MUSIC DIRECTOR REACTS | Final Fantasy XIV - Endwalker - Footfalls 

Big W for Sany Raka and their Patreon Request! Thank you! PATREON 👉 www.patreon.com/drumrolltonyreacts

Endwalker is the culmination of a ten year long story, and Footfalls incorporates the main themes from every other expansion released in that time, and they play alongside the relevant characters to those expansions. Soken is a genius.

You'd be stunned by the variety of in-game music in XIV, it's actually insane.

I like how he was “it makes sense, it’s for a trailer” and we FF14 players are like “it plays in the game in the game and it is sooooo epic”

At about 13:50 you mentioned how it sounds "super contemporary" and like everything is sorta working together, which is actually one of the major themes of this release, the expansion is the culmination of over a decade of story, which mixes so many themes from previous releases, with a story about kinda uniting the world against greater threat. Thematically speaking, this "working together" fits perfectly, and I love it so much. Cool to see you enjoyed the song and especially some of the transitions. Soken's work in general is really interesting and he explores a LOT of genres and styles.

12:15 this section always gets me and the "Higher, oh higher" gives me chills every. friggin. time.

Footfalls is the combination of each ff14 expansion theme combined into 1 song. If you are unfamiliar it may sound very chaotic but knowing the previous themes and seeing Soken combining them into 1 song for the final expansion of the 10 year long story - it's just a masterpiece.

Did he ever figure out that they were a collective of motifs? XD Endwalker, Heavensward, Stormblood, a segment of Torn From the Heavens, Sharlyan's theme, Shadowbringers, and ending with the Endwalker motif. Also, I think if he wants to get the true effect of how the song works with everything, he should watch the full trailer with the voices left in, because so much of the music is structured around the in-scene dialogue as if the sound effects and conversations are actually part of the music.

So the reason the trailer has such a varied sound is because the expansion itself is a huge culmination of the events of the last 10 years of the game, the 3 distinct sections of the song (The Dragon Song is from the expansion Heavansward, the "Storm of Blood" section is from Stormblood, and the stringy bit near the end is from Shadowbringers) before it all comes back to finish the Endwalker portion from the beginning. Great Video, loved hearing your thoughts from your point of view as someone who I imagine, has not played this game.

I love that this is called Endwalker Footfalls, because each time you pointed out a shift in the feel of the type of song it is, it's another "step", another "footfall" in the journey the players have taken in this game. The visual transitions in the trailer hammer home this point, reminding us of where we've been, the people and places that are important to us, to get us to this point as we "walk towards the end" of this arc in the story. I noticed that you noted more often in the back half of the song that the music layers got a lot busier; to me, this reflects an aural storytelling. In the beginning of the trailer, the "player character" stand-in is walking alone, but with each step we've taken on this journey we've gained more, lost more, learned more, building into a climactic finale where everything comes to a head and we must be there to face it with everything we have, and thus why the music itself is so layered and busy.

The final shot of the WoL turning and standing in front of ehteryis with the climax of the song happening always makes me tear up

Footfalls is essentially a collection of leitmotifs from the previous expansions’ main thematic soundtrack scores.

Koji Fox is so impressive man. He was just a localizer with basically no background in music besides an anecdotal experience with the drums. Now he has become a crazy good lyricist. His style meshes so well with how Soken writes/composes the songs and Soken pushes the fuck out of his ability. I remember my Jaw dropping when I heard Rise for the first time. It's a running joke that he basically had to manipluate time to fit all the lyrics in the space that he did. He has slowly become a pretty good voalist as well. Basically every new primals song he gets better and better. I think the coolest part about FF14 music is how many version of each song they make. They make individual covers, trailer music, actual in game music, and remasters of basically every single song in the game.

Definitely gotta check out Dragonsong or Answers sometime. Dragonsong is just an all around beautiful song. Answers, while you won't have the context of the entire game to appreciate the meaning of it, is also a beautiful song that has this really great build throughout it.

Like everyone else said, this is the trailer for the climax of a story 10 years in the making. I think part of why the final section is so loud is because it's like a minute-long crescendo celebrating both the players and the game's milestone achievement.

Whenever you see "Music: Masayoshi Soken and The Primals" then "Lyrics: Michael-Christopher Koji Fox" - you're in for a ride. FF14 has amazing music, amazing everything. But personally my favourite one is Shadowbringers

endwalker truly couldn't have come at a better time. like so many feeling lost and on the edge of giving up, endwalker was my reminder to "forge ahead" and that succumbing to despair isn't the answer. the last section hits so hard, "you're not alone" was a message i think so many of us needed to hear.

