Music Producer Reacts: Moon Halo (Honkai Impact OST) 

As I was editing the video I have to say that I noticed more and more oxymorons and symbolism in this track's lyrics!. If you find yourself being drawn to this track a lot I'm sure it must be because of that too, it's like a book where you discover more details the more times you read it! Didn't notice that on first listen because I always focus on instruments and the music itself first (and I consider voice as just another instrument). Usually my brain will notice lyrics after a bunch of listens, and focus firsthand on how everything sounds, the "acting" of the vocalists as they sing etcetera. Also one other thing I've noticed! The very high "may all" at 08:36 is a melodic call-back to the violin doing the same thing at the start of the track at 01:30. Not sure if that means anything but I thought that was cool!

I think this song works a lot better "in context", because there are a lot of callbacks and references to older songs and the story in general both in the lyrics and the instruments, especially to songs like Nightglow, Starfall, and Rubia..

There are three singers, each representing the main characters of the game: - Chalili: singer of Reburn (same name of the first Honkai teaser trailer), representing Kiana. - Tetracalyx: CN VA of GGZ/Honkai Gakuen Raiden Mei, lyricist of Regression (highly recommended listen), representing Mei. - Hanser: Vtuber (VirtualRealStar), CN VA of Bronya, singer of Cyberangel (the only upbeat song in the entire game), representing Bronya. The song is supposed to symbolize Kiana's journey from her lowest point to her highest point, which is why there are so many callbacks to the previous songs (Nightglow, Cyberangel, Starfall, and Rubia) in the lyrics, most notably the chorus. This song is also the point where she finally accepted her mentor's sacrifice, since that was her struggle way back: the fact that people sacrificed themselves to win. The trailer OSTs are just as good. Fantasy Note (from the Fallen Rosemary trailer) is an example of how a violin gives people a pseudo-orgasm. The main character is less innocent and more...optimistic, so to speak. The optimism comes from the support from her friends and mental fortitude after countless amounts of suffering, guilt, and despair.

Non-honkai players: *Sounds beautiful* Honkai Impact players: _intense crying_ It’s been a long journey everyone.

jack (comment from moon halo official video) Nightglow: "Never let you go" Moon halo: "I will never go" Rubia: "Find a way back home" Moon halo: "There is a way back home" Starfall: "I want no tomorrow or yesterday" Moon halo: "Brighter than tomorrow or yesterday" CyberAngel: "Through my wings've been bloodstained and could never" Moon halo: "Unfold this pair of wings for me again" Honkai world diva: "Crimson moon shines upon a town that is smeared in blood Moon halo: "Turned into a moon that always tells warmth" Moon Halo actually the song which represent whole honkai story and the main character.

"You're just sad" is honestly a very apt description of how the game's story makes people feel sometimes

You've introduced me so so many good video game soundtracks, all I can say is I'm grateful for them

(sees Honkai Impact in title) (immediately clicks on video) as someone who plays Honkai Impact 3rd, yes there's quite a lot of story to the moment this happens (25 chapters into the story, which was after about 5 years of story development in the game).

Dude your Ear Drums are NEXT LEVEL! I am amazed by how you are able to pin point the plot the themes of the story that the song tries to convey so accurately, by just the musical instruments them selfs. The lyrics are just the confirmation for you not the hints. I've been watching your other videos aswell outside of just the Mihoyo stuff. It's scary how accurate you are everytime you analyze the song about what the songs tries to convey about the story. It's an amazing talent my man! 10 out of 10 would come to here any of you musics analysis videos again!😎

If you want more Honkai Impact, I really suggest the recently released Regression and Nightglow (although it is a bit spoiler heavy on the story and is much more understood from a story perspective honestly). These two songs, along with Moon Halo are the real tear jerkers but still unironically a bop and worth a listen. Edit: Damn, he actually managed to mostly hit the nail on the head about the story just using the melody. It made me realize that I focused more on the lyrics more than anything. This man is insane.

