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Download (End card acoustic short: The Elemental Stars)

We’re kicking off May Madness 2019 with the first remake of the year: the Battle and Boss Battle themes from Golden Sun!

A little recap for those new to GaMetal: every year, in May, I take a bunch of my old arrangements (usually anything more than 5 years old) and re-record them to make them sound better.

This year, I had 2 different ways for people to vote on the remake songs: a discussion post on the GaMetal Patreon, and a public 2019 May Madness Request Form that anyone could fill out and enter 2 songs.

I first remixed this song on the day of my ‘return’ in 2013, alongside Don’t Be Afraid. It’s always been one of my favorite older arrangements, and I’ve been wanting to remake it as recently as last year. It didn’t make the cut in May 2018 in favor of other songs, and because it was one of the top requests from the Patreon form and had a decent showing in the public form, I felt this was the year to get to it.

This time around, I changed around some of the sections where the guitar leads rather than the synth and vice versa (mainly in the first 2 minutes or so).

Golden Sun music is so good… this game really deserves either a remake or new game of some sort. Maybe someday we’ll see the series revival, but till then… at least we have this remix!

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Download (End card acoustic short: Peanut Plain)

Release Heavy Lobster! I probably should’ve done this song in the updated Revenge of Meta Knight medley, but I think it’s cool enough to deserve it’s own track.

This song does have lyrics, for those wondering, they are as follows:

HEAVY, LOBSTER (x18)

I spent hours on these lyrics… I wanted to make them as deep as possible to match the intensity of the Heavy Lobster battles. It’s a song about pain, regret, sorrow, triumph, victory, and so much more, but really, I’ve made it so you can interpret these lyrics as you see fit.

I could make a bunch of puns about Heavy Lobster being both heavy and metal, but we need to maintain a serious tone since this is a serious song. I’m sure you understand.

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Download (End card acoustic short: 1943 Mission 01)

1942 is a legendary arcade game, released in the year 1942, that completely changed the way people experienced vertical scrolling plane shooters. Not only seen as one of the greatest games ever, but the soundtrack is also hailed as one of the greatest gaming soundtracks in the history of gaming, maybe ever.

Due to the games wild success, it was a no brainer for Capcom to port the game to the NES a year later, in 1943. The NES sound chip was able to take the already phenomenal soundtrack to new heights, making it the go-to version of the game’s OST.

With the success of 1942, Capcom would release a sequel, 1943: The Battle of Midway, later in the year 1943 after the NES port was released. It failed to meet the incredibly high expectations set by it’s predecessor 1942, and was seen as more of an ‘average’ game with an ‘ok’ soundtrack, as most people felt it was too ‘normal’ compared to the experimental insanity of 1942.

Tackling the stage theme, in all of it’s glory, was no easy task, but I tried my best.

Let’s party like it’s 1942.

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Download (End card acoustic short: Ballad of the Windfish)

With the recent reveal of an upcoming Link’s Awakening remake for the Switch, I had no choice but to finally do a song I’ve been putting off for years and years: Tal Tal Heights.

Link’s Awakening is a game I sunk a lot of time into as a kid. I remember using the shovel on practically every possible square trying to find all the seashells (this was before, ya know, you could just look up a guide/map on the internet). It was one of my staple GB games for long car rides.

Then we got the DX remake, which brought color to the game as well as the color dungeon, which featured a new arrangement of the old Zelda dungeon theme (which is my personal favorite version). Now we have a brilliant looking Switch remake coming and I’m stoked!

Tal Tal Heights is my favorite song from the game, and as I mentioned, I’ve always been meaning to get around to it but just haven’t had the opportunity. Now I have the perfect excuse. Take that, Molgera.

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Download (End card acoustic short: Theme of Ellis)

It’s the return of the Valentine’s Day special!

For the past few years, with the exception of 2018 (which was a sucky year as far as doing specials went.. April Fools?), I’ve let my wife choose for Valentine’s Day. This year she went with one of her favorite game songs: Ellis’s Theme from Battle Arena Toshinden.

While I know pretty much nothing about BAT, I’ve heard this song a lot because she has it on her phone playlist and it plays a lot when we are driving somewhere.

Battle Arena Toshinden was one of the first 3D fighters, intended to compete with Sega Saturn’s Virtua Fighter. Despite this, it was ported to Sega Saturn not even a year later as Battle Toshinden Remix, a port of the PS1 version with a few extra features. Interestingly, despite being known primarily as a Playstation title, there was also a Game Boy remake.

