So I was playing Grandia 2 and one thing I noticed is that this game depends a lot on a particular track for all its 'sad' scenes, and in general a lot of games, but most notably RPGs, there's a track you can usually easily identify as when something sad is going to happen, like the villain burned down your village and killed everyone including the dog. Not every sad music is necessarily a generic 'sad music' track, but obviously most are. One notable exception of a game without a memorable one would be Chrono Trigger. That's not to say the music is lacking or that there aren't sad scenes in Chrono Trigger, but Chrono Trigger isn't a game that concerns itself with crying over like say Lucca's mom have her arm chopped off by a machine because the point is that you're supposed to have hope against stuff like the end of the world. So here are some of the notables ones I can think of.
Grandia 2: Skye's Reminiscence
The Swiss army knife of sad scenes for the game. There's nothing too unimportant to put this in. To be fair, like kind of sucks in the Grandia 2 world, so there's no shortage of people getting murdered or whatever given the impending doom.
Fate Stay Night: 消えない想い
This is Fate Stay Night's big gun for the sad scenes. Generally when this scene goes on you can expect a girl to get repeatedly stabbed a few hundred times while taking one for the team, with tentacle beasts being optional. Sometimes it's only something as minor as a girl being betrayed by everyone she ever knew, again tentacle beasts optional. (Un)fortunately, this music is really good and makes a lot of the ridiculous scenes actually seem kind of emotional, which contributed to the series creator mistakenly thinking it has a good story. Ironically, I think this scene is used well when it doesn't involve a girl getting stabbed repeatedly, but you can't have drama without random girls dying I guess.
Final Fantasy 6: Forever Rachel
Final Fantasy 6 has its share of 'sad' music but I'm pretty sure this one stands out the most. It's kind of ironic given the saddest thing about Rachel is that Forever Rachel was played when Celes attempted to commit suicide instead of Celes's theme. I mean, if you look at the whole story, Rachel got hurt pointlessly trying to save a guy who can obviously survive any fall, and then she died pointlessly while Locke was out on a trip. It's not even like Celes killed her or anything. But this was when Final Fantasy music was actually good, and who cares if Forever Rachel is only a variation of Locke's theme? This is literally a scene/event carried solely by the strength of the music. Sucks if you're Cyan who had his whole life messed up but nobody really cares what happened to him because his family doesn't have Forever Rachel as a theme.
Shining Force 1: Sad Theme
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4IJB2x ... 4WNsJHx0Xl
(the youtube tag for some reason didn't work with this one)
Remember when Max who never said anything prior to the final battle sacrificed himself to save everyone in the end and some other person (probably Tao) who never said anything else after joining you commented on how sad it is? Well, this theme is played when that happens. I don't think it's particularly a top notch quality for this category, but this theme is literally the game's entire plot for sad stuff, because most of the character never have a line after they join you and without this cue you wouldn't be able to tell you're supposed to care when something sad just happened.
Final Fantasy 7: Aeris's theme
Yeah, I know, this is obviously not meant to be the generic sad music especially on a stand alone basis, but obviously the way it's used is very sad. I think it stands out because it's like you just had Sephiroth paratroop in and off Aeris and this happy little song is still playing while you're fighting JENOVA. It's so out of place for what's going on and I think it's one of the best example of integrating music into a non standard scene and it actually works. It's one thing you have say how Magus's theme is perfectly integrated into the battle against him down to the text (he finishes speaking as the music picks up), but that's a pretty conventional boss-like music. Honestly, I found Aeris's theme to be overrated by itself. In terms of just characters themes I prefer Cid Highwind and the sad variations on Red XIII and Cid Highwind are better as the stock 'sad music' compared to Aeris's theme, but it's impossible to discuss Aeris's theme without the very specific circumstance where it happened.
Chrono Cross: The Girl Who Stole a Star
This is an example of no matter how much your game sucks, Mitsuda's music can save it, at least some of it. Like Aeris's theme it's not a strictly 'sad music' music though it obviously leans toward that way even on a standalone basis, and of course it's played in the tragic scene where you went back to the past to rescue Kid and anything you can possibly say is wrong that led to Kid being some kind of street thug that will backstab someone for $5 in the game. Too bad this really has nothing to do with the rest of the game.
