FBM – Overworld Themes Part 8: Four Swords

And so we reach the end of our journey, the last week of the Flute Boy’s Meadow Overworld series. This week, we come to the last category I detailed two months ago in the inaugural post for this series: Menu Overworlds. I had originally said these were “hardly worth the title ‘overworld'” and claimed I may not even give a post in attention to them, but in the end something changed my mind.

As I detailed before, there are only two games in the Zelda series that have a Menu overworld: Four Swords and Four Swords Adventures. They receive that title because they do not have a large, interconnected overworld for Link to travel from place to place in. Instead, they have a menu screen. Still, at least one of these games still offers a good selection of overworld music, so jump on in to see what makes them worth it!

Above, you’ll find the same song I posted with my inaugural post to coincide with the Menu overworlds. Funny thing is, I goofed on that one. It had been a long time since I had played Four Swords, so when I searched YouTube for the Stage Select theme and found that one I assumed it was right. Sure, the tune sounded familiar, but it was actually the tune for the game’s tutorial level “Chambers of Insight.” Of course, I have only played the DSiWare remake of the game released in 2011 for the 25th anniversary so it is entirely possible this track was originally used for the stage select in the GBA version. Anybody who can clarify that, please do so in the comments.

As for the real Stage Select music for this game, well… it doesn’t have one. I even booted up my 3DS to check. As it turns out Four Swords actually plays the music of the currently highlighted level on the stage select screen, so its “Stage Select” music is just the same music from each of the levels. In that sense, this game technically has no overworld theme. There isn’t really a “Hyrule Field” area to use as reference, either. I will admit to being somewhat disappointed by this, but so it goes.

Track: Map/Select
Game: Four Swords Adventures (GCN)

Okay, confession time. I have never played Four Swords Adventures. As of this week it is literally the only Zelda game I have not beaten (having just finished Oracle of Ages, and barring the CD-i abomin- er, games). I hope to remedy that over the summer since a number of my friends have expressed interest in beating it together, but for now I’m left with piecing the game together from its music. You can do that with Zelda games; they’re awesome like that.

Anyways, this track right here is Four Swords Adventures‘ Overworld Theme. It is the song that plays as you are choosing which location on the map to visit, and actually flows straight out of the File Select screen. The track is a rendition of the classic file select and Fairy Fountain music that started with A Link to the Past and continues to be used in today’s Zelda games. This version, however, is much faster paced and has the addition of extra stringed instruments and a quick beat struck up on a snare drum.

Considering it flows straight into this theme from the title music, I must say I absolutely love the use of this song. It is not your conventional overworld theme by any means, in that it is the first thing you hear after loading your file. In this way the song actually works to transition the player from the soft, quiet tune of the File Select and into the excitement of the game. To put it simply this song gets you pumped and ready to go; to quote a YouTube comment, it gives you a “Lock and load!” sort of feeling that prepares you to take on the world with your friends by your side. I had never really heard a rendition of the Fairy’s Fountain that felt as exciting as this tune.

Furthermore…
So, that was the “main overworld” of FSA, but the game does have a number of tracks that also work fairly well as Overworld Themes. These are for the individual stages in the game, but they appear frequently enough to be in the same boat as Hyrule Field. In fact, one track is even called Hyrule Overworld, and is a remake of the overworld from A Link to the Past. There is also a track entitled Lake Hylia which takes cues from Ocarina of Time‘s Hyrule Field. As I dug more into this game’s soundtrack I also found The Dark World, which made me realize that the game’s soundtrack is essentially paying homage to the entire series’ music (especially our favorite SNES game).

In the end, Four Swords Adventures has quite the musical variety. Even if it does not have a set “overworld,” it does have a plethora of overworld themes from throughout the series. Quite a nice surprise for me.

So I have now decided that I really need to play Four Swords Adventures, if anything so I can hear all these great musical homages in their original context. How about you? Have you played this somewhat hard-to-get Zelda game? Did you enjoy its soundtrack, or find it lacking? Let me know your favorite selections in the comments!