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All Japanese music tracks removed from FF13

February 24, 2010

Square Enix have removed the Japanese-language music tracks from the Western release of Final Fantasy XIII in an attempt to make it more friendly for a Western audience.

We've finally got both the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 versions of the Western release in our hands, and we were surprised to see that both the Japanese language audio tracks had been replaced.

The Japanese release had two main theme tunes, Eternal Love and Kimi ga Irukara. Kimi ga Irukara has been replaced by Leona Lewis' "My Hands" which we all knew about, but playing the game has revealed that Eternal Love has been pulled from the game as well.

Eternal Love has been replaced in-game with Serah's theme tune, which had English language lyrics even in the Japanese release. It's a pretty good fit - we actually preferred it to Eternal Love in the scene where it plays.

Square Enix have gone further with trying to make FF13 appeal to the West than any other Final Fantasy, and removing any music with Japanese lyrics is another step in that process. Even the gameplay was changed as a result, and we even put out an article on that design process.

We'll bring you our full reviews of both versions when the Square Enix embargo is up.

FF13 will be out on March 9th, and if you're getting the game or the bundle we highly advise you get your preorders in! Amazon has the Xbox 360 version here and the Playstation 3 version here. Here's the link to preorder the Limited Edition Xbox 360 bundle, too.