[djpretzel]

What did you think? Post your opinion of this ReMix.

[Brim]

Awesome, a Mega Man 6 remix. I've been waiting for this. I hardly recognize the Blizzard Man theme, but after listening a little more carefully, I heard it. It has such a great feeling to it. It could be great background or foreground music.

Overall, I enjoy this piece and its awesome atmosphere.

[Txai]

Very pleasant. The production is quite cool. Really clean and sweet.

[Rexy]

Awesome, I had this mix on my hard drive for a while now and it's still cool to take in. :) Vurez has been able to take the source material, maintain the atmosphere that it held and showcase his own unique incarnation of it. In fact, much of his stylistic approaches to the Mega Man 6 score was of a very powerful interest to me and it's good to be able to see some of which come over here too. Neat-o.

This mix was lucky enough to receive my last ever review at VGMix before my strike over there, so it's best to quote it back here again:

Production techniques
Vurez has taken a lot of Mega Man 6 stage themes in the past and developed ethnical variations on the source material, so with Blizzard Man he had to go with a chillout/new-age/orchestral arrangement to reflect on the sub-zero stage itself. The panning is well thought in terms of spacious effects as well as much of the textures and individual sound positions; in terms of developing ambiance I really appreciate much of the tendencies taken here, so well done on that. As is the usual with his works we have a mix that is drenched with reverb, although for an atmospheric piece like this I'm sure it can be lifted; added to that that I think the melody is a little bit clearer than what I have witnessed in his Ys backlog and I think we're in for a cleaner setting to take on cue. One thing that I should mention here though is to try and increase the release time on the acoustic guitar to make the melodic progressions on that instrument sound a bit clearer instead of being rather harsh in terms of dynamics; outside from there I can tell I'm firm with much of the decisions in enhancing much of the instrumentation when taken. The sound balance is firm for what it was; can be argued that the percussion made things feel a little bit one-sided, but there's been a good range of EQs and dynamics to help emphasize on the overall volume here. Overall I think this is a better setting than what I've witnessed in his past incorporations, and for that I can say that I'm rather impressed; hopefully some of these foundations could be kept for future creations as well as being kept at enhancing some of the minor hindrances too.

Compositional structure
The track started off with the opening genre aspects that the song was claimed to be looking for, given some strong use of orchestrated strings and the use of pads and chimes to help add towards the wintry atmosphere the mix was looking for. The piece was then given a piano melody line as well as some light playing around on some fiddle instrumentation by 0:38 before continuing on with the basic structures of the source; I found much of those aspects to be rather peaceful and fitting for what they were, and they have done well to be able to catch much of the reflective setting that has been searched for here. I don't know about you but I thought it seemed to be a bit early to deviate from the original, but somehow I think it has managed to work out well enough to catch the audience's attention.

The moods then became a bit more relaxed by 1:45, allowing the orchestrated strings and acoustic guitar - with a following saxophone improvisation at 2:03 - to come in and add to the general climax here. I found the programming on the latter instrument to be very skilled and well thought out; much of the swells and manipulation have worked out well to easily aid towards the instrument's broad tendencies, and with much thought also taken towards the overall composition we're in for an area that's barely flawless. If there's something that I was hoping down the line I was hoping for a broader range of attacks on the orchestrated string background to make them feel a bit more realistic, but they still sound nice to help add some light tension to this otherwise subtle portion.

The melody was then incorporated in at 2:41, and it's here that the user then made it feel more to the point in terms of structure. However, he has managed to shake up a lot of the backing instrumentation to be able to aid in a lot of involvement towards his target audience, so that can be seen to be as a solid addition towards the piece structure. Looking back to the start of the mix I was sure that in terms of structure this part would have been more suited for it and a lot of the climatic playing around could have been incorporated here to better add to the dynamic feel on the ending, although that might have been me on that front; nonetheless this has worked well to keep the arrangement going.

And then at 3:50 there came a reprise of the final part of the source material before bringing the track into a climatic ending procedure. I saw some added liberties taken in with the additions of a backing string melody and a vocal soprano taken in, so that's firm to know on that side. However, what I think the ending was missing though was dynamics; I thought they could have been given a light increase getting towards the end to make it showcase a bit more of an energetic punch towards the target audience. Preferences aside, I appreciate a firm amount of what came around on this.

I can admit that the judges' commentary was an amusement to me; Darkesword may have thought we were of a "chill bias" but the adaptation of the theme was firm enough to make it stand its position on the site in a very firm stance. Comparing it to the mixes i've heard from Vurez so far (mainly his Ys stuff and some of his other Mega Man material) I found it to be one of his better produced efforts as well as being much broader on theme scope than a good chunk of his Ys-based material on offer. I understand that he likes using an acoustic guitar in every mix, but I feel the attack could have been a bit more subtle to make it fit in a bit more, likewise with some stronger attention to dynamics at the end.

but otherwise, I realy dig what managed to come around of all this and therefore it's a well deserved welcome onto the site for Vurez. Way to go, hermano :D

[evildrspock]

The beginning reminded me of a Yanni song (not as an insult), but as it continued on, it definitely took a life of it's own. The dynamics and the details is very refreshing and believable. Good job.

[Tom Ato]

What happened to the 6mb limit? This is a whopping 6.1mb.

[Liontamer]

Originally Posted by TheBigTom

What happened to the 6mb limit? This is a whopping 6.1mb.

Originally Posted by [url=http://www.ocremix.org/about/?artid=4

Submission Instructions & Standards[/url]]ReMixes should be no larger than 6MB (6,291,456 bytes). No exceptions.

"What seems to be the problem, sir?"

[MasquedSinner]

This mix sounds very, very beautiful. But I didn't expect anything less than this from Vurez. I just recently heard his works on VGmix, and I'm surprised he doesn't already have any of his mixes over here- Flaming Desert Sand is a very, very cool song.

Looking at the ID3 tags, I see that they take a bit too much space to be put on here.


Anyway, I really enjoyed listening to Frozen Fury. It was a great take on that theme, though I have to agree with one of the guys up above about the guitar. It just suddenly appeared without a reason to really be there. That may be the only real flaw I've found with the song.

Good work Vurez. I hope to hear more of yours! 9/10

[Julio Jose]

Piano sample sounded a little weak to me, but I was more than consoled when the strings came in...

And the guitar... God damn... I loved the winter levels of megaman, more than any other, and this did them justice.

[chthonic]

This works pretty damn well as a standalone piece, seeing as I am completely oblivious to Mega Man 6's OST.

Ok, first off, This is really well produced. The EQ sounds completely full, and the resulting sound is very satisfying. In fact, I think I would have been turned off to this mix on the first listen if it weren't for the excellent sound achieved in the first few seconds. I don't like the solo violin that much (sounds really fake), and I like the solo sax a little more, but it's still a bit lame. I think it would have worked better in a higher octave, but I can't be sure without hearing it.

Dug the solo vox, too.

EDIT: I'm going to start encoding all of my songs in VBR to be exactly 6,291,456 bytes. Seriously.

-chth