It's probably been said a bunch already, but you can think of this as a medley of all the main themes for each expansion that came before this one along with some location themes from the expansion itself. So watching all the trailers, or at least hearing thier songs, gives a lot of musical context to this piece.

This is a very busy song, even in all 14 songs, lol. It flowed from melodies of main themes of previous expansions of the game, along to a whole new chapter, (which is only fully revealed in the final battle of the main story here). A crazy rollercoaster.

I really appreciate your reactions. these songs are as familiar to me as classical christmas tunes and your reactions help me hear things I hadn't noticed before and they help me appreciate the music all over again. *internet wave* from a fellow Seattleite. If Distant Worlds ever comes back to town, you should go see them!

This song is a journey. I apprecate the attention to the percussion you gave. Not many reactors talk about it. The sheer volume of great tracks in FF14 is staggering. If you like that 90s vibe, two songs from the game I recommend checking out. Oblivion and Scream.

If variety is the spice of life, then Tony you just found it. This song is 🔥

oh no. oh NO. you cant do this to me as a critically insane ffxiv player. now you have to listen to every single song and praise them to the ends of the earth, thank you

Who reccomended this song to him without letting him listen to all the other leitmotifs. 😅 The best part of this song is the journey through the previous songs which highlights the new songs.

That last section is my ABSOLUTE favourite ever, this whole song is incredible and means so much to me. FFXIV is such a massive part of my life and i have so much passion for it. The music is incredible

10:30 This part is spefically a mix in of the main theme of your player character, The Makers Ruin, at this part of the trailer they start talking about 'you'.

13:20 That "pung pung" I believe is supposed to be an alarm sound, makes sense in the context of the dire situation the story was at that point. Soken does like to do that, like adding the sound of a ticking clock to the BMG of a zone that's frozen in time (Amaurot's theme).

If you've played this game for 10 years and don't get tears of joy in your eyes while listening to this song, you're a robot.

our song of hope 😍

This hits differently when you realise its a composition of all the previous expansion's theme's that came before since this marks the end of the current story. So for a player everytime you get the transitions and you realise where they're from you get HYPED

This song does include a lot of parts and motifs from other songs in the expansion, by the way! Also, fun fact: Final Fantasy XIV set two Guinness World Records for longest end credits in an MMO, and most original pieces of music in a videogame! There are so many amazing original compositions in this game, and I hope that you revisit it and look at some more of them. From more recent songs in the game, I highly recommend "Scream". (Not to be confused with "Silent Scream," which is the same song, but without the vocal track. Though, it could also be neat to look at if you want a closer listen to the instruments.)

The reason this song seems so chaotic and everywhere is because its a medley of all the past expansions up until the release of this one. The trailer is for the expansion that ended the 10 year long overarching plot of the game, so musically it's chronicling our journey up to this point. the song basically breaks down like this: intro grunge sound: first half of this expansions leitmotif full male choir section with con lang: the first expansion after the game reboot, which was a gothic high fantasy knights vs dragons holy war expac. musical influences were very much piano, claviger, pipe organs, bagpipes and anything that screams church music. Fire and tower section with the shrieking guitars: second expac, which was the revolution/freedom fighter story. it dealt with oppression and war, and how to find the courage and will to cast off the oppression of an empire that has spent decades grinding 2 separate nations down to dust. it's main theme was originally composed more like a national anthem with lots of brass but also asian intrument influences since we're liberating nations in both the east and west. this section kicks ass imo, since the leitmotif works amazingly in this composition with the vocalist and shrieking guitars giving it the edge and calling back to the war fronts we were fighting on. hard cut into symphony/piano section: this is the base game theme "Torn from the Heavens" and it's the musical foundation of the game. the main melody that serves as your springboard into all the expansions to come and such a beautiful rendition calling back to how you started, overlaid by images of some of your closest companions. It is also one of the most emotionally loaded songs for the composer of this piece, since it was the first song he composed for the game after they decided they were going to nuke the game and re-build it in hopes of saving it. It's literally the swansong of the base game. The female vocal section/zoom in on new city: the second half of the new main theme. "A song of Hope" is incredibly on the nose, as this expansion dealt with utter despair and how to overcome it. Walk down bassline with lady coming down the stairs ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-15SSjaoCHSI.html : theme of the expansion right before this. It was the first rock heavy theme of the expansion and one that was filled with massive revelations that lead into where this expansion would take us. which is why it's so seamless when it leads us back into the new expac theme. Zoom out from circle room and lyrics come in: Return to new expac theme and we stay in that theme as a bookend to the trailer. Basically, this theme is amazing if you've played through the game since it resonates with the hundreds or thousands of hours you've already played through. 10/10

The amount of quality songs in FFXIV is insane as is the sheer variety but the most impressive thing to me is how consistently good they always are.

