Hitoshi Sakimoto

Hitoshi Sakimoto is a famous video game music composer. He began his career in music as a freelance composer, working with synthesizer drivers. In his early works, he would write out his name as YmoH.S., as a nod to his favorite electropop band Yellow Magic Orchestra. 
==Biography==
Sakimoto began his video game music career along with longtime friend, Masaharu Iwata. Their friendship had started even before his joining to Square, when they would compose musical scores for the video game company Quest Corporation. With Quest assimilated into Square, Yasumi Matsuno, a well-known developer of Quest, approached him and Iwata to compose the musical score for Final Fantasy Tactics.
With the success of Final Fantasy Tactics, Matsuno again employed the duo to compose the soundtrack for Vagrant Story. After the release of Vagrant Story, Sakimoto bowed out of Square to found his own soundtrack composition company, Basiscape. Iwata would join Sakimoto in Basiscape, along with other composers, to create soundtrack for various media.
However, Matsuno would again call for Sakimoto and Iwata to compose for two of his works: Final Fantasy Tactics Advance and their last collaboration, Final Fantasy XII, both games that takes place in Ivalice. Since then, the three names have been synonymous with works pertaining to Matsuno's world, Ivalice. The release of Final Fantasy XII increased the demand for Basiscape and since then helped the company expand their profile.
In 2006, Sakimoto composed and produced the album "Colors of Life" with Lia. Yukiko Mitsui, who worked on the Final Fantasy Tactics soundtrack, wrote the lyrics for the album. Sakimoto arranged most of the tracks, along with Yutaka Kumada.
He mentioned in the Final Fantasy XII Ultimania Omega that his 20 favorite scores are the music in the Great Crystal ("To Walk Amongst Gods"), the Zertinan Caverns ("Zertinan Caverns"), Nalbina Dungeons ("Nalbina Dungeons"), "Quiet Resolve", the Golmore Jungle ("Golmore Jungle"), Jules theme ("Gutter-Churl"), the Giza Plains nomad village ("Giza Plains"), the Mosphoran Highwaste ("The Mosphoran Highwaste"), "Life and Death", "Boss Battle", "Penelo's Theme", "Ashe's Theme", Nalbina Fortress ("Nalbina Fortress"), the Cerobi Steppe ("The Cerobi Steppe"), the Old Archades ("A Moment's Rest"), the Mandragoras battle theme ("Flash of Steel"), the Dalmasca Estersand ("The Dalmasca Estersand"), the final boss theme ("Struggle for Freedom"), "The Archadian Empire", and, his most favorite, the "Opening Movie (FFXII Theme)".
Outside of the Final Fantasy series, he is known for the Ogre Battle series such as Ogre Battle: The March of the Black Queen and Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together. The first Square project he was involved in was Treasure Hunter G. He is also known for his work on the Valkyria Chronicles series.
He and his studio Basiscape are frequent collaborators with Vanillaware, composing music for their games such as Fantasy Earth: The Ring of Dominion, Odin Sphere, and 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim.
==Musical works within the series==
*Final Fantasy Tactics (1997)
*Vagrant Story (2000)
*Final Fantasy Tactics Advance (2003)
*Final Fantasy XII (2006)
*Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings (2007)
*Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions (2007)
*Final Fantasy Tactics A2: Grimoire of the Rift (2007)
*Crystal Defenders (2009)
*Final Fantasy XII The Zodiac Age (2017)
==Interviews==
thumb|left|320px|On Final Fantasy XII
Hitoshi Sakimoto has given an interview on his works for Final Fantasy XII.
==External links==
*Official site
*Twitter account
*Basiscape Official site
*Hitoshi Sakimoto - VGMdb
*Hitoshi Sakimoto at IMDb
*Hitoshi Sakimoto at RAWG.io
Category:Musicians
Category:Personnel