Leaderboard

Long time since release, but I have to say it: this is a really amazing album! I always loved Castlevania IV and its soundtrack, so "weird" and unique, and it's a pity that most of the tracks (with the exception of Simon's theme) are so underrated and almost no decent covers of them. This album, homever, makes justice. A great tribute to a great soundtrack. In contrast to the previous two volumes of this trilogy, this third one feels more varied, balanced and consistent. Many metal tracks, many orchestrals, many synth/electroincs and many everything, but all in its proper way. Making something with such a variety and experimentation while keeping a very own personality on it does not seems to be an easy task, but you all did it very well. Also a very nice job from Chernabogue to direct and manage the project and keeping it always alive and progressing despite the difficulties in the way (yes, I very rarely post something but I'm very often reading "in lurker mode" :P). It was also a nice experience to go to the "online listening party" that Hallowen night, despite the confussions with the schudule. The first and only one I went to, and hope to go to many more later. Some good remixes from musicians I already knew and liked (especially the one by Goat) and some others I just discovered in this release and I liked very much too (Slimy's orchestrals are really nice and interesting, as well as Timaeus222's crazy remix for the Treasure Room, and the "unofficial group" formed by Jorito, Tuberz, Keskitalo, etc has a very unique and interesting style too). It was great to listen to very nice remixes of very-little-remixed tracks like the Sumerged City, the Forest, the Dark Cellar, the "giant lamps' screen", etc too. This is an album where everything is worth, from the shortest interludes and narrations to the most complex and well-made music. No fillers nor questionable-quality stuff included. If you are one of those many who, as me, always loved the original Super Castlevania IV and its weird and unique soundtrack, this album is the perfect tribute to it and you will sure love it as much as I do too. And if someone liked this album and did not played the game yet, you should do it too! Totally recommended, and I'd dare to say this is the best VGM arrangement/tribute album of 2015 year (at least in my opinion). And well, not much more to say that I didn't. Maybe someday I'll write a more complete review of the whole album, as it deserves, but unfortunately my english level is maybe not enough to that xD. Thanks again for the amazing job, and for making it free for all!

I love this post. I absolutely love this post. It proves a certain point; for every individual convinced he/she has golden ears and can hear the difference between 1024Khz and 4096Khz and 128-bit audio vs. 2048-bit audio (intentionally ridiculous numbers here, folks!), there's someone questioning the use of bandwidth and (incorrectly) invoking something like Nyquist to argue that we've gone past the limits of human hearing... @Grunkk, my brubba.... 128Kbps is a bitrate, not a sampling frequency/depth. You can have a 128Kbps "quality" stream of 16-bit, 22khz mono audio. You can have a 320Kbps stream of the same. You can also have a 64Kbps stream of 24-bit, 96Khz stereo... I'm not gonna bore you with the details, here, but in simple terms: the MP3 bitrate dictates the lossiness of the compression, whereas the bit depth & sampling frequency dictate the fidelity of the source audio. The first is the lossiness of the digital compression being applied to the captured data, the second is the "lossiness" (more like "quantization") inherent in the conversion from the analog realm to the digital. Metaphor: MP3 bitrate is JPEG lossiness on a scale of 0-100%. where as audio bit depth & sampling frequency are the resolution and color depth of the lossless source image being compressed. You can have a JPEG 100% quality image that's 100x100 pixels, and you have have JPEG 20% quality image that's 1000x1000 pixels... 128Kbps can be noticeably lossy, even to the layperson, depending on the nature of the audio in question... hence our decision to increase to either 192Kbps or VBR1, with a Nyquist-friendly and industry-standard 16-bit + 44.1khz stereo source. If all of this seems overwhelming, I guess you'll just have to trust us: we've landed on a standard that 99.9% of people couldn't reliably pass an A/B Coke/Pepsi taste test on when comparing to lossless, including Neil Young and Brendan Becker, yet which doesn't unnecessarily wander into the realm of 320Kbps, 24-bit, 96khz diminishing returns...

I prefer my music at 24fps, anyway. It's more "cinematic" that way *adjusts hipster glasses*

The beginning of the original song sticks out to me as something that could be orchestral. Your version doesn't really have the same kind of of energy though - partially because the melody at the beginning is an octave lower, and partially because all the instruments sound muffled. Your percussion is extremely quiet, I can barely hear snare drum, and if the timpani were any quieter, I wouldn't know it was there at all. (In fact, I'm half expecting you to say that there were no timpani.) And the cymbals are too quiet to contribute anything except some soft white-noise. The "rhythm notes" at 0:12 sound repetitive and midi-like. If you don't have any round robin samples, you could still alternate velocities to improve the sound. There is a strange metallic sound at 0:40... you may have been intending for that to be part of the percussion, but it's so quiet, it sounds like a mistake. I do like the crescendoing trombones at 0:53. I think it's a decent example on it's own of how you could be more liberal with the orchestra to add some nice personal touches.

First of all, frame rate only applies to videos. YouTube videos currently peak at 60 fps for HD and 30 fps for SD. Second, people can hear differences between 128 kbps and 192+ kbps bit rates. Well, I can anyway, and I expect some of the younger people on the Judges Panel to be able to as well. A 128 kbps MP3 degrades audio above 16000 Hz, whereas I can hear pretty much all the way up to 20000 Hz. 128 kbps constant bit rate: 224 kbps constant bit rate: The difference is not obvious, but I hear it, and I can definitely see it. It's not the same as simply hard-low passing (high dB/octave slope) at 16000 Hz, but I do hear a slight degrading of the upper treble frequencies as a result of compression artifacts in 128 kbps relative to 192+ kbps.

Big fan of this game and the soundtrack, probably my favorite in terms of feel and originality. First of all, let me say I love what you have so far. Most people tend to stick to the soft feel of the original track, but you've taken a big step in another direction here. I really like the dirty, low-tone distortion that you've chosen and the almost tribal tom progression you gave the percussion fits perfectly. The orchestration in the background only supports the overall tone and I love how all the tones match. This sounds GREAT. What you are feeling is a lack of intro riff. You need a fill after the first four measures, to go along with the bass coming to the table. Something low-tone like the rhythm guitar, but not too fancy, just enough to get the listener into that orchestral bit. Everything else is there, in my opinion. I like the transition here. Flawless. If you want people to headbang, I have a couple of suggestions: instead of using the main guitar to 'mix up' the melody (second four measures), I would keep the melody by that dirty guitar original and put in another slightly-higher toned guitar fill that plays over top of the melody, then try to get the drums and the rhythm guitar to emphasize the beat together (If you listen to 'Blood Pigs' by Otep, you'll get an idea of what I mean). Not sure the key change fits, but maybe this will sound better with a fill. LOVE how the rhythm guitar supports the melody here. Very powerful. You might want to consider the 'Fear of the Heavens' riff as a sort of 'chorus' to bring the listener back to when finished with whatever other tracks you have planned here - if that fits with your design. I like it, especially how the percussion and orchestral parts drop off to let the riff play out. If you choose to go for another round of this track, you may consider some gentle high-hat or light cymbals for the beat instead of actual drums, to help preserve the emotional feel you have laid out here. I really like what you have here, and I want to hear more. If you are looking for suggestions on where to go next, I say percussion is one of the high points of the SoM soundtrack, so take 'Danger' or 'the Oracle' and see what you can do with it - then finish with 'Fear...' one last time. Stretch it out, epic hair metal ending, worthy of Brian May, Slash, or Keith Richards maybe? Have fun ... and keep writing!

What the Frick?! Anyone who watched Star Gazers on PBS knew how perfect his music went with the night sky....Damn. I found this video way back...We're losing some pioneers.