Welcome to Critical Hit, where I (or someone else on the PC Gamer team) celebrate and lament all things videogame music, audio design, and the ways our favourite games make our ears tingle.
Last month, Final Fantasy 10 turned 25 years old—a fact that has utterly shaken my perception of the passage of time, leaving me to slowly decay into a pile of dust. It remains one of my favourite JRPGs of all time, even if PC only has the significantly weirder-looking, plastic-faced HD remaster. The romance! The belts! The turn-based battling! The cutscenes! Things that all still very much hold up two-and-a-half decades later, in my humble and not at all biased opinion.
But one aspect that has endured above all others is the game’s soundtrack. It’s this immaculate blend of genres, something we’d see happen more in future games like Final Fantasy 13-2. From the all-out rock of Otherworld that blasts your ears during the introduction of Blitzball rockstar Tidus, to the wonderfully ethereal Besaid. Or even the game’s overarching theme, To Zanarkand, which is the perfect musical embodiment of its melancholic narrative.
When I think about Final Fantasy 10, though, one song always comes to mind: Suteki Da Ne. It’s the song that plays during a hugely pivotal moment in the game. Yuna has become increasingly conflicted over her role as a summoner—one which is destined to end in her death—but her desire to quit is outweighed by her commitment to her duty.
The scene culminates in her and Tidus together in the springs at Macalania Woods, a gorgeous glittering landscape painted in shades of blue, while the two descend under the water and share a kiss. It’s the first display of romantic intimacy between the two, capped off by the delicate Japanese vocals and sweet orchestra of Suteki Da Ne.
It wasn’t the series’ first attempt at a vocal track. Final Fantasy 6 had pseudo-vocals during the famous opera scene. Final Fantasy 7, of course, had One Winged Angel, and Final Fantasy 8 was the first time I recall a vocal song in the series going more pop-focused with Eyes on Me.
But Final Fantasy 10, being the first to release on PlayStation 2, felt like a huge step up in terms of how hard composer Nobuo Uematsu could cook. It’s a song that’s needed little-to-no rearrangement in the years since, because it remains so dang good from its initial conception.
It’s the first vocal track I remember really resonating with in a Final Fantasy game, one that brought me to tears the way no other videogame had up until that point. It feels beautiful and tragic at the same time, and it’s a track I don’t think a game in the series has ever come close to matching since—though Final Fantasy 14’s Flow is probably the closest contender.
I’m not sure we’ll ever get another soundtrack quite like Final Fantasy 10, and 25 years later I still find myself going back to its music time and time again. And while Suteki Da Ne might not be my most listened to of the bunch, I maintain it’s one of the best composed pieces—a diamond in a huge stinkin’ pile of gold. And one that still brings a little tear to my eye every time I listen to it.
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