For the 5 of you that bought a PS Classic, Battle Arena Toshinden is one of the included games. It might not have been the greatest 3D fighter of all time, and probably shows it’s age a bit, but at the very least, the soundtrack is amazing! So give it a try. 🙂

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Download (End card acoustic short: Title Theme / Battle Theme)

Here’s something different for ya… the Title and Battle theme from the GBC game Magi Nation!

Magi Nation, based on the card game Magi Nation Duel, was a game where you tamed ‘dream creatures’ to fight alongside you in battle. So it’s sort of like Pokémon… sort of. There was also an animated series that lasted a couple of seasons.

And, like (almost) everything we cover here, it had a great soundtrack. Give it a try sometime, if you can! 🙂

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Download (End card acoustic short: Dark Man)

The first time I heard Splash Woman’s theme, Splash Blue, was when I was working on Mega Man Mega Medley II. Since then, it’s become one of my favorite songs from the Mega Man series.

Mega Man was the 7th most requested series from the 2019 GaMetal Song Ballot, with many different songs scattered throughout various games from the series. Splash Blue was one of the few that had multiple votes, so this was a very easy choice for me to make.

This one’s a little bit toned down from the slightly faster version in Mega Man Mega Medley II, but still keeps a fair bit of intensity. It’s also sandwiched in between an acoustic intro and outro, and I added a prechorus section to add even more emphasis going into the chorus.

This has been one of my favorites that I’ve done in a while, I hope it’s made waves with you as well! 🙂

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Download (End card acoustic short: Horrible Shadow)

Finally, a Romancing SaGa tune!

I’ve been meaning to get around to a song from the Romancing SaGa series for years. We’ve done 2 other songs from the SaGa series, Save the World from SaGa 2 and Battle 1 from SaGa Frontier, and there’s also Lethal Strike from SaGa 2 in the Game Boy Medley if you want to count that, but this is the first Romancing song in the GaMetal lineup.

A localization of Romancing SaGa 3 is actually supposed to be coming to the US very soon, supposedly sometime this year! Maybe we’ll celebrate with another RS tune…

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Download (Instrumental version) (MP3)
Download (End card acoustic short: Practice Fights)

Enter GaMetal 2019!

I had mentioned in the Darkest Lord post that there were a lot of songs I could’ve gone with for the 2018 Finale. The same applied for the 2019 Premiere: there were several options! I ultimately decided to go with a song that’s very hot at the moment: Lifelight from Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. This also happened to be the #3 song from the 2019 GaMetal Song Ballot, so we’re already getting a start on those songs as well.

I’ve also supplied you with an alternative instrumental arrangement, for those of you who’d prefer to go without the lyrics. Whatever your flavor, I’ve got you covered!

I stay fairly close to the structure of the original composition, it’s really too good to change drastically, in my opinion. The most major change you’ll notice is that I bumped the key down a whole step and a half to properly fit my vocal range. I also did the guitar solo during the first half of the key change towards the end (which is still present in the vocal version, but mixed a lot lower, treating it as more of a background track).

In the past, I would always say the Super Smash Bros. Brawl theme was my favorite of the SSB themes (I honestly did not care much for SSB4’s theme), but Lifelight just might take that spot now.

Brawl’s is still great though, and I still need to redo that one sometime…

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Download (End card acoustic short: Mii Channel)

It’s time to close out 2018 with one last song… enter The Darkest Lord from Miitopia!

This was just one of several options I could’ve gone with for the 2018 finale, but I definitely don’t regret choosing it. It’s an amazing song! I whittled it down to the most popular requests (both from comment requests and an early look at the 2019 Song Ballot, where it was in the top 3 most requested), and also made my decision based on how much time I had to work with. I would’ve hated to slate an extremely difficult, complex song as the finale and not have enough time to get it done before the year ended. This song was sort of a middle ground in the difficulty department: I had a couple of other easier songs among my choices, as well as a few really tough ones that I’ll be saving for later.

Like I said, I definitely don’t regret choosing this song to end the year. It really has it all. The few times I listened to it before I considered it seriously, I listened to about a minute or so and thought ‘yeah this is pretty cool’. I wasn’t aware that this song is originally almost 4 minutes long and has SEVERAL different sections. It constantly changes up but it all works together so well.

