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OCRA-0014 - Final Fantasy IV: Echoes of Betrayal, Light of Redemption


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The source material is very dear to my heart (I've played through every version of this game, some multiple times), and I'm already a grumpy old man, so forgive me if I'm overly brutal. Anyway, here are my (terse) reviews:

Full of Courage Sample quality is pretty good. Nice and loud for an orchestral piece, that's usually a problem but not here. Transitions are pretty abrupt. Sounds almost like a "how many themes can you fit into 4:46?" contest entry. Just enough time to recognize the theme, then move on.

The Might of Baron Out of guitars, orchestral and chiptune sounds, I usually only like 2/3 being used, not all 3 together. Sounds messy otherwise. That said, the guitars are really prominent and enjoyable. It's a busy song without sounded too cluttered. Starting around 3:00, the sample quality is pretty low, and the transitions into new themes is again very abrupt. Lead guitar gets buried under the rhythm in the later part of the song. Ending is really sloppy, feels rushed.

Tellah's Prophecy They sound good separately, but not digging the string lead with the otherwise very cool synthy sounds. Given that it's a medley, it doesn't sound like it changes much except for throwing the various themes in. Pretty enjoyable though!

Journey to Solace Again, not a fan of heavy synth with orchestral sounds. This is a really dull song, very unventful with uninteresting sound choices. 2:35 is an awkward transition, feels clumsy. And the second half is pretty verbatim. Not a fan of this one.

Prologue Really enjoying the bright synth sounds. The first lead is a little cheesy. Gets really fun around 1:05. Haha Balloons wtf?? The other themes thrown in made me smile. Reminds of of a Sonic ending theme or something. Good times!

Read the Sine Chris is obviously very talented but I've never cared for the squealy synth sounds he likes to use. This has some really interesting sounds though.

The Skies Hold No Angels for Us Holy shit epic, you guys nailed this. Gets weird in the middle … Still good though.

Golbez 'n Goblins As amazing as usual from bLiNd! Even love the title. This guy's good ;)

That's as far as I got. Hopefully more later!

I left out some of the songs between because I had nothing positive to say about them. I feel that a lot of these should have been cut instead of dumping out 50+ songs, that's really excessive IMO. Again, sorry if I'm a bit harsh. Hope you guys don't mind some (sometimes) constructive critism :)

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Posting my partial thoughts on the album (will edit later for full review)

Golbez 'N Goblins: Awesome. bLiNd is totally upping the ante, turning a gloomy piece into some fantastic trance. This. Kicks. Ass.

Somewhere to Hide: Wow. Just... Wow. I love this piece, and I'm so going to make it a ringtone on my phone. Just trying to figure out which of the awesome parts of it to do so with. The vocals combined with the back and forth of the piece just nail the mood of this song. I can so see this playing properly and fitting perfectly while playing FFIV.

More to come.

By the way, has anyone thought of a "Let's Play" FFIV, and taking it a step farther by subbing in the Echoes, Light soundtrack in place of the original? Heh....

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Somewhere to Hide: Wow. Just... Wow. I love this piece, and I'm so going to make it a ringtone on my phone. Just trying to figure out which of the awesome parts of it to do so with. The vocals combined with the back and forth of the piece just nail the mood of this song. I can so see this playing properly and fitting perfectly while playing FFIV.

Finally, someone comments on this one. I LOVED this one. hy bound needs more attention!! :P

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I hope to have this all downloaded by thursday night. I only get access to real internet 12 hours a week cause of some stupid reason i don't want to say.

Maybe I can give a good review of this by Sunday!

Plus I need to learn music theory/terms/etc. better lol.

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I'm just about done listening to each and every song to its entirity. I'm currently on the Genesis of Destruction mix, and I'm utterly blown away by the complete epicness of this song. It's so good that I'm lost for words. About all I can say is that it reminds me a lot of Black Wing Metamorphosis in terms of epicness, and that I felt like I just got off of Cedar Point's Top Thrill Dragster rollercoaster after I finished listening to it. I'm hard pressed to say which is better, so I'll simply say that they both rock out hard.

Final Fantasy IV is my favorite Final Fantasy out of the entire franchise (that's a whole lot of Fs for you), so this album is officially going on my "eternally the awesomeness" list.

Thank you, to each and every ReMixer and individual that made this project come alive. Props to each and every mixer for each and every song.

Or to sum it up like a true internet junkie, OCREMIX FTW!!!1!11!

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i like how my track is so generic that no one notices it.

the first two tracks, the ones by nutritious and audio fidelity, are really spanking. love them both. nutritious's track is really well crafted - excellent use of original and vg material.

