Liontamer

We'll be picking it up now that we're about to wrap up a particularly lengthy internal project. The wait remains too long to post things, absolutely, but hold tight.

The opening synths were very vanilla, but we'll see where this goes. Better stuff at :40 with the switch to rock, featuring combinations of Sakura's and Fei Long's themes though it wasn't really the smoothest flow in terms of combining these themes. The soundscape was pretty cluttered by the guitars from :54-1:08. I felt the guitar playing was a littled stilted in places, but OA didn't agree for your Shinobi 3 mix, so it may only be my opinion again. It's not horrible, but I'm not saying Sixto is the standard, but there's more of natural flow to his guitar performance, as an example. The tone of the electrosynths for the Sakura verses was shrill and not a good lead choice, IMO (e.g. 1:21-1:36, 1:50-2:05). Small thing, but why bother having such flimsy exposed claps in the picture for a few seconds (2:18-2:25)? 2:39 strongly finished off the final minute and felt like the most cohesive section as far as the mixing and instrument textures. Things clicked much better, and even the synth lead was more understated and less glaring as far as its default-y nature. I like the concept and where this is going so far, Dustin, and it gets more right than it does wrong. That said, the so-called seesaw has to be weighted a bit more toward what works vs. what doesn't for me to pass it. It's clearly headed in the right direction, but could use some further polishing so that everything's clicking. Good luck with the rest of the vote! NO (resubmit)

As soon as that piano came in, I thought this was an interesting approach. That said, this mixing sounds... not so good once more stuff faded in at :06. Cluttered garbage from :12-:38, if I may say so. Not sure how the everything got mixed in such a messy way, with a lot of shrill synths and just a very lossy sound. I'd LOVE for someone to explain in too much detail how exactly this is messed up and how to approach fixing it. As is, this is jacked. Not sure about the Beatles sampling. It's not a completely horrible addition, though I personally felt it was lame except for the 1:36 usage (that was cool). We also don't want to be sued by the various estates of the Beatles. Too bad, the arrangement is definitely strong, but the production is equally weak in the opposite direction. Take another pass at the balance and EQ and send it on back, Brandon; this is strong otherwise! NO (refine/resubmit)

The mixing was cluttered in that the voices kind of mushed together, which undercut the lyrics. Otherwise, I love it. OA's spot-on about how more structural variation would have been good, but what's here is certainly substantive enough interpretation. Awesome goofy approach that had me laughing and smiling at sheer silliness. \m/egarocking, there's just no need to say anything else other than KEEP 'EM COMING! YES

I wrote Robbie. We'll see what I get back, but the initial sweep didn't sound promising. OA/Deia, can you help with some details on the arrangement?

The lack of realism in the string instrument sequencing handling the lead was unfortunate. Whatever plucked instrument got thrown in at :26 sounded dissonant through 1:00, so I'm not sure that was the right move. Once the writing of whatever instrument that was at 1:09 came in, this was basically over as far as the call. The potential here is cool, but there's too much clashing writing dropped into the picture. The arrangement of the theme wasn't particularly interpretive besides adapting it to this instrument set and looping it for too long; then adding two parts with original writing ideas that didn't click with the source melody at all. Too much looping, not enough realism in the lead part, and not enough development of the source tune. The ending also unceremoniusly cuts off. See what you can do to develop the ideas a lot further and improve the cohesion. NO

Just quoting section 3, part 2: I recently YESed a Castlevania medley that had similar criticism where I thought the scales tipped to YES as far as the overall quality of the transitions and development of the themes, but I was outvoted. These are always tougher calls. I think I'm the closest to OA's praise while also agreeing with the NOs that the medley structure here wasn't quite cohesive enough. It's hard to criticize this in the sense that it's very (very) well produced, and orchestrates these themes very nicely. The transition from "You Know Her?" to "Exile Vilify" at 5:03 was probably the nicest one, IMO. The transitions are potentially a grayer area, but here's where I fell as far as whether they were cohesive or not (YouTube video timing, not the MP3). Smooth enough: 2:01, 2:49, 3:08, 5:03 Noticeably jumpy: :44, 1:21 (a bit jumpy), 2:30, 4:18, 5:59, 6:53 Obviously we're not saying literally every song transition has to seamlessly flow into one another, that's unrealistic. There have definitely been game ending themes that have done what this theme does, as far as piecing themes together. And though it's clear thought and care have been put into each transition, I don't think that dismisses that many of the transitions do quickly hop from theme to theme without enough flow from A-to-B or development of the individual themes. I'm more NO (borderline), because I think the treatment of each section was cover-ish but interpretive, even if the pieces were brief. But a NO is still a NO on account of too many gear changes affecting the flow and cohesiveness of the piece. It's a great orchestral medley; we've gotten other medleys with some jumpy transitions that have made in through due to better flow and more development/interpretation of the themes, but this wasn't quite there and falls a bit outside of what we're looking for. Sorry to decline this, Kaze, but it's definitely NOT an indictment on your skills, it's just a reflection of this piece's structure colliding with this site's particular standards on medleys. We'd absolutely love for you to submit something else in the future, and know you're doing great work. Definitely try us again with something that's more focused on fewer songs and gives the themes a little more breathing room to develop and more flow from piece to piece.

