Ah, Final Fantasy X. Although it's one of the most fondly-regarded entries in Square Enix's (Squeenix to the real heads) stupidly important Final Fantasy role-playing game series, some of its elements don't hold up in the 15 years since its release. It's very linear, has an almost skeletal battle system, and is hit-or-miss with its characterization. Still, the game's story is ace, full of satisfying twists right up to the end, and its creative visuals marked a left-turn away from both European fantasy aesthetics and cyberpunk grit. It's good enough to have been remade in HD, something the more famous and supposedly better Final Fantasy VII still hasn't achieved. You can't keep teasing us with this shit at every gaming conference, Squeenix!Never forget though, FFX is the product of humanity, and it's fated–as humans themselves are–to be survived by its memes. The longest-lived of these memes concerns an early cutscene wherein protagonist Tidus–an athlete/swordsman who looks like a Backstreet Boy–lets out an awkwardly forceful belly laugh that goes on far too long, becoming almost hypnotic. It makes… slightly more sense in context and actually becomes kinda sad once you get further in the game, but I've said enough.The Tidus Laugh has since been inserted by fans into numerous sitcoms, uniting nerds across the world through the appreciation of iffy voice acting (Respect to Tidus' voice actor James Arnold Taylor, though, as he's still making money off voicing Obi-Wan Kenobi in literally every single Star Wars game and TV show). It took until 2016 for some uber-dweeb to take the joke to its natural conclusion and create a modified version of FFX which has Nobuo Uematsu and co.'s original score altered significantly with sampled, manipulated Tidus Laughs in the place of pianos, horns and other typically melodic instruments.Tidus Fantasy X is exactly what it says on the tin, e.g. a fucking nightmare. And recently the mod's creator, who goes by the YouTube handle Johnny Mac, has uploaded the complete, Tidus-ized soundtrack for our listening enjoyment. It's an abomination. For example, FFX's most famous piece of music, "To Zanarkand," is normally a beautiful piano piece but becomes a ghastly choir of guffaws in the hands of Johnny Mac. The fact that the remaining stems have been converted to cheesy general MIDI instruments adds to the insanity. Thought the game's battle theme wasn't hype enough? You haven't heard it gloriously defiled with harmonized, hearty "HA"s. Bask in the remixed background music for the Via Purifico level, with its complex, arpeggiated piano replaced with… you can guess what. That headache you're getting means it's working. Listen to the Tidus Fantasy X soundtrack below.Phil is somehow still a Noisey staff writer. Follow him on Twitter.
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