First we got complete (or atleast 95% complete, can't remember if the album is missing some songs) soundtrack for the first Wild Arms, and now were getting piano arrange (23rd of August)and rock arrange (04th of October) albums.

Can't wait to see the tracklist for the rock arrange album, and can't wait to listen those too. But now they only neet to release complete WA 2 soundtrack.

Updated tracklist for the rock album on GMR.

I just did something in my pants that I know I wasn't supposed to.

Just looking at the tracklist for the rock arrange is making me second guess myself for thinking I shouldn't have. There isn't one track up there I'm not dying to see what becomes of it. I wonder who the arranger ends up being...

Come on, October!

The piano arrange...Hopefully, it's more "Arc the Lad"-ish or even FFX PC-ish and not "Hamaguchi-Final Fantasy"-ish. "To the End of the Wilderness" should be good on piano at least. I'll probably end up ordering this just to help bridge the gap until the rock arrange.

Lest not forget...Wild Arms Vth Vanguard's OST may see a release before the end of the year is up as well.

I'm off to the washing machine now...

Razakin: We may get even better than WA2 Complete/Looped OST...There are pretty strong rumors of a total WA2 remake announced soon. Given the way that poor game has aged (graphically at least...puzzles are still good and the characters are stock, but well-played...It's still hanging in there in my top ten RPG list), it needs it.

I'm surprised no one has gone ahead and made a looped WA2 OST, considering how well-known it is that the publishers botched the release by cramming as much as they could on two discs.

Great news, although one can't have too high hopes. After all, there really hasn't been great (official) rock arrangements for a long time, and VGM piano albums have almost always turned out to be rather dull and simple (aside from some Hamauzu's stuff, for example). Still, I'm definitely waiting for those two.

Oh yeah, totally forgotted about Vth Vanguard, let's hope that Naruke will not get sick again. Althought, the guys in WA 4 did pretty good job, so it wouldn't be end of the wilde..world if they would be composing few tracks again.

Hopefully they'll remake it, didn't the producer of the games say that he want's to make WA 2 remake after Vth game?

Well, atleast we do have psf-rip, which is going to my winamp right now, haven't listened WA 2 for ages.

Still, what's next for Wild Arms, Symphonic Arrange? Or a new vocal arrange. But anyways, more WA the better.

Well, we did have Atelier Iris: Eternal Mana arranged...But most of the tracks from that album were rock-ish to begin with, so it was a pretty natural adaptation. The WA one...The track selection is delightfully weird, so anything can happen (Toka and Ge...YES!, will the vocal tracks be arranged vocally?)

Things could change...WA arranged, Atelier Iris 2 Arranged, more Black Mages. And I have my fingers crossed and tied for Valkyrie Profile Silmeria and Legend of Heroes VI SC's arranged material. Could be a good year for rock arranges.

I look forward to bumping this thread two and a half months (or about 75 days...whichever comes first) from now with impressions...

Edit: I'm almost thinking...Rock and piano are Mintjam's specialties. And they've been awful quiet lately. Just venturing a random guess there...

But damn...I can picture them rocking out an arrangement of "This Is Where the Spirit Becomes Certain" already.

SPeaking of Wild Arms Complete tracks (surprised it was barely mentioned here before), did anyone else notice something of a sound quality drop? Or was I just imagining it?

-Joshua

A rock arrangement of "Battle vs Lord Blazer"?  Oh heck yes, this is mine. 

By the same token, I'm also looking forward to the piano version of "You'll Never Be Alone."  Gosh, do I love the theme so.

Wasn't Wild Arms Twilight Venom an anime?

I hope this one doesn't suck as bad as the recent piano collections that have come out.  Mother was awful and Kenji Ito's piano album is pretty awful as well.  Break the trend please!

~jb

Yup, soundtrack is composed by Kow Otani.

I have the feeling that this piano album won't suck at all, considering that it's Wild Arms tunes and not Midipianoish or boring unoriginal tunes.

Agreed. There's nothing I like less than a piano arrangement that ignores what the piano can do (like most of the FF Piano Collections). Unfortunately, considering the quality of most piano arrangement CDs, I don't have much hope for this one.

The rock disc holds no interest for me but then again, I don't like rock.

We need another piano album as good as SaGa Frontier PP, but sadly I am not getting my hopes up.

The original OST had a tweaked instrument set compared to the original game, which sometimes made songs sound a little nicer (or a little worse) than the original music. I'm pretty sure the Complete Tracks are "what you would hear from the PSX".

A rock version of Toka & Ge? Hell yes! If I can't have a rock arrange of Pheonix Wright's Steel Samurai theme, this is the next best thing.

WA2 really should've stopped at the end of Disk 1. I know it was a cliffhanger ending, but Disk 2 was completely awful. Tweak the story and end it with Odessa.

