Music Comparison [Old vs New AC]

[luantoine12]

Hello everyone

It's been quiet a long time since I played AC (because I lost my game....in Japan, what a coincidence?). Anyways, there is something that I still do which remembers me of my good times in Animal Crossing. Yes, I think you know what I am talking about.. the music~~. No doubt that AC's music is what makes the game so beautiful and magical. But there is something that I'd like to discuss with you today!

While I do my homework or randomly listen to AC OST's, it has to be city folk/wild world and not New Leaf. It is not because wild world or city folk reminds me of my childhood or I had better memories of it, in fact I had much more fun in New Leaf. But I don't know, the soundtracks in the old AC's in my opinion are much much more better than New Leaf. I feel like they suit more to the game itself, as an example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsYCK6U3dNw&index=49&list=PLH834K1pkcjI6DHKCawkF87zFx23TNh5T. Listen to it and imagine yourself cutting the trees (hahaha), planting flowers and walking around your town. It sounds so natural, right? Whereas this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJB0OvU_vkg&index=15&list=PLhHcMbVmbwCerhZdxVr4odQY_ZgLXEjET. There are some good soundtracks in New Leaf but some of them in my opinion* are very bizarre.

Now I'd like to hear your opinions ! Do you prefer the old or new soundtracks of Animal Crossing? Let me know your favourite one as well!

Mine is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8Dq0BNW6OI&index=52&list=PLH834K1pkcjI6DHKCawkF87zFx23TNh5T

 

[Soda Fox]

I prefer the original. It was so catchy and memorable, at least to me. Wild World was ok. City Folk was the worse IMO. I like a lot of the New Leaf soundtrack, but some of the tunes are kinda whatever.

In rank I would go Original, New Leaf closely tied with Wild World but New Leaf just a bit ahead, and City Folk dead last.

 

[Haskell]

1. Original
2. City Folk/NewLeaf
3. Wild World

 

[NinelivesBobcat]

I prefer the original. It was so catchy and memorable, at least to me. Wild World was ok. City Folk was the worse IMO. I like a lot of the New Leaf soundtrack, but some of the tunes are kinda whatever.

In rank I would go Original, New Leaf closely tied with Wild World but New Leaf just a bit ahead, and City Folk dead last.

Umm, that kinda makes no sense. City Folk re-uses Wild World's music, just higher quality...
_______________

I'd say that the older games and the movie had MUCH better music that actually fit the games atmosphere. A lot of the hourly themes in New Leaf sound so dead in my opinion (I only like 5PM). The older music made you feel like you were on an adventure while the newer music feels like I'm just wasting my time (except for 5PM). Right now, I think that the movie had the best music, while New Leaf has the worst. Here's my list from best to worst right now:

1. The Movie (the remastered Wild World songs and few original songs made the soundtrack somehow better than the soundtrack in the GCN game)
2: GameCube (nostalgic, upbeat and catchy)
3: City Folk (same as Wild World, except higher quality)
4: Wild World (a bit low quality due to it being on the DS, but still very nice to listen to)
5: New Leaf and Happy Home Designer (New Leaf's music is so boring, except for 5PM. HHD tried to fix this by making the music more upbeat and joyful and a lot of the songs were good, but the main theme of HHD is just so annoying and easily gets stuck in my head that I turn the volume off at the title screen).

I haven't played amiibo Festival so I can't judge the music in that game.

 

[MelbaBear]

I love the old soundtrack from Wild World and City Folk. I was kind of dissapointed when I found out that New Leaf uses different soundtracks, because I love the old one so much

 

[luantoine12]

Many of you shares the same thing as me about the old musics actually fitting the game's environment. By the way is the movie worth watching? Does it have good background music?

Let me know your favorite music

 

[NinelivesBobcat]

Many of you shares the same thing as me about the old musics actually fitting the game's environment. By the way is the movie worth watching? Does it have good background music?

Let me know your favorite music

In my opinion, I'd say it's worth watching since I enjoyed it a lot. Other people have different opinions though. The movie re-uses some music from Wild World but changed some instruments and made them higher quality (e.g the Able Sisters' theme). It also has an extended version of the Roost theme which is the best version of the Roost theme in my opinion. It has a few original songs too (such as 'Rosie' and 'Pirate?!'). I'd say it's a really good soundtrack. I can't decide completely on whether the movie or GCN game had the best soundtrack.

 

[DylanMcGrann]

I'm going to disagree somewhat.

I am someone that could never get into the Animal Crossing games until playing Animal Crossing: New Leaf, and the music is actually a big part of that for me. I find Animal Crossing: New Leaf's music quite a bit more nuanced and developed than previous games. The older Animal Crossing music, to my ears, is often characterized by a lack of texture, predictable rhythms, and simple repetitive expressions that don't develop very much; whereas Animal Crossing: New Leaf is very much the opposite in these regards, even in its more minimalist tracks.

There are plenty of exceptions to this for both the old games and Animal Crossing: New Leaf, but the unified aesthetic lent to Animal Crossing: New Leaf's music, by what I'm guessing is a study of Carribean jazz aesthetic to theme the game with Tortimer Island and ideas of summer freedom, is far more unique than anything Animal Crossing has done before and much more clearly conveys ideas of leisurely relaxed play—very appropriate expression of Animal Crossing gameplay, which has very little to do with adventure archetypes.

But that’s just me. I could see how some might find Animal Crossing: New Leaf's music less exciting. And I don’t think Animal Crossing has ever had bad music, just to be clear. I just think New leaf stepped it up a notch in some important ways.

