In-Game music - do you like it??

[Dikatis]

Well, it plays in Rhalgr's Reach because of the sing-along and the end of 4.0, where the resistance sings a version with (improvised?) modified lyrics after liberating Ala Mhigo. Taking a sad song and making it better? (Incidentally, "The Star-Spangled Banner" has similar origins, but from a popular tavern song. Historical precedent!)

They're the same song. "The Measure of His Reach" is the Ala Mhigan national anthem as it pertains to their faith in Rhalgr and Ala Mhigan cultural values (i.e. perserverance in the face of adversity, resourcefulness to survive in the rugged wilderness). When Ala Mhigo was conquered, the Garleans rewrote the lyrics to sing "The Measure of Our Reach", which instead extols Garlemald. This is a targeted use of cultural erasure meant to break the wills of the Ala Mhigan people while also indoctrinating Ala Mhigan youth by changing the meaning of the song.

Speaking of which, one of the best subtle narrative tools in Stormblood pertains to these two songs. "The Measure of Our Reach" is sung in perfect tune by a Garlean choir to emphasize how regimented it is, as well as Garlemald's diminishing of the individual with its many faceless goons and desire to subjugate all other cultures. By contrast, "The Measure of His Reach", is sung by the Eorzean Alliance. Everyone singing is out of tune because these are all people from disparate walks of life united for a common purpose. Much like fans at a baseball stadium who stand for the national anthem, no one is singing perfectly because they're not all trained singers as part of a scripted performance. This in turn emphasizes the individuality of the Eorzean Alliance's members and makes it more "realistic" in that this is how an exhausted, but triumphant army would sing without proper acoustics or practice.

Zenos is introduced with "The Measure of Our Reach" as the Ala Mhigan Quarter is filled with Garlean soldiers and magitek with Garlean flags in full view. At the end of Stormblood, the Eorzean Alliance celebrates its victory over him and the liberation of Ala Mhigo by singing "The Measure of His Reach" for the first time in 20 years, all while Arenvald raises the Ala Mhigan banner in a recreation of shots like the soldiers raising the flag at Iwo Jima. The story began with this song and it ended with this song, opening and closing the book on this chapter of the story. This is also why so many of Stormblood's MSQ titles are excerpts from "The Measure of His Reach".

[Cleretic]

They're the same song. "The Measure of His Reach" is the Ala Mhigan national anthem as it pertains to their faith in Rhalgr and Ala Mhigan cultural values (i.e. perserverance in the face of adversity, resourcefulness to survive in the rugged wilderness). When Ala Mhigo was conquered, the Garleans rewrote the lyrics to sing "The Measure of Our Reach", which instead extols Garlemald. This is a targeted use of cultural erasure meant to break the wills of the Ala Mhigan people while also indoctrinating Ala Mhigan youth by changing the meaning of the song.

And all of this squares for the Stormblood theme being Ala Mhigo's anthem... but then why the hell is it playing just as much in the Doman half? If you instead took The Measure of Our Reach as the Garlean anthem (which is technically a misreading, but it takes the entire expansion until someone tells you it is), then it being the whole expansion leitmotif makes sense since it's the common thread linking both halves of the story, but then you're just left asking 'but why is it playing in Rhalgr's Reach'--which again, there is an answer for but it's not given until the end of the expansion.

It's a minor bit of pedantry, I know, but it's the one time that a heavy reliance on leitmotifs actually hurt the story rather than helped it; making it an in-universe diegetic piece of music just rendered it very confusing when they kept using it as the general expansion theme. They've done including a song diegetically well in other places--the raw gut-punch of Home Beyond the Horizon wouldn't work nearly as well without it--but that time was a miss.