Deception IV: Blood Ties (PS3/Vita, 2014)

Game info: Wikipedia
Listening: compilation soundtrack (disc 1, incomplete), expansion soundtrack (almost all omitted music from the first album, tracks 11~37), extracted audio

Credits

BGM: Takashi Yoshida, Ayako Toyoda, Yuki Matsumura
Theme song: YOW-ROW

Info

Here’s the fifth entry in Tecmo’s series of dungeon management(?) games where a bunch of invaders try to storm your fortress or whatever and you have to change the layout and place traps in order to kill or capture them: Deception IV: Blood Ties. Yes, I have the numbers correct, don’t worry about it. I don’t know anything about the music of this series, but from the story I was expecting “spooky shit” and we do indeed get some spooky shit.

This was the first (KOEI) Tecmo game in Takashi Yoshida’s discography that I clicked on two months ago when I started investigating him as a potentially Good Composer, and it instantly convinced me that I should check him out because some of his tracks for this game rule. It seems like this setting gave him a bit more leeway to explore fuller orchestral tracks than Dynasty Warriors does, and he took advantage of that while incorporating some interesting mixes of instruments and synths, detuned parts, and odd scales. All combined they result in a few really deranged tracks, particularly the block of tracks 12~15 in the middle of the album. Unfortunately he never gets into that unhinged Aria of Sorrow prog style except for maybe briefly in one or two tracks, because I feel like that could’ve fit pretty well, but we don’t always get what we want.

Yoshida was joined by two composers I haven’t heard anything by on this one: Yuki Matsumura and Ayako Toyoda. Matsumura’s tracks are all spooky or threatening orchestral, a little similar to Yoshida’s though not quite as interesting on a compositional or sound design level. Toyoda’s tracks on the other hand are completely different: they all feature either rockin’ electric guitar or electronic beats, usually both. They don’t fit in with the atmosphere of the orchestral tracks at all, but I don’t really know anything about the in-game usage of music so maybe they make it work.

The limited edition of the game came with a compilation soundtrack containing selections of music from this and the previous four games, though none of the soundtracks were complete. 23 tracks from this game were included with a composer breakdown, but the game has another 30 or so tracks which were originally unreleased but were almost all later published on the album included with the expanded version of the game, Deception IV: The Nightmare Princess (one percussiony jingle and the ending theme were still omitted). Most of these are jingles, otherwise shorter cues, or ambient themes, so it makes some sense that these were the pieces they sacrificed to fit all the music onto one disc. Unfortunately, there’s no composer breakdown on the second album, so we just have to guess for the remaining tracks. The short tracks mostly sound similar to Yoshida’s tracks, though there’s at least one more rock one that sounds like Toyoda, and also a few jazzy ones, which isn’t a style the soundtrack otherwise delved into. That and the weirdness and instrumentation of some of the ambient tracks reminded me a little bit of Planet Laika, which is a great way to get on my good side.

Recommended tracks:

  • Holy Verses Ripped Apart” (Yoshida) is the game’s sufficiently foreboding main theme with a nice mysterious bit at 0:28

  • Crimson-Blood Covered Garden” (Matsumura) is the closest the soundtrack gets to one of those unhinged prog themes so it’s a little funny that this isn’t Yoshida’s fault

  • Promise of Fiery Death” (Toyoda) has a pretty simple synth riff at 0:55 that I really like the sound of for some reason, maybe it’s just because the 6/8 rhythm of it contrasts a little bit with the 3/4 rest of the track

  • House of Madness” (Yoshida) was the first track that made me go “okay what the fuck am I listening to,” this gets really sick starting at 1:01 and proceeding into the unsynced accordion section

  • Raging Trojan Horse” (Yoshida) sounds like a carnival rolling down a hill

  • White Silence” (Yoshida?) does the Big, Long Pitch Bends

(track titles except the last are unofficial translations from VGMdb)

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