1.
Tokyo
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Tokyo, officially Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan and one of its 47 prefectures. The Greater Tokyo Area is the most populous area in the world. It is the seat of the Emperor of Japan and the Japanese government, Tokyo is in the Kantō region on the southeastern side of the main island Honshu and includes the Izu Islands and Ogasawara Islands. Formerly known as Edo, it has been the de facto seat of government since 1603 when Shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu made the city his headquarters. It officially became the capital after Emperor Meiji moved his seat to the city from the old capital of Kyoto in 1868, Tokyo Metropolis was formed in 1943 from the merger of the former Tokyo Prefecture and the city of Tokyo. The Tokyo metropolitan government administers the 23 Special Wards of Tokyo, the metropolitan government also administers 39 municipalities in the western part of the prefecture and the two outlying island chains. The population of the wards is over 9 million people. The prefecture is part of the worlds most populous metropolitan area with upwards of 37.8 million people, the city hosts 51 of the Fortune Global 500 companies, the highest number of any city in the world. Tokyo ranked third in the International Financial Centres Development IndexEdit, the city is also home to various television networks such as Fuji TV, Tokyo MX, TV Tokyo, TV Asahi, Nippon Television, NHK and the Tokyo Broadcasting System. Tokyo ranked first in the Global Economic Power Index and fourth in the Global Cities Index. The city is considered a world city – as listed by the GaWCs 2008 inventory – and in 2014. In 2015, Tokyo was named the Most Liveable City in the world by the magazine Monocle, the Michelin Guide has awarded Tokyo by far the most Michelin stars of any city in the world. Tokyo ranked first in the world in the Safe Cities Index, the 2016 edition of QS Best Student Cities ranked Tokyo as the 3rd-best city in the world to be a university student. Tokyo hosted the 1964 Summer Olympics, the 1979 G-7 summit, the 1986 G-7 summit, and the 1993 G-7 summit, and will host the 2020 Summer Olympics, Tokyo was originally known as Edo, which means estuary. During the early Meiji period, the city was also called Tōkei, some surviving official English documents use the spelling Tokei. However, this pronunciation is now obsolete, the name Tokyo was first suggested in 1813 in the book Kondō Hisaku, written by Satō Nobuhiro. When Ōkubo Toshimichi proposed the renaming to the government during the Meiji Restoration, according to Oda Kanshi, Tokyo was originally a small fishing village named Edo, in what was formerly part of the old Musashi Province. Edo was first fortified by the Edo clan, in the twelfth century
2.
Piano
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The piano is an acoustic, stringed musical instrument invented around the year 1700, in which the strings are struck by hammers. It is played using a keyboard, which is a row of keys that the performer presses down or strikes with the fingers and thumbs of both hands to cause the hammers to strike the strings. The word piano is a form of pianoforte, the Italian term for the early 1700s versions of the instrument. The first fortepianos in the 1700s had a sound and smaller dynamic range. An acoustic piano usually has a wooden case surrounding the soundboard and metal strings. Pressing one or more keys on the keyboard causes a padded hammer to strike the strings. The hammer rebounds from the strings, and the continue to vibrate at their resonant frequency. These vibrations are transmitted through a bridge to a soundboard that amplifies by more efficiently coupling the acoustic energy to the air, when the key is released, a damper stops the strings vibration, ending the sound. Notes can be sustained, even when the keys are released by the fingers and thumbs and this means that the piano can play 88 different pitches, going from the deepest bass range to the highest treble. The black keys are for the accidentals, which are needed to play in all twelve keys, more rarely, some pianos have additional keys. Most notes have three strings, except for the bass that graduates from one to two, the strings are sounded when keys are pressed or struck, and silenced by dampers when the hands are lifted from the keyboard. There are two types of piano, the grand piano and the upright piano. The grand piano is used for Classical solos, chamber music and art song and it is used in jazz. The upright piano, which is compact, is the most popular type, as they are a better size for use in private homes for domestic music-making. During the nineteenth century, music publishers produced many works in arrangements for piano, so that music lovers could play. The piano is widely employed in classical, jazz, traditional and popular music for solo and ensemble performances, accompaniment, with technological advances, amplified electric pianos, electronic pianos, and digital pianos have also been developed. The electric piano became an instrument in the 1960s and 1970s genres of jazz fusion, funk music. The piano was founded on earlier technological innovations in keyboard instruments, pipe organs have been used since Antiquity, and as such, the development of pipe organs enabled instrument builders to learn about creating keyboard mechanisms for sounding pitches
3.
Electric organ
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An electronic organ is an electronic keyboard instrument which was derived from the harmonium, pipe organ and theatre organ. Originally, it was designed to imitate the sound of pipe organs, theatre organs, band sounds, or orchestral sounds. In a fashion not totally unlike that of organs, reed organs generated sound by forcing air over a set of reeds by means of a bellows. While reed organs had limited tonal quality, they were small, inexpensive, self-powered, the reed organ was thus able to bring an organlike sound to venues that were incapable of housing or affording pipe organs. This concept was to play an important role in the development of the electric organ, pipe organ In the 1930s, several manufacturers developed electronic organs designed to imitate the function and sound of pipe organs. At the time, some thought that emulation of the pipe organ was the most promising route to take in the development of an electronic organ. Various types of organs have been brought to market over the years. Electricity arrived on the scene in the first decades of the 20th century. Electrically powered reed organs appeared during the first decades of electricity, cahills techniques were later used by Laurens Hammond in his organ design, and the 200-ton Telharmonium served as the worlds first demonstration of electrically produced music on a grand scale. Meanwhile, some experimentation with producing sound by electric impulses was taking place. Built in Belleville, Ontario, the Robb Wave Organ predates its much more successful competitor Hammond by patent and manufacture, the first widespread success in this field was a product of the Hammond Corporation in 1934. The Hammond organ quickly became the successor of the reed organ, from the start, electronic organs operated on a radically different principle from all previous organs. The organ was electrically powered, replacing the reed organs twin bellows pedals with a swell pedal more like that of a pipe organ. Instead of having to pump at a constant rate, as had been the case with the reed organ, from the beginning, the electronic organ had a second manual, also rare among reed organs. The most revolutionary difference in the Hammond, however, was its number of tonewheel settings. By using the drawbars, the organist could combine a variety of tones and harmonics in varying proportions. In all, the Hammond was capable of producing more than 250 million tones, the classic Hammond sound benefitted from the use of free-standing loudspeakers called tone cabinets that produced a higher-quality sound than small built-in speakers. The sound was further enhanced by rotating speaker units, usually manufactured by Leslie
4.
Synthesizer
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A synthesizer is an electronic musical instrument that generates electric signals that are converted to sound through instrument amplifiers and loudspeakers or headphones. Synthesizers may either imitate instruments like piano, Hammond organ, flute, vocals, natural sounds like ocean waves, etc. or generate new electronic timbres. Synthesizers without built-in controllers are called sound modules, and are controlled via USB, MIDI or CV/gate using a controller device. Synthesizers use various methods to generate electronic signals, synthesizers were first used in pop music in the 1960s. In the 1970s, synths were used in disco, especially in the late 1970s, in the 1980s, the invention of the relatively inexpensive, mass market Yamaha DX7 synth made synthesizers widely available. 1980s pop and dance music often made use of synthesizers. In the 2010s, synthesizers are used in genres of pop, rock. Contemporary classical music composers from the 20th and 21st century write compositions for synthesizer, the beginnings of the synthesizer are difficult to trace, as it is difficult to draw a distinction between synthesizers and some early electric or electronic musical instruments. One of the earliest electric musical instruments, the telegraph, was invented in 1876 by American electrical engineer Elisha Gray. He accidentally discovered the sound generation from a self-vibrating electromechanical circuit and this musical telegraph used steel reeds with oscillations created by electromagnets transmitted over a telegraph line. Gray also built a simple loudspeaker device into later models, consisting of a diaphragm in a magnetic field. This instrument was a remote electromechanical musical instrument that used telegraphy, though it lacked an arbitrary sound-synthesis function, some have erroneously called it the first synthesizer. In 1897, Thaddeus Cahill invented the Teleharmonium, which used dynamos, and was capable of additive synthesis like the Hammond organ, however, Cahills business was unsuccessful for various reasons, and similar but more compact instruments were subsequently developed, such as electronic and tonewheel organs. In 1906, American engineer, Lee De Forest ushered in the electronics age and he invented the first amplifying vacuum tube, called the Audion tube. This led to new entertainment technologies, including radio and sound films, ondes Martenot and Trautonium were continuously developed for several decades, finally developing qualities similar to later synthesizers. In the 1920s, Arseny Avraamov developed various systems of graphic sonic art, in 1938, USSR engineer Yevgeny Murzin designed a compositional tool called ANS, one of the earliest real-time additive synthesizers using optoelectronics. The earliest polyphonic synthesizers were developed in Germany and the United States, during the three years that Hammond manufactured this model,1,069 units were shipped, but production was discontinued at the start of World War II. Both instruments were the forerunners of the electronic organs and polyphonic synthesizers
5.
Video game music
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Video game music is the soundtrack that accompanies video games. Early video game music was limited to simple melodies of early sound synthesizer technology. With advances in technology, video game music has now grown to include the same breadth and complexity associated with television and film scores, while simple synthesizer pieces are still common, game music now includes full orchestral pieces and popular music. Music in video games can be heard over a title screen, options menu. Today’s soundtracks can also change depending on a player’s actions or situation, Video game music can be one of two options, original or licensed. In order to create or collect this music, teams of composers, music directors, today, original composition has included the work of film composers Harry Gregson-Williams, Trent Reznor, Hans Zimmer, Josh Mancell, Steve Jablonsky, and Michael Giacchino. The popularity of game music has expanded education and job opportunities, generated awards. At the time video games had emerged as a form of entertainment in the late 1970s, music was stored on physical medium in analog waveforms such as compact cassettes. Such components were expensive and prone to breakage under heavy use making them less ideal for use in an arcade cabinet, though in rare cases. Sound effects for the games were also generated in this fashion, an early example of such an approach to video game music was the opening chiptune in Tomohiro Nishikados Gun Fight. The first game to use a background soundtrack was Tomohiro Nishikados Space Invaders. It had four descending chromatic bass notes repeating in a loop, though it was dynamic and interacted with the player, the first video game to feature continuous, melodic background music was Rally-X, released by Namco in 1980, featuring a simple tune that repeats continuously during gameplay. The decision to any music into a video game meant that at some point it would have to be transcribed into computer code by a programmer, whether or not the programmer had musical experience. Some music was original, some was public domain music such as folk songs, Sound capabilities were limited, the popular Atari 2600 home system, for example, was capable of generating only two tones, or notes, at a time. As advances were made in technology and costs fell, a definitively new generation of arcade machines. This was further improved upon by Namcos 1982 arcade game Dig Dug, Dig Dug was composed by Yuriko Keino, who also composed the music for other Namco games such as Xevious and Phozon. Home console systems also had an upgrade in sound ability beginning with the ColecoVision in 1982 capable of four channels. However, more notable was the Japanese release of the Famicom in 1983 which was released in the US as the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1985
6.
