Streets of Rage "At the Heart of Yggdrasil" 6:08

Lemme tell ya somethin', kid...
You don't know a damn thing about these streets.

As I write, the fourth edition of Game Set Mash!! is reaching the end of Round 3 (hmm, I really should probably be doing some recording, but people are sleeping and I sing loud, over and over and over again), so I'm looking at one of the highlights of the previous competition: GSM3. As part of Liontamer's mixpost outsourcing project (which I am delighted by and honored to be part of), we both noticed that this ReMix's write-up hadn't been done yet, and we both thought it would be great to have my perspective on this one because, well, it's personal.

For those unfamiliar with the competition, DarkeSword's Game Set Mash!! 3 was in early 2025, where two teams spent a frantic ten days or so mashing together three pairs of sources, half of those sources sight unseen, only to have a break for a few days of voting and source nominations before doing it all again. And then once again. For me, it was exhilarating and downright scary, and the time pressure was brutal, but as an amateur musician it was a great opportunity to learn from my (now) fellow ReMixers and provide my own skills and talents.

The brief for the competition's theme was simple: we would be celebrating Yuzo Koshiro's music by mashing a source each from Streets of Rage I, II and III with one each from Etrian Odyssey I, II and III. Eventually each series' instalment would get a source matched up with the other's. One team took care of choosing the Streets of Rage tracks for the round, while the other took care of Etrian Odyssey's, and then they'd be revealed to each other at the start of the ten-day mixing period. Then after those ten days, our creations would be paired against one another in gladiatorial combat to the death a vote on "which team did it better".

As part of the Etrian Odyssey sources team (aka Team Etrian), before the first mixing round started, I listened through all three games' soundtracks, highlighted what I thought about each track and voted for the ones I liked the most. In doing so, I discovered the "Labyrinth IV - Petal Bridge" theme from Etrian Odyssey II and slipped it into my back pocket, loving its harmonic progressions and compositional structure. When Round 3 came around, I had a clear vision of how I wanted to approach mixing "Petal Bridge" and championed it to my team. We chose it as our team's choice for EO2 for the round, and gave it to the other team to mash. Team Streets chose "The Last Soul" from SoR1 and they gave it to us in return; as per the competition format, our choices were unseen to the other team until they were revealed.

Even though I was initially thrown off-kilter by "The Last Soul" and how to reconcile it with "Petal Bridge", Hemophiliac took me under his wing and with my fellow teammates, colorado weeks, sallekhana and Mel Decision, we worked very hard on our mash-up. Hemo and I spent hours and hours back and forth in Discord with our FL Studios linked up through Sonobus. sallekhana recorded and re-recorded guitar lines. I stayed up beyond sunrise more than once. colorado even took a microphone on vacation to re-record her singing. We were really proud of the work that we achieved.

And then we put it up to the vote against the other team's mash-up.

We lost to this ReMix.

You might think that I should be annoyed because, as it turns out, one of the twins had put "The Last Soul" in their back pocket early on and brought it out for Round 3. You might think that I have a bad taste in my mouth that my team of five contributors lost to a team of six contributors and that having the twins, lifelong bandmates, working together would be an unfair advantage. You might think that my team's sacrifices were in vain. You might think that I'm going to go to the salt mine.

Well, you'd be wrong.

I'm glad we lost to this ReMix.

...

Hey...
Look at me...
And listen...

This gritty rock ballad is truly a magnum opus, and one of the best pieces to come out of the entire GSM competition series. All of them so far. I feel that my write-up won't give it enough justice; but hey, gotta try, right?

So, the creative minds of Team Streets who contributed to this ReMix did the following:

• paradiddlesjosh - arrangement, MIDI sequencing (drums, keys), lyrics
• pixelseph - guitars, bass, vocal performance, lyrics
• gravitygauntlet - sound design, lyrics
• H36T - vocal melody, lyrics
• Moebius - sound design, mastering
• Ronald Poe - lyrics

Lyricists everywhere, and that is actually a good place to begin. From the first few seconds of the ReMix, we're drawn into the dark world of Streets of Rage with the narrator's exhortation to "pass me the smokes" (remember, folks, smoking is bad for you!). Then, we hear his tale about this bleak, film noir-esque city where, instead of angels and devils, we're treated to Norse mythology of the world tree, Yggdrasil, the basis of the Etrian Odyssey series. The two in-game source worlds get nods in all the right places, which do so much to color this world with more shades of black, and highlight the desperate struggle of the song's protagonists. paradiddlesjosh explains the songwriting process:

"I had a rough skeleton for the track laid out in about a day, and then the six of us -- Moebius, H36T, gravitygauntlet, Ronald Poe, Seph, and me -- knocked our heads together sketching out lyrics and a vocal melody. You'll find some Neil Fallon songwriting staples: references to myth, radio-filtered echoes, and a non sequitur in a foreign language. The narrative framework is some modern fantasy nonsense -- the vigilante heroes of Streets of Rage prepare for a showdown with the villainous Syndicate's bossman, Mr. X, only the final battle is taking place in the world tree Yggdrasil of Norse legend instead of the penthouse suite in some downtown skyscraper."