HI3 cinematic songs have been telling a story for a while and have been kind of a crazy progression for hoyomix as you can watch how they progressively get better over the past 4 years. Moon Halo is my favorite, but I don't think it hits as hard if you haven't listened to "Befall", "Nightglow", "Cyberangel", "Starfall", then, "Moon Halo".

I love how much more in depth this analysis is compared to your past ones, this is definitely a step above.

Moon Halo is great but def should've started with one of the the other songs as Moon Halo is a reference to all the other ones. Starfall, Nightglow, Befall would've been great. Or even some PV themes like Fallen Rosemary's which is literally just the murder of a violin from how rich the sound is. Great video as always though Alex!

YOU MADE MY YEAR THANK YOU SO MUCH DOING THIS AHHHHHHHHHHH

I'm crying like a b*tch everytime I hear this song. Even though I'm not playing Honkai Impact, I have a basic gist of the story. I can relate to the story because they have the same relationship of Naruto and Jiraiya. A teacher sacrificing himself/herself to his/her students always hit me. :(

this song became by favourite after i listened to it surpassing will of the herrscher and last lesson's songs. the song for the recent honkai video thus spoke apocalypse was also great.

Honkai's music definitely isn't something you would put on repeat if you didn't go through it story yourself. For me, every time I listen to one the songs on Honkai, I can leave me in tears no matter how many times I've listened to it. Surprisingly even more than Endwalker did, though that might just be me. If anyone reading this is interested in the story, please try this game, it's absolutely beautiful

I see you mention you want the modulation at the end, I just want to explain that, this song is not just for performance purpose. It exist for a CG cut scene, the song, the whole purpose of the songs, the lyrics and the harmony is to serve the cg and the story telling, it must support the tune and the scene of the CG, it can't stand too out.

You are truly have a great sense of music You were able to get so much info correct just from listening to the song!!!(reminds of your genshin videos) I hope you play Honkai too someday

I think a bit of the problem with the Honkai vocal tracks is that they all heavily connect with both the animated CG they go with and usually require the context of the situation to really understand and feel for the lyrics if not the music in whole (for example at the end you felt modulation was needed, but the scene for that was kind of a...send off if you would, so your guess as to why they did it aside from keeping the original vocal was probably right). While that's not to say the analysis wasn't compelling from a purely musical side, I'm not sure if this quite...fits for the messages the songs put out. Now if you want to try listening to some songs that would go great for pure musical analysis, I recommend the version PV tracks, specifically...4.2 and 4.4 if we're starting out and you dont care about the light spoilers in the video. You'll have a LOT to disect there.

great video! seriously, your content is really high quality, I love how you analyse things!

You should react to "regression" or "befall" from honkai impact too!!

As a Honkai veteran, you will definitely enjoy analysing these Honkai songs, especially the latest one "Regression" or "Rubia". even songs from Punishing Gray Raven! they're all absolute bangers! P.S: You are correct about this song being sad infact this game storyline death scenes are just pure depressing yet its soo good!

I feel like this song becomes far better with context since there's a lot of call backs to previous songs as well.

I knew beforehand that Honkai music is absolutely emotional but prob not fit for BLIND reactions. That said, Alex managed to say a whole lot, kinda cool. But yes, its first and foremost a song FOR the cinematic

8:47 Okay, you can't just NOT make a full cover of this now. IT'S SO GOOD

Thank you for reaching the beautiful song so far in honkai impact. May all be beauty be blessed

You know, what's really interesting is that when I heard your modulated versions--and this is probably because I have listened to this song so many times that I'm used to how it goes--the key changes somehow feel off. Yet everything you mentioned is something that's so common in epic orchestral pieces, and I know exactly the effect you mean. I think I don't feel that it fits here because the moment itself isn't really about a grand heroic victory. It's more about finally being willing to ask for help, accepting yourself as you are, and finally letting go of guilt and grief. It's the moment when Meteion clings to your hands and cries for Hermes, when an addict admits that they have a problem. The victory is intimate and close, but there is still a long road ahead. It's a moment of respite but not the end.