Usually when I encounter a song with a million different sections like this one, I don’t change around too much, because there is already plenty to work with. The biggest changes I made were changing some of the synth parts to lead guitar (though this arrangement is still fairly synth heavy), and extending the last guitar solo at around the 3:22 mark. It was originally like.. 2 measures, which was the only part of the original that made me feel like it left me hangin’.

Oh and also, I made the choir in the intro say ‘Miitopia, Miitopia’. Listen carefully!

I decided against adding in other Dark Lord themes (such as the second phase of the fight) because, for one, there is already a TON going on in the first phase theme, and two, they sound… really different from phase one. Not that this has ever stopped me before, but I really felt this particular song stands far better on it’s own. Perhaps I’ll get around to more Miitopia stuff in the future.

This song was a blast to cover, I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. See you in 2019! 🙂

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Download (End card acoustic short: Battle With Mortus)

Comix Zone was a Beat ‘Em Up game (hey we just did one of those) with a unique twist: it takes place within the panels of a comic book. If that doesn’t make any sense, just check out the gameplay. It was an amazing concept that, as far as I’m aware, hasn’t returned in this fashion since.

The soundtrack to Comix Zone was extremely rockin’, and original copies of the game even came with a bonus CD that had actual grunge-rock arrangements of some of the songs! Battle With Mortus wasn’t exactly on the bonus CD, but the chorus section of Woe is the World (from the CD) does make an appearance. It also has some of the rhythm from the Introduction theme. The other parts of the song, as far as I’m aware, are original to the song itself.

I went with more of a classic-rock style as opposed to the grunge-rock Nirvana sounding style from the official CD. I tried to make this less synth-heavy and more guitar focused than I usually do, since that’s how the original sounded like it was intended.

Comix Zone has seen a few ports and returns in Sega’s classic collections, but I’d really like to see something like a sequel or remake someday. It deserves it, especially considering the insane difficulty of the original (you started with only one life!). Bring it back, Sega!

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Download (End card piano short: Circus Battle)

To be honest with you, I’ve never much been one for Tactical RPGs (like Fire Emblem), but there has always been one exception: Shining Force. It’s the only TRPG I’ve played start to finish. I can’t really explain why, because it’s not THAT different from classic TRPGs, but I just found it to be a lot of fun. It was also a really good looking game and, of course, had a great soundtrack.

Circus Battle is one of the more popular songs from the soundtrack that plays during a battle that takes place at, you guessed it, a circus. I made sure to add a lot of ‘circusy’ elements to this arrangement, like the whistle at 0:12 (which, by the way, is called a ‘siren whistle’, it took me like an hour to find it, haha) followed by a somewhat circus style organ, and later on at 2:27 I bring in some old-timey Piano and the definitely-circus Calliope. Oh and of course, what circus arrangement isn’t complete without a few slight nods to Entry of the Gladiators?

If you like classic TRPGs, I highly recommend checking out the original Shining Force!

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Download (End card acoustic short: Sunset Heroes)

God Hand is a beat ’em up game where you go around punching people. That’s all you really need to know. But really, it ‘geared toward hardcore gamers’ (meaning it was hard, haha) and had a lot of comedy elements, and of course… a pretty bangin soundtrack.

Sunset Heroes plays during the fight against the ‘Mad Midget Five’, a colorful group of little persons that appear to be a parody of the Power Rangers. The song has a real Wild West feel to it.

The original song was already very fleshed out, in fact I didn’t lengthen it at all by adding anything, so this might be another one you can call more of a cover tha a remix. I did change up the guitar solo a little bit and of course add a few backing and rhythm changes.

Don’t sleep on this song, this is one of those ones that’ll easily get stuck in your head for days!

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Download (End card acoustic short: Options / Level Selection)

Wizpig is a song I’ve been wanting to cover since the early days of GaMetal, and I mean like… 2010 early days of GaMetal.

Diddy Kong Racing is one of those games I sunk a lot of time into as a kid. There might some other kart-racer out there with a similar adventure mode, but I’ve always wished that the adventure mode style of DKR would return in either a new DKR title (not a remake, like the DS version), or maybe if such a mode were incorporated into something like Mario Kart. It was just a ton of fun, and then there was Wizpig.

Now, it’s been quite a while since I’ve actually played Diddy Kong Racing, but I recall having one hell of a hard time trying to beat Wizpig. You really had to use the turbo boosts almost perfectly. On top of that, he had this really awesome theme.

I approached this remix as if Wizpig were to appear in F-Zero, hence the generous boost in tempo here.

Go play DKR if you haven’t and you like kart racers, especially games like Mario Kart 64. It’s awesome!

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Download (End card acoustic short: Super Mario Land 2 – Athletic)

After 6 straight NES Medleys and one SNES Medley, it’s time to change things up a bit and feature a different console… enter the Game Boy Medley!

Just to recap the process of song choice for these console medleys: all songs were submitted by GaMetal Patrons via the GaMetal Patreon and 10 were pulled in a random drawing, another 3 chosen by the top 3 Patrons, and 2 chosen by myself personally. So if you’re wondering how on earth I could do 2 songs from Dragon Ball Z: Goku Gekitouden, and 0 songs from Link’s Awakening, there’s your answer. 🙂

Even with the randomness of the drawing, we managed to pull out an incredible 15 song combination, perhaps one of my personal favorite song roster of any of the console medleys to this date. This was also one of the toughest medleys I had to record, since there are a ton of really intense songs such as Sun Star, Frieza Battle, Lethal Strike, and Risky Boots.

The following 15 songs appear in this medley:

1. Sun Star (Mega Man V)
2. Boss Theme (The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages / Oracle of Seasons)
3. Game B (Radar Mission)
4. Ronald’s Theme (Pokemon Trading Card Game)
5. Guard Daos (Lufia: The Legend Returns)
6. Elite Frieza Soldier Battle (Dragon Ball Z: Goku Gekitouden)
7. Azalea Town (Pokemon Gold / Silver)
8. Overworld Theme (Super Mario Land)
9. Stage 1 (Ninja Gaiden Shadow)
10. Boss Battle (Looney Tunes)
11. Frieza Battle (Dragon Ball Z: Goku Gekitouden)
12. Coo’s Theme (Kirby’s Dream Land 2)
13. Lethal Strike (Final Fantasy Legend II)
14. Risky Boots (Shantae)
15. Staff Credits (Metroid II: Return of Samus)

My own personal choices were the Boss Theme from Looney Tunes, which has always been an obscure favorite of mine, and Coo’s Theme from Kirby’s Dream Land 2. Kirby was the most major franchise that didn’t manage to get a drawing pull, so I felt it necessary to add the best Kirby song from the Game Boy. You could easily point out the absence of games Link’s Awakening or Pokemon Red/Blue, but at the very least we still had some sort of Zelda and Pokemon representation with the Oracle’s Boss Theme, Ronald’s Theme and Azalea Town.

Probably my favorite song from the medley is Risky Boots, which, funny story, I pulled on our Patreon drawing stream 4 times while pulling the medley winners. I suppose it was destined to be in this medley.

One last note… why no Game Boy Advance? Well, I figured that would add far too many songs to the song pool, and with the drawings being random, we could’ve ran into the possibility of drawing way too many Classic/Color songs and too few Advance songs, or vice-versa. What I might end up doing instead is a Game Boy Advance medley sometime in the future.

I will almost certainly do another Game Boy medley sometime in the future as well, but first I’d like to do a different console medley… perhaps a Nintendo 64 Medley? :O

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Download (End card piano short: Decisive)

I know, you’re probably thinking… what on earth is this game?

The Ogre Battle series is an old T/SRPG series that hasn’t been around since 2001. Ogre Battle 64 was one of the more popular games from the series, and generally a known game from the N64 era.

Decisive is a really cool song, but it’s originally pretty short, so I also threw in the boss battle theme, Loki, which I felt fit like a glove.

 

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Download (End card acoustic short: Ghost Gulping)

We’re keeping up with our Halloween tradition and doing another dark/spooky-themed remix: this time we’re finally revisiting the Paper Mario series and taking on Shadow Queen’s Final Phase theme!

A lot like our last Halloween special, Matricide, this song leans towards the rhythmic/atmospheric side. So it’s not quite chalk full of insane guitar solos, rather I just wanted it to sound dark and heavy and.. well, scary.

I tend to do this thing with heavy/slow songs where I try to emulate Black Label Society. I even borrowed that weird strings-off-the-bridge scrape thing that Zakk does sometimes. If you’re a fan of BLS, you may notice some of the similarities.

I still have plenty of Paper Mario tunes I want to get to eventually… I probably won’t make you wait as long this time. 🙂

PS: I don’t know who this guy in the video is, but I’m glad he recorded and uploaded the video for me. It saved me a lot of work…. still a bit worried that someone got into my house and used all my equipment without me noticing. Hmm…