That section "Storm of Blood" @7:30(?) is a direct tie to one of the previous expansions, Stormblood, and its theme song. Not sure if you've reviewed that one yet (or if you will), but it's a nice reminder for the players of where we've been on the trip of where we're going.

Always enjoy these videos. In particular, I enjoy HOW you listen to these tracks; that you pause regularly to point things out, but also rewind a few seconds whenever you resume, so you can appreciate the "flow" of a song. Especially songs with loads of crazy transitions like this.

I am a xiv player and i have to admit that XIV and Square has such great music in it that shows respect to its old expansions and older games.

For anybody who has actually seen the end of Endwalker .0, when that part at 11:03 kicks in, memories of a certain part come flooding in, it was... probably one of the most masterfully done parts in the entire game, where everything comes together for a ridiculously epic scene.

@DrumRollTony Thanks for this cool reaction video! As a Final Fantasy 14 Gamer i wanna say here: The Trailer Song has combined every Expansion that was released so far. The Choir was from Heavensward, the Sword of Blood part is from Stormblood and the part with "One bring Shadow one bring Light" is from Shadowbringers. With Endwalker the whole 10 year old Arc of Zodiark and Hydaelyn ended, that's why they did some kind of remix with all expansions and the basic game A realm Reborn to contribute this whole journey of 10 years. If you are not familiar with the storyline and played those expansions you don't know, where those songs come from. That's why i think, that non-Final Fantasy players might think, that this song is very chaotic, but tbh i love it! It gave me this epic hype for the expansion when Square Enix shared it with the world the first time. What i would really love to see as a reaction video is "Scream" from Masayoshi Soken. It's my absolute favorite Song of the game and was a song of two raid fights in Endwalker, here is the link! It was a very popular song of this expansion and i know like maybe 2 people that don't have the opinion that it's a banger

One cool thing to do , even off stream , could be to listen back to the FF14 trailer songs , and notice the sections that are lifted from them , and thrown and referenced into Footfalls . Even without being invested in the game and the visuals it's rather fun .

It's an awesome build-up of all the previous expansion themes that in the end call the player to go on. It was a huge move for the dev team to make an "ending" in a MMORPG that's supposed to be endless. Even if the game ends with this or player decides that it's enough for them

In the actual trailer, at the points in the song where the lyrics are crashing and chanting over each other, there's usually a voice over of a character saying dramatic things, which the scrambled chorus is serving as a background to, making audible uncontrolled excitement for the dramatic words being spoken.

I really felt this was jam packed with so much music. I also agree it was very loud. I kinda loved it.

you should do some final fantast 16 music, its the newest game, and the soundtrack is INSANE

Also the style kept changing and in the end went back to the style from the start, is showing it comes a full circle.

This game was such an insane emotional journey, and this song still shakes up these feelings months later. Cant count how many times I legit teared up playing this 😅

Someone request "The Black Wolf stalks Again" ! Such a great track

I really loved the mixed music sorts for the different zones, settings and the feelings that comes with the scenes, like yshtola's part of showing standing her ground, to the council the music just showed her badass mode even more. The whole mix is to show us the expansion as a whole idea. It is a wild ride, just like the song. You do kinda miss the conversations on some bits here though, which make it less immersive for me since we worked up to this story piece with these npcs in the trailer. Seeing them in trailers makes me proud to know em 😂 im a nerd i knowwww

I love your perspective while analyzing this piece. Ive been playing FFXIV and you point out so many things with this OST that are super interesting!! you do a very good job with your descriptions, and i like to hear your opinion without an emotional element to it (?)!! :))

These trailers often include motifs that will return throughout the expansion in different forms and guises. It is a pleasure to play trough the game and pick up on how Soken utilises leitmotivs, (dis)harmonies and such. A great example would be this expansions boss fight "Endcaller" (Zodiark) which utilises a lot of the themes here in a very different context.

All the different musical sections with the more dramatic tonal shifts were the main themes of the previous expansions, so it was sorta revisiting the past games in leitmotif.

FFXIV: Endwalker is basically the Avengers: Infinity War/Avengers: Endgame of MMORPGs, to put it simply.