Out of context, it is indeed quite the emotional piece With context, this is an absolute rollercoaster of emotions, and one of the few things in media that have actually had me starting to tear up. It is absolutely major spoilers, but if you don't really care for that, try watching the Everlasting Flames animated short. Having that story bit, along with the song, is what hits so hard.

This song meant hope and closure at least for me Also uplifting isn't something they do in this game

you gotta listen to some more honkai stuff, not even a reaction just on your own time, shit’s incredible

Just one thing we all Captains always scream : "MAY ALL THE BEAUTY BE BLESSED"

I grabbed my headphones so fast you wouldnt beleive.

Honkai music is on a whole other LEVEL. SO glad to see you react to it 🙌

Beautiful break down. As a Honkai and Genshin player, you are dead on the background of how the music represents the story. Much love.

I just came from "regression" from honkai impact 3. I am crying again. My heart still hurts from that. You should check it out! It is beautiful!!

BBBRRROOO, I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR YOU TO REACT THIS FOREVER!!!

Can we talk about how this song is probably one of the only songs that uses the company's iconic quote in their song? "May all the beauty be blessed" is implying their quote "Fight for all that's beautiful in the world" and honestly it's the most beautiful things I've heard cuz it shows how much passion they gave their first 3d mobile game.

Yup, Moon Halo is definetly a song for the Honkai Impact, not just the game but to the comunity as well. This song is so beloved in Honkai community is because it showing all what happen and the progression of the game, story and community after 4 years of running. Like how the game keep improving and advancing for the better, how the story grew with so many stuff and emotion happening, how the character grew into an adult/better version of themself after long of struggle in life, and how the HI community follow it all and grow up with the game and most of all is the sacrifice of a beloved mentor by the characters and by the comunity that must be accepted after 2 years of waiting for confirmation while hoping for she still alive somehow. And when that confirmation is come, those 2 years of waiting with hope fall to community, making us sad to cry and forcing us to accept it and move one like the character in the story while honoring her sacrifice. It is maybe a bit simple for a song but it is the most impactful song for HI3rd story and community.

i do agree that the song itself felt stable and missing some cool stuff, but i think the song was supposed to play along with the animation. there were a specific moments that makes the song and the dialogue felt so good and emotional. i think they made the song this way because they didn't want to make the song overpowers the dialogue or moments in the animation.

try "Starfall" (also a Honkai OST)! it's one of my favourite songs from the game, but ngl, every song from the game makes me get the urge to cry cause they're so emotional

Really awesome to see you doing a reaction for Honkai Impact 3rd! I agree with a lot of the points you made and your criticisms are on point as always. You hit the nail on the head about the track being designed for the scene, the majority of Honkai tracks seem to be composed this way, so it is incredibly difficult to feel their weight without having the context from the very tragic story that is meant to accompany it. Keep up the awesome work, Alex! 😊 👍 May all the beauty be blessed!

Awesome analysis! I'm thrown aback each time about how much detail Hoyomix put into their tracks

I have been waiting for this banger!!

Man, you should react to Fallen Rosmary and Elysia theme!

when i tell you i screamed seeing this on my recommended- i love your music analyses to bits and honkai is so special to me, especially this song in particular.

What a pleasant suprise!!

Thank you RU-vid for recommending this cuz I totally missed out this video and only recently playing to this part of the game

moon halo !! i agree with some people in the comments when they say that this song is better with context or if you have heard the earlier songs (nightglow, starfall, and rubia preferably) and also, would like to see you react to the trailers (Phantom of the Theaters is one of my favs) as theyre such a banger

I did not expect you to cover Honk but wow 🥺

Always good to see a new video from you and to be introduced to some new music. I'd love to see a turtorial for how you process your vocals!