Final Fantasy X2: 1000 Words
Okay, so most of the emotional effect is clearly on the video itself, but I don't think it'd be quite the same with any generic music. It's better than the rest of the X2 game put together in terms of story (even though that's not saying much) and probably better than half of FFX and I liked FFX. The firing squad guys are totally awesome too. It's almost sad because you're watching a scene of how cool your party could have been with Shuyin, Lenne, and the Bevelle firing squad guys instead of tagalongs you get in FFX not to mention FFX2.
Grandia 2: Skye's Reminiscence
The Swiss army knife of sad scenes for the game. There's nothing too unimportant to put this in. To be fair, like kind of sucks in the Grandia 2 world, so there's no shortage of people getting murdered or whatever given the impending doom.
Fate Stay Night: 消えない想い
This is Fate Stay Night's big gun for the sad scenes. Generally when this scene goes on you can expect a girl to get repeatedly stabbed a few hundred times while taking one for the team, with tentacle beasts being optional. Sometimes it's only something as minor as a girl being betrayed by everyone she ever knew, again tentacle beasts optional. (Un)fortunately, this music is really good and makes a lot of the ridiculous scenes actually seem kind of emotional, which contributed to the series creator mistakenly thinking it has a good story. Ironically, I think this scene is used well when it doesn't involve a girl getting stabbed repeatedly, but you can't have drama without random girls dying I guess.
Final Fantasy 6: Forever Rachel
Final Fantasy 6 has its share of 'sad' music but I'm pretty sure this one stands out the most. It's kind of ironic given the saddest thing about Rachel is that Forever Rachel was played when Celes attempted to commit suicide instead of Celes's theme. I mean, if you look at the whole story, Rachel got hurt pointlessly trying to save a guy who can obviously survive any fall, and then she died pointlessly while Locke was out on a trip. It's not even like Celes killed her or anything. But this was when Final Fantasy music was actually good, and who cares if Forever Rachel is only a variation of Locke's theme? This is literally a scene/event carried solely by the strength of the music. Sucks if you're Cyan who had his whole life messed up but nobody really cares what happened to him because his family doesn't have Forever Rachel as a theme.
Shining Force 1: Sad Theme
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4IJB2x ... 4WNsJHx0Xl
(the youtube tag for some reason didn't work with this one)
Remember when Max who never said anything prior to the final battle sacrificed himself to save everyone in the end and some other person (probably Tao) who never said anything else after joining you commented on how sad it is? Well, this theme is played when that happens. I don't think it's particularly a top notch quality for this category, but this theme is literally the game's entire plot for sad stuff, because most of the character never have a line after they join you and without this cue you wouldn't be able to tell you're supposed to care when something sad just happened.
Final Fantasy 7: Aeris's theme
Yeah, I know, this is obviously not meant to be the generic sad music especially on a stand alone basis, but obviously the way it's used is very sad. I think it stands out because it's like you just had Sephiroth paratroop in and off Aeris and this happy little song is still playing while you're fighting JENOVA. It's so out of place for what's going on and I think it's one of the best example of integrating music into a non standard scene and it actually works. It's one thing you have say how Magus's theme is perfectly integrated into the battle against him down to the text (he finishes speaking as the music picks up), but that's a pretty conventional boss-like music. Honestly, I found Aeris's theme to be overrated by itself. In terms of just characters themes I prefer Cid Highwind and the sad variations on Red XIII and Cid Highwind are better as the stock 'sad music' compared to Aeris's theme, but it's impossible to discuss Aeris's theme without the very specific circumstance where it happened.
Chrono Cross: The Girl Who Stole a Star
This is an example of no matter how much your game sucks, Mitsuda's music can save it, at least some of it. Like Aeris's theme it's not a strictly 'sad music' music though it obviously leans toward that way even on a standalone basis, and of course it's played in the tragic scene where you went back to the past to rescue Kid and anything you can possibly say is wrong that led to Kid being some kind of street thug that will backstab someone for $5 in the game. Too bad this really has nothing to do with the rest of the game.
Final Fantasy X2: 1000 Words
Okay, so most of the emotional effect is clearly on the video itself, but I don't think it'd be quite the same with any generic music. It's better than the rest of the X2 game put together in terms of story (even though that's not saying much) and probably better than half of FFX and I liked FFX. The firing squad guys are totally awesome too. It's almost sad because you're watching a scene of how cool your party could have been with Shuyin, Lenne, and the Bevelle firing squad guys instead of tagalongs you get in FFX not to mention FFX2.
