Xenon: Mugen no Shitai
Game developed by C's Ware
vndb | wikipedia (ja) | mobygames
Soundtrack published by EGG MUSIC RECORDS
VGMdb |
Official Release Website
(archive, not available to purchase)
No. 01 - Desert Storm (XENON_01.M) / Desertstorm (Track 1-02)
This one is a pretty big project, due to it being a visual novel (I’ll be avoiding the term “sound novel” because that’s apparently trademarked by Chunsoft). Yeah, things ain’t easy with the YM-2203. The FM sound effects being used are absurd, after all. A colleague who won’t be named (it’s Hakase)¹ and I went through hell back debating and trying to find something that worked while we wrote our tracks and SEs. We would change things all the time.
Anyways, this is the track played in the opening screen (first thing you hear). In the end, we forgot the prototype version there.
¹ Hiroyuki Kanno's alias
No. 03 - Ranphar (XENON_03.M) / Ranphar 1 (Track 1-05)
Conversation scenes with Ranphar and Mai. Why do Ranphar and Mai share the same theme song, you ask? Let’s just say that’s a spoiler…
No. 04 - Din Memory (XENON_04.M) / Memory (Track 1-09)
The default track playing in the hospital. The keyword for this one was “abstract”, so every decision here was quite difficult to make. I’m back at composing abstract music (laughs).
No. 05 - Real Realize (XENON_05.M) / Realize (Track 1-04)
The default BGM playing in the spaceship Quadra. It represents one step of progress in an incomprehensible situation…
To express this situation, I made an anxiety-inducing melody for the first half, advancing and ending its second half with relatively more bright and cheerful notes.
No. 06 - Reamer (XENON_06.M) / Reamer (Track 1-21)
The word “reamer” means juicer, the device that squishes the fruit to get the juice. You may think this has nothing to do with the track… but you’ll understand when you get to the end of Scenario II.
I like this one a lot because it felt like I went out of my comfort zone for the first time in a long while.
No. 09 - Synaps (XENON_09.M) / Synaps (Track 1-14)
Your typical climax track. Nothing more, nothing less. The closest thing it has to originality is its base tone.
No. 11 - Tacit Communicate (XENON_11.M) / Contact (Track 1-10)
A mega short track but one of my favorites.
I considered making it longer, but it just has the perfect cut off point.
Pretty much all "conversation" tracks follows this pattern.
No. 12 - Access (XENON_12.M) / Access (Track 1-07)
This jingle plays during counseling and abstract conversations.
No. 13 - Encoder (XENON_13.M) / Encoder (Track 1-06)
The theme song for a room with a device called Psychic Program Encoder.
Not the best track…
No. 15 - Risc (XENON_15.M) / Risk (Track 1-12)
This one is kinda annoying because the alarm plays over it the entire time, but turning off channel 1 erases the alarm, so I recommend doing so.¹
Using 2 channels was our only option for the FM part, so I did this one as a bass solo.
¹ the sound fades out in the official release/links above, thankfuly. I recommend following his advice if you're listening in hoot or a vgm player.
No. 16 - Moonlight (XENON_16.M) / Moonlight (Track 1-08)
The climax track. The impressive amount of variations for the same scene is because of how the route splits change the situation. Don’t worry too much about it.
A colleague who won’t be named (it’s Hakase) said he liked the moon-related song from FFVI, so I tried to make something similar.
By the way, the moon is completely irrelevant for the scene (laughs).
No. 17 - Dream (XENON_17.M) / Dream (Track 1-03)
The plot takes a huge turn for the abstract, so I made this tune into the default BGM. The chords are F#m-F. It’s quite the earworm, so any unexpected sound effect is really surprising.
No. 21 - Towering Past (XENON_21.M) / Past (Track 1-16)
My favorite track in this game.
Its mood is similar to Moonlight, but I think this one has a better cut off point.
No. 23 - Magenta (XENON_23.M) / Magenta (Track 1-13)
I’m running out of things to say about dialogue scenes. That’s really frogging me out… I mean, freaking.
No. 24 - Magnify Dark (XENON_24.M) / Magnify (Track 1-19)
A colleague who won’t be named (it’s Hakase) said he liked Disco Music, so I tried to make something similar.
KAJA used a 808 hi-hat in his songs, so I tried making one too.
No. 25 - Our Lullaby (XENON_25.M) / The pirate (Track 1-20)
Pirate Business Special Theme Song
The protagonist in the 3rd story is a great pirate cruising the universe, until chance forces him to switch places with the modern-day protagonist…
But the thing is, the former couldn’t possibly know anything about modern day common sense. This song symbolizes the reality clashes in how he’s always trying to act cool but everyone who sees it thinks he’s on drugs.
No. 26 - Ranphar II (XENON_26.M) / Ranphar 2 (Track 1-18)
This goes in the core of the 2nd story’s conversations, so I made it a long piece (maybe not long enough…). Ranphar (the female lead) is extremely happy-go-lucky in the 2nd story, so the vibes on this tracks are completely different from (XENON_03.M) “Ranphar”
No. 10 - Memory (XENON_10.M) / Fact (Track 1-15)
The ending theme to the 1st story. I ultimately settled for a remix of (XENON_02.M).
After that, pulling this stuff (XENON_02.M) became a standard production practice. I didn’t have the time to have better ideas… sob sob.
No. 02 - Xenon (XENON_02.M) / Xenon (Track 1-17)
A track I composed without deciding where it was going to be used, so it ultimately went on the credits. And as an unaltered prototype.
Next we’ll be talking about the 2608 arrangements.