MIDI Week Singles "The Ramshackle Village" - Shining Force III (SAT)

 

"The Ramshackle Village" from Shining Force III on the Sega Saturn (1997-1998)
Composer: Motoi Sakuraba
Album: Shining Force III Original Soundtrack*
Label: FUTURELAND
Publisher: SEGA
Developer: Camelot Software Planning

I knew literally nothing about Shining Force III before listening to the soundtrack.  By the name and the box art, I was expecting a top-down bullet hell shooter akin to Gradius or Commando backed by a high-energy mix.  What I got instead was a tactics JRPG with a great fantasy-themed soundtrack.  By the time "Ramshackle Village" came up in the soundtrack, I was already invested in the themes and eager to find out what more.  "Ramshackle Village" feels like a very emotional piece, like the village was once a thriving place but is now nearly in ruins, that there are only a few people left who reminiscence on the past of what their lives once were.  Or at least that is what the first 25 seconds sound like to me, but then from that point through the rest of the song sound like music played in an idyllically secluded village.  I am confused and intrigued by the history of this village just from the music alone, which is pretty impressive in the span of 60 seconds.  Which I like to think is rather impressive.

~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian

Hang Onto Your Hopes My Friend

*P.S.  I wanted to footnote the album, because while there is an official album for the game, it appears that it is only a select number of songs and not the entire soundtrack.  This could be because that only Scenario 1 was released outside of Japan while Scenario 2 and 3 were just released in Japan, but that is speculation on my part.