There's even references to the famous line from the Streets of Rage series: "only trust your fists – police will not help you", which featured a few times throughout Team Streets' contributions throughout GSM3. We feel alone, we feel outnumbered, but damn if we don't feel pumped up thanks to the sweet, sweet hard rock we're treated to.

The Clutch influence for the music comes on very strongly in this one, and its grit works like magic when applied to these pieces of Koshiro's music. Josh gives his take on how the music came about:

"Writing proggy stuff is fun, but putting a stylistically simpler arrangement together just hits different. I've never played a game from either series, so GSM3 was my first introduction to both games' soundtracks. I gotta give mad props to Koshiro-san for crafting the sources: "Petal Bridge" captures the essence of foreboding darkness and implacable determination of dungeon delving without an over-reliance on harmonic tension and the bassline on "The Last Soul" has this slippery propulsiveness to it.

For the final round, I heard "The Last Soul" from the first Streets of Rage, and the slinky, shuffled bassline immediately pulled me into a Clutch mood. While I was originally thinking along the lines of "Careful with That Mic...", my inspiration shifted toward something more akin to "Son of Virginia" once Team Etrian Odyssey's pick of "Labyrinth IV - Petal Bridge [Dungeon: 16F-20F]" was revealed. That inspiration informed structural decisions like the pivot between the "Last Soul" bassline riff and the "Petal Bridge" intro vamp with its more colorful voicings of the same i-iv progression, the slow burn until a true chorus emerges at 2:33, and a partial extension of the final chorus."

As a fellow arranger of "The Last Soul", I cannot help but agree with his take on that bassline. It is the crux of that entire piece and I know it was definitely the thing that took my focus. The "Son of Virginia" inspiration for how to use it was perfect. Josh and Seph go ahead and put it front and center, celebrating it, pumping it up with steroids and making it the engine of the team's arrangement. The commonality between that bassline and "Petal Bridge"'s descending chord introduction drives much of their build-up verses. And when the storm finally breaks after that aforementioned slow burn...look out indeed! This is rock you can sink your teeth into like Nidhogg does in the lyrics, as Team Streets take "The Last Soul"'s climactic B-section and go to town complete with gated organ accompaniment that may contain traces of seagulls (it's an inside joke for GSM3, you had to be there). We get time to breathe as the tender "verse" section of "Petal Bridge" acts as the, well, bridge, of the arrangement, but after a very creative and apt nod to "The Last Soul"'s drum break, we then once again get a tasty reprise of the arrangement's chorus to finish. This piece isn't just a meal: it is a full-on banquet that leaves us satisfied, but one we'll certainly want to have again and again.

Take a look at the judges' decision thread for the full source usage and technical production notes. And speaking of the judges:

prophetik music:

"this is a really interesting combination. the SoR stuff is way more visible throughout, mostly due to Last Soul's bassline, but there's a lot of fun interweaving of the parts. [...] there's a ton going on, and i doubt i could do better! i do really like the vocal approach throughout and think it fits the concept a lot. the swagger throughout feels great and i think that the piece as a whole definitely does what you set out to do. nice work."

jnWake:

"Track starting like a cowboy theme wasn't what I expected! The SoR bass line as a slower moody riff works great and the chords from EO2 work great as a trade-off. [...] On arrangement this is really cool, you grabbed 2 sources with completely different moods and feels and created a blend that has its also completely different mood and feel! Like proph said, there's a lot of swagger in here and it's really fun to listen to. [...] Overall, a really cool arrangement with solid production."

My sensei and fellow arranger, Hemophiliac, gave the final vote to get this masterpiece over the line:

"This was very well done. If something was going to beat out our track in the final round, I'm glad it was this one.

I like how both sources were worked in together, especially because they are so different. It's also really funny how both entries in the compo chose to focus on the Last Soul bassline.

[...] great work bringing together something cohesive, musical, and interesting from all the chaos of the compo. Well done, team SoR!"

Well done, indeed. This ReMix easily crossed the judges' panel with only a little bit of subsequent spit-and-polish. "At the Heart of Yggdrasil" shows what is possible when you get a group of people together with a ten-day deadline and the creative excellence of the musicians in the OC ReMix community.

As the "loser" in this match-up, I don't feel like I've lost at all. We've all won from having this stellar example of lyric-writing and arrangement and production get made and get into the open. In fact, this piece has already become a source of inspiration for my own music- and lyric-writing.

I cannot thank everyone enough in Game Set Mash!!, from DarkeSword for his organization, to my fellow participants for supporting one another and bringing their best to the table in its chaos, no matter if we were on the same team or not. I have learned and gained so much from everyone who's participated, and this ReMix will, I hope, continue to inspire VGM arrangers into the future and show you, the listener, the joys of our craft brought about by the amazing crucible that's Game Set Mash!!