Battle Music Sequence, commonly abbreviated BMS, is one of three types of gameplay in the Theatrhythm Final Fantasy series, along with the Field Music Sequence and Event Music Sequence.
Gameplay[]
During a Battle Music Sequence, the player's four party members line up opposite an enemy as in a traditional Final Fantasy battle scene. Notes fly from the left to the right in one of four tracks, one for each party member. The player must tap the touchscreen as the notes fly by the cursors in front of the party members to score a hit, damaging the enemy. The better the player's rating for the note, the more damage they do. Missing a note results in damage being taken. The power of hits and the damage taken depend on each party member's individual Strength and Defense values when they hit or miss a note. Numerous abilities and items can activate during BMS to damage enemies further. The damage that abilities deal is reliant on the caster's Magic stat.
When the current enemy takes enough damage, it is destroyed and another enemy enters. This continues until a boss-type enemy enters, signalled by a brief visual distortion and a roar sound effect. Bosses are stronger and explode more violently when defeated, and some items and abilities activate specifically in response to a boss entering. When a boss is defeated enemies continue to appear, eventually cycling repeatedly including the boss, until the end of the stage. Defeating more enemies rewards more EXP to the party at the end of the stage.
In the Feature Zone of a BMS, the player must hit silver notes to cause a Summoned Monster to appear. At this time the party and the background vanish, replaced with a summoned monster and a color-coded background for that summon. A single track of notes now appears, the player's success in tapping them causing the summon to attack the enemy monster. When the feature zone is finished the party reappears and the song continues as normal. Abilities of equipped party members remain active during the feature zone, and if a damaging ability defeats the enemy monster the next monster will appear normally.
The five summons that may appear, in order of strength, are Ramuh, Shiva, Ifrit, Odin, and Bahamut. Bahamut is the most powerful of the summons, but does not appear under normal circumstances, needing an item to be equipped by the party for him to appear.
In Theathrhythm Final Fantasy Curtain Call, the five summons return, in addition to two new summons, Chocobo and the Knights of the Round, both the weakest and strongest summons respectively. Summons are now guaranteed to appear in the Feature Drive, with each character now given a set summon, though they they can still use other summons through their respective Magicite. However, the Chocobo can only be summoned if the player performed poorly during the Feature Drive. In addition, stronger summons such as the Kinghts the Round require the player to gain a perfect CRITICAL on higher difficulties, as failing this also increases the chances of the Chocobo appearing.
List of Battle Music Sequences[]
In Theatrhythm Final Fantasy and Theatrhythm Final Fantasy: Curtain Call, songs categorized as battle music have an accompanying stage featured in the background of the song chosen. These locations are representative of where most of the original songs took place or played in that original game. Several songs share a background, typically the standard battle themes, since they are the most common of the battle themes the player will hear in the series main games.
In Theatrhythm Final Fantasy All-Star Carnival, both Battle and Field music backgrounds are universally shared, and the stages now randomly shuffle based on the type of song played.
In Theatrhythm Final Bar Line, Battle and Field music have been seperated, and are now presented in a different camera angle and perspective for depth.
Songs in Italics are available as DLC.
The following Battle Music Sequences featured below are as they appear in Theatrhythm Final Fantasy Curtain Call: