Arrangement of the Week: The Freak Winged Boy

One of the great things about looking up game music arrangements is that it can lead you to the discovery of a game or game franchise that you didn’t know too much about. Such has been the case for me and the Ys series. The action RPG franchise has been around since 1987 and has featured music by Yuzo Koshiro and Meiko Ishikawa. It was a cool discovery for me, so now the Ys franchise is on my gaming bucket list. Today’s arrangement that we’ll be looking at is one of Ishikawa’s pieces from Ys III: Wanderers from Ys.

This week’s selection comes from Dr. Manhattan with a rock arrangement of “The Boy’s Got Wings,” which Dr. Manhattan has titled “The Freak Winged Boy.” Whether you first experienced the soundtrack on the SNES, Sega Genesis, or the other platforms the game was released on, this track in particular had a great amount of energy to it.

The arrangement maintains an upbeat and energetic vibe throughout the track, keeping in the spirit of the original soundtrack. As rock arrangements go, it keeps everything relatively simple. The lead guitar gives a clear performance of the melodic material that never feels like it’s competing with the other instruments for attention.

At around the 2’20” mark the arrangement enters into an improvisation section. I like that it allows a moment for the rhythm guitar and percussion to shine while the lead guitar focuses on arpeggios in the background. It’s a good little break from what’s heard in the rest of the track. At 2’56” the lead guitar returns for some more decorative melodic riffs. The piece ends with a statement of the guitar motif that the arrangement opened with. A nice concise ending to a great arrangement.

Are there any cool game music rock remixes, arrangements, or covers that you’ve heard this week? Let us know in the comments below. You can check out and download “The Freak Winged Boy” on OC ReMix.