Your arrangement needs a more creative title. The quality of the opening brass samples was already pretty suspect when this started. The backing percussion gives this a manic, directionless feel despite holding fast to the melodic structure. And how about that melodic structure; not much going on there as far as interpretation. By 1:45, I was waiting for some sort of dropoff or major drum pattern change to create dynamic contrast, but it never came. 1:57-on basically serves as a slightly more active second loop. There's just no synergy going on with the drums & the melody. You need much more melodic interpretation, more dynamic contrast, more realistic-sounding leads, and a better balance of volume between the drums and the lead. Agreed with Palp, this would need a ton of reworking to get it where it needs to be, but you may want to give it a shot to see how far you can take it, even if it doesn't pass. Don't be discouraged, Brian, and keep learning. NO

The arrangement is excellent, but the muddy mixing really dragged this down for the fullest sections. A lot of writing details in this piece got swamped out. The strength of the arrangement being so great leads me to hold my nose (try to use that expression without sounding like an asshole; can't do it ) and go YES (borderline) with a lot of reservations. But it's possible that in a few years, Yan will look back at this one and wish he could take another pass at the mixing. It really undercut the potential of this piece a lot. EDIT: Read Palp's vote after I made mine, and thanks god [sic] I'm not the only one who mentioned the production. But yeah, listened 6 or 7 times, and while I'm personally dissatisfied with the way the production went, at the end of the day, it wasn't ENOUGH to tilt it to NO. It almost was though. I always use Revenge of Shinobi 'Consent (Make Me Dance)' as a control track just to make sure my ears aren't playing tricks on me, and the differences in those two as far as clarity are pretty striking. Still a sweet arrangement here.

I thought this was way more liberal due to the soloing than what was implied in the breakdown. I needed more than 110 seconds of overt source usage for this to pass on the arrangement side. :23-1:11, 1:12-1:16, 1:18-1:23, 1:35.25-1:45.25, 1:49-1:55, 2:32-2:43.5, 2:48-2:53, 3:16-3:39 = 112.5 seconds or 51.14% Honestly, this got pretty liberal, so even picking apart what I could was enough of a chore. That said, it squeaked by at least, and there's probably some other connections I just couldn't get a bead on. With that out of the way, I thought the performance ended up sounding pretty intense, and there was a level of polish here in the performance and the instrumentation that I've definitely not heard with any of your past arrangements. Not much more to say other than keep up the improvement, Liam! YES

Wow, Persona 2's map theme is my new cut; awesome track! Opening was rather mechanically sequenced, but I'm seeing where it's leading. Hahaha, the bassline brought in at :18 definitely had an '80s vibe to it. The background beat at :38 felt too sparse and was holding the track back from sounding fully fleshed out. Meanwhile, there was a lack of clarity with the mixing that made this sound lossier than the encoding would have you think. Wasn't feeling the transition back to DKC2 at 1:35; not particularly smooth, coupled with some loose timing issues. The textures until 1:57 there felt flimsy and the instrument set change didn't seem to naturally evolve from the sounds that came before it, IMO. At the end of the day, I like the potential here, and won't be mad if it passes, but I thought Emu's crits within his YES followed by Palpable's reservations in his NO really articulated the nagging feelings I had. I'm actually glad they voted earlier, because I wouldn't have been able to articulate these issues in the way that they have. This here. There's nothing inherently wrong with going a more straightforward route with the melodic treatment, and the effort's clearly there to weave each theme with the background writing, but I didn't feel like the various sources were as cohesively stitched together as your past approved mixes, so I'm actually agreeing with Emu (and disagreeing with Palp and the YESs) in that the structure ends up not sounding defined or fully organized to me. I didn't mind the piano at all, and I've heard enough official arrange album pieces where basic sequencing and a lack of complexity aren't dealbreakers, but I think he's onto something here on this particular piece. The lead changeups DID help create some good dynamic contrast, but not quite at the level where this didn't feel like it was basically in one gear from :19 onward. This is cool, but the overall lack of dynamic contrast, the muddy mixing, and the blandness brought about by basic sequencing were enough to pull this down to a NO (resubmit) for me. I think this could sound even better with further tweaks, but best of luck with the rest of the vote, Mansoor!

Nice opening. A LITTLE stilted with the left hand to start, but this still sounded nice. Really awesome delay/ambiance on the piano helped fill out the soundscape nicely and mitigate the timing issues. I could see how one could say it went overboard, but it came across like a purposeful choice to me; either way, I wasn't bothered and don't feel like important details got lost in the mix. There were noticeable imperfections in the timing throughout that I wish had been smoothed out. But it was all small things that didn't drag this down enough in the big picture, IMO. Solid arrangement with production choices that helped undercut some noticeable negatives with the timing. Not the strongest YES on account of the timing issues, but it gets more right than it does wrong by a wide enough margin to me to go with it, flaws and all. YES

