July 4th is almost upon us once again. Time again we honor a bunch of patriotic stuff like the color red, blue, and white, those guys and gals that stick their necks out for us, and the BBQ pit. Try not to burn your eyebrows this time. If this week’s release is anything to go by, one does not play video games for the week of July 4th, unless it’s a music game in which case it’s totally copacetic.

Remember. Release dates are quite literally made at the whims of the publisher.  The following are subject to change without any warning.

 

Honorable Mention

Theatrhythm Final Fantasy (3DS)

Tuesday July 3, 2012

Pop quiz hot shot! Hum a Role Playing Game battle theme right now. NOW! Let me guess, you hummed one of the many battle themes from a Final Fantasy game didn’t you? Arguably one of the most prolific contributors to various “Greatest Video Game Music Evar” lists, the Final Fantasy series has an enormous library of soundtracks just waiting to be exploited by Square Enix for any number of cash ins. Oddly enough, Theatrhythm Final Fantasy appears to be the first one to do just that.

Theatrhythm consists of three types of musically related mini-games: Field, Event, and Battle. Each one accompanied by Final Fantasy music that matches the mini-game type. The Field mini-game type and tends to be slower and far less bombastic than the other two mini-game types to match the normally slow paced music of overworld themes. The Battle type pits four moppet caricatures (more on that later) of Final Fantasy characters against famous enemies from the series like Ultros or those petrification-loving Coeurls. I’m sure there’s a Marlboro somewhere in there too. This one looks the most like Guitar Hero with little circles coming down a track for you to tap in time with the music. The Event type seems to be for any other music that doesn’t fit the other two and looks to play very much like Elite Beat Agents where circles would show up on the touch screen that needs to be tapped in time with the music. These are accompanied by a cutscene from whichever game it comes from.

This being a Final Fantasy title, Theatrhythm has an RPG twist as well. The previously mentioned moppet caricatures can be leveled up giving them new abilities like more health for those Battle type games and various other abilities. They can even use items like potions, which are used automatically after certain conditions are met.

Of course, not everybody necessarily knows the tunes of Final Fantasy compared to Black Sabbath or Aerosmith, so making a music game themed around a video game series, even one as popular as the FF franchise, may not necessarily appeal to everyone. That said, I can’t name any other franchise that can pull this off. Can you?

 

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