SECRETS & FUN FACTS
Jonathan Jones' name
Mifune's Comment
I kind of remember the planner changing the name. I think it was because there was a real person ... but I don't remember for sure. I'm sorry. We'll leave JoJo's strange adventures to your
imagination. :)
Jonathan Jones is one of two characters designed by Mifune to have actually made it to the final game (the other being Valentina), with both being redesigned by Kurashima for the
final game. Both characters actually have interesting origins for their names, with Jonathan Jones actually having two origins. "Jonathan Jones" (ジョナサン・ジョーンズ) was originally concieved with the name "Jonathan Jozu" (ジョナサン・ジョーズ), with "Jozu"
(ジョーズ) being the Japanese name for "Jaws", the name of both the shark & the 1975 movie of the same name (a correct localization of his original name would be "Jonathan Jaws"), which makes sense
since both characters are sharks. What likely happened (and can be inferred by Mifune's comment above) is that the names was changed slightly to "Jonzu" in order to avoid any issues with copyright.
There is another reference in Jonathan Jones' name, specifically the first two letters/symbols of his name in both English & Japanese, "Jo Jo" (ジョ ジョ), being a reference to the manga
series "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure" (ジョジョの奇妙な冒険), specifically the first protagonist, Jonathan Joestar. While this would be a massive stretch, there is a lot supporting this, including:
- The existence of another JoJo's reference in the game, the Japanese thoughts for the enemy "Buzzer".[1]
- The fact Jonathan Jones is located next to "Seaside Town", known as "Ripple Town" in Japanese (リップルタウン). This one is up for debate, while "Ripple" is the power used in the first two parts of
"JoJo's Bizarre Adventure" & the name of the town, the manga uses "波紋" which is pronounced as "Hamon", while the game uses "リップル" which is pronounced as "Ripperu".
- Mifune's comment, which comes from his Twitter account.
I should mention that, as I was writing this fact, Mifune himself liked a retweet I made about this fact, which to me basically confirms this as an intentional reference.
YOKO SHIMOMURA'S 2023 ADVENT CALENDER
For December of 2023, Yoko Shimomura, the game's composer, began sharing facts about a random composition each day! This will be an active archive that will update as more & more
info is released!
- "Dodo's Coming!"
Eh. why this song?! you might think lol. This song is actually the first song I created for "Super Mario RPG". We were asked to make a music game, so I created it
to perfectly fit the game's specifications and timing.
- "Super Pipe House"
I had decided to use the famous Mario melody since it is Mario's house, but when I was thinking about adding something more Mario-like, I suddenly remembered the
BGM for WORLD 1 of "Super Mario Bros. 3".
- "Fight Against Monsters"
Since this is a battle song for a Mario RPG, I wanted to make a bright and fun battle song! This is the song I came up with. In this Switch version, it is
a little longer and in a different key. I think it made the fights feel even more exciting!
- "Grandpa and the Delightful Tadpoles"
I love Latin music. I get excited when I start adding Latin percussion while composing. The original version of this song is only 17 seconds long
per round. It may be the shortest field song I have ever written in my life.
- "Hello, Happy Kingdom!"
The original song was, I believe, the second song I wrote. I remember that after I wrote this song, the image of the song grew and grew. I used the sound of a
metronome in this song, and the Switch version has a studio recording of the metronome sound! How extravagant!
- "Fight Against an Armed Boss"
What do you think the loose, chugging bass sound in the original song is? It's actually the sound of the percussion in "Welcome! Yo'ster Island!!". In
those days, music data was a battle against capacity. It would be a waste to make a sound that would only be used once! I tried a lot of things and ended up with this sound!
- "Weapons Factory"
This song was requested by the game's original planner, "I'd like a song with an odd time signature that I don't understand anymore." If you don't understand it well,
let's make it a 13 time signature so that you don't understand it well! When I made the song, he said "I don't really understand... by OK!"
- "Let's Go Down the Wine River"
This is already a fun song! There aren't many opportunities (at least for me) to create songs with this kind of atmosphere in a game. I had a lot of fun
making it, and for the Switch version, I put all of my imagination into what I was imagining at the time!
