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Old January 1, 2010, 08:00:51 PM
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Default In-game Pokémon soundtracks— discussion for theory geeks

Or "remixers", if you don't think of yourself as a geek.

I dunno if many other people here are in the habit of dissecting MIDI files of game soundtracks to learn what makes them tick, but if anyone is I thought there should be a place to share interesting traits of Poké-music we find.

The first thing is something everyone else probably knows about, but it surprised me because I didn't notice it until I replayed my old Red and Blue games in the spring of 2007:
Did you know that Viridian Forest and one of the "dungeon" themes— the one for Team Rocket's hideout and the Unknown Dungeon— have the same melody? I suppose it's harder to hear on Viridian Forest's end, and I certainly didn't hear it when I played it as a kid, because it's slightly later in the loop, and you can't walk around for more than a few seconds without encountering something, but it's right there, out in the open. I think it's because all the music in RBY was written by one person (Junichi Masuda) rather than a team, and he felt like he could recycle motives as long as they remained interesting.

The second of such connections between seemingly unrelated tracks is a LOT more subtle. Remember the Cinnabar Mansion theme? Let's take the melody from that (the images and midis titled "mansion1").

Now lets speed it up a bit, and write it with eighth notes rather than quarter notes ("mansion2"). Nothing too special here, it's just faster.

Let's speed it up again by using sixteenth notes and OH WAIT I THINK I'VE HEARD THAT SOMEWHERE ELSE. It's the Team Rocket hideout music again, or at least the accompaniment for it.

Thoughts? Other discoveries/insights?
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  #2  
Old January 1, 2010, 08:25:03 PM
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The bike music from Gold/Silver/Crystal is basically the same song as used for Goldenrod City.

Last edited by Yoshi648; January 1, 2010 at 08:25:42 PM.
  #3  
Old January 1, 2010, 09:43:45 PM
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Uh huh. Albeit, in different keys (town is in Db Major, whereas the bike is in G). It's a pretty obvious similarity, and the two are linked in that you get your bike in Goldenrod. I like the bits of chromaticism in the accompaniment for the bike version.
  #4  
Old January 2, 2010, 02:12:41 AM
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Not Pokémon, but I have to point it out. Super Mario World remixes the same song for all the main themes.
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Old January 2, 2010, 11:41:17 AM
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And the same thing happens in SSBB.

In Pokemon, a bunch of themes, mainly battle and rival themes, always have that 2 measures of 16th notes. I'm not exactly sure that they all have them, just a lot do.
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Old January 2, 2010, 07:32:03 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mariothecellist View Post
And the same thing happens in SSBB.

In Pokemon, a bunch of themes, mainly battle and rival themes, always have that 2 measures of 16th notes. I'm not exactly sure that they all have them, just a lot do.
It seems like that's true for every single wild Pokémon and trainer battle theme, and some of the rival, evil organization, and gym leader battles... if you're talking about that particular pattern of "three steps down one step up" notes descending down the chromatic scale. Most of the legendary battles (except for the FRLG default, for obvious reasons) all have something different. It seems like all of the themes, including the champion battle, from RBY have that, but the composers started adding in a little variety for the openings starting with GSC.
The themes that don't start with sixteenth notes at all would include the champion battles from Johto and Sinnoh, all of the legendary battles except for the Johto dogs (the Regis had eighth note triplets instead), and the Elite Four from Hoenn.

Personally, I like the opening to the Lugia battle the most... too bad the rest of it is totally different.
 
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