My favorite sections are the Old Sharlayan and Estinien sections, so the fantasy language and when the song kinda sounds aetherial and floaty, but I'm actually quite fond of the last segment as well. It starts off very energetic with a single layer of vocals, before drifting higher and adding a second layer of vocals. It sounds a lot more hopeful than the section at the very beginning but it's also more ordered, or aligned, than the very chaotic Stormblood section. I think that kinda fits the themes and story wonderfully, being that energetic ray of hope, all working together for a brighter future. And even if it may sound a bit overwhelming, I always feel like it has a clear direction, and in the end, the vocals align for the "Forge ahead" but the vocals also slow down and I think that has a beautifully hopeful and calming effect, after all the chaos of the song, before finally ending in the style that it began, which just feels fitting. I don't know if any of that makes sense. I suck at music theory, I just like the game and the song, but I really like how that section works thematically in the context of both the song and the game, and it ends on such a nice note. Endwalker has always been about finding hope and love in the face of overwhelming despair, at least to me, and I love how this song represents that, while also retracing your Footsteps (fitting name) through the themes of previous expansions.

So my take as a musician of why the song continued to rise and rise and get louder with more kids and at the end all the highs is due to how the story culminates over the 10-year run. It starts very base level and introspective. By the end, we are heading to a place called “Ultima Thule” which is the ultimate north or ultimate far reaches. In the game context, it’s literally the other end of the known universe, or the furthest “up” you can go. I almost imagine this trailer song as taking off into space going higher and higher and further away from the base level.

Love what you do. Stay awesome!

All the theme songs from all expansions smashed into one amazing work!

Glad you seemed to enjoy the piece overall! You were def dropped into the deep end as far as music from these games go with so many different styles in these trailer pieces lol. I hope you get a chance to listen to the other tracks of this game since they're so varied in style! There's melancholic piano tracks (Tomorrow & Tomorrow), apocalyptic goblin rap (Rise), a dragon-focused ballad and lament (Dragonsong), a naval electronic rock shanty about a robot pill bug (eScape), and my personal favourite, orchestral choir... with horror strings! (The Queen Awakens). As a game on its own, it won the Guiennes Record for most original tracks in a videogame. It has a looooot of depth and variety in its tracks thanks to the work of Nobuo Uematsu (former lead composer and grandfather of FF music in general), Masayoshi Soken (lead composer for everything after the base game), and everyone else involved. It really is a monster of a tracklist to tackle but, the more music experts talking about these tracks the better imo.

First thing I picked up in this track was the funky rhythm on the guitar. I think it might sound better on a flatter pair of headphones. You said your headphones really bring out the mids, and that might make it sound muddy because there's a lot going on in the mids here.

Hell yeah, so glad to see you get into FF content. Looking forward to you reacting to XVI’s tracks.

I'm sure you've already been told but the reason it incorporates so many different themes is due to the fact each one represents one of the expansions in the game as Endwalker is the final arc in FFXIV's first major saga

One thing I love with a lot of Sokens work is how its incorporated in the game. At times some of the lyrics just click for the place your in. And to top it off it incorporates music from every expansion seemlessly, just so darn good.

Part of why so many different styles are woven into this song is that this particular expansion is the end of a 10 year story arc that covers the base game and four expansions. Different sections of the song bring back musical elements from the main themes of all of those. That last section tho? That is pure "endgame" and for me, tied to the story line at the end of this arc and what has led to it, it's just this defiantly triumphant climax to the whole musical journey.

The late 90s rocked dude

This song is end walkers theme but its also a culmination of 10 years of the games life and stories told through each expansion while remaining its own unique piece, and they nailed it so gard

I think part of why some areas are so differnt is because it's a trailer, so they feature music that would be in the diffrent areas / parts of the game that are being added in. Some parts are also just like strings becuase in the actual trailer there would be spoken diaulog there.

the transitions at like 5:04 are actually inclusions of each major expansions main theme to basically say everything has been leading up to this one point in the game

I never thought that Sam Carter did the vocals until watching this. Awesome stuff!

Sam from the Architects is so good please listen to their music And Amanda Achen's voice is just wonderful

If there is a genre of music, there is likely a FF XIV song that uses it at some point. The variety is amazing with what Soken has used hearkening back to the original Uematsu FF music and took it in every direction.

Only Final Fantasy 14 fans will truly understand and appreciate the callbacks in this song

Anyone else forget we weren’t listening to the ACTUAL opening and just the song itself and was waiting for all the dialogue? 😅 “I knew it. This star still has secrets to tell. Take care my friend.”

It's not just in the trailer, it's in the actual game. No trailer music for the game isn't excluded from the game itself.

You reviewed Footfalls from FFXIV, I sub. Keep it up man, your react was on point.

Yes the differents you heard is all the main theme of all extension in the game. That's why you heard mutliple change in the song

Like many others said, this has many elements of other songs. For example 12:30 "one brings shadow..." is from shadowbringer, which you also reacted to.

