The direction of FFXIV's music.

[auritribe]

Although I agree with your sentiments on the whole, I don't really get this part. "Classic Final Fantasy" to me was always a balance of rock, orchestral music, and something in between the two. I think Uematsu's tracks for this game are great. I don't think the designers always chose the best music for certain areas and cutscenes, but that's not a fault of the music itself.

What's disappointing to me, though, is that Uematsu seems to have been taken off the project (or he decided to leave, at least). I'm pretty sure all of the new music is coming from a team of S-E composers. I think that's a real shame.

I think Uematsu was a one time thing when the game was first released.

Square went to him and was like 'hey we're makin a game, give us some musics here have some money' 'what kind of music?' 'oh we dont care, whatever.' 'well here's a bunch of tracks I made awhile ago that didn't get used, enjoy.'

Since Nobuo doesn't work in house, it probably costs them a lot of money to get his work. They're not going to spend that kind of cash again on a game that is 'failing'.

Matt: Your other big score this year was Final Fantasy XIV. What was it like to revisit the series here? How did your freelance experiences since Final Fantasy XI influence your direction?

Nobuo Uematsu: 11 years have passed since I did Final Fantasy IX, which was the last Final Fantasy project I composed all of the themes for. I didn't feel like I was revisiting Final Fantasy, though, since all of the games have a different taste or feeling about them.

The big difference is that I working as a freelance composer on Final Fantasy XIV. When I was in Square Enix, I used to talk with designers, writers and programmers, just smoking and discussing a lot. I didn't have the chance to talk with them as much this time. I'm not sure if this was a good or bad thing.