Why are we seeing so much FREAKING sappy love songs with modern VGM?

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Mikurotoro92
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Why are we seeing so much FREAKING sappy love songs with modern VGM?

Post by Mikurotoro92 »

I legitimately want to know! I am not even talking about J-pop from games like Persona rather I'm actually referring to games like Phantasy Star Online 2 & Universe ("Hello" & "With You" respectfully) thouse songs did NOT sound like traditional VGM I thought VGM was my escape from these kinds of songs but I guess not so why is game music suddenly being invaded by sappy love songs (which is the very thing I'm trying to get away from)?!

Could it have something to do with the rise of vocal VGM plus the fact that PSO2 & PSU are epic-scale games with a deep story?

Also I'm surprised the song "The Concept of Love" from Jet Set Radio isn't this kind of song despite it having "love" in the title! It's probably the biggest example of "looks can be deceiving" & "don't judge a book by it's cover"!

With the exception of the aforementioned J-pop in Persona & various other non-romantic vocal VGM I think vocal game music was the WORST thing to happen to the genre!

EDIT: I'm pretty sure the progenitor of this at least for Sega but possibly VGM as a whole was the song "Dreams Dreams" from NIGHTS into Dreams (which is an over-rated song BTW)
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Post by Ace_Croft »

Can you actually list any other games that actually do this in Modern VGM ? Concept of Love has random sound clips to make it sound catchy which is Hideki Naganuma's style with sampled clips so it's not really a "love" song.
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Jackisback
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Post by Jackisback »

I feel that VGM is more Diverse. That doesn't mean that VGM can't tackle Love, as long as it's not over did or boring.
Mikurotoro92
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Post by Mikurotoro92 »

Shaddix_Croft wrote:Can you actually list any other games that actually do this in Modern VGM ? Concept of Love has random sound clips to make it sound catchy which is Hideki Naganuma's style with sampled clips so it's not really a "love" song.
Which was exactly my point I said it's NOT really that kind of song despite it having "love" in the title so it's the outlier compared to an actual love song like Dreams Dreams

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Jackisback wrote:I feel that VGM is more Diverse. That doesn't mean that VGM can't tackle Love, as long as it's not over did or boring.
Yeah but I thought VGM was the one genre I could always go to if I wanted to escape that! All I'm saying is I don't want game music to be reduced to nothing more then a clone of top-40 love songs! I want it to stay unique (which it can without having to resort to these kinds of songs)!
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Jackisback
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Post by Jackisback »

True, that is similar to my reasons also.
I'm sure vgm will stay as fresh as the cool ideas of video games themself, I feel.
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Post by EsperK »

@OP - VGM shouldn't be restricted to just what you want in it--it should be allowed to be diverse. Don't curse an entire orchard just because you come across a few apples you don't like.

If I were to go by that course of logic, me saying (for the sake of the argument, and to put the shoe on the other foot), "I can't STAND the cacophony of bleeps and bloops! I wish they'd just go away and never existed! IT'S JUST NOISE. HOW DO PEOPLE LIKE THIS?!" comes off as not only a very vocal negative opinion (which are still free to exist), but a possibility that being exposed to a different variety of VGM in the subgenre of sorts the person has an abhorrence to can offer a more educated and understanding opinion (and maybe evolve the opinion. Maybe.).

For example, I'd actually offer up one of the very songs you put on blast, "Hello" from Phantasy Star Online 2. You may think it's about love, but it's more a sense of making positive use of the second chance given by the person they're singing for/to (This, uh, may involve spoilers for the story mode of the game, so I won't go into it publicly. Just a heads up there. Unless you really want to know, in which case I'd PM that part.). As for the series itself, it's not just about love--it's about different walks of life uniting and taking on and vanquishing a universal (and time-space hazardous) evil (every millennia or so).

To close, shutting out a particular subgenre of VGM may cause some missed opportunities on hidden gems, or possible niche favorites. If there isn't one facet of it you don't like, wander over to another section of it that may catch your fancy.
Mikurotoro92
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Post by Mikurotoro92 »

I mainly like classic VGM from the 80's-late 90's with some modern stuff (note I said "some") but I just don't like how this stuff is invading VGM there's plenty of other genres people can go to listen to this stuff like country or pop or R&B! Please don't let one of the last good musical genres go to the dark side!
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Jackisback
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Post by Jackisback »

I agree so much with this guy.
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Jackisback
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Post by Jackisback »

I agree SO much with this guy.
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