 | Album Title: Wizardry Gaiden -Prisoners of the Battles & Five Ordeals- Audio Collections |
| Record Label: Five Records | |
| Catalog No.: FPBD-0005 | |
| Release Date: April 24, 2007 | |
| Purchase: Buy Used Copy |
Overview
The Wizardry series is, without doubt, a massive franchise, with eight main games and endless spin-offs from various game studios. I have only played the eighth installment, which is a better-than-decent western RPG with good graphics, music, and a plot combining spaceships with cold arms and magic. From today’s point of view, Wizardry 8 marked the end of the series. Although the brand is still being used by other game studios, the games they produced seem to be mostly inferior compared to the main games.
The two gaiden games whose music featured in this CD are no exception. I’ve briefly played both games and they are horrifyingly primitive. They play just like old-school RPGs of the ’80s without flashy graphics like those in Etrian Odyssey. To be honest, I can come up with no reason why anybody would release games like this to torture players and gamemakers. Thus, the background music became the sole strength of these games.
The first 20 themes are from Prisoners of the Battles, and the last five are from Five Ordeals. The former pieces are orchestral, distinct from the latter which are mostly rock and jazz/fusion pieces. Unfortunately, all of these themes lack decent names with character; names like “Town” or “Shop” cannot conceal that they are better than decent. This album is the product of multiple composers, so I am going to analyse it according to different composers. Now let us start with Masaharu Iwata.
Masaharu Iwata’s Contributions
Iwata wrote ten pieces on this album, the most of the four composers. They almost all exhibit styles similar to Iwata’s past works, so do not expect any new ground in this album.
One aspect Iwata specializes in is the majestic quality of music. The main theme “Prisoners of the Battles” is a fine example of this. It features epic and not-so-lyrical themes with a rigid structure that reminds me of classical music. “Fortress” utilizes a harpsichord, a favorite of Iwata’s when expressing majesty. The masculinity is quite evident here, yet its sound seems to lack substance, and the short length prevents better development.
Iwata is also famous for his representation of the dark side. “The Pervert” in Final Fantasy Tactics showcased that perfectly. Yet in this game, Iwata’s darker contributions lack variety. When Iwata uses eerie passages, they occur without contrast. As a result, the music becomes monotonous and boring. Labyrinth 1 and 2 follow this method of writing dark music, so the result is exactly what I expected. Between them, “Labyrinth 2” is slightly better. It seems Iwata relied on this approach, abandoning melody and using odd percussion and tremolo strings to create tension. This approach is effective, yet the end product is not satisfying for most listeners. “Battle 2” is quite similar to Iwata’s battle themes in Tactics and Stella Deus. “Annilation” has a good opening, but soon becomes tedious.
The real highlight of Iwata’s music is his more soothing pieces. The opening “Inn” seems like yet another warm “potion” track, but it has its moments, such as a whimsical passage appearing in the middle of all this warmth. “Shop” also looks like a standard Iwata shop piece, but it soon transforms into a brilliantly composed mazurka-like folk dance. In summary, Iwata’s contributions are not bad, but aside from one or two pieces, they are average at most.
Mitsuhiro Kaneda’s Contributions
Kaneda’s name is relatively unknown compared to the first three members (Sakimoto, Iwata, Namiki) of Basiscape, and he has much less project experience than those big names. However, to many people’s surprise, his pieces in the recent Basiscape collaboration projects such as Odin Sphere and Grim Grimoire are the best among all collaborators. In my opinion, he has the potential to become the next Sakimoto if given the opportunity.
Kaneda has written nine pieces on this album. “Bar” and “Temple” showcase individual instruments very well, showing Kaneda’s good understanding of instrument usage. The first piece that reeks of Kaneda-ism is “Museum”, which has good development, a playful melody, and, most importantly, brilliant orchestrations. The technique reminds me of Sakimoto, but Kaneda uses much lighter instrumentation—pizzicato strings and woodwinds—creating something both playful and steeped in history. “Chest from After the Battle” is in the same realm, but it also has some suspense in the music.
The rest of the Kaneda pieces are mostly dark-oriented. However, Kaneda’s darkness differs from Iwata’s; he never favors monotonous, grayish darkness. They are dark and colorful at the same time. “Labyrinth 3” is a fine example of this, with the brilliant use of sax, ethnic percussion, and harmony. This is also my favorite piece on the whole album. The two battle pieces (1 and 3) not only have great power, but also show meticulous design, such as the ferocious cello passage in the latter part of “Battle 1”. All in all, Kaneda did a better job overall than Iwata, thanks to colorful orchestrations and better development.
Hitoshi Sakimoto’s Contributions
Sakimoto has only two pieces on this album. The first piece, “Ending”, aside from the majestic reiteration of the main theme in the opening, is just a standard—if slightly boring—Sakimoto string piece. The strings wander without direction. The other piece, “Town”, is far more interesting, though.
It shows a strong Jazz/Fusion influence. The bass melody sounds very improvised, and the accompaniment of odd percussion and ambient sound effects makes the song stand out from the composer’s usual style, although Sakimoto’s trademark harmony is still evident here.
Although Sakimoto showed his diversity in games like Gradius V and Breath of Fire V, I had been worried that he was being typecast as a strict orchestral composer after Final Fantasy XII. Now it seems my worries were unnecessary. Given an appropriate project, his ability to diversify will still be shown.
Kenichi Koyano’s Contributions
Koyano is the only non-Basiscape composer who worked on this album. I am not familiar with Koyano’s music at all, but judging from the four pieces he composed for this album, he’s at least a decent composer. Although these four pieces are rock songs, a genre I don’t usually enjoy, they are delicate melodically and harmonically, especially the two battle songs, which make me very excited. Also, the arrangement of Iwata’s main theme is quite good.
Another point of note is that these four pieces are not played by live instruments, aside from the electric guitar, and were mixed at Sakimoto’s studios. What great technology they have (laugh).
Summary
A musical friend of mine once told me that Basiscape composers are distinctive: although they all wear the mask of orchestral music, the meat behind the mask is totally different. What this CD has shown us is mainly the distinctive styles from two Basiscape composers, Masaharu Iwata and Mitsuhiro Kaneda, as well as a small window of stylistic change from Hitoshi Sakimoto. Although the game featuring this music is extremely low-budget, the music itself is of high production value, which makes me very satisfied.
Basiscape had a great (and busy) year in 2007 with over ten projects, and judging from the two collaboration projects already released (Odin Sphere, Grim Grimoire), they are still doing a great job. Let us hope they continue to make fantastic music in the upcoming Deltora Quest: The Seven Jewels, Opoona, Final Fantasy Tactics A2, and Archaic Sealed Heat.
