Half-Masked

Guess what this post contains? Here’s a hint: It rhymes with: “FPOILERS“.

Whoa. I didn’t know I could use smileys here. Kind of sad that I only figured this out now. <.<;

~~~

You know that sound that you hear whenever you turn on a car radio, no matter what station it’s on? That whiny, white, teenagery sound? Filled with clumsy, overly simplistic “they probably thought this was more clever than it actually is” guitar and drum compositions? The kind of manufactured crap that wouldn’t even qualify to be featured in Guitar Hero?

(I’m trying to come up with a specific example, but you all know what I’m talking about. I know that you know, because there are approximately 14 googol bands like that in North America alone. And chances are, at least 12 of them are in your own personal Top 10. You tools.)

Yeah, THAT’S the sound Square-Enix decided should accompany the big, final, apocalyptic battle against their allegory for Satan. That’s the last boss music in Dissidia: Final Fantasy, an upcoming PSP fighter game starring an all-star cast of Final Fantasy characters duking it out. Complete with lyrics about “pilgrims” and “marching bands“. Definitely appropriate mental imagery for sword-fighting a giant, 4-armed demon monster on his volcanic throne, determining the fate of an ethereal fantasy world. You tools.

“Surely this cave-troll is exaggerating”, you must be thinking. I don’t blame you. I know I have a tendency to display my opinions in a polar fashion(either something is awesome or it’s Crap Mountain, you could say). To get a good idea for just how bad it is, here is a video of “Chaos“(supposedly the most fearsome opponent in the game) getting his ass handed to him by a giggling, levitating midget with magic powers.

And all I could think was: “You know, the music was the most ridiculous part of that video”.

This looks like the right place for a Green Day song, AMIRITE

…Actually, you know what? I think I like the music. The actual composition and instruments, I mean. It’s the god-awful “losing contestant from American Idol” vocals that I object to. It’s just so out of place and inappropriate given the context, and the lyrics are idiotic horse shit. And that atrocious -noise- the person makes in lieu of singing smothers anything the music does right. It makes me remember Shamus Young’s thoughts on the “Achievement Unlocked!” messages in Xbox 360 games.

“It’s like hearing Bob Barker shouting: “A New Car!” during the shower scene in Psycho.”

You know it’s bad when one of the leading game developers starts taking cues from those horrible youtube AMV’s, with Evanescence songs played over mashed-up clips of Sonic X.

The same “band” responsible for that unpleasantness has a similar song in the OST, for the Goddess of light, goodness, fluffy kittens, etc. That one starts out with a female vocalist who, in a shocking turn of events, actually has some singing talent. She is drowned out of that song about a third of the way through, by the ever-present nasally emo anthem. Wouldn’t want people to enjoy what they’re hearing, I guess… Even though the game is filled with cool remixes of Final Fantasy music, which makes this final boss track stand out like a dried-up cat turd on a chocolate sundae.

I can understand if one song was done with female vocals and the other with a male singer. That makes sense in context and in theory, considering the characters these themes are written for and represent happen to be female and male respectively(”Cosmos” and “Chaos”). The female vocals would make sense for the peaceful woman character who is a force for good. But how exactly is James Blunt the appropriate choice for a hellish monster king devoted to endless destruction and warfare?

And did he really have to whore the attention for the “Good” God track too? Why did he have to ruin that? Whoever that lady was, she was doing a good enough job on her own. She didn’t need YOU there mucking it up, No-Talent Man. Having vocals in final boss music doesn’t always hurt(”One Winged Angel” ring a bell?). Having vocals provided by someone who fucking couldn’t sing his way out of a paper bag does.

I mean, we’re not expecting Terms of Endearment here. This is basically Fan-Service: The Video Game. There is a story in there, I’m told, but we’re paying to see big-name video game characters beat the crap out of each other in cool ways, with some hard-rocking music backing it up. This is not hard, Squenix. So when you set up an entire game to conclude with a hyperactive, kinetic fight against the very God of evil, random and meaningless violence, is it too much to ask that you get somebody other than Panic! At The Disco to provide the accompanying music?

Pictured: Someone who probably isn't fond of My Chemical Romance

END OF LINE

~A.H.

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 4th, 2009 at 5:19 pm and is filed under Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.