Liontamer   Judges ⚖️

ReMixer name: Tarcani Email: Userid: 50321 Game: Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island Arrangement: Run, Yoshi, Run!! Individual songs arranged: Athletic Theme Comments: I've been toying around with developing a piano arrangement of this piece ever since it invaded and pervaded my consciousness for about a month a while back. I came up with this light-hearted arrangement over the course of many revisions and I am pleased with the way it came out. The solo piano was an attempt to create a sort of homogeneous unit that demonstrates that this piece doesn't require any complicated instrumentation to be executed in an interesting and successful way. Enjoy!

Man. I really disliked the phasing electrosynths in this. Is it just me? I'm paneling it just because I wanna be sure it's not just me. They just sounded so generic and were not fitting this at all. Sometimes, things sounded off-key or flat, and just... unpleasent. Aside from those electrosynth leads and the glassy instrument first brought in at :47, the arrangement had a cool minimalist vibe. Some might say it was too flimsy, but the space was being filled out well enough. The articulations were too mechanical on the organic-style instrumentation, though some stuff like the bass at the end was fine enough. That said, too many sounds felt out of place and dragged this way, way down. Props on getting this performed; I'd defintiely like to hear how this arrangement turned out with a different instrument set and dynamics of live players. As far mockups go, you get the gist of it, sure, but man does it need a lot of TLC. NO

Alias: Melodious Punk Name: Kevin Fredericks Address: Website: http://soundcloud.com/melodious-punk Forum ID: Melodious Punk Games: Mega Man 2/3 Arrangement: Metal Snake Stages: Metal Man, Snake Man, Air Man, Mega Man 3 Intro, Gemini Man This piece is a remix of an arrangement that will be performed by the Reno Video Game Symphony on October 19th 2012 in Reno, NV. The original score is for woodwinds, tuba/euphonium/trombone/trumpet, full strings, percussion, and bari/alto sax. I made this to show the 22 members of the group how the track sounds, but I opted to make it in Ableton with an electropop treatment for fun. Thank You, Kevin Fredericks

The filename from the Mediafire link actually said 'A Lovely Shade of Emerald', but OK. The synth design was pretty vanilla for the first minute, but the mixing was OK. Things became pretty muddy after the drop at 1:08, and I'm not sure what happened to cause it. Some light wubbing was added at 1:35, but everything was so muddy, it just sounded like a distortion bleeding into everything else. Really exposed, fake pizz strings brought in from 2:04-2:17. It can slide some given the context of the song. More creative dubstep-style wubbery after 2:17, though the melody was getting drowned down some. 3:13 ended that and moved back into more of a focus on the source upfront. Definitely not my thing personally on account of the manic dub-wub in the middle, and I felt the treatment of the source tune was kind of straightforward once you took all of that out. That said, the approach was solidly personalized and I thought well in the right direction of interpretation. The mixing being off was the main dealbreaker for me. The cleanest sections sounded pretty thin despite being so loud, while other areas were too muddy and lossy-sounding. The arrangement was OK, but some production/balance improvements there would get things sounding a lot more solid and put this over the top, IMO. Good start here, Matthew. NO (resubmit)

Remix Title: Emerald Evolution Game: Pokemon Red/Blue Song: Viridian Forest Remixer Name: MtM Remixer Website: http://soundcloud.com/mtm64 This is a trancey/complextro-style remix of the Viridian Forest theme, which is also the very first video game remix I ever did, way back in 2009. I decided to remix the theme again now that I actually know what I'm doing, and I'm pretty proud of the result. There's not much more to say, really. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPH9bT2Agc0