- "The Road is Full of Dangers"
At the time, I heard from a staff member that Mr. Uematsu, upon hearing the song & seeing the data, said "This is amazing." I was very happy. We had to
be very creative to express what we wanted to do with the limted number of tracks.
- "Welcome! Yo'ster Island!!"
This song actually has a phrase inspired by the sound effects of a certain Famicom game. For some reason, it's a sound that has stuck with me for a long,
long time. The title's a secret. But for me, that sound is one of the fond memories of my family.
- "Versus: Bowser Battle"
When arranging the original Mario RPG song for the Switch version, there were a few sounds that were present in the original music, but were difficult to express
now. This song has one of those sounds. I couldn't reproduce the same sounds anymore, but I tried my best to make the image as close as possible.
- "Genos's Awakening"
I did a lot of tempo changes to get the timing right. I recorded it for the Switch version, but the tempo change was quite unnatural from a musical standpoint,
so I was like, "Why?" lol. The original song is a loop, but it ended in the Switch version because the timing happened to be right.
- "Victory!!"
In the original work, the moment the piece is played, the "Jang!" sound effect plays at the right time. That's actuall my suggestion, I thought I'd fit, but it didn't.
So I thought, wouldn't it be more pleasing if I timed it to match it? This time too, the timing for Mario to take off his hat is perfect! I'm happy♡.
- "Welcome to Booster Tower"
The original request was "Paul Moriah style" and "easy listening style". What do you think? I think it turned out quite like that. The contrast to Booster's
later songs as quite interesting, and I thought the planning staff had a great sense of style.
- "And My Name is Booster"
The tone of the original melody is the result of applying an effect called LFO to the original song, which is ofter used to create a vibrato-like effect over the
pitch. This is the result of increasing the volume a lttile. This time, I used a saxophone technique called "Growl".
- "Beware the Forest Mushrooms"
This is probably the most famous song in Mario RPG. Everything from the melody to the structure came to me in a flash, and I was able to create this song
quickly and asily. As I wrote in the soundtrack booklet at the time, people said it was "strangely lyrical". I am grateful that this song is so well-loved.
- "You and Toadofsky Create Exquisite Music"
The melody of the song is divided into four parts. The first and second were decided by the specifications of the game, the third I was free to
decide, nd the fourth, as you know, is really free. The development team, the composer, and all of you have worked together to create this amazing piece of music!.
- "The Merry Mary Bells Ring"
6/8 time is said to be the time signature that Japanese people are not good at, i learned so in school. But I love it! Actually, long after I
wrote this song, I thought that I wanted to write another song like "Merry Mary", so I wrote this song. Has anyone noticed?
- "Fight Against Smithy, Who Likes Transforming"
I was wondering what instrument to use for the melody in the Switch version arrangement, so I tried making it a Violin Solo, and I was
like, "That's great!" Then I decided to use live guitars & basses, and that turned out to be pretty cool! I'm sorry for saying "You're going to transform too!" in the original story lol.
- "Our Paradise ~Monstro Town~"
The reason why this piece is longer than the other files songs is because once I started making it, the pieces started to connect one after
another in an imozuru style (lol), and I was able to complete this piece without stopping once. Although it is longer than the others, it is not complicated and consists of only 4 short phases.
- "Fight Against Culex"
At the time of the original production, I was asked to choose any FF battle song I wanted to use, and I immediately started humming this song and FF2 battle scene
1. So, depending on the situation, it could have been the song from FF2 Battle Scene 1. I'm glad I decided to do it!
- "Farewell, Geno... ~ Seeing Dreams Through the Window of the Stars"
There is one addition/change from the original song. I had to add two bars to fit the picture, but many of the
melodies fit better in four-bar increments. The flow of the music was not interrupted by unnatural additions.... This is 3 bars of my best work, including the changed parts!
- "Fun Parade, Cheerful Parade / There Goes the Parade"
I remember the original song, but I was told that no sound effects would be played, so I used the sound effect
bank and added the song data, and when the fireworks sound became necessary at the end, I turned pale. I restored the sound effect bank in the dark section where the song cuts out for a moment.
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