Track list:
1. 0:00 - Title screen theme - Scarlet Beyond a Crimson Dream
2. 1:56 - Stage 1 theme - A Soul as Red as a Ground Cherry
3. 4:36 - Rumia's theme - Apparitions Stalk the Night
4. 6:32 - Stage 2 theme - Lunate Elf
5. 9:25 - Cirno's theme - Tomboyish Girl in Love
6. 12:30 - Stage 3 theme - Shanghai Teahouse ~ Chinese Tea
7. 16:31 - Meiling's theme - Shanghai Alice of Meiji 17
8. 19:35 - Stage 4 theme - Voile, the Magic Library
9. 23:18 - Patchouli's theme - Locked Girl ~ The Girl's Secret Room
10. 26:48 - Stage 5 theme - The Maid and the Pocket Watch of Blood
11. 31:59 - Sakuya's theme - Lunar Clock ~ Luna Dial
12. 34:48 - Stage 6 theme - The Young Descendant of Tepes
13. 36:41 - Remilia's theme - Septette for the Dead Princess
14. 40:53 - Extra stage theme - The Centennial Festival for Magical Girls
15. 45:30 - Flandre's theme - U.N. Owen was Her?
16. 50:00 - Ending theme - Crimson Beyond a Fleeting Eternity
17. 51:48 - Credits theme - Crimson Belvedere ~ Eastern Dream...
Just to clarify from the start, I didn't arrange these MIDIs myself, I just recorded them in-game in the music player; wanted to upload the OST in this unusual form for curiosity's sake.
If you go down the rabbit hole of early Windows-era Touhou music (highly recommend, since it's chock full of bangers), you might've heard it said that what you hear in the games is not the way the soundtrack was originally intended to be heard. ZUN actually first composed Touhou 6, 7, and 8's music using a certain MIDI module, the Roland SC-88Pro. Later on, he got a fancier new synthesizer, the Roland Edirol SD-90, and before releasing the games, re-recorded their music (with a few adjustments) - and those are the versions you know and love.
The in-game WAVs are great, and the "true" MIDI versions sound pretty nice in their own way, but I'm more intrigued by the ugly duckling sibling of those 2, the MIDIs played with the default Windows MIDI or "Doom" soundfont. Some may say it's wrong just on principle to listen to it this way, or wrong because they sound hideous, but this soundfont has always had a naive nostalgic charm to me. Reminds me of simpler times playing fun old PC and GameMaker games.
What you hear in this video is what you hear if you go into Touhou 6, 7, or 8's options menu and select the "MIDI" option - that's right, you can play the whole game with these simplistic versions! (The option exists in TH9 also, but oddly it's not selectable.) I had an odd issue on Windows 10 with disappearing drumbeats, so I recorded on Windows 7 instead, where they play just fine. I would've provided the actual MIDI files to download, but I can't seem to find them anywhere in the game files, at least not unencrypted.
Didn't realize until too late that apparently somebody else (Soulblade950) already uploaded pretty much this same thing over a decade ago - oops. Still, hopefully this video's useful for you, maybe if you want to hear the full uninterrupted OST, or if you like this recording's sound quality better, or if you're interested to learn about the few changes ZUN made between these original MIDIs and the final WAVs, often changing the song's key. I wonder why he did, maybe to give them a more sinister vibe?
As for the soundtrack of this game (Embodiment of Scarlet Devil) in particular: gosh, I just love everything about it. Excellent memorable melodies, some creepy dark undertones, some of ZUN's coolest combinations of eastern and western sounds - it all makes for something I'd like to aspire to for my own compositions. Of course U.N. Owen stands head and shoulders above the rest (and not just for the memes). But even besides that, to my ears, few soundtracks (Touhou or otherwise) come close to this tightly crafted masterpiece - even when it's played with the most basic of all MIDI soundfonts.
Normal WAV versions of the songs:
ru-vid.com/group/PL9A33FD6D8F3E8DA1
The "true" MIDI versions of the songs on Roland SC-88Pro:
ru-vid.com/group/PLzdQcm51guT_Du9fuiiHpGENQWyLPtFoE
Playlist of all my game soundtrack rip videos:
ru-vid.com/group/PLBd_U5xoWsxaTCemZbGQSByfgJh8da4i6
Google Drive archive with my video thumbnails, music MP3s and other stuff:
drive.google.com/drive/folders/1x9EjnjobmGAyuZvNdmdsJ8cHfMGJewqv
Audio recorded 2023-06-05
Video produced 2023-06-06 to 2023-06-13, uploaded 2023-06-16
Assets used:
Album art edited from Touhou Wiki
Background and character portraits from The Spriters Resource, provided by gabrielwoj
Music recorded in-game by me
Screenshots taken in-game by me
Programs used:
Audacity - Audio editing
Inkscape - Thumbnail and video layout
Magix Vegas - Video editing
Paint.net - Thumbnail and video graphics
17 июн 2023
