6th Gen How would you rate the ORAS soundtrack?

[PlatinumDude]

Nostalgia hit me hard upon listening to the OR/AS soundtrack. I couldn't help imagine the original R/S/E soundtrack alongside the OR/AS one.

 

[Adam Levine]

ORAS had great soundtrack and it competes with the original. Many things here had their simplicity broken, which made it sound like an actual adventure. The music also got a little more organized and completed.

The originals are also good. Who doesn't love the sound of French horns always being there? The simplicity is also what makes me love it.

In my opinion, both the remakes' and originals' soundtracks are great and evenly weigh each other out.

 

[Hikamaru]

I pretty much felt tons of nostalgia as I listened to this soundtrack, which makes sense given I started my Pokemon gaming experience with Hoenn. I did love the revamped Groudon/Kyogre theme, which definitely sounded more epic than the original.

 

[Sopheria]

You know, for some reason I didn't quite feel the nostalgia with this one. Probably because I wasn't actually that young when I played it :P Makes me kinda sad to realize my nostalgia pretty much ends at 2nd gen ;;

 

[sirboulevard]

ORAS really hit the soundtrack just right. In fact, I think several pieces from ORAS are actually better than the RSE versions. Most notably, Littleroot Town, which just couldn't get the emotional oomph needed from the RSE soundchips. Most of the pieces are faithful and thats what saves them.

That said, there are a couple of pieces where they were outdone.

First is the Gym Leader theme. Here is the one from ORAS.



And here's the version from Pokemon Colosseum and XD, which I feel is superior.



A large chunk of that is due to the Colo/XD version using more instruments and harmonies (specifically using the infamous trumpets in conjunction with strings). Not to mention Tsukasa Tawada improvising some additional flourishes on the pieces like at 0:33 and 0:59.

The other is Mt. Chimney. While I don't dislike it as a fan of Jazz. Its totally wrong tonally for the location. Mt. Chimney was really Team Magma/Aqua's first real act of world changing villainy, setting a trend for a decade and a half of Pokemon enemy teams. It should have been music to invade Poland too, not music to chill in a hipster bar to.

 

[fenyx4]

Unfortunately, I'll have to reserve judgment on the entire soundtrack of Pokemon OmegaRuby/AlphaSapphire (ORAS) in comparison to their Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald (RSE) predecessors, although it seems like some tracks like Zinnia's battle theme and Wally's battle theme have been well-received, so that's good to hear.. Preliminary thoughts on the music (I am not really one who can sufficiently describe music as I would like to, so apologies if some of these remarks don't make much sense :~):

-I really like the booming percussion featured throughout in the "Battle! VS Wild Pokemon (Hoenn)" ORAS arrangement, although I felt that a few "sub-melodies" from the RSE version were lost in the transition.

-I inadvertently heard the remix of the Hoenn Battle Frontier overworld theme ("Battle Resort)", but it sounded decent from the segment that I heard.

-The ORAS arrangement of "Pokemon Main Theme" was inferior to the RSE composition, in my opinion. Even in the early segments of the song, some sub-melodies that you can hear in the RSE version fail to be present in the ORAS version (compare the RSE beautiful melodic trills of 0:13-0:20 to what is supposed to be in the ORAS repetitive segment of 0:13-0:20; so much beautiful melodic diversity lost!) , which dampened my outlook on the whole soundtrack, sorry to say. -_- I mean, it's essentially the first song (and arguably one of the most iconic of Hoenn) of the game.. >_>

-I think that the ORAS version of "Battle! VS Team Magma Grunt/Team Aqua Grunt" removed the tubular bells (sadly, prominently replaced with some...other instrument..it sounds brass-ish), harp (or piano?) thing, and "malevolent-sounding buzzing" in one portion that were arguably iconic (and one of my favorite) components of the original RSE song.. Granted, I haven't heard the whole song, but when my favorite part is seemingly ruined, there doesn't seem like there is much to salvage..

