Video games use musical motifs. I know quite a few of them. Nintendos older main franchises use 20+ year old motifs to help keep their mascots relevant today. Marios theme is a must for any Mario game. For Zelda, I find the use of motifs to be cleverer because of how certain decade-old musical bits are carried over in later games of the series and remixed in some way. An example of this is the use of Zeldas Lullaby in a particular boss fight in Twilight Princess. Feel free to look it up. Id rather not spoil it. I will, however, spoil a bit of the Kingdom Hearts franchise in this thread.
The Kingdom Hearts series has music I think folks like more than the games themselves. Im sort of on that bandwagon as well. When a new Kingdom Hearts game is announced, I sometimes look forward to the music more than playing the game. Considering their stories are all connected, Im fortunate to actually follow the overarching story. The cool thing about that endeavor is when I discover a new motif. Some pieces of the series music link back to tunes and themes from the earlier games mainly in regard to certain characters or situations. This has been the case since 2002 when the first Kingdom Hearts dropped. Destati from the first game came back in Birth by Sleep. Not to forget the less thematic usage Simple and Clean (the Japanese version being Hikari) as the intro of both games. Fortunately, the series uses its themes in way that doesnt beat you over the head like Simple and Clean almost did.
Part 1: The usage of Destati throughout the series.
Kingdom Hearts 1
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-Kingdom Hearts 1 had the coolest promo art of all the games IMO.
Heres Destati for reference (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbeHo6c_a8o). Give this a listen. Though not in any of the games in its entirety, Destati was featured on the Kingdom Hearts OST. The piece itself is broken up into several parts interspersed throughout the first game, starting with the Kingdom Hearts dream sequence and tutorial level playing Dive Into The Heart (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOpB12ow-VM). It loops the calmer part of Destati until you reach the end of the level where a boss fight ensues.
-Scary looking dude despite how easy he is.
Destati reoccurs near the final parts of the game once the team reaches The End of The World, which acts in the narrative as where every world goes to essentially die. All the worlds that are being destroyed by The Heartless are being pulled into a vortex, sort of like dumping food down a drain to be pulverized. This worlds theme (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcwgdGPAl5o) echoes Dive Into The Heart but with the calm part looped. The worlds battle theme is called Fragments of Sorrow (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe9D9oWzUuo) and it loops the more intense part of Destati.
Its appropriate that one of the first tunes you hear is one of the last tunes. Destati seems to be played when the story has characters entering areas that lean toward the more abstract parts of the Kingdom Hearts lore involving hearts. The beginning of the game had Sora exploring his own heart once his power to use the Keyblade was awakened. The ending of the game has him and friends drawing close to The Heart of All Worlds: Kingdom Hearts itself.
-Billy Zanes greatest role
As the player progresses through some of the best parts of the game to chase down the big bad, Ansem, Sora ends up back on his island home which was devoured by the darkness at the beginning of the story. As you run around here, The End of The World theme continues playing considering youre still in the same level, youre just seeing the destroyed state of Destiny Islands which Ansem soon reveals to you before you proceed to beat the shit out of him and Darkside again with a giant key.
After those fights, the game transitions into the final boss battle in front of Kingdom Hearts itself. Sora, Donald, and Goofy are flying in darkness and out of it emerges Ansem and The World of Chaos a giant cruiser-like heartless that hes attached to as a sort of heart himself.
Since I cant seem to find a good picture of the boss showing off its size, heres a video of the fight: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ahL_cz9wDs
-Kingdom Hearts is a good Disney game since it also has its share of phallic imagery.
The theme used here is the last we hear of Destati in the game. Its called Guardando nel Buio (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lr_hU_zGglo) and its appropriate for the final battle with its fast pace, volume, and intensity like in all Final Fantasy final battle themes. The title is Italian for looking into the darkness I believe.
Beating The World of Chaos gets you the ending of Kingdom Hearts. A few themes play while the sequences happen, and Simple and Clean comes back, this time not remixed.
Kingdom Hearts 2
Unfortunately, Destati doesnt occur in either the GBA or PS2 version of Chain of Memories. The next time we hear it is in Kingdom Hearts 2, where it plays a similar role but used far less. This was probably to make room for The Organizations motif thats used with more regularity than Destatis use in the first Kingdom Hearts game. Dont worry. The music related to The Organization will get its own part once I finish writing this one about Destati.
Kingdom Hearts 2 uses two pieces based off Destati, which are recomposed versions of tunes we heard already. The first is called Dive Into The Heart Destati (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trq3SyaYGbI) and the second is Fragments of Sorrow (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QWSJySREaY). Both are used when Roxas (the first playable character of Kingdom Hearts 2) undergoes a sequence similar to what Sora went through in the beginning of Kingdom Hearts 1.
Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep
-mfw hit with the nostalgia of a nearly ten year old song in a boss fight for the first time
Here, we hit the final occurrence of Destati in the series at the true final boss of Birth By Sleep. Theres a metric ton of backstory with this particular fight considering it helps set in motion the stories for the rest of the games sans Kingdom Hearts Chi, which apparently takes place way before the events of Birth By Sleep.
The piece is called Dismiss (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvWa1fMpXIM) and it meshes Destati with a piece originally in Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix called Fate of the Unkown (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0fZgEXdRmc), which is an amalgamation of a number of character themes and motifs from within Birth By Sleep, which well return to in its own part a bit later on. I'll also use that time to summarize the story to Birth By Sleep - it'll make more sense as I break down that game's musical motifs.
Though Birth By Sleep is the prequel to all the Kingdom Hearts games, it was followed by another handheld game called Dream Drop Distance, which chronologically takes place at the latest point of the series.
Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance
With the return of Ansem: Seeker of Darkness (because he now needs that subtitle since at a certain point in KH2, we learn than there's a dude named Ansem the Wise who got his identity stolen by an apprentice named Xehanort, who's heartless we defeated back in KH1. Yup, you read that correctly), we get Destati again. This time, with some neat remixes.
-If you look hard enough, you can see where the Kingdom Hearts series tried to commit suicide
You play as Sora and Riku in this game, and their tales end with Sora fighting Xemnas and Riku fighting Ansem. Don't ask how. I'll get to that later. Dream Drop Distance introduced some fairly stupid new bits of plot to make this happen.
In Riku's first fight against Ansem, you have L'Eminenza Oscura I playing (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBjKzdpenFM). If anything, it sounds more like a sampling of Guardando nel Buio, even though Ansem doesn't turn into The World of Chaos here. However, in the second fight, that Guardian shadow thing encases him. L'Eminenza Oscura II plays and it has an awesome intro with the heavy synth (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmp66tEGNCU). This and Dismiss are my favorite tunes based off of Destati.
Beating Ansem twice leads Riku into the final parts of the endgame where he has to rescue Sora from darkness, which Sora has been tricked into falling into. The theme heard when 'Diving' here (diving is a gameplay mechanic used to enter worlds in DDD) is called My Heart's Descent (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6xgfDaKr8Y). It sounds a lot like Dive Into The Heart, but slightly more foreboding and sad. It's that weird techno bit that I feel is unnecessary, however.
Then finally, Riku fights a corrupted Sora! He's wearing Ventus' (a character from Birth By Sleep. Bear with me here dammit) armor which summoned itself to protect Sora from Darkness to no avail. The theme in this fight is called The Eye of Darkness (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKuduyM0xk4)
-I think this design is cool. Nice touch with the symbol too.
This wraps Dream Drop Distance up, as well as references toward Destati throughout the series thus far. Destati is associated closely with both characters diving into their or another's heart with the player able run around in such levels, as well as being attached to Ansem/Xehanort's heartless back in Birth By Sleep and the two Ansem fights in Dream Drop Distance. These are more of callbacks to Kingdom Hearts 1 than how Destati is used elsewhere, which is fine - both induce nostalgia and that's what anyone who played KH1 sticks with this series wants.
If I missed any usage of Destati, feel free to correct me. I'm PRETTY sure Chain of Memories or 358/2 days didn't have it. Never played Coded :/
Next, I gotta decide if I'm going to write about Dearly Beloved (the menu theme for all the Kingdom Hearts games) or a character's theme (probably Sora's since it's been used regularly after Kingdom Hearts 2). Or I could lay down the The Organization XIII's motif. No clue.
Hope you enjoy.
TL;DR:
List of music linked in Part 1 for your headphones.