Thanks, dude, I appreciate it. As for your track, I actually only discovered it recently and find it extremely catchy. It's literally been in my head the past two days. I plan on reviewing it when it's posted on the front page (you did sub it, right?)

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"Smiling Hilltop for Four Hands" by Long Dao is fantastic, really enjoyed this one most.

I concur. I started my serious listening with trepidation due to the uncertainty of what might be done with my second-favorite vg track of all time. Once I heard Dao's take, I smiled the biggest smile. And I cried a little. Beautiful. So perfectly articulate; every emotion, every significance is enhanced.

1:10.

LD nailed it. Phenomenal. Thank you so much.

Edit: The in-game significance of the "four hands" part of the title hit me this afternoon, then the entire title clicked. He surely was smiling. I never thought about it quite that way before... how agonizingly bittersweet and touching.

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Question: as tracks get posted on ocr, will there be any that are submitted/posted differently than they appear in the album? I ask because this might save bandwidth (at least from my downloading)... if I know a track is the same as on the album then I won't dl it, but if I think it could possibly be different then I'll dl it anyway. If that sounds AR, well, maybe it is, but I've found (subjectively, at least) better ocr versions before.

My bonus track, Smooth Sun of Magma will probably be submitted within the next month or so, so you won't see it for a while.

The story with that song was that in late June, audiofidelity asked me to give him an old, unfinished version for the bonus that I collabed with Long Dao on. However I said F THAT and said I would redo it... I had to redo it from scratch because I no longer had the same sample library or even the project file.

Anyway I redid it some last month, but did most of the work on it July 10th (all night while packing before camping) and turned it in on the 11th. While I think the song is nice for the album, I am really not happy with how a lot of it turned out because I have been so busy and it was pretty damn rushed. Also Protricity basically did most of the drums that night as well.

The version I will probably submit will be much cleaner and have better drums, that I will redo (again) myself. So yeah, expect it to be a bit different if you hear an OCR version.

THE END!

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bLiNd's Bridge to Eternity is easily the best song on the album. It captures the heart and soul of the original and takes it up several notches. As for the rest, many strayed into the hard rock or rock opera area. A pity.

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bLiNd's Bridge to Eternity is easily the best song on the album. It captures the heart and soul of the original and takes it up several notches. As for the rest, many strayed into the hard rock or rock opera area. A pity.

As a project that has been labeled and marketed as more of a "Rock Opera" production, I fail to see how it's a pity that many of the tracks reflect that.........

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I just want say that I love this album and every track on it.

To all the remixers - you all did an awesome job with your tracks and I hope you all are proud of the finished product.

I've met some amazing people because of this project and the experience of making music with all you guys has and will always be the best part.

Thanks everyone for making this happen.

And to all the fans of FFIV, this is for you and I hope you give each track a chance because to me this album stands only together as a whole.

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I joined up to comment on this because I couldn't let this go unaddressed. Final Fantasy IV is my favorite game of all time and I'm very familiar with the tracks supposedly being covered. I really didn't care for this at all and have been looking forward to it for quite some time. With the exception of 2 tracks, the other 44 strayed so far from the source material that it was just uninteresting. Every time I thought one was headed in the right direction (track 2, CD1), things started spiraling downhill. The routine in almost every track seemed to be to play the cover song through once and then, for the rest of the track, play whatever you want with a few vague hints here and there of what you're actually covering. I certainly recognize the talent involved here (with the exception of one track* in particular which I'll address), but it just seems to have been misused. Most of this sounds like it should be on a demo CD promoting yourself and your own areas of expertise in the music world rather than on a compilation meant to cover songs composed by someone else. :?

*The Chocobo rap song...wow. You're doing it wrong. I couldn't even make it through that disrespectful piece. :-x

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You didn't say, but which 2 did you only like?

I agree with the assessment that most of the songs strayed too far from the source material. I kept waiting for some arrangement to hit the original out of the park, but that didn't come.

One weakness of OverClocked albums is that many artists contribute to them. In one way, that's great, because lots of tracks are submitted, but it also creates so many different styles that the album lacks cohesiveness.

This album contains great music, worthy of listening to many times, but I don't think it's as strong when considered as a story, or when considered as remixes of FF4 songs.

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I assure you, I'm quite educated and know the meaning of both words. My expectations were clearly different from yours, that's all. Thank you.

About the rap song, may I remind that it's just my opinion I shared. I care for very little rap in general so, naturally, I wouldn't care for this.

I enjoyed the tracks titled "Bridge to Eternity (Within the Giant)" and "Facing (Epilogue)."

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