 3 did get remade for the DS, that version has a more direct update on this song
There are some older ones that still manage to scream Uematsu, especially in FF4. But yeah, it's definitely more limited
The Gameboy was basically a portable (originally black and white) NES in terms of hardware, so the composition techniques available would have been similar between Pokemon and FFIII.
As has been pointed out elsewhere, this was 1990 while Pokemon was 1996 for the original release date, I believe 1998 for the US (1999 for Europe) – Pokemon GS, same sound chip as the original pokemon releases – was 1999 for it's original release date, and I believe 2000 and 2001 for US/Europe respectively for just how before Pokemon this would be.
It's nice to hear one from FF3, I was concerned at first that it was the wrong FF3 seeing that title screen lol. FF3 has a really nice soundtrack; a big fan favourite on the soundtrack and one that Square themselves have reused multiple times is Eternal Wind, the world map theme. One of Uematsu's very best melodies in my opinion.
Interesting notes about FF3 and composing on the NES: Uematsu actually said that if hardware hadn't improved beyond this level, he probably would have stopped composing for video games. Fortunately, the SNES was a pretty significant upgrade in sound capabilities, so he was able to do a lot more and create what he envisioned more accurately.
I don't feel that Uematsu's style is drastically different over the course of the FF series; certainly, he gets creative and brings out the prog rock occasionally in FFVII upwards, but in general I feel the way he creates melodies and structures his songs is quite consistent.
I just thought of an example actually: I feel that from FFVII, You Can Hear the Cry of the Planet is comparable to The Dark Crystals here; perhaps not on as grand a scale, but the foreboding sound of the lead-in that goes into a more hopeful sounding part is a bit similar. The lead-in is even about the same length (I just listened to these side by side lol), it's just that FFVII has an entire additional section after that before the more uplifting part.
React to FFXIV version of this track. Also, FFIII version of Crystal Tower theme and then the FFXIV version to compare it. FFXIV has beautiful renditions of both tracks.
Was the original uploaded by SilvaGunner? Fucking memes man.
Actually Jesse, I think most people do not have any nostalgia towards the song. FFIII never came out in the west originally. I think the first version of III was the not-so-good DS Remaster. The history of FFI-VI in the west is a bit confusing. So confusing, that even the video has the wrong game on the screen.
FFI released in the west as FFI. FFII and FFIII never came out here, so FFIV became FFII in the west. Then we skipped FFV and FFVI became FFIII. The title screen in the video is from that FFVI version (hence 1994). With the release of FFVII, we just went with the official titles again and skipped FFIV-VI. Today we know which game truly is FFI-VI of course, but back then it was kinda complicated hahah.
I'd argue that more people know this song from FFXIV and feel no nostalgia towards the original actually
Jessi needs to play FFXIV (at least the free trial) just for the musical tour. An arrangement of this track is quite early in the game, and he would arguably get more out of ARR right out of the gate than most would, discovering new music through early dungeons, new areas, and cutscenes. I would also love to see him actually discover how it feels to listen to XIV tracks in the context of gameplay
(I know this is unlikely to happen, this isn't a request, I just think that Jessi might enjoy playing the game casually solo or with his community without touching the broader MMO stuff)
im so surprised they didn't ask for cloud of darkness. btw, ff3 was great. I played all the games in order and while 3 isn't close to being as good as later entries, the introduction of the job system is probably my favourite aspect of final fantasy, ngl.
Man, to hear that earlier FFs aren't that popular in requests is a shame. I hope someone has suggested The Decisive Battle from 5.
Shame this song has been ruined for me in FFXIV. It plays in one of the most boring raids in the whole game.
Early FF has a lot of good music. I think one of the strengths that old 8 bit music had, was they often have really strong melodies. The limits of the hardware allowed only a few tones and various restrictions usually meant tracks had to be very short. It's a wonder that so much good music came out of these restrictions.
Something really nice about FF3, compared to 1&2, and even later entries, is each town and many of the dungeons, have unique pieces of music. That was also the first game where Uematsu was given free reign over the soundtrack.
There are a lot of other great tracks in FF3 and the whole OST has been redone twice for remakes, with some select tracks being redone for other reasons.
You should listen to the pixel remaster version to this track as well.
Since the NES/Famicom Final Fantasy's been opened up… Although it only plays during a small section of the game, I think 3 has one of the best world map themes in Boundless Ocean. No need to review or react to it, just look it up and listen to either the original NES or DS version.
mm, the REAL ff3!
I think pretty much all Final Fantasy music is worth a listen to, but some of the earlier games are rough to get into unless you got into them early on, so you might not hear as much of the soundtrack… Although I think all of them have had remasters/remakes, some of those being their first western release, sometimes making them easier… Either way, Final Fantasy 6 forward are probably the best in terms of overall soundtracks, even if there are still great tracks before that… Naturally, the later the game, the better sound quality, which also helped later titles pick up more fans earlier… Some people might hear orchestral versions later or something, but by that time the others have a head start…
But yeah, there are at least two more versions of this from the remake and remaster, then there seems to be an FF14 version too (because of course there is lol)… I'm not sure if it is featured in any of the orchestral albums or whatever… It might be.