Kingdom Hearts 1
1. Destati
2. Dive Into The Heart
3. End of The World
4. Fragments of Sorrow
5. Guardando nel Buio
Kingdom Hearts 2:
1. Dive Into The Heart - Destati
2. Fragments of Sorrow
Birth By Sleep:
1. Dismiss
2. Fate of The Unknown
Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance:
1. L'Eminenza Oscura I
2. L'Eminenza Oscura II
3. My Heart's Descent
4. The Eye of Darkness
The Kingdom Hearts series has music I think folks like more than the games themselves. Im sort of on that bandwagon as well. When a new Kingdom Hearts game is announced, I sometimes look forward to the music more than playing the game. Considering their stories are all connected, Im fortunate to actually follow the overarching story. The cool thing about that endeavor is when I discover a new motif. Some pieces of the series music link back to tunes and themes from the earlier games mainly in regard to certain characters or situations. This has been the case since 2002 when the first Kingdom Hearts dropped. Destati from the first game came back in Birth by Sleep. Not to forget the less thematic usage Simple and Clean (the Japanese version being Hikari) as the intro of both games. Fortunately, the series uses its themes in way that doesnt beat you over the head like Simple and Clean almost did.
Part 1: The usage of Destati throughout the series.
Kingdom Hearts 1
-Kingdom Hearts 1 had the coolest promo art of all the games IMO.
Heres Destati for reference (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbeHo6c_a8o). Give this a listen. Though not in any of the games in its entirety, Destati was featured on the Kingdom Hearts OST. The piece itself is broken up into several parts interspersed throughout the first game, starting with the Kingdom Hearts dream sequence and tutorial level playing Dive Into The Heart (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOpB12ow-VM). It loops the calmer part of Destati until you reach the end of the level where a boss fight ensues.
-Scary looking dude despite how easy he is.
Destati reoccurs near the final parts of the game once the team reaches The End of The World, which acts in the narrative as where every world goes to essentially die. All the worlds that are being destroyed by The Heartless are being pulled into a vortex, sort of like dumping food down a drain to be pulverized. This worlds theme (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcwgdGPAl5o) echoes Dive Into The Heart but with the calm part looped. The worlds battle theme is called Fragments of Sorrow (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe9D9oWzUuo) and it loops the more intense part of Destati.
Its appropriate that one of the first tunes you hear is one of the last tunes. Destati seems to be played when the story has characters entering areas that lean toward the more abstract parts of the Kingdom Hearts lore involving hearts. The beginning of the game had Sora exploring his own heart once his power to use the Keyblade was awakened. The ending of the game has him and friends drawing close to The Heart of All Worlds: Kingdom Hearts itself.
-Billy Zanes greatest role
As the player progresses through some of the best parts of the game to chase down the big bad, Ansem, Sora ends up back on his island home which was devoured by the darkness at the beginning of the story. As you run around here, The End of The World theme continues playing considering youre still in the same level, youre just seeing the destroyed state of Destiny Islands which Ansem soon reveals to you before you proceed to beat the shit out of him and Darkside again with a giant key.
After those fights, the game transitions into the final boss battle in front of Kingdom Hearts itself. Sora, Donald, and Goofy are flying in darkness and out of it emerges Ansem and The World of Chaos a giant cruiser-like heartless that hes attached to as a sort of heart himself.
Since I cant seem to find a good picture of the boss showing off its size, heres a video of the fight: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ahL_cz9wDs
-Kingdom Hearts is a good Disney game since it also has its share of phallic imagery.
The theme used here is the last we hear of Destati in the game. Its called Guardando nel Buio (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lr_hU_zGglo) and its appropriate for the final battle with its fast pace, volume, and intensity like in all Final Fantasy final battle themes. The title is Italian for looking into the darkness I believe.
Beating The World of Chaos gets you the ending of Kingdom Hearts. A few themes play while the sequences happen, and Simple and Clean comes back, this time not remixed.
Kingdom Hearts 2
Unfortunately, Destati doesnt occur in either the GBA or PS2 version of Chain of Memories. The next time we hear it is in Kingdom Hearts 2, where it plays a similar role but used far less. This was probably to make room for The Organizations motif thats used with more regularity than Destatis use in the first Kingdom Hearts game. Dont worry. The music related to The Organization will get its own part once I finish writing this one about Destati.
Kingdom Hearts 2 uses two pieces based off Destati, which are recomposed versions of tunes we heard already. The first is called Dive Into The Heart Destati (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trq3SyaYGbI) and the second is Fragments of Sorrow (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QWSJySREaY). Both are used when Roxas (the first playable character of Kingdom Hearts 2) undergoes a sequence similar to what Sora went through in the beginning of Kingdom Hearts 1.
Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep
-mfw hit with the nostalgia of a nearly ten year old song in a boss fight for the first time
Here, we hit the final occurrence of Destati in the series at the true final boss of Birth By Sleep. Theres a metric ton of backstory with this particular fight considering it helps set in motion the stories for the rest of the games sans Kingdom Hearts Chi, which apparently takes place way before the events of Birth By Sleep.
The piece is called Dismiss (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvWa1fMpXIM) and it meshes Destati with a piece originally in Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix called Fate of the Unkown (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0fZgEXdRmc), which is an amalgamation of a number of character themes and motifs from within Birth By Sleep, which well return to in its own part a bit later on. I'll also use that time to summarize the story to Birth By Sleep - it'll make more sense as I break down that game's musical motifs.
Though Birth By Sleep is the prequel to all the Kingdom Hearts games, it was followed by another handheld game called Dream Drop Distance, which chronologically takes place at the latest point of the series.
Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance
With the return of Ansem: Seeker of Darkness (because he now needs that subtitle since at a certain point in KH2, we learn than there's a dude named Ansem the Wise who got his identity stolen by an apprentice named Xehanort, who's heartless we defeated back in KH1. Yup, you read that correctly), we get Destati again. This time, with some neat remixes.
-If you look hard enough, you can see where the Kingdom Hearts series tried to commit suicide
You play as Sora and Riku in this game, and their tales end with Sora fighting Xemnas and Riku fighting Ansem. Don't ask how. I'll get to that later. Dream Drop Distance introduced some fairly stupid new bits of plot to make this happen.
In Riku's first fight against Ansem, you have L'Eminenza Oscura I playing (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBjKzdpenFM). If anything, it sounds more like a sampling of Guardando nel Buio, even though Ansem doesn't turn into The World of Chaos here. However, in the second fight, that Guardian shadow thing encases him. L'Eminenza Oscura II plays and it has an awesome intro with the heavy synth (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmp66tEGNCU). This and Dismiss are my favorite tunes based off of Destati.
Beating Ansem twice leads Riku into the final parts of the endgame where he has to rescue Sora from darkness, which Sora has been tricked into falling into. The theme heard when 'Diving' here (diving is a gameplay mechanic used to enter worlds in DDD) is called My Heart's Descent (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6xgfDaKr8Y). It sounds a lot like Dive Into The Heart, but slightly more foreboding and sad. It's that weird techno bit that I feel is unnecessary, however.
Then finally, Riku fights a corrupted Sora! He's wearing Ventus' (a character from Birth By Sleep. Bear with me here dammit) armor which summoned itself to protect Sora from Darkness to no avail. The theme in this fight is called The Eye of Darkness (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKuduyM0xk4)
-I think this design is cool. Nice touch with the symbol too.
This wraps Dream Drop Distance up, as well as references toward Destati throughout the series thus far. Destati is associated closely with both characters diving into their or another's heart with the player able run around in such levels, as well as being attached to Ansem/Xehanort's heartless back in Birth By Sleep and the two Ansem fights in Dream Drop Distance. These are more of callbacks to Kingdom Hearts 1 than how Destati is used elsewhere, which is fine - both induce nostalgia and that's what anyone who played KH1 sticks with this series wants.
If I missed any usage of Destati, feel free to correct me. I'm PRETTY sure Chain of Memories or 358/2 days didn't have it. Never played Coded :/
Next, I gotta decide if I'm going to write about Dearly Beloved (the menu theme for all the Kingdom Hearts games) or a character's theme (probably Sora's since it's been used regularly after Kingdom Hearts 2). Or I could lay down the The Organization XIII's motif. No clue.
Hope you enjoy.
TL;DR:
List of music linked in Part 1 for your headphones.
Kingdom Hearts 1
1. Destati
2. Dive Into The Heart
3. End of The World
4. Fragments of Sorrow
5. Guardando nel Buio
Kingdom Hearts 2:
1. Dive Into The Heart - Destati
2. Fragments of Sorrow
Birth By Sleep:
1. Dismiss
2. Fate of The Unknown
Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance:
1. L'Eminenza Oscura I
2. L'Eminenza Oscura II
3. My Heart's Descent
4. The Eye of Darkness
