Final Fantasyis one of gaming’s longest-running franchises. It’s known for many things, including its memorable characters and wondrous settings, but if there’s one thing that transcends everything else, it’s the music. Legendary composers like Nobuo Uematsu have lent their talents to the series over the years, creating beautiful pieces of music to accompany every scene in the games.
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The music thatFinal Fantasyfans tend to hear most often, however, are the battle themes, which play every time enemies are encountered. Considering that the earlierFinal Fantasytitles featured random encounters, these songs popped up fairly frequently. These are the best standard battle themes fromFinal Fantasy’s 30-year history, not including boss battle themes or other special encounters.
10Final Fantasy IV
Being one of the earlierFinal Fantasytitles,Final Fantasy IV’s battle theme is a very simple loop. Thanks to the sound chip of the Super Nintendo, though, the repeating loop sounds excellent, especially combined with Nobuo Uematsu’s legendary composition skills.
You’ll hear thisbattle themehundreds of times as you make your way throughFinal Fantasy IV, and it won’t ever start to sound grating. It takes a lot of talent to keep a roughly 50-second loop from getting old over the course of a 30-hour game, but Nobuo Uematsu thankfully has talent to spare.
9Final Fantasy III
Final Fantasy IIIlaid the groundwork for a lot ofFinal Fantasytropes, like the job change system that allowed for enhanced party customization, and its battle theme screams classicFinal Fantasy.
Much like the battle theme forFinal Fantasy IV, it’s a short loop that repeats itself fairly often, but it never gets old throughout the entirety of the roughly 30-hour RPG. It also sounds more heroic and adventurous thanFinal Fantasy IV’s upbeat battle theme, making it fit in better with the questing and dungeon crawling that the franchise is known for.
8Final Fantasy VIII
Final Fantasy VIIIisoften overshadowedby the otherFinal Fantasygames on the original PlayStation, but its music stands shoulder to shoulder with some of the best songs in the entire series. The battle theme is no exception to this, and it has an incredibly unique sound compared to other standardFinal Fantasybattle themes.
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Like other modernFinal Fantasygames, the battle theme doesn’t have the iconic introductory bassline that the classic games have, but the intro toFinal Fantasy VIII’s normal battle theme is just as iconic and instantly recognizable to anyone who’s played it.
7Final Fantasy XIII
Final Fantasy XIIIhas a lot of faults, but the music is not one of them.Final Fantasy XIIIwas the firstFinal Fantasygame to release on an HD console, and the orchestral score was given just as much attention as the pretty new graphics.
The string-heavy main battle theme, like the rest of the soundtrack, is one of the only good things to come out of the mediocreFinal Fantasy XIII. After leaving Square Enix in 2004, Nobuo Uematsu still contributed his talents to a few songs forFinal Fantasy XIandFinal Fantasy XII, but he didn’t return to do any work forFinal Fantasy XIII, makingXIIIthe first mainlineFinal Fantasygame to feature absolutely no involvement from the legendary composer outside ofFinal Fantasy X-2.
6Final Fantasy VI
One of the bestFinal Fantasygames of all-time just so happens to have one of the best main battle themes in the series. The main battle theme inFinal Fantasy VIis an instant favorite, and it has a noticeably different vibe than some of the other mainlineFinal Fantasybattle themes.
On top of the normal battle theme,Final Fantasy VIis also packed with some of the best music of any RPG ever created. It’s not exactly fair to compare a standard battle theme to a work of art like the 18-minute long Dancing Mad, but the battle theme is still able to hold its own againstFinal FantasyVI’s other memorable tracks.
5Final Fantasy X
Final Fantasy Xwas the firstFinal Fantasygame in which Nobuo Uematsu was not the sole composer. There were a total of three composers working on the project including Uematsu, andFinal Fantasy Xhas an incredibly diverse soundtrack as a result. The battle theme is one of the most iconic that the series has to offer.
Final Fantasy Xwas the first game in the series to be released on PlayStation 2, the first next-generationFinal Fantasygame after the franchise skyrocketed in popularity followingFinal Fantasy VII,VIII, andIX, so the music had to be as innovative as the graphics and gameplay.Final Fantasy X’s compositions are noticeably more complex than those that came before it, and the battle theme is no exception.
4Final Fantasy IX
Final Fantasy IXwas a return to roots for the franchise. Following the massive success ofFinal Fantasy VII, the series shifted away from its traditional fantasy setting in favor of more modern and futuristic settings. Before the series would shift to the PlayStation 2 withFinal Fantasy X, the developers wanted to make a game that celebrated classicFinal Fantasy, and that game wasFinal Fantasy IX.
Final Fantasy IX’s battle theme is heavily inspired by classicFinal Fantasybattle themes, even bringing back the iconic bassline intro that the series had ditched withFinal Fantasy VII. It’s so good that Nobuo Uematsu has gone on record stating that his work onFinal Fantasy IXis his favorite as well as the work he is most proud of.
3Final Fantasy XV
Final Fantasy XV’s music is one of the game’s many highlights, and each of its many battle themes is worthy of being on this list. That’s right,Final Fantasy XVhas several battle themes that play in the various regions of the game’s world. For the sake of fairness though, this list refers to only one ofXV’s many songs, “Up For the Challenge,” which plays in the game’s later areas.
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Final Fantasy XV’s beautiful orchestral score was composed primarily by Yoko Shimomura, who also works as a composer on theKingdom Heartsseries, and all ofXV’s music has a tinge ofKingdom Heartsin it as a result.
2Final Fantasy V
Criminally underratedand underplayed,Final Fantasy Vhas one of the best battle themes in the entire series. Much likeFinal Fantasy VIII,it tends to be ignored in favor of the games that came directly before it and after it, in this case,Final Fantasy IVandVI.
It’s a good thing the battle theme is as good as it is, becauseFinal Fantasy Vhas an abnormally high encounter rate in the original version of the game. Later ports corrected this issue somewhat, but you’ll still be hearing this battle theme quite often if you decide to giveFinal Fantasy Va shot.
1Final Fantasy VII
Not only isFinal Fantasy VII’s battle theme the best battle theme in anyFinal Fantasygame, but it’s also one of the most recognizable pieces of music in all of gaming. It’s just as iconic as any song fromMarioorZelda, and simply seeing a screenshot ofFinal Fantasy VIIwill trigger the song to start playing in people’s minds.
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It was the firstFinal Fantasybattle theme to ditch most of the musical conventions that the battle themes ofFinal Fantasy I-VIincluded, like the introductory bassline. In doing so, however, the intro to theFinal Fantasy VIIbattle theme has become just as recognizable, if not more.Final Fantasy VIIis anall-time classic, and this battle theme will be remembered forever by those who have played it and even those who haven’t.