Composer
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A composer is a person who creates or writes music, which can be vocal music, instrumental music or music which combines both instruments and voices. The core meaning of the term refers to individuals who have contributed to the tradition of Western classical music through creation of works expressed in written musical notation, many composers are also skilled performers, either as singers, instrumentalists, and/or conductors. Examples of composers who are well known for their ability as performers include J. S. Bach, Mozart. In many popular genres, such as rock and country. For a singer or instrumental performer, the process of deciding how to perform music that has previously composed and notated is termed interpretation. Different performers interpretations of the work of music can vary widely, in terms of the tempos that are chosen. Composers and songwriters who present their own music are interpreting, just as much as those who perform the music of others, although a musical composition often has a single author, this is not always the case. A piece of music can also be composed with words, images, or, in the 20th and 21st century, a culture eventually developed whereby faithfulness to the composers written intention came to be highly valued. This musical culture is almost certainly related to the esteem in which the leading classical composers are often held by performers. The movement might be considered a way of creating greater faithfulness to the original in works composed at a time that expected performers to improvise. In Classical music, the composer typically orchestrates her own compositions, in some cases, a pop songwriter may not use notation at all, and instead compose the song in her mind and then play or record it from memory. In jazz and popular music, notable recordings by influential performers are given the weight that written scores play in classical music. The level of distinction between composers and other musicians varies, which issues such as copyright and the deference given to individual interpretations of a particular piece of music. In the development of European classical music, the function of composing music initially did not have greater importance than that of performing it. The preservation of individual compositions did not receive attention and musicians generally had no qualms about modifying compositions for performance. In as much as the role of the composer in western art music has seen continued solidification, for instance, in certain contexts the line between composer and performer, sound designer, arranger, producer, and other roles, can be quite blurred. The term composer is often used to refer to composers of music, such as those found in classical, jazz or other forms of art. In popular and folk music, the composer is usually called a songwriter and this is distinct from a 19th-century conception of instrumental composition, where the work was represented solely by a musical score to be interpreted by performers
7.
Final Fantasy Tactics
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Final Fantasy Tactics is a tactical role-playing game developed and published by Square for the Sony PlayStation video game console. It is the first game of the Final Fantasy Tactics series and was released in Japan in June 1997, the game combines thematic elements of the Final Fantasy video game series with a game engine and battle system unlike those previously seen in the franchise. In contrast to other 32-bit era Final Fantasy titles, Final Fantasy Tactics uses a 3D, isometric, rotatable playing field, Final Fantasy Tactics is set in a fictional medieval-inspired kingdom called Ivalice created by Yasumi Matsuno. As the story progresses, Ramza and his allies discover a plot behind the war. Various other games have utilized the Ivalice setting, including Vagrant Story for the PlayStation. An enhanced port of Final Fantasy Tactics, Final Fantasy Tactics, overall, the game received positive reviews from gaming magazines and websites and has become a cult classic since its release. The gameplay of Final Fantasy Tactics differs in key areas from other titles in the Final Fantasy series. Instead of a battle screen, with the players characters on one side. Characters move on a battlefield composed of tiles, movement and action ranges are determined by the characters statistics. Battles are turn-based, a unit may act when its CT reaches 100, charge time is increased once every CT unit by an amount equal to the units speed statistic. When CT reaches 100 or greater, the unit may act, during battle, whenever a unit performs an action successfully, it gains Experience Points and Job Points. Another difference is the manner in which battles are encountered. Like other Final Fantasy games, random battles occur on the world map, however, in Final Fantasy Tactics, random battles only occur in pre-set locations, marked in green on the world map. Passing over one of these spots may result in a random encounter, another major aspect of battles is magical attacks. Certain magical attacks cause area of damage, and many of the more powerful magical attacks require several turns of charging. Hit Points of enemy units are also visible to the player, movement on the world map is limited to predefined paths connecting the towns and battle points. Later in the game, some towns contain Fur Shops for obtaining items by way of poaching monsters, like several installments in the series, Final Fantasy Tactics features a character class system, which allows players to customize characters into various roles. The game makes use of most of the original character classes seen in earlier Final Fantasy games, including Summoners, Wizards, Priests, Monks, Lancers
8.
Final Fantasy XII
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Final Fantasy XII is a fantasy role-playing video game developed and published by Square Enix for the PlayStation 2 home video console. Released in 2006, it is the title in the mainline Final Fantasy series. Final Fantasy XII also includes elements from games in the series, such as Chocobos. The game takes place in the land of Ivalice, where the empires of Archadia and Rozarria are waging an endless war. Dalmasca, a kingdom, is caught between the warring nations. When Dalmasca is annexed by Archadia, its princess, Ashe, during the struggle, she meets Vaan, a young adventurer who dreams of becoming a sky pirate in command of an airship. They are quickly joined by a band of allies, together, Final Fantasy XII received critical acclaim, earning numerous Game of the Year awards in various categories from noted video game publications. Selling more than two copies in Japan, it became the fourth best-selling PlayStation 2 game of 2006 worldwide. By November 2009, over 6 million copies of the game were sold worldwide, a sequel, Final Fantasy XII, Revenant Wings, was released for the Nintendo DS in 2007. A high-definition remaster of the International Zodiac Job System version, subtitled The Zodiac Age, throughout the game, the player directly controls the on-screen character from a third-person perspective to interact with people, objects, and enemies. Unlike previous games in the series, the player can control the camera with the right analog stick. While in towns and cities, the player may see from the perspective of Vaan. The player navigates the overworld on foot, Chocobo, or by airship, players may save their game to a memory card using save crystals or gate crystals, and may use the latter to teleport between gate crystals. An in-game bestiary provides incidental information about the world of Final Fantasy XII, Final Fantasy XII restructures the system of earning gil, the currency of the Final Fantasy games, instead of gil, most enemies drop loot which can be sold at shops. This ties into a new battle mechanic which rewards the player with improved loot for slaying a particular type of multiple times in a row. Selling different types of loot also unlocks an option in shops. Excluding the MMORPG Final Fantasy XI, Final Fantasy XII is the first entry in the main Final Fantasy series not to random encounters. Instead, enemies are visible in the overworld and the player may choose to fight or avoid them, battles unfold in real time using the Active Dimension Battle system
9.
Ogre Battle: The March of the Black Queen
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Ogre Battle, The March of the Black Queen is a 1993 real-time tactical role-playing video game directed by Yasumi Matsuno with artwork by Akihiko Yoshida. It is the first installment of a series, and was originally developed by Quest. Originally released for the Super NES, it has since been released for the Sega Saturn, PlayStation, Virtual Console and it was followed up by a successor in 1995, Tactics Ogre, Let Us Cling Together, which featured different gameplay. Ogre Battle, The March of the Black Queen begins in the outskirts of the Zeteginan Empire, the main character is leading a revolution against this empire, which has turned to evil through the use of black magic by the mage Rashidi. The game begins with the seer Warren using tarot cards to ask a series of questions to determine the suitability as leader of the revolution. There are several out of a fixed set which are randomly asked. Each question has three possible answers, one righteous, one evil, and one neutral, after the player finishes answering the questions, Warren wishes luck for the revolution and the game begins. The players answers to questions determine the Lords abilities and starting units. Ogre Battle mixes movement elements of a real-time tactics game with the character development, the game consists of a series of battles in which the player deploys units to fight against enemies and liberate occupied towns and temples. A variety of types can be recruited, ranging from common to rare. As a result, the character will either evolve or become a new soldier with different abilities. Potential recruits consist of historical and mythological figures, including knights, ninjas, wizards, angels, griffins, witches. The player is free to organize units of five fighters or less. Additionally, time passes on the map, alternating between day and night. In accordance with this element, vampires and werewolves will only be seen in the evening, with the former appearing in coffins during the day, each stage has a boss whose defeat signals the completion of the mission. Both during and after the stage, towns and temples can be visited to gain information or items, the game also features an alignment system, both for the revolution as a whole and for individual characters. These parameters are influenced by how the game is played, there are twenty-five main stages in the game, with some variation possible in how the stages are played. There are also four hidden stages accessible through the game with an additional stage as an easter egg
10.
Square (company)
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Square Co. Ltd. was a Japanese video game company founded in September 1983 by Masafumi Miyamoto. It merged with Enix in 2003 and became Square Enix, the company also used SquareSoft as a brand name to refer to their games, and the term is occasionally used to refer to the company itself. In addition, Squaresoft, Inc was the name of the companys American arm before the merger, after which it was renamed to Square Enix, Square was founded in Yokohama in September 1983 by Masafumi Miyamoto after he graduated from Waseda, one of Japans top universities. Back then, Square was a game software division of Den-Yu-Sha. Squares first two titles were The Death Trap and its sequel Will, The Death Trap II, both designed by part-time employee Hironobu Sakaguchi and released on the NEC PC-8801. Despite an initial reluctance to develop for video game consoles, Square entered the Nintendo Famicom market in December 1985 with the porting of Thexder, in September 1986, Square spun off from Den-Yu-Sha and became an independent company officially named Square Co. Ltd. Sakaguchi then became an employee as the Director of Planning. With 400,000 copies sold, Final Fantasy spawned multiple sequels over the years, by late 1994 they had developed a reputation as a producer of high quality role-playing video games. Final Fantasy VII was one of games, and it sold 9.8 million copies. On February 8,2001, due to its first quarterly loss since going public, three key figures have been moved around in the company ranks, resigning from their current positions in order to take responsibility for the losses, and have been reassigned to different positions. Hironobu Sakaguchi, the father of the Final Fantasy series, will no longer be vice president, additionally, company president Tomoyuki Takeshi will become a contractual consultant for the company, with director Masahi Hiramatsu now taking the role of executive consultant. With the company in its year of financial loss, Square approached Sony for a capital injection and on October, 8th 2001. In an interview with GIA. com in 2001, when asked Are you ever worried that Square will become too dependent on the Final Fantasy name. Hironobu Sakaguchi responded that Avoiding that has actually been one of Squares goals for a long time and it is our aim to try and develop a few more major franchises for the company, that has always been on our minds. Source codes and resources will be shared for efficiency, and employees will receive varying bonuses depending on the profit of their division, by settling developers into groups, Square also aims for the developers to re-use the titles they have developed, making game development more cost efficient. Development costs- originally 2-3 Billion yen, are expected to fall to 1 Billion yen, in addition, the company revealed plans to release two Final Fantasy X spinoffs that would later become Final Fantasy X-2. Following the success of both Final Fantasy X and Kingdom Hearts, the company recovered to stability and the company recorded the highest operating margin in its history in fiscal year 2002. It was announced on November 25,2002 that Square and Enixs previous plans to merge were to officially proceed, as described by Yoichi Wada Square has also fully recovered, meaning this merger is occurring at a time when both companies are at their height
11.
