Final Fantasy 7 Meets Trombone Champ In Hilarious Mod
"Trombone Champ," a new game from indie developer Holy Wow, works kind of like "Guitar Hero," except, instead of playing guitar, the player has toot along to the music using a trombone. The title has exploded in popularity in the few weeks since it debuted, with internet personalities such as YouTuber and author Hank Green sharing their experiences with it.
The base "Trombone Champ" experience comes with over 20 songs to play along with, but modders have incorporated their own custom tunes into the game. One added "Tank," the theme song to the anime "Cowboy Bebop," while another added a chart for the most infamous "Guitar Hero" song of all time, "Through the Fire and Flames." All of these track have expanded the title's replayability, but one user decided to get even more creative.
Instead of stopping at a simple music chart with a copy-and-paste background, modder Henry Zhou's Textbook also made their own custom animations to go with it. They decided to create a mashup between "Trombone Champ" and the theme song for one of the most infamous video game villains of all time: Sephiroth from "Final Fantasy 7."
Sephiroth rocks out on the trombone
"One-Winged Angel," Sephiroth's boss theme song that plays at the end of "Final Fantasy 7," has been infamous since fans first heard the original version back in 1997. Nobuo Uematsu composed the song, and it was the first theme in the franchise to feature vocals. The version used in Henry Zhou's Textbook's "Trombone Champ" mod comes from the sequel film, "Advent Children," which featured a remastered take, adding heavy drum and guitar melodies to the more orchestral instruments.
Henry Zhou's Textbook created their own custom animation using the Unity engine. It opens with Lord Sephiroth stabbing a generic player, before Shinra's most powerful SOLDIER himself steps in and jams out to his own theme. He uses an incredibly long-tubed trombone while standing on a cliffside, which appears to parody Sephiroth's weapon, Masamune, a rather lengthy katana. The trombone also moves up and down following the reticle on the screen. About a quarter of the way through the video, seven more trombone players appear on the opposite side of the gorge just as the choir kicks in.
For those who want to try out this mod for themselves, Henry Zhou's Textbook has made it available for fans to download through the Trombone Champ Modding Discord page.