Sakuraba's PlayStation era compositions (Valkyrie Profile, Star Ocean 2, Tales of Destiny, etc.) had more energy than anything he really produces nowadays. He had more time between games to come up with fresher stuff, unlike the last decade or so where he's had to create soundtracks nearly nonstop. It's not his fault more than half his music sounds identical. The man needs a break.
Oh he needs a break for sure and he deserves it. That said, he's had some really good tracks in Zesty and Berseria compared to recent games and I personally like where he's going. Though in this particular case it was very much intentional he made the song more orchestral (similar thing happens to a bunch of Star Ocean 1 songs on the PSP remake). I suppose it has to do with how RPGs kinda changed from fun adventures to epic quests from mid 90s to mid 2000s. But that's just my guess lol
Oh I quite agree. The title screen music for Berseria is perfectly fitting, and the excellent final dungeon and extra dungeon tracks reminded me of his older works. I thought to myself, "He doesn't make tracks like this anymore." So it was good Berseria captured some of the feel of his PS1 stuff. As for how you interpreted the difference, that's a good way to look at it. When you think about it, RPGs have changed a lot in their atmosphere and structure since the jump to PS2 gaming back then.
![[ToD PSX] Rebel Against Destiny](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/SGQt_uij-LM/mqdefault.jpg)
![[ToD PSX] Rebel Against Destiny](/img/tr.png)
The PSX version always felt like it was just time to begin the final beatdown of that asshole.
Yeah, I was a big fan of the psx version of most of the themes in ToD and Tales of Eternia.
Sakuraba's PlayStation era compositions (Valkyrie Profile, Star Ocean 2, Tales of Destiny, etc.) had more energy than anything he really produces nowadays. He had more time between games to come up with fresher stuff, unlike the last decade or so where he's had to create soundtracks nearly nonstop. It's not his fault more than half his music sounds identical. The man needs a break.
Oh he needs a break for sure and he deserves it. That said, he's had some really good tracks in Zesty and Berseria compared to recent games and I personally like where he's going.
Though in this particular case it was very much intentional he made the song more orchestral (similar thing happens to a bunch of Star Ocean 1 songs on the PSP remake). I suppose it has to do with how RPGs kinda changed from fun adventures to epic quests from mid 90s to mid 2000s. But that's just my guess lol
Oh I quite agree. The title screen music for Berseria is perfectly fitting, and the excellent final dungeon and extra dungeon tracks reminded me of his older works. I thought to myself, "He doesn't make tracks like this anymore." So it was good Berseria captured some of the feel of his PS1 stuff. As for how you interpreted the difference, that's a good way to look at it. When you think about it, RPGs have changed a lot in their atmosphere and structure since the jump to PS2 gaming back then.
I like the PSX version way more, it felt more heroic, and I coulda sworn it had a longer loop, but I could be wrong.