I cannot tolerate how repetitive post-ARR music is

[Souljacker]

I also think shadowbringers was the last time ff14 music peaked with some decent music in endwalkers but dawntrail I was like why is the music all over the place. And I was like why would soken listen to ishikawa when she commissioned smile and wanting soken to make a musical style song and have it play when building a train bomb. But I also feel soken was covering up for a protege and taking the blame saying he came up with it so that people wouldn't hate on or question the next generation that he is training.

They lean too heavily on some of the music that was created for Shadowbringers (and its DLC Endwalker) - it has actually kind of made ShB lose some identity I think. That music was iconic, and appropriate, and they have just continued to use it and use it and use it because... cheaper?

SE is really struggling with identity these days - job identity, xpac identity, you name it, they are struggling with it.

[Daralii]

They lean too heavily on some of the music that was created for Shadowbringers (and its DLC Endwalker) - it has actually kind of made ShB lose some identity I think. That music was iconic, and appropriate, and they have just continued to use it and use it and use it because... cheaper?

SE is really struggling with identity these days - job identity, xpac identity, you name it, they are struggling with it.

They still look back at the success of ShB and are too risk averse to do anything but recycle portions of it, even if it makes it worse retroactively.

[Sarnai]

In all honestly Dawntrail is the first time I turned off music entirely after like 2 mins into a zone. Tulliyollal annoyed the hell out of me in the first few minutes, I expected to hear something like the theme of Zanadalar in WoW, not the Emperor new groove thing. (Overall returning in wow for 3 days made me weep a bit that we didn't get fully fleshed out Aztec style location, just a piece of something and then a mishmash of everything they saw fit to throw in the blender for Tural)

And every new patch I turn on music just to hear that it's still annoying then turn it off, it's the first time when absolutely none of the music sticks with me, not alliance raids, not trials, not normal raids, not locations... Which is sad, I always loved Soken's music and had at least 5 themes saved on my playlist.

[Nebelheim]

They lean too heavily on some of the music that was created for Shadowbringers (and its DLC Endwalker) - it has actually kind of made ShB lose some identity I think. That music was iconic, and appropriate, and they have just continued to use it and use it and use it because... cheaper?

SE is really struggling with identity these days - job identity, xpac identity, you name it, they are struggling with it.

They do seem to keep reusing certain music and story themes from past expansions. Like how many times do we need the last zone/dungeon of an expansion be a memory of some lost civilization or reuse the same dramatic cutscene music we been hearing since arr. Don't know why they keep recycling story ideas from shadowbringers and the same music for cutscenes for over 10 years.

[CuteBucket]

I clicked into this not reading the title clearly and thought this was going to be about how so many cutscenes reuse old ARR era music to this day. At this point when "Machinations" starts I just start laughing and it breaks all the narrative tension. That track is literally a meme at this point.

As to the actual topic, I do wish these tracks were longer before they started looping. A song that loops after 5-7 minutes (like some of the best raid songs) is far less grating over time than a song that loops every 2-3 minutes. One of the guys I raid with mentioned offhand once that he mutes the game's music and just plays his own, because he hates how repetitive and looping the music gets. I still enjoy the game's music for the most part, but there are the occasional areas, like The Diadem, Ultima Thule, and Solution 9, where I just mute the music if I need to go there because I don't wanna hear it loop a zillion times because it grates on my nerves faster than other songs, for whatever reason.

[Valence]

A reason why ARR hits different is simply because they don't loop on cooldown. There is always a pause/breath until the music starts again.

[Anonemoose]

I'm sick and tired of the leitmotif abuse. It's lazy.

[Nebelheim]

I'm sick and tired of the leitmotif abuse. It's lazy.

Me too it makes me start to miss Nobuo a lot more because at least when Nobuo used leitmotifs you had to listen really close to hear it otherwise you wouldn't hear his leitmotif usage. While Soken makes his leitmotif usage painfully obvious that it feels like your always just listening to the same song over and over again just slightly changing genre or musical styles.

[Averax]

I generally prefer the night themes because they're a lot more chill and fade into the background more than the day themes. Especially Tulilyollal.

Also yeah, reusing the same leitmotif in just about every soundtrack for the entire expansion is extremely tiresome.