No worries. Red Rum was just pissed and it's hopefully smoothed over on the Tweeter. https://twitter.com/Real_Red_Rum/status/299934313674334208 Everyone's a winner. Back when Rexy was regularly rejected, I'm sure she felt the same way. The things I'd say to Greg in regards to these replies are two-fold. 1) DON'T compromise your artistic vision for an arrangement to accommodate the OCR standards. When we judges make suggestions, it's with the OCR arrangement standards in mind. But if altering that arrangement isn't something you want to do, and you don't feel addressing the criticisms will improve your own enjoyment of the track, don't do it. Apply our criticisms in a way where you know you're improving the track in your own eyes, and not just ours. 2) We don't want you to put your heart into and submit a track that's too much of a close cover only to be surprised and angry it didn't make it for being too cover-ish, especially after 3 people, including 2 Workshop mods, tell you why they believe it's not going to make it. That said, this SoR track WAS mostly a straightforward cover. If you need guidance on understanding the level of interpretation needed to make it, you have to explore mixes posted in the last year, compare them with the originals and get a better feel for what we're looking for. People are here to help you get to where you want to be.

I'm 5 eps in, and loving it like I knew I would. Dave mentioned enjoying the breaking of the 4th wall, which was carried over well from the BBC version. It works well there too. I will say though, in episode 5, they showed Democrats working unified messaging on TV to perfection, when that's just total bullshit. Much to my chagrin, only Republicans effectively utilize Frank Luntz-style obfuscation language to that degree of unity and repetition. It's a not a huge complaint, I just got a kick out of it. I've got Jeff Beal's theme on repeat for the weekend http://www.youtuberepeater.com/watch?v=DbWcdaeYrsI

Saw this gem in response to the judges decision And yet, you had 3 different people basically say a lot earlier what I said in my vote, yet somehow you're still shocked: Now Rozo was wrong, IMO, and maybe that gave you false hope, but we still have ReMixes that are more cover-ish, retaining the same structure and tempo, but are more personalized than what you had. See what else you can do on the arrangement side or just try another arrangement with more interpretation in mind. I think djp said it best when I mentioned this offhand in chat just now: "Hey man, no need to call us cunts, we liked the track, we just have requirements that the arrangement change things up a bit more. No hard feelings if you don't feel like it, but we'd love to see you make some changes & resubmit." That's basically it. Maybe you can't read past the NOs at the bottom of the vote, but we all still enjoyed the track. And we've been called worse than Fucky McFuckcunt, or whatever you yelled, so we don't mind. Your production's not bad, just get the arrangement/interpretation component on point, and you're good to go. And if you no longer aim to get something passed on the site here because you don't like the standards, that's fine, but go channel that anger into something positive. EDIT: Here's the proof that we hate you:

We know. It'll be fixed.

...the fuck???

Forgot to come back to this, but just co-signing with a YES. I was just high and neglecting the steady bassline usage, which more than put the source involvement over the top. WillRock had a good point about the nature of the source tune being standard blues, but as I mentioned in the #j chat last night, that's not really the source's fault. As long as the source wasn't flat out lifted from another non-VGM song, it's valid to arrange. I still poo on the piano here, but this rises above that.

I wish the snare patterns were a little less vanilla, but as the track hit the soloing, that part dropped and the percussion really got room to get active. The first 90 seconds were a well-personalized cover, IMO. I wouldn't pass a whole arrangement done this way, but everything after 1:28 with the integration of original writing with the original, followed by guitar and woodwind work on top of the base of the source from 2:09 until the end, made it an easy pass. The progression here was solid; it started close to the vest and steadily opened up as the level of interpretation grew. Vig's high about the intro & outro crits. I mean, sure, you COULD trim the start and add more to the end, but did that really break the track as far as what we're looking for in the big picture? Not really. Forward. YES

Good catch; you're definitely right about hearing those brief "skips." If I had to take a guess, I'd say intentional alongside the other glitching effect, but I wouldn't bet my life on it. I could ALSO see it being unintentional, but it honestly didn't make any difference to me. Still a solid YES myself.

