Final Fantasy XIV Soundtrack “Before Meteor” Now on Pre-Order

If there’s one thing Final Fantasy gets right pretty much every time, it’s the music.

With the continuing success of the hush-hush beta for Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn, Square Enix has already taken the next step and begun taking pre-orders for the FFXIV soundtrack on their official store website.

With a price tag of $49.99 USD, the soundtrack entitled “Before Meteor – Final Fantasy XIV Original Soundtrack” includes over 104 tracks and clocks in at over 5 hours of music. Not surprising, considering it includes all of the music from the original 1.0 release, plus a newly remastered 5.1 surround sound version of the “End of an Era” trailer where rocks fall, everyone dies, and which closed version 1.0 forever in order to start anew in A Realm Reborn.

For those planning to play after relaunch of FFXIV, an exclusive in-game minion, Wind-Up Dalamud, is included in the purchase of the soundtrack. The code for Dalumud will not be available until after the relaunch in August, and you will have until December 2014 to redeem it.

There are several things to keep in mind before you start throwing your money at the screen. As per the NA Square Enix store page:

• Please note that this soundtrack is not a CD. A Blu-Ray disc player is required.
• Owners of a Blu-Ray-compatible computer drive will be able to retrieve mp3 versions of all the tracks.
• Please note that this is a Japanese import soundtrack disc.

Well that’s new. And a little confusing. I guess it’s not a bad thing that they’re trying out new formats for soundtracks to come with, but I have never been a fan of music DVDs in the past. They generally include no accompanying visuals, and a still graphic for five hours while (most) home entertainment systems need to keep their TVs on in order to listen.

Furthermore, what exactly does “this is a Japanese import soundtrack disc” mean? Since it’s posted up in English in the NA Square Enix store, can I take it as read that it is region free and playable on a North American Blu-Ray player? If so, that last bullet only muddles the message. Is it region 2 and most fans are essentially left with a $50 paperweight? Why sell it on the North American site in that case?

If you ask me, hold out on this purchase until they’re a little clearer on the facts. Or if regions aren’t a problem to you and you’ve got no issues with the proposed format, you can find the FFXIV soundtrack preorder page here.