I really hope you check out even more songs from this game cause holy crap

When he modulated that repeating part it really hit 100 harder!! I really wish they did that in the original song I could cry😭😭

Man, I'm crying again when the chorus part start

Ok, you've gotta be pulling my leg now. You said you've never played Honkai Impact before, yet you nail EVERY SINGLE LITTLE DETAIL that goes by the people that played the game up to the point the song plays, just by listening to the first seconds of the music... Teach me your ways, please!

LETS GOOOOOOOOOO ive been waiting for this moment

When I watch your video, I always appreciate how you deeply disassemble the notes and tones to explain the music. The last part when you pointed out about how this song "stays"... it stunned me. I think you actually got the point of whole part this track took in the game, just by listening to it. Im not gonna write down what happend in the game line by line here, but I really felt it. For stubborn guy like me, its kinda surprise that whole storyline actually was gathered in the track, or that just little nuance in the melody, and well talented and skilled person like you, can actually reverce-engineer it from these notes. bravo to your video! bravo! I just gonna go back and watch the cutscene again! thank you!

Hey! One of their very bestest tracks or Oracle for the second chapter of A Post Honkai Odyssey. That song will have your eyes rolling it’s so good

Alex: pause the music Audience: cant stop the tears

After playing the game go back to this track and you'll see just how emotional this song is and just shows even when the main characters are in struggle they still manage to fight on. All for the beautiful in this world.

I am really happy you listened to this song. This song references past songs and the painful journey so far with the lyrics and the beautiful three vocals. Amazing video as always.

as a honkai player whenever u listen songs from the game, it s an instant tears

Thanks you for the great vid and info!

"You're just sad, that's the vibe im getting" basically every honkai storyline.

The composer of this song (fella by the name of Zoe) said the melody for this song came to him in a dream.

The thing about the vocal music in honkai is that you really need the context in order to get the full range of intended emotions. Like this song is HYPE in Everlasting Flames (Especially the "May all the beauty be blessed" part). The unfortunate part is that watching Everlasting Flames would be *heavy* spoilers. So what I'm saying is that you should probably play the game. *Be prepared to cry your heart out for several reasons*. In the meantime, you've got some trailer music to breakdown like Rosemary's Nocture and Infinite Future

"Fight for all that's beautiful in the world"

Thinking back at it, the other songs for Honkai like Befall, Nightglow, Rubia, etc, were much more bombastic and impactful, yet Moon Halo carries its message through purity and simplicity, a sincerity of it that doesn't need anything special to carry itself because the memories, the weight of its words are only truly understood after walking through the story at every step. If anything, it is exactly for this reason that the message is so powerful, as its not just a song for Honkai players, its a culmination and resolution.

I hope you could get to know the story of Honkai in order to better understand the references being made in the song. Thank you for doing this, though! It's interesting to listen to opinions of the song from someone who's not into the lore.

When I first saw people proposing this track of all tracks from the game for you to listen to I was kinda hesitating, because as you said, music in video games is almost always accompanied by the context of the video game itself and this song, sadly or not, has an incredibly bigger impact once you have the full context. Although, at the end, you managed to get this perfectly analyzed as always, personally I thought about Rubia, by Zhou Shen, cause when it comes to the artistic value I think this is one of the strongest if not THE strongest song Hoyoverse/Mihoyo has given us so far. Maybe you'll give it a listen in your free time without the analysis video. As always, it's a pleasure to listen to your analysis and reaction bro, stay awesome!

May all beauty blease

May all the beauty be blessed

OMG! I JUST SUDENLY GET THIS SONG ON SPOTIFY AND THEN I CHECK ALEX CHANNEL AND THE LATEST VIDIO IS THIS VIDIO OMG

May all the beauty be blessed. :)

Oh boy, so glad you looked at something Honkai! While Genshin is more large scale and epic, more of a traditional hero story; Honkai is more of a tragedy, following the lives of the characters in the front lines of a huge world encompassing struggle. As many have said, this song is referencing many previous songs, countering the negative points in those songs, giving more hope. Honkai has much more vocals in the songs, and tends to lean to the more emotional side of things. If I was to suggest anything from Honkai, it would be the most recent song, Regression, which I've been listening to on loop for weeks since it came out.