TL;DR Undecided. For stuff like this, we cross that bridge when we get there and handle it on a case-by-case basis. For something like Sonic Before the Sequel or a similar example like Streets of Rage Remake, the game certainly looks good, but the game itself is unauthorized. That might be a call djpretzel ultimately makes, with or without thoughts from the panel. Personally, I could live with it, but the soundtracks of unauthorized fan-games possibly fall outside our scope of acceptable games. Well-made original games with some notability aren't legally nebulous. I'd rather keep my fingers crossed for more success stories like Capcom being forward-thinking and taking Street Fighter X Mega Man in-house.

comiXology pretty much runs the game. They're awesome. https://twitter.com/comiXology/statuses/218946422635106304

I actually got to hear this one in Stevo's car while visiting Maryland for a work conference, and everything sounded strong; really glad we finally got to this one. Vocals isn't a direction I would have expected to hear "Rainbow Road" in, but it works very well. Great combination of the acoustic and chip elements as well. The nasally style of the vocals will kill some haters dead, but that's about the only "issue" I hear and it's a subjective thing. Cool to hear Ben do some vocals as well. Play this for your Kart 64-lovin' lady and give her a big hug. YES

I loved the BBC series with the late Ian Richardson as Francis Urquhart. Now we hopefully get to see Kevin Spacey kick ass as Frank Underwood. In both versions, FU is the creme de la creme of douchey, scheming, underhanded politicians, and if the American version is ANYTHING like the British one, it will be awesome. Netflix is the exclusive home of show, and they've released ALL 13 episodes of season 1 TODAY. This release style may eventually blow up the television model, given the way things are going. Ars Technica has a good overview up, and I just gave props to showrunner Beau Willimon on the Tweeter as a show of support. With Kevin Spacey on board, I can't WAIT to see what kind of evil stuff he's up to here, and I know he's gonna be great. Gotta give a big recommendation to check this show out, and definitely hit the BBC trilogy as well on Netflix if you have time.

Friday, March 22 to Sunday, March 24 Boston Convention & Exhibition Center, Boston, MA http://east.paxsite.com/ Time to pahk the cah in Boston again! OCR heads north to attend the 4th annual PAX East! OverClocked University will be there with an oh-so-sweet LIVE PERFORMANCE! If you promise to love video game music, we promise not to beat you up! Got swag to give away as well, so get HYPE! PANEL! OC ReMix: Punching You in the FACE with VIDEO GAME MUSIC!!! Arachnid Theatre Sunday, March 24th, 2PM Panelists: djpretzel DarkeSword Liontamer José the Bronx Rican Palpable AND OverClocked University!!! OA Level 99 diotrans DragonAvenger with special guest rumpshaking by Vilecat!!! (Stevo's going to kill me) We'll see you there! Who else is going?!

You're probably gonna die hard before that avatar gets added.

We don't offer custom stuff otherwise, because we don't want ugly images, or annoyingly stretched/animated stuff. We have over 1000 to pick from, so they're not truly limited. But if you or anyone else wants to make more according to spec (32 x 32 GIF, good quality/sharpness, not animated), I can eventually add it. But adding more avatars is admittedly a low priority. OC ReMixers and staff are allowed to have custom 32 x 32 GIF avatars.