Anime
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Anime is Japanese hand-drawn or computer animation. The word is the pronunciation of animation in Japanese, where this term references all animation. Arguably, the abstract approach to the words meaning may open up the possibility of anime produced in countries other than Japan. For simplicity, many Westerners strictly view anime as a Japanese animation product, some scholars suggest defining anime as specifically or quintessentially Japanese may be related to a new form of orientalism. The earliest commercial Japanese animation dates to 1917, and Japanese anime production has continued to increase steadily. Anime is distributed theatrically, by way of television broadcasts, directly to home media and it is classified into numerous genres targeting diverse broad and niche audiences. Anime is an art form with distinctive production methods and techniques that have been adapted over time in response to emergent technologies. It consists of an ideal story-telling mechanism, combining art, characterization, cinematography. The production of anime focuses less on the animation of movement and more on the realism of settings as well as the use of effects, including panning, zooming. Being hand-drawn, anime is separated from reality by a gap of fiction that provides an ideal path for escapism that audiences can immerse themselves into with relative ease. Diverse art styles are used and character proportions and features can be quite varied, the anime industry consists of over 430 production studios, including major names like Studio Ghibli, Gainax, and Toei Animation. Despite comprising only a fraction of Japans domestic film market, anime makes up a majority of Japanese DVD sales and it has also seen international success after the rise of English-dubbed programming. This rise in popularity has resulted in non-Japanese productions using the anime art style. Anime is an art form, specifically animation, that all genres found in cinema. In Japanese, the term refers to all forms of animation from around the world. In English, anime is more used to denote a Japanese-style animated film or television entertainment or as a style of animation created in Japan. The etymology of the anime is disputed. The English term animation is written in Japanese katakana as アニメーション and is アニメ in its shortened form, in English, anime—when used as a common noun—normally functions as a mass noun
12.
Eminence Symphony Orchestra
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The Eminence Symphony Orchestra founded in Sydney, Australia is an independent symphony orchestra which delves into the classical music featured in video games and anime, as well as film scores. Eminence was founded in 2003 by a group of friends. The difference in the cultural backgrounds between these friends as well as their experiences and qualifications contributed to what would be their first concert. Eminence focuses particularly on the music of notable Japanese video games, the orchestras vision is to inject something bold, dynamic and fresh into classical music. Eminence wishes to break down the barriers between the audience and the musicians, and to revive orchestra in todays society, particularly amongst youth. These services were provided through a Sydney-based business entity, Eminence Group Pty Ltd. This facilitated further work in countries, particularly in Japan. Australia continues to be the base for the orchestra, with the majority of recordings being performed in Sydney. A resolution to wind up the company was made on the same day, the Eminence Symphony Orchestra continues to operate through Eminence Artists in Australia, Creative Intelligence Arts, Inc. in Japan and Eminence Group North America in the United States of America. Eminences debut concert, A Night in Fantasia, was held on 31 October and 1 November 2003 and it was born out of the idea that such an event had never been done before in Australia. The first of a series of concerts was mainly composed of music from Final Fantasy and Studio Ghibli films, and took place at Sydney Congress Hall with tickets that sold well before the night. The overall success as well as the support of the first concert proved a point to the organisers that such a concept of cultural music would appeal to a wide range of people. At this point the company running the concert was Infinity 8LUE, in 2004, the orchestra was fully formed, and held A Night in Fantasia 2004 at Verbrugghen Hall at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music on 30 and 31 October. William Motzing became the Chief Conductor and Artistic Director, Daniel Smith became the Assistant Conductor and this concert marked the name change for the orchestra, as they became known as the Eminence Symphony Orchestra. Infinity 8LUE was the company behind the concert, and shortly after finalised the name change by becoming Eminence, Alexey Yemtsov performed the first Piano Stories concert on 15 April, at Verbrugghen Hall. Featuring work from Studio Ghibli, Yoko Kanno and Shirō Sagisu, Piano Stories marked the beginning of a series of concerts celebrating piano scores from a selection of anime,2005 saw Eminence present the World of John Williams concert, held on 8 July at Sydney Town Hall. Phillip Chu and Daniel Smith conducted the Eminence Symphony Orchestra and the Eminence Choir through performance featuring music from one of Hollywoods most recognised composers, John Williams. His work from Harry Potter, Schindlers List, Saving Private Ryan, Star Wars, E. T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Home Alone, Daniel Smith conducted the Australian Premiere of Battle of the Heroes
13.
Japan
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Japan is a sovereign island nation in Eastern Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies off the eastern coast of the Asia Mainland and stretches from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea, the kanji that make up Japans name mean sun origin. 日 can be read as ni and means sun while 本 can be read as hon, or pon, Japan is often referred to by the famous epithet Land of the Rising Sun in reference to its Japanese name. Japan is an archipelago consisting of about 6,852 islands. The four largest are Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu and Shikoku, the country is divided into 47 prefectures in eight regions. Hokkaido being the northernmost prefecture and Okinawa being the southernmost one, the population of 127 million is the worlds tenth largest. Japanese people make up 98. 5% of Japans total population, approximately 9.1 million people live in the city of Tokyo, the capital of Japan. Archaeological research indicates that Japan was inhabited as early as the Upper Paleolithic period, the first written mention of Japan is in Chinese history texts from the 1st century AD. Influence from other regions, mainly China, followed by periods of isolation, from the 12th century until 1868, Japan was ruled by successive feudal military shoguns who ruled in the name of the Emperor. Japan entered into a period of isolation in the early 17th century. The Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937 expanded into part of World War II in 1941, which came to an end in 1945 following the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Japan is a member of the UN, the OECD, the G7, the G8, the country has the worlds third-largest economy by nominal GDP and the worlds fourth-largest economy by purchasing power parity. It is also the worlds fourth-largest exporter and fourth-largest importer, although Japan has officially renounced its right to declare war, it maintains a modern military with the worlds eighth-largest military budget, used for self-defense and peacekeeping roles. Japan is a country with a very high standard of living. Its population enjoys the highest life expectancy and the third lowest infant mortality rate in the world, in ancient China, Japan was called Wo 倭. It was mentioned in the third century Chinese historical text Records of the Three Kingdoms in the section for the Wei kingdom, Wa became disliked because it has the connotation of the character 矮, meaning dwarf. The 倭 kanji has been replaced with the homophone Wa, meaning harmony, the Japanese word for Japan is 日本, which is pronounced Nippon or Nihon and literally means the origin of the sun. The earliest record of the name Nihon appears in the Chinese historical records of the Tang dynasty, at the start of the seventh century, a delegation from Japan introduced their country as Nihon
14.
Shooter game
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Shooter games are a subgenre of action game, which often test the players speed and reaction time. It includes many subgenres that have the commonality of focusing on the actions of the avatar using some sort of weapon, usually this weapon is a gun, or some other long-range weapon. A common resource found in many games is ammunition. Most commonly, the purpose of a game is to shoot opponents. There are many criteria to determine the type of shooter, listed below are some of the major divisions, using the following, it is possible to categorize almost all shooters developed. It is also possible for a game to have a camera, especially shooting gallery games. Tactical shooters are games that attempt to emulate lifelike ballistics and character damage, other shooter games range further away from realism and towards fantasy, like the Sci-Fi action shooting series titled Lost Planet. Games which feature non-player characters fighting alongside the player, but which are not directly controllable are not considered squad-based games, if a shooter game is playable online, there are several other sharp divisions it can take. Many games will offer differing modes which allow players to choose from various types. In team modes, players are assigned to one of two factions which are competing for some goal, co-op modes have several players on the same faction playing through either single-player or custom missions against computer-controlled enemies. Individual has all players competing with each other and this is often an optional way to categorize a shooter, but in some cases its needed to help distinguish it. A game may quite often heavily rely on stealth as opposed to direct action, others might have large horror elements to them. However, the one thing in common with all shooters is that combat with a gun or similar long range/projectile weapon is the focus of gameplay itself. Shoot em ups are a subgenre of shooters wherein the player may move up and down and left and right around the screen. Shoot em ups share common gameplay, but are categorized by viewpoint. This genre also includes run and gun games which emphasize greater maneuvering or even jumping, such as Thexder, Contra and Metal Slug. Shooting gallery games include light gun games, although many can also be played using a regular joypad, when these debuted, they were typically played from a first-person perspective, with enemy fire that occurred anywhere on the screen damaging or killing the player. One of the earliest examples is the 1985 arcade game Shootout produced by Data East, other games in this subgenre include Blood Bros
15.
PC-9800 series
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The PC-9800 Series is a lineup of Japanese 16-bit and 32-bit personal computers manufactured by NEC from 1982 through 2000. The platform established NECs dominance in the Japanese personal computer market, the first model, the PC-9801, was launched on October 1982, and employed an 8086 CPU. It ran at a speed of 5 MHz, with two µPD7220 display controllers, and shipped with 128 KB of RAM, expandable to 640 KB. Its 8-color display had a resolution of 640×400 pixels. Its successor, the PC-9801E, which appeared in 1983, employed an 8086-2 CPU, the NEC PC-9801VM used NEC V30 CPU. When the PC-9801 was launched in 1982, it was priced at 298,000 yen. In the 1980s and early 1990s, NEC dominated the Japan domestic PC market with more than 60% of the PCs sold as PC-9801 or PC-8801, in 1990, IBM Japan introduced the DOS/V operating system which enabled displaying Japanese text on standard IBM PC/AT VGA adapters. After that, the decline of the PC-98 began, the PC-9801s last successor was the Celeron-based PC-9821Ra43, which appeared in 2000. While NEC did not market these specific machines in the West, it did sell the NEC APC III, however, localized MS-DOS or Windows will still run on PC-9801s. Seiko Epson manufactured PC-9801 clones, as well as compatible peripherals, software for the PC-98 generally ran from program and data disks, and NEC did not have a strong GUI to go up against Microsofts Windows 95 when it took Japans PC market by storm. The PC9801 had thousands of game titles designed for it, many of which made use of the systems limitations to great commercial success. Partial list of PC-98 models sold in the Japanese market,2, June 2000, pp. 197–216 Ascii Techwrite. DOS/V, The Soft Solution to Hard Problems, archived from the original on 2017-01-15. From Chaos to Competition - Japans PC industry in transformation, archived from the original on 2017-01-16. Intro to NEC PC-9800 World PC9801, the first model of the series Info about NEC PC-9801M with uPD8086D-2 PC博物館, モデルナンバー （本体） - PC-9800 - NEC - レトロＰＣ - Retro Computer People. Neko Project II, a PC-98 emulator for Windows and Mac OS X
16.
