10 Video Game Franchises With The BEST Spin-Offs

There was a lot of love given to Persona's music in the last entry - and rightly so - but the undisputed king of video game soundtracks has to be Final Fantasy. Chiefly driven by the once-a-generation talent of Nobuo Uematsu, the Final Fantasy series has become a byword for musical excellence - how many other game soundtracks are regularly featured in Classic FM?

As such, it's only appropriate that Final Fantasy's rhythm game spin-off isn't just a good game - it's arguably the best rhythm game of the past fifteen years. Theatrhythm: Final Bar Line sees Square Enix take the formula they'd developed over the past two Theatrhythm games and perfect it, marrying its 300-song soundtrack with enjoyably addictive tap-to-the-beat gameplay to create a musical colossus that will keep your eardrums in raptures for months - possibly years - to come.

Which is not to say Final Fantasy spin-offs consist solely of a one-hit wonder (no pun intended). The PSP's Dissidia games are excellently inventive brawlers that do a remarkable job emulating the balletic air-battles of a Final Fantasy cutscene; Crisis Core is still one of the most heart-rending stories Square Enix have ever told; and Final Fantasy Tactics may be coming up to its 30th birthday, but few SRPGs have come close to matching its colossal impact on the genre.