Shiren the Wanderer 3 Soundtrack (Wii)

Shiren the Wanderer 3 Soundtrack (Wii), Hayato Matsuo, 2008

The Shiren the Wanderer franchise is one of those game series that has generated a surprising number of entries despite never enjoying outstanding sales. When Fushigi no Dungeon: Fuurai no Shiren 3: Karakuri Yashiki no Nemuri Hime was released in Japan in 2008, it was already the seventh title in the long-running roguelike series. To make matters slightly more confusing, Atlus USA released it in America simply as Shiren the Wanderer, not to be confused with the 1995 SNES original. For the purposes of this review, it is best to stick with Shiren the Wanderer 3. Like most other entries in the franchise, the game received respectable reviews and decent sales without leaving a particularly strong impression either way. Several critics did note, however, that its difficulty had been toned down somewhat from its predecessors, making this a more accessible entry.

While the first Shiren the Wanderer had been blessed with Koichi Sugiyama’s best work outside the Dragon Quest series, Hayato Matsuo had taken over scoring duties for the franchise with 2001’s Shiren the Wanderer GB2. On that score and 2002’s Fushigi no Dungeon: Fuurai no Shiren Gaiden: Onna Kenshi Asuka Kenzan, Matsuo relied extensively on material previously written by Sugiyama. He took a much more individual approach on the Shiren the Wanderer 3 soundtrack, which features only a handful of reprises of Sugiyama’s melodies. The score also arrived at a fortuitous moment in Matsuo’s career, hot on the heels of his magnum opus Hellsing Ultimate. Unfortunately, no soundtrack release was ever forthcoming for Shiren the Wanderer 3 — perhaps developer Chunsoft was wary of issuing a four-disc album for a Wii title that had not been a major commercial success.

Yes, Matsuo’s score runs to four hours in its looped in-game form, making it one of the most expansive soundtracks on the Wii. Thankfully, it also happens to be one of the system’s very best scores. When all is said and done, this masterful work contains no less than three hours of excellent music. Matsuo’s gifts as a composer of lavishly orchestrated, fluidly developed pieces full of exquisite melodies are on full display throughout. Most striking of all may be the way he generates a seemingly endless stream of beautiful melodic writing, usually carried by woodwinds, while blending Japanese and Western orchestrational practices with an ease rivalled by very few other composers.

In this journey across sound worlds, Matsuo follows in Sugiyama’s footsteps and develops the template established in 1995. Naturally, advances in technology and the far longer running time allow him to explore his wide range of instrumental colours with greater detail and variety. While he rarely ventures beyond acoustic-style orchestration on the Shiren the Wanderer 3 soundtrack, Matsuo teases a dazzling array of moods and timbres from his synthesised ensemble.

An impressionistic cue such as “Goten Kaguyagoryou”, with its contentedly glowing and slowly drifting melodies, reprises the mood of the first Shiren the Wanderer’s bucolic village music. When Matsuo leans more strongly into Japanese influences, usually led by shakuhachi and shamisen soli, the mood often turns strikingly ritualistic and austere. On “Toride 1” and “Toride 4”, he evokes a remarkably arid atmosphere through traditional Japanese instruments, setting a scene that feels lonely without becoming bereft of hope or melodic beauty. Elsewhere, he uses his home country’s traditions in a lighter vein. “Goten Tenshu” becomes a nocturnal reverie thanks to its calm shakuhachi solo set against glistening synths. Like “Ryuugaike”, it then surprises by moving from a serene opening into a lively B section without rupturing the carefully conjured atmosphere of enchantment.

It is in the more cinematic pieces that the Shiren the Wanderer 3 soundtrack wears its other major influence, Western classical music, most openly, again to excellent effect. One would hardly expect to encounter a harpsichord on a score like this, yet “Yashiki 1” carries off the surprise effortlessly before developing into one of the soundtrack’s most ambitious and complex cues, combining quiveringly dramatic string writing with a thrilling shakuhachi solo. “Yagura 2” sees Matsuo enjoy himself with the format of a belligerent, brass-heavy march, slipping in humorous undertones. “Warabeuta Kaguya” delivers an unexpected burst of choir- and brass-driven bombast, taking an initially innocent flute melody to unexpectedly theatrical heights. Then there is “Kaguya 3”, a superbly written string adagio that may well be the score’s most melodic and heart-rending composition.

Matsuo’s surest command of orchestral forces is heard in “Epilogue 1” and “Epilogue 2”. The first is a delightful blend of gentle dance rhythms and light-footed call-and-response writing between various solo instruments. Its successor then builds seamlessly from a reflective opening to a mighty brass climax that proves Matsuo at least the equal of Sugiyama when it comes to writing orchestral music of genuinely classical gravitas and splendour.

Like Sugiyama before him, Matsuo combines Japanese and Western instruments with consummate skill. In fact, the Shiren the Wanderer 3 soundtrack may be one of the finest amalgamations of Eastern and Western music in any medium. Again, there is an embarrassment of riches to choose from. “Kaguya” mixes a warm romanticism rooted in Western classical music with Japanese woodwind leads. “Yashiki 2” grafts a shamisen melody onto percolating orchestral woodwind lines to underscore a tense situation in beguiling colours. At the lighter end of the spectrum sits “Touge”, one of the few pieces to feature the pipa more prominently, as two woodwind lines intertwine blissfully against swooning strings. And of course “Staff Roll” is the ideal place to summarise Matsuo’s eclectic yet unified approach, appropriately upbeat and proud as it unfolds through a cornucopia of colours and melodies.

Not many soundtrack enthusiasts associate the Wii with the kind of sweeping, grand RPG score that attracted so many listeners to game music in the first place. Yet that is precisely what Matsuo’s Shiren the Wanderer 3 is: a work of immense stature and boundless melodic invention, at once coherent and kaleidoscopic.