Why do so many RPGs have only one regular battle theme?

[Plastiware]

Basically, it occurred to me that like 90% of turn-based RPGs have just one piece of music for regular enemy battles.  Sure, the bosses probably each get their own themes, but frequently-occurring regular battles all have the same music.  This gets REALLY old after hours of play.  Square (Final Fantasy, Chrono Trigger, Mario RPG) is perhaps the biggest offender.  I'm not much of an Mother fan, but if there's one thing I love about it, it's how every game in the series has lots of battle themes, and as a result entering battle never feels stale.  Why don't more games do this?

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[Jairo]

some rpgs have environment specific themes for enemies (eg paper mario) which is nice

but the boss-only theme thing is a trope to make them seem more unique and important

[Epicduke]

why does some rpgs have huge swords for weapons
it makes no sense damnit

[Plastiware]

some rpgs have environment specific themes for enemies (eg paper mario) which is nice

but the boss-only theme thing is a trope to make them seem more unique and important

In my experience, Paper Mario has the same music for every regular battle.  Unless you mean the new one?

The boss thing is fine, giving each boss its own theme certainly adds a sense of uniqueness, but why then go and give every single common enemy the same music?  Frankly it is the most irritatingly repetitive thing that games still get away with.  I'm not even asking for much here, 3 or 4 common battle themes is enough.

[tikitai]

i never did mind if the battle theme was good and/or catchy

[Flamecannon]

i never did mind if the battle theme was good and/or catchy

Yeah, as long as it's a song that gets you super hyped to fight it's fine! I've been listening to Raidou Kuzunoha's battle theme along with Bravely Default's this entire weekend. To answer your question I think its both so A. You know it's a random battle and not like a special battle (Although for example TWEWY always changed its theme when entering battle although this is not a turn by turn game, Earthbound was enemy specific) and B. They're banking that it's so cool that you'd like it. I mean I think people even when they're not playing want to pop on the battle theme. Iunno like Pokemon it's catchy with the DUN DUN NA DUN DUN NAA DUN DUN NAAA yadda yadda

[.:FancyPants:.]

Yeah, as long as it's a song that gets you super hyped to fight it's fine

persona 4 always seemed to do that for me.

[Fredulus]

budget

[Flamecannon]

persona 4 always seemed to do that for me.

Now I face out I hold out
I reach out to the truth of my life
Seeking to seize the whole moment, yeah!
YEAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

[Alkatjo]

I wondered why they did this...
I later found out, interestingly enough, that its a phycology trick. It makes you long for the next boss or whatnot. Some theory.

This was broken around final fantasy X I think.
Its also noticeable in the Kingdom Hearts series. Although that's just the over world battle theme most of the time.
The music played during battles often scale with the difficulty of the boss fight, it sounds odd but its true.

[Zanaran2]

It's not that big of a deal if the song is catchy (i.e. THE DREAM WORLD BATTLE MUSIC IN DREAM TEAM)

[Flamecannon]

I'm kinda confused what you mean doesn't Kingdom Hearts have different battle themes depending on the world you're in? Or are you including this with the "breaking of the trick" clause mabob

[Buu]

Speaking of kingdom hearts, i still can't hear dance to the dead after the hydra battle: "GET ON THE HYDRA'S BACK"

[Khorde]

budget

this. music assets in a game are really expensive to make not only because you need a good composer, but also because of how much data is used by the actual files themselves. game music tends to be repetitive in order to save space and money, and that's probably why they use duplicate tracks for battles.

i have never had a problem with RPGs and music.

[Jairo]

i have never had a problem with RPGs and music.

rpgs usually have the most catchy music too