 

[Bilaz]

I've played every animal crossing game and to be perfectly honest I've loved all the music, here's why:

New Leaf: If you look purely at the quality of the music this is best. 1 AM, 4 AM & 7 PM are really beautiful songs and there a quite a few other gems in there. It's just really good from a musical point of view.

Wild World/City Folk: This music is the best if you look at how fitting it is with the game. Cheerful, fun and simple it catches the feel of the game perfectly and never feels out of place.

Gamecube: This music is the best if you look at how much fun the soundtrack is to listen to. It's brilliant and quirky and always amusing. Cats at 1 PM? Party at 2 AM? Wonderful, bring it on!

 

[UglyMonsterFace]

Gamecube: This music is the best if you look at how much fun the soundtrack is to listen too. It's brilliant and quirky and always amusing. Cats at 1 PM? Party at 2 AM? Wonderful, bring it on!

I've never played anything besides New Leaf, but I just had to see what you meant about cats at 1 PM, and OMG it's my new favourite Animal Crossing song ever! Thank you

 

[NinelivesBobcat]

I've never played anything besides New Leaf, but I just had to see what you meant about cats at 1 PM, and OMG it's my new favourite Animal Crossing song ever! Thank you

Funny thing about 1PM. Back in the day, people would post on forums (I think it was Animal Crossing Community, I could be wrong though) saying that they could hear a cat around 1PM and people would make up fake ways to get a pet cat in Animal Crossing (which makes no sense as cats are also villagers, then again bird villagers can have pet birds so nevermind).

 

[watercolorwish]

lol acgc definitely sounded more funkier at the weirdest times. but imo wild world had the best music especially the opening. best opening in the series! kills me everytime i think that city folk just ripped off almost all wild world's music :')

new leaf's music is really weird imo best game in the series, but kinda forgetful themes as much as i hate to say it especially the opening theme. its also all kind of tropical to me for some reason, not that thats a bad thing, just the one thing that stood out to me

 

[luantoine12]

I watched the movie and the soundtrack is definitely great!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cv5yNWzfcGw&index=7&list=PL0E4AF202C5E776D5

The quality <33

 

[Mayor-of-Bliss]

GameCube. I'm actually starting to hate New leaf's day music. I love the night music in Newleaf but I'm not awake then.
I'll randomly hum I think it's somewhere between 1pm and 6pm the track had this little barking meow bow type noise.
I feel like the original game just was more natural. The music now is good but after hearing some tracks 500 times I wish I could play it with the older music.

 

[NinelivesBobcat]

GameCube. I'm actually starting to hate New leaf's day music. I love the night music in Newleaf but I'm not awake then.
I'll randomly hum I think it's somewhere between 1pm and 6pm the track had this little barking meow bow type noise.
I feel like the original game just was more natural. The music now is good but after hearing some tracks 500 times I wish I could play it with the older music.

The song with the meows was 1PM.

 

[lizziety]

Not gunna lie, that cat song takes the cake for me lol.

As someone who has played all of the games I would put them in this order (1 best, 5 worst)

1. Population Growing
2. New Leaf
3. City Folk
4. Wild world
5. Happy Home Designer (I don't even know why I added this one)

For purely nostalgia reasons I think Population Growing is the best in the music department.

I can understand though why some might think that New Leaf has the best of the 5 games

 

[StereoGraph]

Nah

I prefer the original. It was so catchy and memorable, at least to me. Wild World was ok. City Folk was the worse IMO. I like a lot of the New Leaf soundtrack, but some of the tunes are kinda whatever.

In rank I would go Original, New Leaf closely tied with Wild World but New Leaf just a bit ahead, and City Folk dead last.

Man animal crossing Wild World has the best music of the series, with City folk/ Lets go to the city being a Close second. Then the original. New leaf's music is so unchill and I just heavily dislike it. No where near the quality of the older ones

 

[Sweetley]

I always prefer the soundtrack from the previous games over the one from New Leaf. I mean, NL's OST isn't so bad, it has some good tracks like the 7 PM soundtrack for example, which is a favorite of mine. But I don't know, it kinda becomes stale and boring after a while. I miss something like the cat song from the GC title, something that sticks in your mind because of being catchy.

 

[AlyssaAC]

The soundtrack from previous games were a lot better. From what I understand, the music soundtrack from New Leaf gets a bit old and repetitive, but I will have to admit, the 10pm is my personal favorite from New Leaf. I guess the reason I like the ones from the older games is because I played those first before New Leaf came out and I got used to them.

 

[Blood Eclipse]

It's really interesting to read the different opinions and likes/dislikes on this.

I have to agree that New Leaf's tracks, at least to me, are really uninspiring. That's not to say I don't like any tracks in it because there are some I really do like, namely 1am, 2am and 4am (absolutely love those tracks) and anything from 9-12 aren't too bad, either, but on the whole, when compared to the past releases of Animal Crossing, New Leaf just can't hold a candle to any of them in OST (or dialogue).

Animal Crossing Forest (N64/GCN) had the best soundtrack, in my opinion, I can't even pick a favorite from track list because I like nearly all of them and even downloaded the music to use as background noise to make chores easier or to tune out New Leaf's music. Even Wild World's music was better. I remember the music being a mood lifter and making tasks, like decorating your town, watering your plants, catching bugs/fish, digging for fossils or gyroids or running errands a breeze to do.

I see New Leaf's soundtrack like I see Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon's soundtrack when I compare it to Pok?mon Mystery Dungeon 2.