Mega Drive
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The Sega Genesis, known as the Mega Drive in most regions outside of North America, is a 16-bit home video game console which was developed and sold by Sega Enterprises, Ltd. The Genesis was Segas third console and the successor to the Master System, Sega first released the console as the Mega Drive in Japan in 1988, followed by a North American debut under the Genesis moniker in 1989. In 1990, the console was distributed as the Mega Drive by Virgin Mastertronic in Europe, by Ozisoft in Australasia, in South Korea, the systems were distributed by Samsung and were known as the Super Gam*Boy, and later the Super Aladdin Boy. The system supports a library of more than 900 games created both by Sega and an array of third-party publishers and delivered on ROM-based cartridges. It can play Master System games when the separately sold Power Base Converter is inserted, the Genesis has benefited from several peripherals and network services, as well as multiple first-party and third-party variations of the console that focus on extending its functionality. Controversy surrounding violent titles such as Night Trap and Mortal Kombat led Sega to create the Videogame Rating Council, Sega sold 30.75 million units worldwide. The console and its games continue to be popular among fans, game music fans, collectors. As of 2015, licensed third party re-releases of the console are being sold by AtGames in North America and Europe. Many games have been re-released in compilations for newer consoles and offered for download on online services, such as the Virtual Console, Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network. The Genesis was succeeded by the Sega Saturn, in the early 1980s, Sega Enterprises, Inc. then a subsidiary of Gulf & Western, was one of the top five arcade game manufacturers active in the United States, as company revenues rose to $214 million. The company retained Segas North American R&D operation, as well as its Japanese subsidiary, Sega Enterprises, with its arcade business in decline, Gulf & Western executives turned to Sega Enterprises, Ltd. s president, Hayao Nakayama, for advice on how to proceed. Nakayama received permission to proceed with project, leading to the release of Segas first home video game system. The SG-1000 was not successful, and was replaced by the Sega Mark III within two years, Nakayama was then installed as CEO of the new Sega Enterprises, Ltd. In 1986, Sega redesigned the Mark III for release in North America as the Sega Master System and this was followed by a European release the next year. In 1987, Sega faced another threat to its business when Japanese computer giant NEC released the PC Engine amid great publicity. First announced in June 1988 in Beep, a Japanese gaming magazine, the developing console was referred to as the Mark V, but Sega management felt the need for a stronger name. After reviewing more than 300 proposals, the settled on Mega Drive. In North America, the name of the console was changed to Genesis, the reason for this change is not known, but it may have been due to a trademark dispute
17.
EMI Music Japan
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EMI Music Japan Inc. was one of Japans leading music companies. It became a wholly owned subsidiary of British music company EMI Group Ltd. in June 30,2007 after Toshiba sold off its previous 45% stake and its CEO and president was Kazuhiko Koike. When EMI Music Japan was trading as Toshiba-EMI, it was involved with the production of anime, on April 1,2013, the company became defunct, following its absorption into Universal Music Japan as a sublabel under the name EMI Records Japan. The company was founded on October 1,1960, as Toshiba Musical Industries, from 1962, it licensed Columbia titles for release in Japan. After an injection of capital by Capitol EMI, EMI acquired 50% of the company in October 1973, on October 3,1994, the equity ratio of the company was changed, in which EMI obtained 55% with Toshiba owning the remaining 45%. On June 30,2007, Toshiba Corporation sold the remaining 45% stake in the company to EMI, the name was then changed to EMI Music Japan, reflecting Toshibas divestiture from the business. On April 1,2013, EMI Music Japan was officially absorbed into Universal Music Japan, the label continued to use the TOCT catalog code until October 2013, when it started to use the TYCT catalog code. The official website has shut down as of October 23,2013. After the dissolution and absorption, some of the former EMI staffs, then-executive producer San-e Ichii has been the managing director of Japan Content Expansion Department. Kazuhiko Koike has stepped down from his position as CEO by the end of 2013, nine months after the merger and he was replaced by Naoshi Fujikura. EMI Music Japans present slogan is Music for all, All for music, TM Factory Unlimited Records List of record labels Youmex Official website— 50th Anniversary of EMI Music Japan website—
18.
Data East
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Data East Corporation also abbreviated as DECO, was a Japanese video game and electronic engineering company. The company was in operation from 1976 to 2003, and released 150 video games and its main headquarters were located in Suginami, Tokyo, The American subsidiary, Data East USA, had been headquartered in San Jose, California. Data East was founded by Tokai University alumni Tetsuo Fukuda on April 20,1976, realizing the money that could be made within the interactive content, Data East developed in 1977 its first arcade game Jack Lot. This was followed in 1978 by Super Break, a clone of Ataris Breakout and Space Fighters, in 1979, Data East released its first original game, Nice On, which was released exclusively in Japan. Data East established a U. S. division in 1979, after its chief competitors Sega, in 1980, Data East published Astro Fighter which became its first major arcade title. Data East dropped the DECO Cassette by 1985, in 1981, three staff members of Data East founded Technōs Japan, who then supported Data East for a while before becoming completely independent. Data East continued to release video games over the next 15 years following the video game crash of 1983. Karate Champ was the first successful fighting game, due to being one of the most influential to modern fighting game standards. It was also the subject of the litigation Data East USA, Inc. v. Epyx, Data East also purchased licenses to manufacture and sell arcade games created by other companies. Some of its licensed games included Kid Niki, Radical Ninja, Kung Fu Master and Vigilante, all licensed from Irem and it had a brief stint as a Neo-Geo arcade licensee in the mid-1990s, starting with Spinmaster. Data East entered the game console market in 1986 with the release of B-Wings for the Famicom. Several of Data Easts video games series, such as Tantei Jingūji Saburō, Glory of Hercules and Metal Max, were created specifically for home consoles. Some of the properties that Data East licensed for its pinball machines included Guns N Roses, Star Wars, Back to the Future, Batman, RoboCop, The Simpsons, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Data East is the company that manufactured custom pinball games. The pinball division was created in 1985 by purchasing the pinball division of Stern Electronics and its factory, amidst plummeting sales across the entire pinball market, Data East chose to exit the pinball business and sold the factory to Sega in 1994. At the time of the buyout by Sega, Data East Pinball was the worlds second-largest pinball manufacturer, although video games represented the majority of the companys revenue, Data East had always been involved in engineering. Outside of video games, Data East produced image transmission equipment, data communication adapters for satellite phones from NTT DoCoMo, according to the companys website, its Datafax product, released in 1983, was the worlds first portable fax machine. By the end of the 1990s, the companys American division, Data East USA, had been liquidated, the Japanese parent company itself withdrew entirely from the arcade industry in 1998 and had accumulated a debt estimated at 3.3 billion yen
19.
Shin Megami Tensei
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Shin Megami Tensei is a post-apocalyptic role-playing video game developed and published by Atlus. Originally released for the Super Famicom in 1992 in Japan, it has been ported to multiple systems and it is the third game in the Megami Tensei series and the first in the central Shin Megami Tensei series. The gameplay uses first-person navigation of dungeons and turn-based battles against demons, the player can recruit demons as allies by talking to them rather than fighting them, and two to three demons can be fused to create new demons. The story follows a nameless protagonist who lives in near-future Tokyo, when a portal to the realm of demons is opened, United States officials order a nuclear attack on Tokyo. The story is influenced by decisions the protagonist makes, aligning him either with the Order. From the start of the production, Atlus staff saw Shin Megami Tensei as a chance to create a game with the brand on it. The staff saw it as a remake of the previous Megami Tensei game, because of this, they knew what was going to happen in the story, the story went through multiple revisions, and many settings were inspired by the staffs personal lives. The character and demon designs were done by Kazuma Kaneko, who used mythical figures, reception and sales for the game have been highly positive, and its success helped launch Atlus as a developer and publisher, along with popularizing the Megami Tensei series. In Shin Megami Tensei, players take the role of an unnamed protagonist, the gameplay is similar to that of other games in the series, players make their way through dungeons and fight against demons in a first-person perspective. The protagonist uses a variety of weapons and items, with the weapons being swords. Such items are bought from merchants scattered around the world map, in special areas, the protagonist can use the in-game currency to restore health and magic points for themselves and their demons, remove status ailments, and revive fallen demons. Special Terminals scattered across the world map allow the player to save their game, by participating in battles, human characters in the players party receive experience points, by accumulating these points, the characters levels rise and new abilities are randomly learned. Players can choose to talk to demons instead of fighting them, they can ask the demons for items or money, try to get them to go away, or try to form an alliance with them. Magnetite is used as a fuel for allied demons, and is used up by summoned demons as the character walks around in the dungeons, if players run out of magnetite. The way demons behave is based on their and the protagonists respective alignments, alignments come in two types, Light-Neutral-Dark, and Law-Neutral-Chaos. A demons alignment can range across both alignments, resulting in nine possible stances that affect how they behave and what actions in battle or story progression pleases them. Additionally, depending on their alignment, players not be let into certain areas, for instance. Shin Megami Tensei takes place in a postmodern Tokyo, first in the year 199X, a rift has been opened to another world, allowing demons to invade Tokyo, by using a computer program, humans are able to communicate with and summon the demons
20.
Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together
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Tactics Ogre, Let Us Cling Together is a Japanese tactical role-playing game created by Quest. The game was released in 1995 on the Super Famicom in Japan and then re-released on the Sega Saturn in 1996. An enhanced port of the game developed by the development team was released on February 15,2011 for the PSP. In some regions, notably Japan, the remake was retitled as Tactics Ogre, though Let Us Cling Together is the second entry released in the Ogre Battle franchise, it featured dramatically different gameplay than its predecessor. While Ogre Battle, The March of the Black Queen was more akin to a grand strategy RPG, Let Us Cling Together, then, launched a sub-series within the franchise with Tactics Ogre being used to distinguish the two forms of gameplay in later sequels. Chronologically, it is the 7th episode of the Ogre Saga, for eighty years, Valeria has been in constant strife, and its three leading ethnic groups all claim leadership. King Rodrick, aided by the powers of the Palace of the Dead, is able to dominate the people of Valeria until Dorgalua of Bakram successfully leads his army to defeat Rodrick. Dorgalua then claimed the throne as his own, and was able to end the struggle between the ethnic groups, under King Dorgalua, the rights of the people were preserved, and all internal struggles in Valeria came to a temporary halt. All is right until the royal family is lost due to a string of accidents. Denam Pavel is the primary protagonist in Tactics Ogre and he must lead the Liberation Army to bring freedom to the oppressed nation of Valeria. The gameplay of Tactics Ogre is similar to the turn-based strategy style of tactical RPGs, like other tactical RPGs, the player builds up a team of several characters with changeable classes and fights battles on isometric grids. The order of movement is determined by the speed of individual characters, each character is moved individually on the grid and the order of combat is calculated for each character individually. The gameplay is intermixed with expositional cutscenes revealing the plot, shown in the isometric view as the battles. Movement and team management between battles are done through a map interface, most human characters begin as either amazons or soldiers. By leveling up correctly, they can progress to the other male or female classes, although most advanced classes are limited to certain alignments, lawful, neutral. Another feature is the Warren Report, a type of database on the land, people, encounters and this was the second game directed by Yasumi Matsuno, following Ogre Battle, which featured a considerably different game style. According to Matsuno, Japanese players were not used to the strategy gameplay of Ogre Battle so he changed to a turn based grid system for Tactics Ogre. The game was innovative in its nonlinear branching plotline inspired by sound novels, crucial decisions made in the game determine the path of the story, the members of your army and the ending sequence
21.
