This Game (Wakabayashi Mitsur, 2014)

 

The vast majority of pop has their chorus set within their first minute. Even set aside though, you can tell this song is different. It opens with a nice piano introduction (correction: piano version of the chorus), and then gets right in to the “piano verse” with the drums and guitar added. With the amp-up, the verse is very nice to begin with. As the verses build up–

“Reflected in our eyes is a fate of absolute victory.
Everything is going as planned;
We’ll change everything with an untainted blank space.”

the excellent message of the chorus then complements this,

“We are maverick; we don’t need a savior!
No matter how unfair the odds,
All we can do is win.”

The further verses also assert the certainty of victory.

Overall, 90/100. The anime is very fun and the full song is very well done, with a beautiful piano and unusual chord progressions and a good message. The song slows down at points only to build up again, silence the guitar only to bring it back stronger. Clocking in at only 20 seconds short of 5 minutes, No Game No Life opening hardly ever gets boring. Energetic and powerful, This Game is unique and unlike many stupid love songs these days.

On a side note, the piano music made by Animenz is hard as hell, though it does also show the uniqueness of this song. Take a look at Despacito, which is the number one viewed video on youtube. Although it doesn’t represent all of pop music, it displays what is wrong with a majority of pop songs.

http://prntscr.com/ir74mk

In this so-called “advanced hard” piano sheet music, the same note is repeated many times through the “unique section” (for non musical people, being in the same-line means the same note–yeah, Despacito is very boring) and when the melody becomes more creative the bass line then depends on the four chord progression. Despacito hardly stands up to This Game, which sheet music is the TRUE meaning of “advanced hard”, as you’ll see:

http://prntscr.com/ir7aac

While This Game has a similar repetition, it is far harder to play due to repeating four note theme instead of one. The left hand varies wildly; the opening calmly hints at the chorus, but does not stress the four notes (while Despacito very poorly uses “B B B B B ” both times in the very beginning), while the afterwards repetition rearranges the melody such that you can hear the four note melody now. Even then, the build up uses a three note pattern that builds upon this four note, with symmetry of note-up-down similar to note-up-down-down, instead of repeating the same melody. The big explosive guitar show-off creates a very strong contrast and differentiation to the start.

If I haven’t convinced you yet that This Game is highly unique and creative, I should probably give up by now. Yet still, I have no doubt this song opened up your mind. It uses loud and soft to its advantage and uses repetition to its advantage to trick the listener rather than most pop songs that use the same melody and get it over with quickly. At times, This Game is one of my favorite songs.

(Do note, the song is a bit chaotic and loud with voice, guitar, piano, and drums, hence why it became no longer my number one favorite song)