You should react to more of honkai soundtracks to see the more "Lyrical and techno-orchestral" side of HoYo-Mix I would recommend Fantasy Note (Fallen Rosemary character theme) and Befall.

Honkai impact 3rd is an underrated gem and I’m so glad to see you delving into its music!

In signora topic you really describe her story just because of her boss music. Love it. Gonna watch the signora music reaction of yours next.

I love your analysis, I start to admire game music because of you. I love it even more when you give suggestion like this. I'm sure it'll be very useful to them.

Yooooooo WHAAAAAAT, Alex react Honkai Impact 3 MOONHALO song ?!?!?!?! What an Epic

I recommend you watch the animation as the song is cut differently and spread over 8 minutes where each section fits the scene

It's nice to see Honkai getting noticed too 😁 One of my favourite songs from Honkai is Oaths from A Post-Honkai Odyssey and Cyberangel. It would be interesting to see your take on it 😳😳 with that aside this video was amazing and i hope to see more of this 😍

I would LOVE if you analize some of the ender lilies music, or the library of ruina's songs, those was composed by a japanese/multinational band called mili, and their recent music is just AMAZING, I'll leave the title of one of my favorites: "And then is heard no more"

I'm crying man when hearing this music, especially when I just finish the story😥😥😭

great video as always, Alex! As someone who spend 4 years playing this game, thank you for breaking it down!

when you can tell the emotion by listening just once

Yeah a lot of the context and feeling is also from the story and exact moment the song is being played and what is happening with the main protagonist. Big ups for listening to it, hoping you get to play the game as it's story really elevated the music.

Bro i started honkai yesterday and this is in my feed, nice

Aaaah posted a min ago!! Ive been listening to this song nonstop. Can't wait to watch the whole thing

As always great react ✨✨

your guess on what the song try to describe is spot on. i would really recommend regression from honkai too

You really glean so much from the song itself, that it makes me notice just how much care they take with their songs. And I think you nailed it: this is a song written for a very important, very moving animation and they might not have wanted to distract too much from that and/or emphasize the bittersweet hopefulness.

cant wait for more of these good reaction :)

Bro for real! First time hearing this song on it's release I thought they would modulate to set a climax in to the song but with context I think it does the job and catches the feelings of the captains playing it. Nice vid brother! Learned so many stuffs! Would be nice if you listen and analyze their new song Regression.

You're right that not knowing the story doesn't give you a full picture in this case. This is a major moment for the main character, when she finally overcomes her grief and self-blame from all the tragedies she's been through in her life, accepts that the world is a tough place, and rediscovers her resolve to "fight for all that's beautiful in the world". It's the culmination of a lot of things that happened in the story before this point and the biggest moment of character growth that the protagonist experienced.

Yay this is an amazing one to react too! Tho I wonder if you'll go back to the other songs so you can enjoy the evolution of the themes like ffxiv's Answers did

First of all I like how you somehow understand some context just from the music, I myself do not understand if the music matching well, so I'm happy when the feel from the music matches with the story. It helps me appreciate the effort. Now, with all my respect, aside from the modulations not fitting the cutscene, I think they sound so clichéd. Like I heard the same stuff so many times before I cringe when I hear it now. Even if it lacks something without the modulation, it sounds more fresh (to me) and most importantly it sounds more genuine. Which is exactly what this emotional moment needs. It has less of the feeling of "seeing the composer's hands" if you know what I mean. Anyway thanks for putting so much effort in a song that is clearly not your type.

welp, you should watch Honkai's Dreamy Euphonia Concert, just mind-blowing

Great video! I'm def down for you to look into other songs that the game released like Nightglow and Rubia.

I like that final fade at the end of the song it invokes that feeling of not necessarily having won, but done so at a great cost.