-the ORAS version of "Battle! VS Team Magma Leader/Team Aqua Leader" is probably my greatest disappointment so far..
--While I do like how the ORAS version's introductory segment (percussion of sorts?) has more of a nice-sounding melody to it (not that the original RSE version's introductory notes were bad, so to say), the "secondary" melody that begins seconds later that was comprised of backing brass in the RSE version (either French horns or trumpets; hard to distinguish all of the brass happenings {XD}~_~ - I guess I would call them something like "pumping" brass horns/instruments in the original version, as if valves were getting opened and closed in rapid succession..?) now sounds very weird...as if someone was swishing saliva with one's mouth closed, with visually-unappealing food particles getting sloshed around in their mouth at the same time. {XD}-_-
--Also, the general tempo of the ORAS song (at least from what I can tell) seems to have been (slightly?) reduced, which detracts from the intimidating imposing nature and intensity of the RSE composition.
--The ORAS version's "bass drop", while interesting to hear in terms of placement and decent-sounding, didn't do much for me as it apparently did for other people. {XD}
--Furthermore, the brass after the bass drop sounds really "laborious", as if the brass-instrument players are having a tough time playing the song compared to the seemingly "effortless" brass players of the RSE version (this sensation of "trying hard to play brass instruments" may stem from the reduced tempo/speed of the song..?). I was hoping to hear additional sub-melodies that "built" upon the original composition, kind of like in this fanmade remix. In particularly, I would have loved to hear something like the "piano trills" that begin at 0:14, as well as something that conveys "escalation" like the lovely "step-wise climbing phrase (evocative of the notable '8 escalating notes' in the Team Magma Grunt/Team Aqua Grunt battle theme)" between 0:23 and 0:31 (and even the aforementioned fanmade remix seems to at least maintain a tempo similar to the RSE version of the song - really, that fanmade great remix (up until 0:55; :S) is what I was expecting ORAS to achieve).

-Regarding the ORAS version of "Battle! VS Pokemon Trainer (Hoenn)", I'm sorry, but the synthesizer/synth just sounds horrible/over-produced/unfitting at around 15 seconds in (I think this melody was carried by brass instruments in the RSE version). It's like the song is blatantly trying to tell me "Hey! I'm using a weird synth for the melody! Hope that's okay; thx plox". The subsequent violin didn't sound as powerful as the original RSE brass, in my opinion.. The song does an okay job of keeping the general melody (especially during the "stuff gets serious"/low-sounding part), although the synth that crops up right before the loop point still manages to be annoying, unfortunately..

-I don't want to outright blast the song without even hearing it yet, but I apparently read that the ORAS version of "Battle! VS Elite Four (Hoenn)" took out the RSE version's distinctive clapping sounds, which were another of my favorite sounds.. I'll wait until hearing the whole thing, but there had hopefully be something that is worth the omission of the classic clapping.. :(

-I heard "Pokemon Gym" and "Fortree City (at least one of the remixes)"; these sounded decent, although I think Fortree had way more brass..?

-Whichever remix of "Battle! VS Super-ancient Pokemon" did it, I like the idea of the one that (from what I've read) fades in and out and interspersed the original RSE composition with the ORAS arrangement. A shame that this tidbit was spoiled; I would have loved to discover this musical treat firsthand in the games themselves... :(

Apologies if this post seemed overtly negative... I guess I'm particularly more critical of Hoenn music remixing/rearranging since I've heard a lot of the tunes for so long, as well as since the Hoenn music already had "sounds/melodies" that were defined/refined already.. {XD} Now I see how some Pokemon Gold/Silver/Crystal fans felt about the Pokemon HeartGold/SoulSilver (HGSS) arrangements (although, out of the 2 HGSS songs that I've heard so far; both of them were amazing ^_^). The overall ORAS soundfont seems to provide a nice, rich, vibrant sound to some of the original compositions (still on the fence about the soundfont's execution of violin), so at least there's that positive..

 

[blue]

I think they did a really good job with the soundtrack, some of the tracks have been recreated perfectly. RSE have some of the best soundtracks of any of the games, but ORAS managed to remix a majority of them to sound just as good!

 

[Alita]

I love the new Verdanturf theme, it's a big improvement.
Sky Pillar is amazing, so ominous. ^^ It kind of reminds me of Derris Kharlan from Tales of Symphonia. :D
The Hoenn E4 has my favourite E4 theme, but I slightly prefer the original in RSE.

9/10

 

[Harmonie]

I think they did a pretty good job with it. I had no second thoughts about buying it on iTunes right when it was released!

I particularly like that funky sound they went for with Mt. Chimney.

 

[ZoroStar]

The ORAS soundtrack is absolutely fantastic.
RSE had my favorite arrangements overall, and if I have to be completely honest,
I was interested in the music before the game itself.

This remake nailed it throughout and I can't be any happier with how it turned out.​