One thing that's easy to miss if you're not into Final Fantasy 14 is that Endwalker is the culmination of the epic story that's been told since the start of the game, known as the Hydaelyn saga. So every section of the song is a reference to the original game or one of the expansions (in order), and the stories and characters within that arc of the story. There are references to the title music for each portion of the game, as well as leitmotifs for major characters and places. So as a standalone piece of music it may feel very disjointed, but as piece of music that is meant to invite players into the final chapter of a story they've been a part of for a full decade, it's really very thematic.

goosebumps everytime

Would recommend Answers, Dragonsong, Revolutions, Fiend, Dedicated to Moonlight and my favourite of all, Flow. There are many more that could be (and probably have been) recommended and are definitely very good. But I really love these ones in particular.

I think that the endwalker theme embodies rebelling well in their loud song :) that and the cries of war

I had never read the lyrics of the second voice at the very end of the song. God dammit I'm crying again.

The song and trailer are amazing on their own... but if watched with the voice lines its a whole nuther level... maybe even for someone that has never played but of course for those of us that have.

If you thought this was weird, you should give The Final Day/With Hearts Aligned a listen to. There's also an orchestral version. ETA: The thing about their trailers is that it always involves a boss fight track. So, for those curious, the first portion is the base melody for the expansion (Footfalls), second the callback to Nidhogg's boss trial (Revenge of the Horde) and the release trailer (Heavensward), third is the Stormblood expansion's dungeon boss theme (Triumph) that was also used for the closure of the cinematic trailer for Stormblood (Storm of Blood), fourth is "Torn from the Heavens" which has been present since at least A Realm Reborn, fifth is another theme for Endwalker and a portion of With Hearts Aligned, the sixth is Shadowbringers and the first phase of Hades's fight (it is also a motif used in several songs for that expansion including To the Edge), the line "tumbling to the never" part is another line from With Hearts Aligned, and it ends with the other portion of Footfalls. Long list of leitmotifs is long.

Oh shit, I have a feeling he might like this one. It is really varied.

The reason the composition is so chaotic is that it's incorporating motifs from the main theme songs of all prior expansions, and those motifs have very different rhythmic and melodic ideas going on.

Someone should have mentioned to him that this song pulls from main themes of the other expansions.

for most FF14 fans, i completely imagine most stop what they're doing when they hear that first guitar cord. grabbing and donning their different gear and just walking calmly towards the massive shit storm that is rolling their way like, "whelp...here we go."

I like that this song is basically a throwback to every main themes of all the previous expansions.

Aluminium sound is a fun wording since the theme color of the ekspansion was Platinum/silvery shining, kinda transcension of gray. I somehow think that the aluminium sound is there for that reason.

the ff14 arc has begun guys. the shadowbringers reaction wasn’t a fluke!

Probably weird for any person who hasn't played the game but this song still has me tearing up so bad.

Do as you must then, but we scions will fight. Until the heavens fall. Until our last breath!

We gotta get some 16 songs in here!

I'm glad you think the music is good. Perhaps it's nerdy or ridiculous, but for many XIV players, this isn't just music - they're events, feelings, & memories.

Hope he reacts to In The Balance!!

While this one is a medley of sorts of every leitmotif from all previous expansions. The song Endsinger (The Final Day) is a similar concept but with the medley of every expansion end boss theme woven in to one tapestry. Depending on what style you prefer, if you like the more orchestra leaning stuff the standouts would be The Worm's Tail, Endcaller and Revenge of the Horde.

The Black Wolf Stalks Again is a great listen!

finally FFXIV content! Please do more from this game! the soundtrack is one of the greatest in modern gaming!

Awesome song. I still listen to this, it's on my tunes playlist when I go out. etc

FFXIV often puts lyrics in songs that blend with a lot of the instrumentation, and I think it's intentional. A lot of the trailers have dialogue going, and games historically don't using lyrics in music during dialogue, but I think they did this intentionally to give the music more depth underneath the dialogue while not distracting from it if that makes sense. FFXIV does this a ton even during the game. There's a song that plays towards the end of the main scenario of endwalker *spoilerish* where the culmination of all the game and expansions is finally and fully explained by the main goddess in the game, and the lyrics underneath are ALSO telling the story as well. It's intense.

I know my reaction to this is 8 months later, but it kind of bugged me enough to comment. This video is a COMPILATION of all the themes of the last 4 expansions because it was the culmination of the 10 year story line they were building to. That's why all the themes are so different.

great commentary and reaction. loved endwalker which is the conclusion of 10 years of ff14 story. liked and subscribed