Seemed to open OK. The mixing was a little muddy, and some of the synth squeaks came across as abrasive. The piano at :39 sounded pretty similar to :41 of the original's, which was a deduction as far as the arrangement standards, IMO. I think enough else is done in terms of varying the lead and interpreting the theme to get away with it, but it did almost come off as sampling due to how close the two pianos sounded. The added warmth to the piano in Damon's take was an improvement on the more mechanical sound of the source. More synths added around :55 to add some new writing ideas in the background. The core beat is pretty bare, but there's enough going on around it to compensate, even if it still feels a bit empty to me despite the number of things going on. Switchup at 1:27 with some cool Sonic SFX cameos and some light dub-wub elements. The mixing's still too piercing, but the changeup to the piano-centric stuff sounded pretty nice. Didn't like the way the note changes worked for the synth lead from 2:16-2:31, but it's not a big deal in the big picture, even though the timing sounded too stiff. 3:07 felt a bit like a cut and paste of :39's section, but the overall level of interpretation was solid. The one thing killing me is the mixing and those piercing higher frequencies. They get on my nerves, but with the volume taken down a bit, it doesn't have that same negative effect, so it might just be something that sticks out at full volume. Not ideal and those issues pull it down to borderline, but I believe the arrangement carries it. 8 years later, and this sounds nothing like that first sub. It even has dubstep elements that weren't mainstream back in 2004. I'm glad you didn't listen to me and kept it in the back of your mind for all that time, only to create something a lot stronger after a lot of musical growth. It really makes it worth the wait. YES (borderline)

That's a good point! If we can find them, we'll reach out and see if they're still interested.

Looks like most of those are resubmissions; any resubmissions can be immediately added back to the panel to vote on again so that they don't have to wait for us to catch up to when they resubmitted it. We'll be back to voting more often soon.

There's potentially some foot-in-mouth action here, but I haven't heard that trailer, only the soundtrack (which is sweet). Why not ask Jake about the process and if there were any major differences vs. the April game preview? He's not a sheepish guy. Part of the layout of the music has to do with the '80s homage, so if you're not down with that approach in the first place, you're not gonna be feeling the music. But no one's asked any of the April posters how they feel now that the final OST is out, so see if they still feel the same way now. The soundtrack sounded good to me, or I wouldn't have plugged it so many times. Almost reminds me of the Street Fighter III: Online Edition criticism for Simon Viklund's arranged soundtrack.

http://ocremix.org/forums/showthread.php?p=859012&postcount=85

All the pledges cover shipping to ANYWHERE in the world. Antarctica? Covered. Yes, really.

Never posted here (I'm surprised), but the arrangement here is excellent, with genteel yet solemn instrumentation. This one's vastly underrated. Even back in the day, the variety and creativity within the community was strong, with djp leading the way. The genre diversity's grown since 2002, but the focus on creativity has been there since the beginning.

Update (2012-09-25): We're BACK! (New Announcement!)

That's cool, no worries. I had scanned the FLACs with AudioTester before the release, and everything turned out fine, so it was definitely surprising to initially hear that issue. I also scanned my copy of the FLACs with FileVerifier++ (thanks for making me aware of programs like these) before I replied, and didn't see any issue, so I just had to double check with you about if maybe it just was a corrupt DL.

Excellent, chill arrangement, one of the coolest, moodiest pieces amongst the oldest mixes. Definitely a fan.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/17/mcrib-2012-debut-dates_n_1889744.html SECOND HALF OF DECEMBER!!!! McRib is BACK! McRIB!

Emphasis added, of course. So what we're looking to do is decide whether the used for this submission is substantive enough to be used as a source tune. Though the vote is currently at 6Y/4N, implying that at least the YES's think it IS substantial enough to be a source tune, that might not necessarily be the case upon some further reflection.We have mixes of other jingle themes on the site, including one from and . I'll try to find some others later.If I'm not misrepresenting Dave, Dave wants to know if the panel feels the Seiken Densetsu 3 piece is much less substantive than other source tunes we've allowed, or if we've just made mistakes allowing mixes of more or all of these short jingles. I feel I explained my POV in my vote on the sub, but there seemed to be enough to work with musically, despite being basic, to form a viable arrangement out of it. Palpable basically agreed with my breakdown on how the source was used, but also felt the arrangement itself was nonetheless off the rails, but I disagreed there. EDIT: And yes, I shouldn't have forgotten what Shariq alluded to below: if you have 0 problem with the eligibility of the SD3 source, and only had a problem with the arrangement, definitely point that out. It seems from the submission voting (correct me if I'm wrong) that no one thinks it's not an ineligible theme to arrange as far as the substance, but that the arrangement is too liberal and "modified the source material beyond recognition" according to the current standards.

That's not how it works. Perceived strength of vote doesn't factor into how we treat the end result of the vote count. You can't argue that because 2 out of the six YESs aren't strong, and 3 of the four NOs were hell NOs, that that somehow equals an overall NO vote. The vote ended up 6Y/4N so far, which isn't a NO. We don't even have Vig's vote yet. The standards issues to look at are 1) if the source is too simplistic to be acceptable source material and/or 2) if the arrangement is beyond recognition compared to a simplistic source. So it's time for djp to chime in, but this isn't closed yet.