We’re back with Mana Music Monday, bringing you more samples from those soundtracks that brought the game to life, and this week we’re looking at a comparison between a track from Final Fantasy Adventure that was remade for the later Sword of Mana.

The track in question is one of my personal favourites: In Search of the Holy Sword, a track I always felt should have been included among those arranged for the Let the Thoughts Ride on Knowledge album.

Final Fantasy Adventure version

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Sword of Mana version

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Square’s Battle Tracks Vol.1 has now been released, as was previously announced to happen here. Just to remind you, the CD contains three Seiken Densetsu related tracks (FFA’s “Battle 1”, SoM’s “Danger” and SD3’s “Nuclear Fusion”), though we can now confirm that, sadly, the tracks are not remixed or rearranged at all, so nothing new and exciting (to the point that Danger, or Crisis as they have named it, only loops the once, same as the SoM OST).

Only the track “Last Battle” from Romancing SaGa 2 is remixed.

Another album to look forward to next month is Square Enix’s CD entitled “Battle Tracks Vol 1”, which will compile classic battle music from Square’s games for the Famicom systems between 1987 and 1996. Among the composers we can see our local heroes, and, of course, tracks from the games we cover on this site (note, although Shimomura is listed, since this disc only covers Famicom titles, no tracks from Legend of Mana are present).
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Ah, the Village People.  No, not the ones that dress up all weird and sing, I’m talking about the normal-everyday people you meet through your adventures in the Seiken Densetsu series.
People like the jerks that kicked you out of Potos Village in Secret of Mana.  People like the sketchy folk in Byzel who run a blackmarket at night.  People like that lady in Secret of Mana who tells you to shut up.  The people who make you do those annoying fetch quests in Sword of Mana.  Yes, those are the people, the ones we are trying to help save the future of.
Those people are jerks.  If only there was something you could do about them…
Well there is!  Sort of!
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WARNING: The following “Whatever Wednesday” feature is extremely biased. Also, most of the negative attitude here is fake. I actually like Sword of Mana a whole lot. I kinda rat on it a lot because it is like a little sibling of the Seiken Densetsu series to me. And who doesn’t like messing with little kids? Am I right? Also, maybe there are some spoilers here.
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A while back Deques brought us news of the Children of Mana soundtrack being available for purchase at Square Enix’s iTunes store, and the near release of Dawn of Mana’s OST. Now, if you’re still not the proud owner of the previous games’ soundtracks, you can now buy and download them here: http://www.square-enix.co.jp/music/sem/page/dl/seiken/

Available are:
– Seiken Densetsu 2 (aka Secret of Mana) for 1200yen
– Seiken Densetsu 3 for 2700yen
– Seiken Densetsu Mobile for 900yen
– Children of Mana for 1800yen

Or, if you were looking for hard-copies on CD, you can mosey on over to their Amazon store and buy the following:
– Seiken Densetsu (FFA) for 3700
– Seiken Densetsu 2 (1 CD) for 1835yen
– Secret of Mana + for 2421yen
– Seiken Densetsu 3 (3CD set) for 3486yen
– Legend of Mana for 2570yen
– Sword of Mana Premium Soundtrackfor 2850yen

And in case there wasn’t a date already, the OST for Dawn of Mana is slated for 24th Jan 2007 at the price of 3800yen, and comes in a 4CD set.

It’s also worth mentioning at this point that Kikuta-san recently launched a solo project containing music that he composed round about the time he started work on SoM, but which was never used in any game. The CD is called Lost Files, and is available for 2700yen from Amazon in Japan.

Monster, monster.

After putting the section off for three years I finally did some work and finished the Final Fantasy Adventure section.  Hilariously enough it took less than an hour or two to do.
Check it on out for your FFA needs!

I know guys, I’m amazed I actually got some real work done too.