The Best Soundtracks Composed By Motoi Sakuraba

Key Takeaways

• Sakuraba’s music enhances various game genres, such as Kid Icarus: Uprising, with diverse soundtracks.
• Sakuraba’s compositions span lighter themes in games like Mario Golf, contrasted by heavy guitar-filled soundtracks in games like Resonance of Fate.
• In games like Eternal Sonata, Dark Souls, and Valkyrie Profile, Sakuraba’s music evokes ethereal, melancholic tones.

Music is an integral part of any game. You can’t be walking around in silence when a piece of music could be enhancing the scene, can you? Music has been experimental in games since the beginning. Early consoles had restricted sound channels, meaning you had to get creative with your sounds.

Motoi Sakuraba has been working in the gaming industry since the late 1980’s, and hasn’t stopped since. While he has his own signature style, the changing technologies in the deacdes since he first started composing have led to some truly diverse soundtracks. Here’s the greatest of them.

10

Kid Icarus: Uprising

Over 20 years since its last new entry, Kid Icarus returned with Uprising for the 3DS under the direction of long-time Smash director, Masahiro Sakurai. It was a complete reinvention of the series, swapping camera perspectives, level structure, and storytelling from the previous games.

It also had a packed team of famed composers. Yuzo Koshiro, Yasunori Mitsuda, and of course, Motoi Sakuraba. While he doesn’t have a special place above any of the other composers on this soundtrack, some of his entries are truly stellar. Check out Dark Pit’s theme as an example.

9

Star Ocean The Second Story

The Star Ocean series is one of Square Enix’s older series that has never enjoyed quite as much popularity as its bigger series’, like Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy. However, they’re still some truly unique experiences with a fun twist on sci-fi, especially when you look at the earlier entries.

Star Ocean: The Second Story (and it’s HD-2D remake) are composed by Motoi Sakuraba, as is most of the series. The Second Story has such a massive diversity of tracks in it, from up-beat techno rhythms to slower pieces with flutes and chimes.

8

Mario Golf

Well, here’s a funny one. Since its inception, Motoi Sakuraba has been the primary composer of the Mario Golf series, up to the most recent release, Super Rush. While it’s hard to say that any of Sakuraba’s soundtracks are consistent in their stylings, his Mario Golf entries are definitely not par for the course.

The Mario Golf games tend to have a lighter feeling. No orchestral triumphs nor building beats. They’re more calm and playful, upbeat without being frantic. It’s a competition, but not an end-of the world scenario.

Humourously, Sakuraba has composed on multiple other golf games as well.

7

Eternal Sonata

Have you ever heard of the Polish composer, Frédéric Chopin? He was a rather successful composer, made quite a name for himself with his music. He’s also been the subject of a few games, bizarrely enough. Eternal Sonata is perhaps the most prominent of them.

Of course, Eternal Sonata features plenty of Chopin’s own compositions, some left as they are and others rearranged. However, the original compositions were written by Sakuraba and took more vocal and orchestral elements. His composition, Heaven’s Mirror, is one to look out for.

6

Resonance Of Fate

Resonance of Fate is such a fascinating game. It pulls heavily from the Western actions films with a clear artistic style inspired by Final Fantasy 13. It also has a wonderfully complex combat system mixing turned-based and real-time elements. If you stop moving, you’re dead. It’s great.

Sakuraba composed on the game alongside Kohei Tanaka, with the pair being tasked to create opposing sound styles. Sakuraba focused on more rock elements with a heavy guitar presence, while Tanaka created more orchestral tracks. They contrast wonderfully, though with combat such a major focus, it’s Sakuraba’s half you’ll be hearing the most.

5

Tales Of Berseria

The Tales series is very, very large. There are so many games in so many different styles that it makes it a tad difficult to follow them. While many are independent games, some are direct sequels. It’s confusing. For example, Tales of Berseria is a prequel to Tales of Zestiria.

Less confusing is the composers. Since the very first game, Sakuraba has acted as the lead composer. Every game has its own unique style, and many people could assuredly pick out their own favourite from the crowd of games, though Berseria is still an undeniably strong entry music-wise.

4

Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings And The Lost Ocean

Monolith Productions is most well-known today for the Xenoblade series, which is an overall successor to Xenogears, the game that prompted Monolith’s creation in the first place. After making the first Xenosaga game, they moved on to Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean.

Beautifully long name aside, the game also featured an incredibly unique art style and combat system, but had a stellar soundtrack to accompany it. It’s a very upbeat selection of music though has a strong sense of whimsy underneath it all with some funky beats interspersed. It fits the unique setting of the game wonderfully.

3

Golden Sun

Golden Sun remains one of Nintendo’s most beloved and missed series, despite not being developed by them nor having seen the light of day in over a decade. That’s a testament to how moving the story of Isaac was, and how impactful so much of the music was.

While Sakuraba worked on all three entries, he classes the original two games as his favourites of his work on the series. The original game especially was the first game he composed on the Game Boy Advance, offering a dramatic improvement in sound over previous handhelds. As such, he created some truly unique tracks with plenty of layered sounds and even hints of vocals throughout certain tracks.

2

Valkyrie Profile

Square Enix has a lot of gaming series in its back catalog that often get forgotten due to the deluge of incredible games they released in the 1990’s, and Valkyrie Profile was one such series among them. It has more recently gotten new entries in Valkyrie Elysium, though few hold a candle to the original 2D games.

Much of Sakuraba’s compositions help solidify the identity of those games. The songs are slower, more ethereal. They hold a certain melancholy and wonder. They step away from many of the rock elements that define much of his other works to create a soundtrack that feels awe-inspiring in its angelic lightness.

1

Dark Souls

For many, Dark Souls is likely the most well-known game on this list. Few are small games, but dark Dark Souls is massive. It might even be where many of you learned of Motoi Sakuraba as a composer. And his work on Dark Souls is quite different from many of the games that came beforehand.

It is a very somber soundtrack. It has more classical elements like harps and violins, but switches at times to heavier percussion and throaty vocal chanting. It is never uplifting or soft, and has a passive dread spread throughout. It fits the dark setting, and is a drastic shift from Sakuraba’s typical musical style.