Game info: Wikipedia
Listening: emulated audio, YouTube (single video)
Credits
Sound: Makoto Hagiwara, Kenjiro Matsuo, Yuichi Nakamura
Info
I just played the Switch remake of this game and its sequel, and it had a few tracks that I thought were really really cool, so I’m going to listen to it. But as the game is a remake, a lot of its soundtrack is arrangements from the original two games, so I need to listen to the originals too! This is basically a point-and-click adventure game set in a mansion on an abandoned island where you have to uncover mysteries in the past and present of two characters, hence the game’s subtitle “Two Memories” in every region but the U.S.
The soundtrack generally has a mellow synth-acoustic vibe to it, with plenty of keyboards/piano, strings, double bass, and mallets. It’s not strongly present in every piece but there’s a bit of minimalist influence in the soundtrack, with several tracks building up a few different repeating figures, an approach I always appreciate. A decent number of tracks also have spicier chord changes than I was expecting, not a mindblowing chord progression that makes me jump out of my chair every thirty seconds but a nice “ooh” moment every now and then. I found this one pretty enjoyable overall! Not a flashy soundtrack but a lot of pleasantly pretty or darkish tunes.
I don’t know anything about the three sound folks credited in the game, but all three also worked on the earlier game Glass Rose by the same developer, CING, so it seems like they all could’ve worked for the company. Most if not all of CING’s games released after this had outsourced audio, though, so they could all have been outsourced from some unidentified company too. Who knows! Matsuo and Nakamura have worked on other random stuff since this game and are now composers at sound company invisi Ltd., while Hagiwara seems to have disappeared. None of them returned for the sequel or the remake.
Recommended tracks:
-
“Trace Memory” is the opening theme and gets us started with some minimalist figures
-
“Uneasy Feeling” gets spooky with some dissonant ploonks and the plucked string writing at 0:46
-
“Second Another” starts off in 7 before switching into some syncopated phrasing in either 4 with extra beats or 6 at 0:42 (missed opportunity for polymeter imo, still cool though)
-
“Miracle of the Blue Moon” is the track with the best chords from start to finish
-
“D’s Theme” kinda randomly changes to 6/4 somewhere around 0:35
(track titles are taken from the music player in the sequel except for “Trace Memory,” which is unofficial)
Leave a Reply