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This Week in Games: The Sonic Adventure Music Experience at MAGFest




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belvadeer





PostPosted: Thu Jan 11, 2018 11:42 am Reply with quote
MAGfest 2018: Much like Mega Man's music, Sonic's music is just plain great to hear. Fans can harp on all they want about gameplay quality, but music is always a main draw to game soundtracks. Nice to see the Sonic Adventure love is still out there.

Quote:
Seriously, no Sonic Adventure 1 Death Egg music? That guitar bit was practically made to be done live.


Well the song is practically perfect for this little constantly quoted video:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KCc7ylTgiwk
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Hoppy800



Joined: 09 Aug 2013
Posts: 3331
PostPosted: Thu Jan 11, 2018 11:43 am Reply with quote
99% of Sonic games have good music even when the rest of the game is trash (Sonic 06, Shadow the Hedgehog, Sonic Boom, Sonic Lost World), even cancelled titles ended up having good music. I believe only 1 Sonic game has bad music which is Sonic Eraser.

Also Border Break got a port for the PS4 albeit with loot boxes which are bound to be illegal or restricted soon in most places as they are gambling. The game would've been near perfect if it wasn't for those loot boxes.
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GriffithDidNothingWrong



Joined: 02 Dec 2017
Posts: 16
PostPosted: Thu Jan 11, 2018 12:32 pm Reply with quote
"Live and Learn" by Crush 40 is one of my favorite songs, so nostalgic, brings me right back to the days on Gamecube
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belvadeer





PostPosted: Thu Jan 11, 2018 2:18 pm Reply with quote
Hoppy800 wrote:
even cancelled titles ended up having good music.


Very true, Hoppy. A solid example is Sonic X-treme's Space Queens. With or without context of the level it was originally intended for, it's great to listen to on repeat. It certainly sounds like an amazing journey.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DPYPmXETH00
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BadNewsBlues



Joined: 21 Sep 2014
Posts: 6363
PostPosted: Thu Jan 11, 2018 8:16 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
(Of course, it helps that everyone agrees that Sonic music is awesome regardless of how the games play.)


No they don't to wit Sonic Unleashed (underrated game btw).

"Why do they have two different versions of almost every song"

"Slow paced music doesn't work for Sonic games (Sonic 1, Sonic CD, and 3D's soundtracks be damned)".

Hoppy800 wrote:
99% of Sonic games have good music even when the rest of the game is trash (Sonic 06, Shadow the Hedgehog, Sonic Boom, Sonic Lost World), even cancelled titles ended up having good music. I believe only 1 Sonic game has bad music which is Sonic Eraser.


Fans weren't too kind towards Dark Brotherhood's soundtrack especially the pseudo remixes.
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leafy sea dragon



Joined: 27 Oct 2009
Posts: 7163
Location: Another Kingdom
PostPosted: Thu Jan 11, 2018 11:04 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
Seriously, no Sonic Adventure 1 Death Egg music? That guitar bit was practically made to be done live.


There was no Death Egg in Sonic Adventure (either of them). Perhaps you mean the Sky Deck, Egg Carrier, or Final Egg?

I know this is stuff only a Sonic fan would really know, but all of the songs in the two Sonic Adventure games have titles. According to the official soundtracks, they are as such:

Sonic Adventure
Emerald Coast - "Azure Blue World" (first half) and "Windy & Ripply" (second half)
Speed Highway - "Run Through the Speed Highway" (first part), "Going Down" (running down the building), and "At Dawn" (ground-level area)
Egg Carrier - "A Song that Keeps Us on the Move"
Sky Deck - "Sky Deck a Go Go" (first half) and "General Offensive" (second half)
Final Egg - "Mechanical Resonance" (first half) and "Crank the Heat Up!!" (second half)

Sonic Adventure 2
City Escape - "Escape from the City" (most of the stage) and "The Mad Convoy Race" (when the truck chases Sonic)
Prison Lane - "This Way Out"
Mission Street - "Rumbling HWY"
Green Forest - "Won't Stop, Just Go!"

belvadeer wrote:
MAGfest 2018: Much like Mega Man's music, Sonic's music is just plain great to hear. Fans can harp on all they want about gameplay quality, but music is always a main draw to game soundtracks. Nice to see the Sonic Adventure love is still out there.


