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Chrono Trigger's soundtrack has been recreated with the original uncompressed samples by musician Mathew Valente (UPDATE 2: MSU-1 and Steam mods!!)

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AuthenticM

AuthenticM

Son Altesse Sérénissime
The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
30,172
Youtuber and musician Mathew Valente just recently finished restoring the OST of Chrono Trigger. It took him years to track down every sample that the original composers used to create the music that was then compressed and formated to work on the SNES hardware. The result of this restoration is the soundtrack as it would sound like without the SNES compression. This process is what Frank Klepacki did with the soundtrack of the C&C games for the remasters that came out a couple of years ago. You might have also come across some Donkey Kong Country tracks that were restored through the same process, which made the rounds on this forum some years back.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cw_4DVI-5Vo

The description of the video has a link to the google drive folder that contains the tracks in .flac!

I encourage you all to give it a listen. It's real good stuff. Check out his other work as well. He's been doing this process for other games as well.

EDIT: the man's google account was hijacked. Fingers crossed that it gets resolved soon. In the meantime, check the threadmark to download the albums from google drive.
EDIT 2: he got his account back!
 
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Borman

Borman

Digital Games Curator at The Strong Museum
Verified
Oct 26, 2017
844
He was working on the soundtrack for Chrono Trigger Resurrection, for those who may recognize his name. Good dude.
 
antitrop

antitrop

Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,634
Gato's Song an eternally catchy loop.

Battle with Magus... To Far Away Times... Schala's Theme... Frog's Theme, it's all too good.
 
chiller

chiller

Member
Apr 23, 2021
2,777
Some of the samples sound off to me, like the sax in the intro, but I'm also incredibly picky. Cool effort.
 
lakhesis

lakhesis

Member
Oct 27, 2017
42
This is very clean. Holy crap.

I don't know if I can listen to the SNES processed version now.
 
Anoregon

Anoregon

Member
Oct 25, 2017
14,075
Man I don't think there is any music, video game or otherwise, that immediately sends my brain into nostalgia mode like Chrono Trigger music.
 
Psxphile

Psxphile

Member
Oct 27, 2017
6,529
Oh good, they used the version of The Hidden Truth that has a definite end and doesn't just loop forever.

i.e. the best version.
 
justjustni

justjustni

Member
Oct 27, 2017
382
Check out his whole channel, too! He's been doing the same stuff for the Final Fantasy games also. Listening to FF V right now. Just as impressive!

Thanks, OP, for sharing this.
 
jkk411

jkk411

Member
Jul 22, 2018
1,032
Big fan of these efforts, always fascinating to hear the tracks in this way. There's someone out there that was doing this for DKC and it's great too.
 
jett

jett

Community Resettler
Member
Oct 25, 2017
44,667
TSSF is a legend in the remixing space.

This sounds nice overall, but personally I have a nostalgic association with the way the tracks originally sound like. Just like the DKC project from Sam Miller. Some stuff I just prefer how it sounds originally, some changes take away from the vibes. Like I don't really care for how clean the piano sounds in Memories of Green. It has a really haunting vibe on the SNES, kinda lost here.

edit: sounds like he removed the reverb effect all over
 
HVivi

HVivi

Member
Nov 29, 2020
571
There is a github repo for generating a MSU-1 patch for Chrono Trigger using the Chrono Symphony album: Edit: Removing link as I noticed some wav file in repo and don't know if that is pirated/against TOS.

Probably could be modified to use these songs instead but would require some work.
 
APizzaPie

APizzaPie

Member
Oct 27, 2017
834
It's hard to put together a top 5 but I think I'm rolling with:

Brink of Time
Corridors of Time
Schala's Theme
Secret of the Forest
Undersea Palace
 
MaxAugust

MaxAugust

Member
Jan 28, 2018
3,153
jett said:
TSSF is a legend in the remixing space.

This sounds nice, but I have a nostalgic association with the way the tracks originally sound like. Just like the DKC project from Sam Miller. Some stuff I just prefer how it sounds originally, some changes take away from the vibes. Like I don't really care for how clean the piano sounds in Memories of Green. It has a really haunting vibe on the SNES, kinda lost here.
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Yeah, Memories of Green in particular struck me as benefitting from being slightly less pristine. Adds a bit to the mystery and general shady vibe.

Really incredible stuff in general though.
 
TheAggroCraig

TheAggroCraig

This guy are sick of the One Winged Slayer
Member
Nov 6, 2017
5,930
Saving to listen to later when I'm not using a crappy headset, very excited!
 
jett

jett

Community Resettler
Member
Oct 25, 2017
44,667
Last Battle sounds kinda bad. The panning sample sounds really harsh and unpleasant. lol and because everything is so clear now a sound channel I had never noticed before now takes some serious prominence.
 
OP
OP
AuthenticM

AuthenticM

Son Altesse Sérénissime
The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
30,172
jett said:
Last Battle sounds kinda bad. The panning sample sounds really harsh and unpleasant. lol and because everything is so clear now a sound channel I had never noticed before now takes some serious prominence.
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Wild. I listened to it earlier with some headphoens on and it just sounds like an upgrade across the board to me. It sounds more sci-fi and otherwordly than ever.
 
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