WA2 shouldn't have been made, period. I don't think that story ever become coherent, no matter what disc was being played. The game can also claim one of the worst translations of the PSX era. That's posterity for you.

What in the world? Ryo Yonemitsu is doing the arrangements for the rock album? I MUST get this.

I thought that might be some sort of joke at first, but I know PV doesn't mess around on GMR like that.

Be interesting to see how his style has changed over the last 12 years (or even to see how much it HASN'T changed, since it was fine to begin with back in 1987). He did his last serious game arrange back in 1994, which was Ys IV Perfect Collection Vol. 3. Guess he must have realized he still had fanboys all these years later. I'd love to find out the backstory about this.

I think I'll be able to die happy about an hour after I listen to this for the first time...Now I know this is going to turn out well. Never thought I'd see Yonemitsu and Naruke happily married in the same gaming franchise. Only thing better than a rock arrange of Toka and Ge is a Yonemitsu rock arrange of Toka and Ge.

Maybe after this, Falcom can get him in for those Legend of Xanadu Perfect Collections which are long overdue...

Oh, this is going to be fun.

What next, Hamauzu arranging the piano album?

But still, Yonemitsu was a big suprise, now I really can't wait for the rock arrange to arrive at my home. Still so many days left.

Well he did do the "Sailing to the World" piano arrange (meaning he isn't bound to Square and can take on other projects) and FFXIII IS a long way off...

Honestly wouldn't surprise me. Hamauzu doing WA Piano makes perfectly logical sense, compared to Yonemitsu coming back to arrange game music.

Wow, Yonemitsu's coming back; now there's really something to wait for. Good old honest synth rock would be right about perfect.

I can't help but be suspicious of this news.  It seems far too good to be true - Yonemitsu coming back totally out of the blue after 12 years of doing no gaming stuff?  I did some searching in Japanese for the CD and none of the sites with information about it say anything about him.  Can anyone find a confirmation anywhere?

Then again, try searching for any new CD that PV adds to GMR (or info regardless).

Btw, it appears Yonemitsu's last game music work wasn't Ys IV, but arrangements on Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side in 2002. Since then, he has been working with fairly popular pop groups and artists.

Yeah, we found out he was working on vocal tracks for the Tokimeki Memorial series before (both for 1 and 2...didn't know about Girl's Side), but was he really arranging? I just had him credited for "all instruments" in the liners...Not clear what that was.

In any case...This would definitely be his first MAJOR game work in 12 years.

Although...I'm starting to wonder what would happen if someone pranked this in Japanese (which would trickle down and confuse us English speakers as a result). It does seem a little too sweet to be true.

We'll have to wait until the album comes out to see if it is Ryo's handiwork.

Yasuo Sako from the Chocobo no Fushigina Dungeon - Coi Vanni Gialli fame is arranging the Piano Collections. He is also joined by Haruki Mino (performer for the album) who has arranged and performed in the Falcom album 'Lilia ~ From Ys ~ Kotono Mitsuishi & Haruki Mino Quartet'. Enjoy.

haha. Well, it's almost Hamauzu
Haven't heard nothing from Haruki Mino, but that will be fixed fast. Thanks for the info Harry.

Also, it seems like the tracklist has been re-arranged following the announcement. I have re-ordered the tracklist on GMR.

The cover art for the piano arrange CD is up at http://www.wild-arms.net/cd.html

This site should be a good place to watch for confirmation on Yonemitsu doing the rock arrangements, although I do consider PV to be a reliable source.

"The 1st feature piano arrangement album the lock type sound which becomes the exact opposite, battle tune & subject song of popularity boldly arrangement! Extremely hot music is anticipated, the WA fan necessary it is the album of listening."

There's the babelfished blurb for Rocking Heart...If that doesn't get people excited, I don't know what will. Yonemitsu or no...I'm ready!

Given the cover of the piano album (which are the four main heroines from the four games...aw, no Kanon though), I'd expect to see the male members make up most of the cover of Rocking Heart. Probably Rudy, Ashley, Jude and one of the male WA3 members (since Virginia was the main character in that one).

Good thing, since I always liked the character designs of WA (especially in contrast to the usually barren landscapes)

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Most of his Tokimeki stuff threw me completely off...Everytime I came across one that sounded like him (notably "God of Courage" and "Motto Motto Tokimeki 99"), I was shocked to see it wasn't him. Most of his tracks were indeed of the more mellow electronic variety.

Still love "Double Bubble" though (from TM1 Vocal Collection 6)

What specifically has he been into? I might need to look into it.

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The rock arrange album cover looks like all the lead characters are about to go into battle with the guitars.  Rudy looks lke he is going to bash someone with it. heh

I guess we will find out in October if Ryo is credit on the album.