We've seen many success stories from different kinds of media who managed to draw attention to themselves thanks to Internet-related fame... today's featured track is about another one of them!
Paradisus-Paradoxum Re:Zero -Starting Life in Another World-| Version |  |  |  |  |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| All | x3 (86) | x5 (160) | x6 (287) | x8 (432) |
Taiko 0 R, Taiko 3DS 3, Taiko +
201
none
???Making its debut on the Red Version arcades through one of its updates, this Latin-titled song is one of the two opening themes from the 2016 Anime adaptation of the Re:Zero − Starting Life in Another World (Re：ゼロから始める異世界生活) novel, originally penned by Tappei Nagatsuki (長月達平) since April 2012. Much like for the Log Horizon series that we took a look at earlier this year (link), the Re:Zero series started out as a freely-available web novel series hosted on the Japanese story-writing website Shōsetsuka ni Narō (小説家になろう), with its author signing his works as Nezumi-iro Neko (鼠色猫, lit."Mouse-Colored Cat").
The story stars 17-years old hikikomori Subaru Natsuki, whose social segregation life changed when one night he was summoned to another world, on his way home from a convenience store. In this new land, the fantasy-rooted kingdom of Lugunica, Subaru meets a large array of characters from the place and discovers that he himself has gained the ability to reverse time by dying, in a process dubbed "Return to Death" that leaves him with the memories of the timeline he rolled back from. With the awakened knowledge on foreign soil, Subaru is now enticed into finding out more of Lugunica's surroundings and a mischievous group called the Witch's Cult which is planning to lay waste on the kingdom and its inhabitants.
As the self-published series went on its original (and still active!) digital run with both its core story and sideline episodes, The Kadokawa-branded publication company Media Factory acquired the rights to release the series in printed form, resulting into an ongoing visual novel production of over 15 volumes and 2 out of the three "Chapters" of the main story for their manga transposition, with Chapter 2's volumes being published by Square-Enix instead. Roughly 4 years since the Re:Zero series' beginning, the 25-episodes Anime series was aired in Japan between April and September of 2016, with the release for English-speaking countries' broadcast/streaming services shortly following suit. Among the popularity accolades received by the series between the main media and different side projects (mainly, a radio show and the March 2017 PS4 light novel game subtitled DEATH OR KISS), Re:Zero managed to score high ranks in the 2015/2016 edition of the Newtype Anime Awards as well as the 2017 edition of the Sugoi Japan Awards, where it won for both Best Light Novel and Anime categories. Outside of Japan, it was also nominated in 2016 by users of the English-speaking service Crunchyroll as the best Anime series of that year; while not winning in the end, it still managed to become the service's most watched game of the year, topping the actual Best Anime winner (Yuri On Ice)!
In Taiko no Tatsujin, the Re:Zero series is represented with the inclusion of its Anime's second opening theme which is made by the Media Create-affiliated act MYTH & ROID, consisting of the female singer Mayu and the nicknamed Tom-H@ck as both the composer and producer of the duo's works. Outside of Bandai Namco's rhythm game series, the song found some music-related footing in bemani's REFLEC BEAT series, in which it was playable as one of the new licenses of the latest entry of the series, Yuukyuu no Reflesia (悠久のリフレシア).
Notecharter Sentai memeber Yamaguchi (ヤマグチ) handled the task of making the song playable in Taiko no Tatsujin, relying on a cluster-oriented trial which makes use of the track's fast tempo to both tire players towards the end and to make simpler portions where following the singing track's cadence is more crucial to the accuracy instead.