Dragon Quest VI
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It was released on December 9,1995, in Japan, developed by Heartbeat, whereas the previous Dragon Quest games were developed by Chunsoft. Like its predecessor, Dragon Quest VI was a Japan-only release as the larger ROMs needed for English dialog were cost-prohibitive, in addition, the games release occurred very late into the SNESs lifespan, by which time Enix had dropped support for the console outside Japan. The title was released overseas for the Nintendo DS in North America on February 14,2011. A version of the game for Android and iOS was released in Japan on June 10,2015, as the sixth installment to the Dragon Quest series, the graphics and gameplay remain close to the other games, with minor additions and upgrades. The graphics were improved from Dragon Quest V, Hand of the Heavenly Bride, which was also for the SNES. Navigation remains largely unchanged from the games and the turn-based battles are still in first-person. The class system from Dragon Quest III returns, with minor adjustments. The large cartridge ROM used by the game resulted in a high price of 11,970 yen, Dragon Quest VI sold 3.2 million copies in Japan. The DS version sold a one million copies by March 2010. The story follows the traditional Dragon Quest Hero on a quest to save the world, in this particular installment, the heroes also have to endure the personal struggle of amnesia, as many of the main characters do not initially remember who they are. The Hero and his new party work together to both worlds from the ever-growing threat. Dragon Quest VI is a traditional, turn-based role-playing video game features random battles. The Hero travels around the gathering a party throughout his adventure. To progress in the story, the party must defeat specific boss monsters or trigger specific flags, in order to defeat the bosses, the player must spend time training the party by gaining experience points from battles to advance in character and class levels. Other new features were added to the series, such as the monsters being animated when they attack, the Slime Arena and Best Dresser Contest were new mini-games introduced, the casinos return from previous Dragon Quest games. Like previous games, mini medals can be hidden throughout the worlds. There are bonus dungeons and a few extra characters after beating the main storyline, there is a day and night system, as in some previous installments, with certain storyline events happening at night. While the Monster Master class can catch monsters in the original Super Famicom version it is not a part of the game
22.
Vagrant Story
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Vagrant Story is a Japanese-developed action role-playing game developed and published by Square for the PlayStation video game console. The game was released in 2000, and has been re-released through the PlayStation Network for the PlayStation 3, Vagrant Story was primarily developed by the team responsible for Final Fantasy Tactics, with Yasumi Matsuno serving as producer, writer and director. The game takes place in the kingdom of Valendia and the ruined city of Leá Monde. In the prologue, Ashley is blamed for murdering the duke, the game received critical acclaim from gaming magazines and websites. Vagrant Story is a solo action role-playing game, in which the player controls Ashley Riot from a third-person perspective while exploring Leá Monde, the player may also switch into first-person perspective to allow for a 360° view using the START button or right analog stick on the game controller. Characters and sprites are proportionate with each other, and the player navigates Ashley on a field map. Navigation is in real-time, and areas accessed by the player are stored in an in-game map menu, Ashley can run, jump, and push crates and cubes to navigate around obstacles, adding puzzle and platforming elements to gameplay. During the game, the player must sometimes solve block puzzles to advance the story, when the player returns to a completed block puzzle room, a time-attack mode called Evolve, or Die. begins. Players must reach the end of the room in the shortest time possible and this stage is optional and can be turned off from the menu. In the field map, players may engage the enemy as soon as they enter Battle Mode, in Battle Mode, when the player taps the attack button, a spherical gride appears around Ashley. Individual body parts within this sphere can be targeted, the battle system involves the player chaining different attacks known as Chain Abilities to achieve large combos and deal damage to the enemy. This is done by pressing buttons in succession, making combat resemble a rhythm game. In addition to Chain Abilities, Defensive Abilities allow Ashley to reduce or reflect damage or avoid status ailments, Ashley also gains Break Arts, which exchange his hit points for increased damage. Magic in Vagrant Story is learned later in the game using Grimoires that are dropped by enemies, once a Grimoire is used, the magic spell associated with the Grimoire will remain in the menu, and players only need to spend magic points to cast a learned spell. Magic spells can be used to attack, heal, create status effects, certain magic spells allow the player to affect multiple targets by using a small sphere positioned within the Battle Mode wire frame. Unlike physical attacks however, magic attacks cannot be chained, Risk is an essential element in the battle system. A Risk bar is placed below the HP and MP bar, Risk Points affect Ashleys concentration, the longer Ashley attacks a target, the more his Risk Point accumulates — lowering his accuracy and defenses. Chain and Defensive Abilities increase Risk faster than regular attacks, while Break Arts do not increase Risk at all, enemy attacks and spells deal more damage if the player has high Risk
23.
Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter
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Breath of Fire, Dragon Quarter, known in Japan as Breath of Fire V, Dragon Quarter, is a PlayStation 2 game originally released on November 14,2002. It is the fifth role-playing game in the Breath of Fire series, as players progress through the game, they must travel upward through a network of tunnels while battling enemies and collecting keys in order to advance. The game uses a map system that alerts players to the location of nearby doors, treasures, rather than experiencing the entire game in a single play-through, Dragon Quarter is designed to encourage the player to play through the title multiple times in order to experience the whole story. Using the Scenario Overlay System, certain points and areas of the game are only accessible if the players D-Ratio number is high enough. Progress is saved to the PlayStation 2s memory card using limited Save Tokens found during gameplay, players may also suspend their game as many times as they wish by creating a temporary save at certain areas in the game, which are deleted as soon as they are loaded. When a player reaches a point in the game, they obtain the ability to use powerful dragon abilities. When the D-Counter reaches 100 percent, the ends and the player is sent back to their last permanent save. The meter raises continually as the player uses these abilities in or out of battle and can only be lowered by restarting using SOL, battles in Dragon Quarter use the Positive Encounter and Tactics System, which is described by Capcom as a combined real-time and turn-based combat. A battle begins when a character comes in contact with an enemy creature. Players may also avoid combat by setting traps to slow down or stop enemies from approaching, while in the battle screen, each character and enemy present take action by order of their agility statistic, with each participant allowed free movement around the battle area during their turn. Characters are given an allocation of Active Points at the start of turn, with the number decreasing with each step. Attacks are divided into three levels, with higher level attacks costing more AP to use but dealing more damage, a character may learn new attacks by equipping new weapons and by finding Attack Skills scattered throughout the game. An unspecified amount of time before the game begins, humanity fled the desolated surface world to the underground in order to survive. Now, the lies in a state of turmoil, polluted and stagnant. According to Breath of Fire tradition, dragons play a role in Dragon Quarter. Despite this tradition, however, the influence of Dragons is felt in the storyline of the game and not the gameplay - unlike every other installment. The focus of the story is on Ryus escape to the surface with Nina, on the lowest levels one can find those with low D-ratios, as one ascends the levels, the D-ratio of the inhabitants increases. As the name suggests, D-ratios are expressed as a fraction with a numerator of 1, as one can see, D-ratio is the main determinant of social status in the world of Dragon Quarter
24.
Tactics Ogre: The Knight of Lodis
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Tactics Ogre, The Knight of Lodis is a tactical RPG game developed by Quest. It was originally released by Nintendo in Japan in 2001 on the Game Boy Advance, like Tactics Ogre, Let Us Cling Together, The Knight of Lodis features party-based tactical combat on an isometric playing field. Characters can be hired or acquired in combat, and there are interchangeable classes and this game is set before the events of Ogre Battle, The March of the Black Queen and Ogre Battle 64, Person of Lordly Caliber, probably the 4th instalment. Ovis is brutally oppressed by the knights of Lodis, Alphonse Loeher is a knight in Rictor Lasantis military unit, the Order of the Sacred Flame, and he is sent to Ovis. When he is separated from the main forces, he meets Eleanor Olato and Ivanna Batraal. Various circumstances lead Alphonse to separate from Rictors main unit, as the plot unfolds, Alphonse begins to question the actions and motives of Rictor. It is later revealed that Rictor initially knew about the sacred spear, about halfway through the game, the player is presented with two choices, one of which eventually leads to his falling out with Rictor. In fact, the choice will significantly affect all plot elements that follow. There are five possible endings in the game, the A+ ending sequence features one additional scene which details Lans Tartares past, in addition to the entire A ending sequence. To view the A+ ending, several conditions must be met, in particular, the D ending excludes Eleanor altogether. Tactics Ogre, The Knight of Lodis offers a strategic field-and-class based combat system, although the player starts with a meager army of only six units, the army can later blossom to as many as thirty-two. Characters can also earn emblems, certificates given after performing a specific feat or reaching a certain checkpoint and these emblems sometimes have no effect, often alter character statistics, some have a negative effect, and a few are required to advance to certain classes. The games playable units are divided into categories, humans, demi-humans, dragons, Beasts. The human class is the category with interchangeable jobs, with each class being marked by a required, or multiple required statistics. Some classes can only be unlocked by a sex, while other classes are reserved only for certain special characters. Demi-humans, non-humans, and the undead cannot change classes, although all categories of units in the game can be persuaded in battle, the undead alone cannot be bought. Instead, undead units are created by using a spell on deceased units. Once a dragon has upgraded, altering its alignment will automatically change its class, after customization of the players party, the group of units engage in combat
25.
Capcom
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Capcom Co. Ltd. or Capcom, is a Japanese video game developer and publisher. Originally established in 1979, it has become an international enterprise with subsidiaries in North America, Europe. Capcoms first predecessor, I. R. M Corporation, was founded on May 30,1979 by Kenzo Tsujimoto, Tsujimoto named I. R. M after his other company Irem Corporation which he founded earlier in 1974 and remained with until 1983. In January 1989, the old affiliate company Capcom Co. Ltd. merged with Sambi Co. Ltd. resulting in the current Japanese branch. While Capcoms first product was the coin-operated Little League from July 1983, its first real video game, since then, Capcom has created 15 multi-million-selling game series, the most successful of which is Resident Evil. Capcom has been noted as the last major publisher to be committed to 2D games, the companys continued commitment to the Super Nintendo Entertainment System as its platform of choice caused them to lag behind other leading publishers in developing 3D-capable arcade boards. In 1994, Capcom adapted its Street Fighter series of fighting games into a film of the same name, while commercially successful, the production received almost universal criticism. A2002 adaptation of its Resident Evil series faced similar criticism but was successful in theaters. The company sees films as a way to build sales for its video games, Capcom partnered with Nyu Media in 2011 to publish and distribute the Japanese independent games that Nyu localized into the English language. In August 27,2014, Capcom filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Koei Tecmo Games at the Osaka District Court for 980 million yen in damage, Capcom claimed Koei Tecmo Games infringed a patent it obtained in 2002 regarding play feature of the video games. Later, games developed internally used to be created by several numbered Production Studios, in addition to these internal teams, Capcom also commissions outside development studios to ensure a steady output of titles. It also has the Ueno Facility, an office in Iga. The international Capcom Group currently encompasses 15 subsidiaries in Japan, North America, Europe, affiliated companies include Koko Capcom Co. Ltd. in South Korea, Street Fighter Film, LLC in the United States, and Dellgamadas Co. Ltd. Suleputer, a marketing and music label established in cooperation with Sony Music Entertainment Intermedia in 1998, publishes CDs, DVDs. Capcom also owns numerous arcade game known as Plaza Capcom, including one in Narita, Futtsu. An annual private media summit called Captivate, renamed from Gamers Day in 2008, is used as a platform for new game. Capcom launched its Street Fighter franchise in 1987, the series of fighting games are among the most popular in their genre, and have sold over 30 million units. That same year,1987, the company introduced its Mega Man series, selling nearly 30 million units, the series serves as Capcoms flagship franchise
26.