Yep, Sonic gameplay has had its ups and downs, but the quality of its music is the most consistently good thing about the Sonic franchise, even if there were some duds (which I'll explain below).

Hoppy800 wrote:
99% of Sonic games have good music even when the rest of the game is trash (Sonic 06, Shadow the Hedgehog, Sonic Boom, Sonic Lost World), even cancelled titles ended up having good music. I believe only 1 Sonic game has bad music which is Sonic Eraser.


Sonic Chronicles had incredibly simplistic music remixed from previous Sonic games that sound like placeholders to be filled in with more complete-sounding music later. That was definitely a Sonic soundtrack to be skipped. I also didn't really like either of the soundtracks for Sonic 4. The 16-bit chiptunes clashed with the look of the game, and as great as Jun Senoue is as both a composer and a guitarist, he really dropped the ball with this one (which puzzles me as he composed the soundtrack for the 16-bit version of Sonic 3-D Blast which was very nice, showing he CAN work with the Genesis/Mega Drive MIDI set).

Though they aren't BAD, per se, the songs in Sonic Rivals and Sonic Rivals 2 sound very similar to each other, and as a result, they can feel repetitive and tiresome after hearing them for too long. The exceptions are the Neon Palace Zone themes and Blue Coast Act 1 (which Jun Senoue composed instead of Chris Rezanson for the rest of those games' music). Sonic Forces has some standout tracks (I really like "Nowhere to Hide," and I enjoyed the remixed tracks in the game, particular the ones for the US version of Stardust Speedway's Bad Future and for "Rhythm & Balance," the White Jungle theme from Sonic Adventure 2), but otherwise is unusually bland for the franchise, which is worrisome as Tomoya Ohtani can do much better than that and has made larger, better soundtracks in less time (like the entirety of Rhythm Thief & the Emperor's Treasure). I can only hope Ohtani returns to form with whatever he makes music for next.

While I'd consider it a good soundtrack overall, I personally feel Richard Jacques could have changed the themes more when he remixed music for Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed. Most of the soundtrack was taking the original song, then adding additional percussion to it (and sometimes more of other instruments) and a different song from said game while adjusting its tempo to match. There wasn't really much he could do for "Samba Studios" or "Burning Depths" as he had to work with vocals, but I felt there was a lot of unrealized potential in stuff like "Temple Trouble" or "Graffiti City." Jacques heavily remixed "You Can Do Anything" (AKA "Toot Toot Sonic Warrior") and "Super Sonic Racing" for the Ocean View racetrack, so I don't know why he didn't do the same for the rest of the game.
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TheAnimeRevolutionizer



Joined: 03 Nov 2017
Posts: 329
PostPosted: Fri Jan 12, 2018 3:18 am Reply with quote
I can only hope for Hideki Naganuma next time! Sonic Rush and Jet Set Radio forever!!
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Cetais



Joined: 02 Feb 2012
Posts: 507
PostPosted: Fri Jan 12, 2018 1:27 pm Reply with quote
I wonder how you feel, publishing this right before the sudden Nintendo Direct.
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leafy sea dragon



Joined: 27 Oct 2009
Posts: 7163
Location: Another Kingdom
PostPosted: Fri Jan 12, 2018 10:48 pm Reply with quote
TheAnimeRevolutionizer wrote:
I can only hope for Hideki Naganuma next time! Sonic Rush and Jet Set Radio forever!!


Oh, I would LOVE Hideki Naganuma, but I don't see his music really working as live entertainment.
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