I mean, the key is different and the second half is different, but the first half is identical. So while it’s not exactly plagiarism, it definitely wasn’t an accident.

There are other cases of very similar tracks that I have less certainty about. Like Apocalypsis Noctis from FFXV. It does definitely have a very similar melody to the Elder Scrolls theme at first, but then everything other than the main melody is very different, and it’s also just not exactly a ground-breaking chord progression either. So I’m willing to give Shimomura the benefit of the doubt here. The BoFIII ladies get no such benefit though as that is clearly just a copy. And it’s one of the earliest tracks in the game too. CT was so big and get they thought they could get away with it