Square Enix
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The Square Enix headquarters are in the Shinjuku Eastside Square Building in Shinjuku, Tokyo, and the company employs over 3800 employees worldwide. The original Square Enix Co. Ltd. was formed as the result of a merger between Enix Corporation and Square Co. Ltd. on April 1,2003, with Enix legally absorbing Square. Each share of Squares common stock was exchanged for 0.85 shares of Enixs common stock, at the time, 80% of Square Enix staff were made up of former Square employees. As a result of the merger, Square Co. Ltd. was dissolved, in addition to its flagship subsidiary, Square Enix Holdings owns the arcade gaming corporation Taito, known for games such as Space Invaders, Bubble Bobble, Arkanoid, Darius and Lufia. Square Enix Holdings also owns game publisher Eidos Interactive, which has absorbed into Square Enix Europe. Square Enix Europe now publishes all of Eidoss intellectual property and runs Eidoss development studios, Eidos was most well known for publishing the Tomb Raider, Hitman, Deus Ex, Legacy of Kain, and Thief series of games. Square was founded in Yokohama in September 1983 by Masashi Miyamoto after he graduated from Waseda, at that time, Square was a computer game software division of Den-Yu-Sha, a power line construction company owned by Miyamotos father. In September 1986, Square spun off from Den-Yu-Sha and became an independent company officially named Square Co. Ltd, with 400,000 copies sold, Final Fantasy spawned multiple sequels over the years and became Squares main franchise. By late 1994 they had developed a reputation as a producer of high quality role-playing video games, Final Fantasy VII was one of these games, and it sold 9.8 million copies, making it the second-best-selling game for the PlayStation. Enix was founded on September 22,1975 as Eidansha Boshu Service Center by Japanese architect-turned-entrepreneur Yasuhiro Fukushima, key members of the developers staff consisted of director Koichi Nakamura, writer Yuuji Horii, artist Akira Toriyama, and composer Koichi Sugiyama, among others. The first game in the Famicom-based RPG series was released in 1986 and this caused a significant rise in stock for both Enix and Sony. By November 1999, Enix was listed in the Tokyo Stock Exchanges 1st section, with the company facing its second year of financial losses, Square approached Sony for a capital injection and on October 8,2001, Sony Corp purchased 18. 6% stake in Square. Following the success of both Final Fantasy X and Kingdom Hearts, the companys finances stabilized, and it recorded the highest operating margin in its history in fiscal year 2002. As described by Yoichi Wada, Squares president and CEO, Square has also fully recovered, the combination of the two provides no negative factors but would bring little in the way of operational synergies. The merger was set for April 1,2003, on which date the newly merged entity Square Enix came into being, at the time of the merger, 80% of Square Enix staff were made up of former Square employees. As part of the merger, former Square president Yoichi Wada was appointed president of the new corporation, the founder of Enix and the largest shareholder of the newly combined corporation, Yasuhiro Fukushima, was made its honorary chairman. In July of that year, the Square Enix headquarters were moved to Yoyogi, Shibuya, Tokyo, since its foundation, Square Enix has acquired a number of companies, as well as creating several subsidiary companies. In January 2005 Square Enix founded Square Enix China, expanding their interests in the Peoples Republic of China, the acquisition of Eidos was completed in April 2009, and in November the publisher was merged with Square Enixs European publishing organization to form Square Enix Europe
27.
Final Fantasy Tactics Advance
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Final Fantasy Tactics Advance is a tactical role-playing game developed and published by Square for the Nintendo Game Boy Advance. A spin-off of the popular Final Fantasy series, the game shares several traits with 1997s Final Fantasy Tactics, the player assembles a clan of characters, and controls their actions over grid-like battlefields. Players are mostly free to decide the classes, abilities, the games story centers on four children, Marche, Mewt, Ritz, and Doned, who live in a small town named St. Ivalice. The children are transported to a realm of the name as their town, Ivalice. The story then focuses on the exploits of Marche as he attempts to return to the world while facing opposition from those around him. Following its release, Tactics Advance-themed merchandise was introduced and it has a sequel, Final Fantasy Tactics A2, Grimoire of the Rift for the Nintendo DS. Tactics Advance was re-released for the Nintendo Wii U Virtual Console on January 28,2016 for Europe/Australia & North America with Japan on March 30,2016, in Tactics Advance, turn-based tactical battles take place on a three-dimensional isometric field. The player takes the role of Marche, a leader, he must organize the clans members. The player competes against the team in turn-based play, although unlike Final Fantasy Tactics characters execute their actions instantly. Missions are tasks undertaken by a clan, there are four types of missions, regular, encounter, dispatch, and area. In regular missions, Marches entire party ventures to a location to do battle. Many of these missions are used to advance the story, in encounter missions, Marches group battles a rival mercenary clan by purchasing a mission or meeting them on the map. In dispatch missions, which do not involve battle, Marche temporarily sends away one member from his party, area missions are usually a dispatch mission where Marches clan can liberate certain regions to obtain bonuses and discounts at shops. Some missions, typically dispatch missions, require an item to be in possession in order to accept the mission. Others require a character to have a specific job class. In regards to items, this may mean another mission must be done to get an item that would allow you to perform the later mission, the world map is initially empty except for the starting location, it is customized as the player wins location tokens after certain missions. These tokens represent different terrains and settlements, such as plains, mountains, deserts, forests, and towns, items are rewarded to the player depending on the placement of the tokens. Ivalice also introduces areas called jagds, lawless slums that Judges avoid, jagd is a German word which means the hunt
28.
Odin Sphere
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Odin Sphere is an action role-playing game developed by Vanillaware for the PlayStation 2 home console. It was published by Atlus in 2007, and by Square Enix in 2008, the game was conceived by George Kamitani as first a sequel and then a successor to the 1997 Sega Saturn title Princess Crown. Development began in 2004 after the formation of Vanillaware. The story was based around the concept of a Valkyrie princess, the scenario and world design incorporated Norse mythology, the works of William Shakespeare, fairy tales and early video games. 2D graphics were chosen over 3D graphics as Kamitani felt the style was stagnating, Leifthrasir began development in 2013 as a means of addressing the issues both players and staff had with the original game while keeping the story intact. The music for both versions was composed by a team from Basiscape, led by company founder Hitoshi Sakimoto, first announced in February 2007, the team had encountered difficulties finding a publisher due to Kamitanis sparse record as a game developer. Atlus picked up the title, but it was delayed into 2007 despite completion so it would not compete with Atlus other titles that year, the localization was handled by Atlus USA, and proved challenging in multiple areas. Leifthrasir was praised for its performance and reworked mechanics. The game was a success, contributing to the rise of Vanillaware as a developer. Odin Sphere is a two-dimensional side-scrolling action role-playing game where the player control of five different characters across six playable scenarios. Areas within levels are circular stages allowing movement left or right with exits leading to other areas, combination attacks are triggered by attacking enemies continuously. Jumping can be used to reach airborne enemies within stages, at the end of each battle, grades are awarded based on the battle time, damage taken from enemies, and the amount of damage dealt. The ammount of in-game currency the player receives as a reward after each battle depends on the battle grade and these two elements are upgraded by collecting Phozons, spirit energy released from defeated enemies. Phozons fill a meter, which is used to trigger special skills. All physical attack drain a characters POW gauge, and if depleted entirely the character must rest until the gauge refills. Tied to Phozons and leveling is a system, where seeds planted and fueled with Phozons provide meals which raise a characters level, boosting their health. Food can be grown in the wild using seeds, but later two restaurants are available where prepared meals can be eaten, Leifthrasir adds to and augments the existing features. These include new battle arenas, and new areas within environments to create platforming segments
29.
Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings
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Final Fantasy XII, Revenant Wings is a real-time tactical role-playing game developed by Think & Feel and Square Enix who also published the game for the Nintendo DS. It is a sequel to the 2006 PlayStation 2 role-playing game Final Fantasy XII, one year after the events of Final Fantasy XII, the protagonist Vaan is now a sky pirate possessing his own airship. Their treasure-hunting adventures take them to the purvama of Lemurés and the ground below, Revenant Wings is the first title announced in the Ivalice Alliance series of video games. The North American release of the game was rebalanced to be more difficult than the Japanese version, after completing a prologue sequence, the player starts the game with an airship, named after their clan. The airship is used as a base where the player can check on their current mission and view other tasks, customize equipment in the synthesis shop, the airships interior can also be customized by the player. Revenant Wings is a strategy game, but with elements reminiscent of the turn-based Final Fantasy Tactics and Tactics Advance. It can be played entirely with the Nintendo DS stylus, battles are initiated when the player begins a mission or chooses to fight a melee battle in a particular area. The characters attack automatically once the enemy is within range, the player is given the option to give commands to the characters by tapping on them with the stylus. Possible commands include changing the target, setting their gambit. Each character is distinguished according to three types, melee, ranged and flying, melee characters attack at a close range, and ranged from afar, while flying are able to travel unbound to terrain. The types oppose each other in the manner where melee wins over ranged, ranged wins over flying and flying wins over melee, Summon abilities are learned via the new Ring of Pacts system, which is used to allow the summoning of Espers. Each slot in the Ring of Pacts is placed with an Auracite to create a pact with the Esper, summoning Espers to aid in battle is accomplished by using a Summon Gate located in the play field area. The ability to summon the different creatures depend on the Affinity of the player characters, additionally, two Espers per character are automatically summoned at the beginning of each battle where Espers are allowed. Espers can be linked to battle using a system reminiscent of the earlier Square game Bahamut Lagoon. Summons are ranked from 1 to 3, with Rank 1 and 2 able to manifest in large numbers, as opposed to Rank 3 which summons only one entity. Before the battle begins, players can select up to five Espers to possibly summon through Esper Gates in the battle, one Rank 3 Esper. Summons are also differentiated by varying elements, which are fire, water, earth, recovery and non-elemental are two other types. An element of alchemy and synthesizing is used in the game, only leader characters can obtain the materials, of which can be synthesized into weapons and armor and the stats of being dependent on the materials grade
30.
Kaleido Star
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Kaleido Star is a Japanese anime series animated Japanese studio Gonzo. The series was created by Junichi Sato, who directed the first season. Kaleido Star, New Wings was directed by Yoshimasa Hiraike, Kaleido Star follows Sora Naegino, a young Japanese girl, who travels to the United States to fulfill her dream of performing at the world-famous Kaleido Stage. Three original video animations have been produced, as well as a manga series, however, she runs into difficulties as soon as she arrives. She gets lost on her way to the Stage, is leered at by a mysterious stranger, employing her acrobatic skills, Sora chases down the criminal. A kind police officer gives her a ride to Kaleido Stage, but she discovers that she has missed her audition, however, after a performer is injured, Kalos, the owner of the circus, offers her to perform. Sora, humiliated by her efforts, decides to return to Japan. Kalos, having seen her earlier chase, reconsiders and informs Layla that Soras performance will eventually be the act at the circus. The other members of Kaleido Stage, particularly Layla, is dissatisfied with Sora and her personality eventually earns the respect of the performers as well as several increasingly major roles in the productions. She also befriends Layla over time, however, Laylas father pressures her to leave and insiders plan to take over and shut down Kaleido Stage. Sora relies on her personality, hard work and close friendships to keep the stage afloat. In the second season, Sora returns to the stage after attempting the Legendary Great Maneuver with Layla and this leaves Laylas shoulder injured and unable to perform. The absence of her co-star, having retired to further a career in Broadway productions, because of this Kalos brings in a new recruit, Leon Oswald. It seems at first that Leon is reminded very much of someone due to Soras presence, despite this, however, Leon disapproves Sora as worthy of being on the stage with him. This leads to the most talented of the new Kaleido Stage recruits to question and challenge Soras position as Leons partner and star of the show. Soras first goal in the season is to attend the festival in Paris. The atmosphere and attitude this creates does not bode kindly to Soras carefree and it, in turn, causes her to withdraw from the competition in the middle of her act with the redeemed Yuri Killian, leaving her friends, family and Layla confused and otherwise disappointed with Sora. Most of the season concentrates on Sora finding, questioning, after many trials and rejections, Sora eventually aims to become a True Kaleido Star while creating a fun, conflict-free stage, the complete opposite of what she experiences at the festival in Paris
31.
