Today I was blessed with the opportunity of going to see FINAL FANTASY: A New World, which came to my college town. This was really exciting because as some of you may know, I'm a longtime fan of the Final Fantasy series and I've been in love with its music since the age of 7, probably. It meant a lot to me to see some of my favorite songs being played live by very talented musicians.

Really great music was performed all around and I'm very happy I could go! I do have some complaints, but they're pretty minor in the grand scheme of things. Arnie Roth, the conductor, shared a story that did upset me a little bit. He talked about Nobuo Uematsu wanting to arrange a string quartet to play a piece from Final Fantasy 8 (my personal favorite game in the series which I will defend to the death). This, of course, is Fragments of Memories, a theme that has always meant a lot to me because of its in-game associations...Nobuo Uematsu forgot the name of it, however, and it was very difficult to come up with the arrangement because they couldn't find the song in Square-Enix's catalog and had to arrange it by ear. I can't blame Uematsu because he composed thousands of pieces at the time, but it really irritated me that it wasn't in Square's catalog when it's such a special composition. Needless to say, I loved the arrangement a lot and was really happy they played it in the concert.

They also were selling soundtracks from the FF series, which made me run to an ATM and get cash...only to find out that despite the sign that said "FF4-FF11 SOUNDTRACKS", they were only selling FF5 and FF11. Ghostie said boo because he wanted FF8, but ended up buying the CD of the concert, which has some fantastic recordings but...all the FF8 songs (Force Your Way and Fragments of Memories) were branded as "From Final Fantasy VII". And it's not just typos on the back cover of the CD, the files themselves are incorrectly named and URGH FF8 BITTER RANT I'M DONE.

The concert itself was really nice. From the opening I knew I'd be in for a treat! Not perfect--the trumpet player flubbed some of his solos in the first half and the string quartet wasn't as strong as featured in the recordings, especially when it came to Fight with Seymour and lining everything up together with rhythmical precision. Of course, One Winged Angel was played towards the end. It was a little embarrassing because the conductor asked the audience to shout "SEPHIROTH" in the appropriate times...but other than these complaints, it was a very good time!

I thought it would be a good idea to kick off general discussion with something completely unrelated to Sound Horizon, sharing an experience I just had with all of you!

Overall the performances were pretty good! The string quartet they got for this particular concert from Detroit wasn't as good as, say, the string quartet they got for the big London premiere concert recording that was a year ago, but still very high professional quality. The acoustic guitar player pretty much stole my heart, as well as the amazing piano player they got from Cologne...ahhh, such great talent!

It was definitely worth it! I even overheard some people go just for the music who didn't have any knowledge whatsoever on Final Fantasy and they really enjoyed it, even though they didn't have some of those special connections only those who played the games would understand.

Ahh, I've always wanted to go to a video game orchestra performance - particularly one of Zelda or Final Fantasy theme. I'm always listening to music, and I have a lot of different symphonic arranges of my favorite themes. Playing Dissidia introduced me to a lot of really great FF themes, on top of FFX and X-2 being a big part of my childhood, so hearing that you got to go to a concert playing music from those games makes me extremely jealous. Damn ghost getting all the fun!

What are some of your favorite themes? My tastes are all over the place, but the ending song for FFIX and the Song of Sending/Song of Prayer/Hymn of Faith (so many names!) both hold a special place in my heart. The battle songs for FFI-III are also really good, and Gran Cross is also one sw33t jam.

Oh, you like Zelda music as well? Perhaps it will interest you that...in 2012 I went to a Zelda: Symphony of the Goddesses concert! It was the most incredible thing in my life and I cried, that was quite an experience...

If you get me started on Final Fantasy music I will find it hard to stop, oh my god...My favorite soundtracks are FFVI-FFIX, around the time I consider as Nobuo Uematsu's prime. Final Fantasy VIII just excites me so much with its soundtrack with some of the best battle themes (Man with the Machine Gun, The Extreme, Force Your Way, I could go on...) location themes (Balamb Garden, Fisherman's Horizon...I could go on...) and cutscene themes like Love Grows and Fragments of Memories...

Man, I'm just a huge fan!

Part of what I loved about Dissidia was that they revisited a bunch of those old themes and made them totally awesome! And I could fight people to them. The best part about Dissidia was that I could punch Sephiroth in the throat while Fragments of Memories played softly in the background. And gratuitous Kuja crotch. 11/10 best game.

I haven't played Dissidia 012 but I did play the first game. The strong part of that game was most definitely the music. Some of those remixes were just...incredible to listen to.

I do want Duodecim because it's been a while since I've played the first (lost my PSP to the depths of the abyss...), I want and need Laguna in my veins, and yeah I need those remixes.

Duodecim is REALLY GOOD I bought both of them because I am a Loser with a capital L and I played it so much that my thumbstick kind of stopped working but I picked it back up recently and am still trying to play, despite the fact that it is literally impossible to turn right.

012 also added a bunch of new ambient themes for the walkabout mode and its really great and all of them are really great and the game is Really Great.

The best parts of the Dissidia soundtrack, I feel, were the cool awesome arranges for the FFII themes. That game had some pretty music, yo. It also makes me kind of sad that they never arranged the Hymn of Faith because that would have been the perfect opportunity to bring back the best song in FFX (sorry Suteki Da Ne). But otherwise, it was perfect.

FFII does indeed have some incredible music. This very concert I was very impressed with the Rebel Army Theme, which always stood out to me. Really, all of them have such standout tracks and I'm glad that they were well represented for the most part.

I'm such a FF music Loser that I bought Theatrhythm, loved it, and then impulse bought Theatrhythm Curtain Call...I love it so much, it's my favorite music game. Especially that Curtain Call has some Bravely Default DLC tracks and is getting Xenogears stuff as well and has everything the first game had but much, much more...it's really, really fun!

I DONT HAVE A 3DS..... GREATEST TRAGEDY OF MY LIFE TBH.............. not only can i not play the new Pokemon games or animal crossing, or a bunch of other fun stuff i want, im also barred from the Bravely Default club, and I never got to play Theatrhythm. cry for me and my cursed life.