Yasunori Mitsuda
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Yasunori Mitsuda is a Japanese composer, musician, and sound producer known primarily for his work in video games, among other media. He is best known for his compositions in the Chrono, Xeno, Shadow Hearts, and Inazuma Eleven series of games, as well as such as Mario Party, Soma Bringer. Mitsuda began composing video game music for his own games in high school, as part of his college course, he was granted an intern position at the game development studio Wolf Team, studying under composer and musician Motoi Sakuraba. Upon graduation in 1992, he joined Square as a composer after seeing an advertisement in an office he was visiting with his professor. Despite his job title as a composer, Mitsuda worked as a sound designer for two years. In 1994, after threatening to quit to Squares vice president, Hironobu Sakaguchi, after the games success and the musics acclaim, he went on to compose several other games for Square, including Xenogears. In 1998, Mitsuda left Square to work as a composer, founding his own music production studio, Procyon Studio, in 2001 as well as his own record label. The company has expanded to six employees, and Mitsuda continues to compose for video games, as well as for anime series, films, documentaries. Mitsuda was born in Tokuyama, Japan, on January 21,1972 and he took piano lessons beginning at the age of five, but was more interested in sports at the time and did not take music seriously, quitting by the age of six. For a while, he wanted to become a professional golfer, while in high school, Mitsuda rediscovered music, inspired by Vangelis Blade Runner and Henry Mancinis The Pink Panther film scores. After watching Railman, he decided to become a music composer and he became interested in PCs after his father bought him one, which was a rare item at the time. He started to program games and compose music for them. After high school, Mitsuda decided to leave town and become independent, with encouragement from his father and sister, he moved to Tokyo and enrolled in the Junior College of Music. At the cost of being used for physical labor, Mitsuda got a first-hand view of the Japanese music world. During this work experience, with his term ending, Mitsuda saw an advertisement for a sound producer at Square in a copy of Famitsu magazine at a game company he was visiting. With no clear plans as to what he wanted to do after school, Mitsuda sent a demo which won him an interview at the game studio. Although his official job title was composer, Mitsuda found himself working more as a sound engineer, over the next two years, he created sound effects for Hanjuku Hero, Final Fantasy V, The 7th Saga, Secret of Mana, and Romancing SaGa 2. Sakaguchi assigned the young musician to the working on Chrono Trigger, telling him that after you finish it
32.
Yoko Shimomura
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Yoko Shimomura is a Japanese video game composer and pianist. Shimomura has worked in the game industry ever since graduating from the Osaka College of Music in 1988. From then until 1993, she worked for Capcom, where she composed wholly or in part the scores for 16 games, including Final Fight and Street Fighter II, from 1993 until 2002, Shimomura worked for Square, where she composed for a further eight games. While working for Square, she was best known for her work on the soundtrack for Kingdom Hearts, starting with Mario & Luigi, Superstar Saga in 2003, she began working as an active freelancer, starting up a music production company called Midiplex. Music from several of her games have been published as arranged albums, Shimomura was born on October 19,1967, in Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. She developed an interest for music at an age. She began composing her own music by playing the piano randomly and pretending to compose, eventually coming up with her own pieces, Shimomura attended Osaka College of Music, and graduated as a piano major in 1988. Capcom invited her in for an audition and interview, and she was offered a job there. While working for Capcom, Shimomura contributed to the soundtracks of over 16 games, including the successful Street Fighter II, The World Warrior, the first soundtrack she worked on at the company was for Samurai Sword in 1988. Final Fight, in 1989, was her first work to receive a separate soundtrack album release, the first soundtrack album to exclusively feature her work came a year later for the soundtrack to Street Fighter II. While she began her tenure at Capcom working on games for game consoles. She was a member of the companys in-house band Alph Lyla and she performed live with the group on a few occasions, including playing piano during Alph Lylas appearance at the 1992 Game Music Festival. In 1993, Shimomura left Capcom to join another game company and she stated that the move was done because she was interested in writing classical-style music for fantasy role-playing games. Her first project at the company was the score for the video game Live A Live in 1994. While she was working on the score to Super Mario RPG the following year and these games were followed by Tobal No. 1, the last score she worked on another composer for a decade. Over the next few years, she composed the soundtrack to several games, including Parasite Eve, of all her compositions, Shimomura considers the soundtrack to Legend of Mana the one that best expresses herself and the soundtrack remains Shimomuras personal favourite. The soundtrack has led to two albums of piano arrangements, Kingdom Hearts was the last soundtrack that she worked on at Square
33.
Michael Salvatori
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Michael C. Salvatori is an American composer best known for his collaboration with colleague Martin ODonnell for the soundtracks to the Halo video game series. Salvatori continued to manage TotalAudio and worked on his own music for such as Disney. He most recently co-composed the soundtrack to the 2014 video game Destiny, Salvatori wrote music for his own rock band while he was in college, and became friends with Martin ODonnell. ODonnell eventually moved to Chicago after completing his degrees, and was approached with a job offer to score a colleagues film, since Salvatori had his own recording studio, ODonnell offered to split the job with him, the two became partners. Soon after producing the music for Myth II, Bungie contracted ODonnell for several of Bungies other projects, Bungie wanted to re-negotiate the contracts for Oni in 1999, which resulted in ODonnell joining the Bungie team ten days before the company was bought by Microsoft. Salvatori remained behind to manage the business aspect of TotalAudio, which he continues to do, ODonnell and Salvatoris company TotalAudio was contracted to produce the music for Bungies upcoming title, Halo, Combat Evolved. During production Bungie decided that instead of contracting work to ODonnell, Salvatori remained at TotalAudio to manage the business aspect of the company, and shortly after ODonnell joined the team, Bungie was bought by Microsoft. Salvatori co-composed the music for Halos sequels—Halo 2 and Halo 3—with ODonnell, for the music to Halo 3, ODST, ODonnell began work on crafting the games themes before Salvatori joined the team in February 2009. Marty had started writing before me, and sent me some of his ideas, I picked a few that I felt I could add some magic to, and worked on those. I also came up several ideas that I sent to Marty that he put his hands on. Once the duo felt they had enough material, the Chicago-based Salvatori flew to Bungie in Seattle to complete the arrangements, early on, the team decided that rather than rely on old Halo themes, ODST would feature all-new music. It was a bit intimidating at first, Salvatori recalled, because in previous Halo games if new ideas werent coming, I could always dust off an old one, I was afraid that we might hit some writers block along the way, but that didnt happen at all. Instead, we had the freedom to some new musical territory. With the exception of the player character, ODonnell and Salvatori did not compose themes to represent characters. While the games setting in Africa inspired some percussion pieces, the team was interested in a sparser atmosphere, which Salvatori described as a bit darker and less epic. He most recently co-composed the soundtrack to the 2014 video game, Destiny for which he won the 2014 Original Dramatic Score, ODonnell and Salvatoris music has been packaged and released in physical and digital forms. The soundtracks feature frozen arrangements that represent an approximation of a play-through of the games, the Halo Original Soundtrack sold over 40,000 copies, and was followed by two different releases of the music to Halo 2. The second album was released more than a year after the soundtrack had been mixed and mastered, Halo 3s soundtrack was released in November 2007, and featured a fan contribution that was the select winner from a pool of entries judged by ODonnell, Rodgers, and others
34.
Play! A Video Game Symphony
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A Video Game Symphony was a concert series that features music from video games performed by a live orchestra. The concerts from 2006 to 2010 were conducted by Arnie Roth, from 2010, Andy Brick took the position of principal conductor and music director. Play. was replaced by the Replay, Symphony of Heroes concert series, in 2004, Jason Michael Paul was approached by Square Enix to organize a concert for music from its Final Fantasy series. After the concert sold out in a few days, Paul decided to video game music concerts into a series. Arnie Roth, who had conducted the Dear Friends - Music from Final Fantasy and More Friends. Andy Brick, who had conducted the Symphonic Game Music Concerts, was chosen as the associate conductor. The concerts are performed by local players and choirs. Premiered on May 27,2006 at the Rosemont Theater in Rosemont, the premiere show featured performances by Koji Kondo, Angela Aki, and Akira Yamaoka, and composers Nobuo Uematsu, Yasunori Mitsuda, Yuzo Koshiro and Jeremy Soule were in attendance. Each concert features segments of video game performed by a live orchestra and choir. An opening fanfare, written by Nobuo Uematsu, is performed at each show, Music from all video game eras is performed at the shows. According to Paul, the show is a music program. Music from the games has been performed at Play. On January 9,2009, a live album CD and DVD of the concert was released and it was recorded in Prague and was performed by the Czech Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra. The concerts have been well received, audiences regularly give standing ovations after each song. Jeremy Soule, composer of the music for The Elder Scrolls IV, Oblivion, helps to promote the work of composers, as well as lend credibility to the genre of video-game music. Roth stated that the help to also push the classical industry forward. According to Soule, video game concerts can help to educate old generations that game isnt just a bunch of bleeps and bloops. One associate conductor stated that the crosses the generational gap
35.
Orchestra Hall (Detroit)
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Orchestra Hall is an elaborate concert hall in the United States, located at 3711 Woodward Avenue in Midtown Detroit, Michigan. The hall is renowned for its acoustic properties and serves as the home of the internationally known Detroit Symphony Orchestra. With the creation of an auditorium for jazz and chamber music in 2003. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1971, the Detroit Symphony Orchestra had previously played at the old Detroit Opera House. However, Ossip Gabrilowitsch demanded that the DSO build a suitable auditorium before he assumed his position as music director, construction on Orchestra Hall began on June 6,1919, and was completed in barely six months. The 2, 014-seat hall was designed by the theater architect. The first concert took place on October 23,1919 and the remained the home of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra until 1939. Due to the difficulties of the Great Depression, the orchestra was compelled to leave Orchestra Hall. Orchestra Hall was vacant for two years until it was purchased by new owners, for ten years Orchestra Hall presented jazz artists under the name Paradise Theater, opening on Christmas Eve 1941. The Paradise hosted the most renowned musicians, including Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Count Basie. The Paradise closed in 1951 and now Orchestra Hall sat vacant for twenty years until it became the object of a renovation plan in the late 1960s. Paul Ganson, the assistant principal bassoonist of the DSO, spearheaded a movement to rediscover the hall, renovation work started in 1970 and continued for about two decades, costing roughly $6.8 million. The original building required extensive renovations including, a new stage, all new seating, plaster and lath work, all of the restoration work was completed with the goal of maintaining the fine acoustic properties that the hall was historically known for. The hall was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1971, the DSO moved back into Orchestra Hall in 1989. Additional work on the hall was done in the months of 2002 and 2003 as part of the creation of the new Max M. Fisher Music Center, or the MAX. The mayor of Detroit delivers the annual State of the City address at Orchestra Hall, list of concert halls Hauser, Michael & Marianne Weldon. Hill, Eric J. & John Gallagher, AIA Detroit, The American Institute of Architects Guide to Detroit Architecture. Meyer, Katherine Mattingly and Martin C. P. McElroy with Introduction by W. Hawkins Ferry, cS1 maint, Multiple names, authors list Media related to Detroit Orchestra Hall at Wikimedia Commons Detroit Symphony Orchestra official website
36.
Detroit
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Detroit is the most populous city in the U. S. state of Michigan, the fourth-largest city in the Midwest and the largest city on the United States–Canada border. It is the seat of Wayne County, the most populous county in the state, the municipality of Detroit had a 2015 estimated population of 677,116, making it the 21st-most populous city in the United States. Roughly one-half of Michigans population lives in Metro Detroit alone, the Detroit–Windsor area, a commercial link straddling the Canada–U. S. Border, has a population of about 5.7 million. Detroit is a port on the Detroit River, a strait that connects the Great Lakes system to the Saint Lawrence Seaway. The Detroit Metropolitan Airport is among the most important hubs in the United States, the City of Detroit anchors the second-largest economic region in the Midwest, behind Chicago, and the thirteenth-largest in the United States. Detroit and its neighboring Canadian city Windsor are connected through a tunnel and various bridges, Detroit was founded on July 24,1701 by the French explorer and adventurer Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac and a party of settlers. During the 19th century, it became an important industrial hub at the center of the Great Lakes region, with expansion of the American automobile industry in the early 20th century, the Detroit area emerged as a significant metropolitan region within the United States. The city became the fourth-largest in the country for a period, in the 1950s and 1960s, suburban expansion continued with construction of a regional freeway system. A great portion of Detroits public transport was abandoned in favour of becoming a city in the post-war period. Due to industrial restructuring and loss of jobs in the auto industry, between 2000 and 2010 the citys population fell by 25 percent, changing its ranking from the nations 10th-largest city to 18th. In 2010, the city had a population of 713,777 and this resulted from suburbanization, corruption, industrial restructuring and the decline of Detroits auto industry. In 2013, the state of Michigan declared an emergency for the city. Detroit has experienced urban decay as its population and jobs have shifted to its suburbs or elsewhere, conservation efforts managed to save many architectural pieces since the 2000s and allowed several large-scale revitalisations. More recently, the population of Downtown Detroit, Midtown Detroit, paleo-Indian people inhabited areas near Detroit as early as 11,000 years ago. In the 17th century, the region was inhabited by Huron, Odawa, Potawatomi, for the next hundred years, virtually no British, colonist, or French action was contemplated without consultation with, or consideration of the Iroquois likely response. When the French and Indian War evicted the Kingdom of France from Canada, the 1798 raids and resultant 1799 decisive Sullivan Expedition reopened the Ohio Country to westward emigration, which began almost immediately, and by 1800 white settlers were pouring westwards. By 1773, the population of Detroit was 1,400, by 1778, its population was up to 2,144 and it was the third-largest city in the Province of Quebec
37.
Michigan
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Michigan /ˈmɪʃᵻɡən/ is a state in the Great Lakes and Midwestern regions of the United States. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, Michigan is the tenth most populous of the 50 United States, with the 11th most extensive total area. Its capital is Lansing, and its largest city is Detroit, Michigan is the only state to consist of two peninsulas. The Lower Peninsula, to which the name Michigan was originally applied, is noted to be shaped like a mitten. The Upper Peninsula is separated from the Lower Peninsula by the Straits of Mackinac, the two peninsulas are connected by the Mackinac Bridge. The state has the longest freshwater coastline of any political subdivision in the world, being bounded by four of the five Great Lakes, as a result, it is one of the leading U. S. states for recreational boating. Michigan also has 64,980 inland lakes and ponds, a person in the state is never more than six miles from a natural water source or more than 85 miles from a Great Lakes shoreline. What is now the state of Michigan was first settled by Native American tribes before being colonized by French explorers in the 17th century, the area was organized as part of the larger Northwest Territory until 1800, when western Michigan became part of the Indiana Territory. Eventually, in 1805, the Michigan Territory was formed, which lasted until it was admitted into the Union on January 26,1837, the state of Michigan soon became an important center of industry and trade in the Great Lakes region and a popular immigrant destination. Though Michigan has come to develop an economy, it is widely known as the center of the U. S. automotive industry. When the first European explorers arrived, the most populous tribes were Algonquian peoples, which include the Anishinaabe groups of Ojibwe, Odaawaa/Odawa, the three nations co-existed peacefully as part of a loose confederation called the Council of Three Fires. The Ojibwe, whose numbers are estimated to have been between 25,000 and 35,000, were the largest, French voyageurs and coureurs des bois explored and settled in Michigan in the 17th century. The first Europeans to reach what became Michigan were those of Étienne Brûlés expedition in 1622, the first permanent European settlement was founded in 1668 on the site where Père Jacques Marquette established Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan as a base for Catholic missions, missionaries in 1671–75 founded outlying stations at Saint Ignace and Marquette. Jesuit missionaries were received by the areas Indian populations, with relatively few difficulties or hostilities. In 1679, Robert Cavelier, Sieur de la Salle built Fort Miami at present-day St. Joseph, in 1691, the French established a trading post and Fort St. Joseph along the St. Joseph River at the present day city of Niles. The hundred soldiers and workers who accompanied Cadillac built a fort enclosing one arpent, cadillacs wife, Marie Thérèse Guyon, soon moved to Detroit, becoming one of the first European women to settle in the Michigan wilderness. The town quickly became a major fur-trading and shipping post, the Église de Saint-Anne was founded the same year
38.
Singapore
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Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, sometimes referred to as the Lion City or the Little Red Dot, is a sovereign city-state in Southeast Asia. It lies one degree north of the equator, at the tip of peninsular Malaysia. Singapores territory consists of one island along with 62 other islets. Since independence, extensive land reclamation has increased its size by 23%. During the Second World War, Singapore was occupied by Japan, after early years of turbulence, and despite lacking natural resources and a hinterland, the nation developed rapidly as an Asian Tiger economy, based on external trade and its workforce. Singapore is a global commerce, finance and transport hub, the country has also been identified as a tax haven. Singapore ranks 5th internationally and first in Asia on the UN Human Development Index and it is ranked highly in education, healthcare, life expectancy, quality of life, personal safety, and housing, but does not fare well on the Democracy index. Although income inequality is high, 90% of homes are owner-occupied, 38% of Singapores 5.6 million residents are permanent residents and other foreign nationals. There are four languages on the island, Malay, Mandarin, Tamil. English is its language, most Singaporeans are bilingual. Singapore is a multiparty parliamentary republic, with a Westminster system of unicameral parliamentary government. The Peoples Action Party has won every election since self-government in 1959, however, it is unlikely that lions ever lived on the island, Sang Nila Utama, the Srivijayan prince said to have founded and named the island Singapura, perhaps saw a Malayan tiger. There are however other suggestions for the origin of the name, the central island has also been called Pulau Ujong as far back as the third century CE, literally island at the end in Malay. In 1299, according to the Malay Annals, the Kingdom of Singapura was founded on the island by Sang Nila Utama and these Indianized Kingdoms, a term coined by George Cœdès were characterized by surprising resilience, political integrity and administrative stability. In 1613, Portuguese raiders burned down the settlement, which by then was part of the Johor Sultanate. The wider maritime region and much trade was under Dutch control for the following period, in 1824 the entire island, as well as the Temenggong, became a British possession after a further treaty with the Sultan. In 1826, Singapore became part of the Straits Settlements, under the jurisdiction of British India, prior to Raffles arrival, there were only about a thousand people living on the island, mostly indigenous Malays along with a handful of Chinese. By 1860 the population had swelled to over 80,000, many of these early immigrants came to work on the pepper and gambier plantations
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Final Fantasy concerts
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Final Fantasy is a media franchise created by Hironobu Sakaguchi and owned by Square Enix that includes video games, motion pictures, and other merchandise. The original Final Fantasy video game, published in 1987, is a video game developed by Square. Music from the franchise has been performed numerous times in concert tours and other performances such as the Orchestral Game Music Concerts, Symphonic Game Music Concerts. A Video Game Symphony and the Video Games Live concert tours, as well as forming the basis of specific Final Fantasy concerts, voices - Music from Final Fantasy was a concert held in Yokohama, Japan on February 18,2006 focusing on vocal pieces from the series. The longest running Final Fantasy concert series so far is the Distant Worlds, Music from Final Fantasy concert tour, which began in 2007 and continues to date around the world. The orchestra was conducted by Taizou Takemoto, and the concert was hosted by Masakazu Morita and Mayuko Aoki, the orchestra played 17 songs over a period of almost two hours. The setlist ranged covered songs from the very first Final Fantasy game through Final Fantasy X and their rendition of Suteki da Ne from Final Fantasy X was accompanied by Japanese folk singer Ritsuki Nakano, known as RIKKI, who sang the track in the original game. Similarly, Melodies of Life from Final Fantasy IX was performed by Emiko Shiratori, at Zanarkand and Yunas Decision, both from Final Fantasy X, were solo piano pieces performed by Aki Kuroda, while Liberi Fatali and One-Winged Angel saw the orchestra combined with a small chorus. Kiyotsugu Amano performed guitar accompaniment for Dear Friends and Vamo Alla Flamenco, an album based on a live recording of the concert was released on May 9,2002 by DigiCube, and was subsequently re-released on July 22,2004 by Square Enix. The album spans 25 tracks over two discs and covers a duration of 1,47,27, and includes the initial tuning of the orchestra, the speeches given by the MC, and the songs themselves. The album was received by critics and was termed an amazing soundtrack. Liz Maas of RPGFan agreed, although she found there to be a lack of actual innovation overall, she felt the music was wonderful, patrick Dell of Soundtrack Central felt that the album was wonderful and an impressive display, although he greatly disliked the performance of the choir. Sophia of Square Enix Music Online, on the hand, felt that it was a fantastic album. Tour de Japon - Music from Final Fantasy was a tour featuring music from the Final Fantasy video game series that toured Japan from March 12 to April 16,2004. The tour was built upon the success of the 20020220 Music from Final Fantasy concert, the series of concerts featured music composed by Nobuo Uematsu and arranged by Shiro Hamaguchi. The orchestras were conducted by Taizō Takemoto, as the orchestra in 20020220 had been, Uematsu guest conducted the encores for each performance, he used a borrowed baton that he had snapped and taped together. One of the performances was recorded and released exclusively on DVD to Nobuo Uematsu Fan Club members, Dear Friends - Music from Final Fantasy was a concert tour featuring music from the Final Fantasy video game series that toured the United States from 2004 to 2005. The concert was the first Final Fantasy concert tour for North America and featured record sales, the series of concerts featured music composed by Nobuo Uematsu from the later releases of the series