I'm pulling from 2004 stuff from just before I got started on the panel, but it's worth pointing out: I don't think this arrangement was particularly subtractive as much as different, but subtraction (in conjunction with other things of course), is a valid form of arrangement. I also disagreed with: No, it's not exactly the same, the strings at 2:17 are definitely louder. The strings at 1:00 kind of peaked in around 1:11, but still, the later stuff was notably louder than that. Moving onto the big picture, honestly, I think it primarily boils down to needing better humanization. Some further melodic interpretation wouldn't hurt either, but what's there was solid enough. I'm not quite getting the rationale of the NOs basically saying the overall feel was too close to the original. On that level, I thought Kory personalized his approach more than well enough. The concept is actually pretty sweet. It's orchestral, but it's a distinctly softer, mellower mood than the source, which was more of militaristic electronic-orchestral hybrid. Short and sweet, if the articulations were more on point so this sounded more expressive, this arrangement style could easily hang, IMO. It certainly shouldn't be short-changed. The whole of the arrangement deals with 1:10-on of the source and basically ignores the rest, and it's just two iterations of that part of the source, so that's why the arrangement could seemingly come across as somewhat repetitive and underdeveloped. The opening seemed OK. Right from the beginning, this was a bit dynamically flat, on account of the samples needing better humanization, but I appreciated the slower approach. Once the music swelled at 1:44, the string articulations not quite sounding realistic enough was more apparent. The string articulations in particular sound flatter than the inherent energy in the writing, undermining some of the more touching sections like 2:16-2:47. Yep. Also, I can hear a lot of original writing ideas in the background, but they're pretty quiet, and, for all intents and purposes, are buried or muddied under the leads, so you can't really appreciate any of the detail work in the background. The mixing isn't horrible by any means, but something's obscruing your supporting writing. The piano's basically a non-factor from 1:10-on, and brass sounds good, but bleeds into the strings a good deal. Again, the textures already sound pretty good, but could shine with a bit of EQ love to separate the parts a bit. OA was right in that respect. Definitely. Well, as far as the usage of the source material goes, I disagree. Kory's already firmly in the right direction of making it his own. I think because the mixing makes it a bit harder to appreciate the original/additive writing, one basically walks away hearing 2 iterations of the 1:10 section of the source tune, one softer, then one louder right at the halfway point, and it seems too simple. So I think the combination of a relatively straightforward, somewhat repetitive structure and the obscruing of some detail work made it seem like the arrangement could be underdeveloped. But if you ask me, what's there is substantial enough and interpretive enough. The instrumentation, dynamics, and tempo coupled with the new supporting writing were enought to satisfy the arrangement criteria for me; it's substantial enough when you pay attention to the details. I think you could maintain this structure, Kory, but improve the mixing and sample articulations so that you fully realize the potential here. Right now, the arrangement is good, but the sound is not quite realistic and expressive enough, even though it's maybe 80% there, in my opinion. Just as important, the mixing needs to be cleaned up a bit as well. Give those parts room to breathe and shine. Also, just noting that if you do resubmit this, there's no waiting period for it to be posted to the panel to be rejudged. NO (refine/resubmit)

I think I'll take a look and also holler at Homeslice. If you're looking for the most obvious stuff, it definitely came across as light on the source usage, but we'll see what's up. On the production level, it seemed like a sure thing, but the source usage has gotta be there. I'm LOLing at Fishy though; you don't like the at least 50% source usage guidance, but you're leaning on it, so that makes me smile like the Grinch. Why would you make the source material requirement higher than that? Go eat a Digestive. EDIT (2/1): On second thought, I'm confident making a call on this without needing to ask Joshua. As everyone else has said, the production's impeccable, aside from the thin, mechanical piano sample during some exposed moments. Which leaves it down to source usage for an arrangement pass. I'm basically hearing what everyone else heard. This was a 262-second-long arrangement, so I needed at least 131 seconds of overt source usage for the source tune to be dominant in the arrangement. :46.5-1:08, 1:56-2:02.25, 2:08.5-3:19, 3:40.5-3:46.25 = 104 seconds or 39.69% If there's something that all 4 of us have somehow completely overlooked from either "One Final Effort" or maybe another Halo track was also used, it's far from obvious, but just let us know Joshua and we can revisit this decision. That said, we all know your music sounds awesome, and this was pretty polished on the production side, but the source material needs to be the dominant in the arrangement, otherwise it's a no-go. Do improve the piano too, if you can, though it's not necessary. NO (resubmit)

The additive piano writing, first brought in at :38 & which was well-written, was basically the only thing significantly different from the source tune, which is a huge favorite of mine. Otherwise, this arrangement was basically just a (well done) sound upgrade of the original; same structure, same tempo, same mood, basically the same feel. There were some brief sections where other things happened, like liberally using the beginning buildup part of the source from 1:55-2:14 and the original dropoff writing from 2:43-3:01, but those were 15 seconds a pop. The original section on top of the source backing from 4:19-4:47 followed by the dropoff and original piano & keyboard writing from 4:48 into the finish were cool (though the piano was exposed as mechanical-sounding). But those felt like too little too late in the big picture of a 5 1/2 minute piece. It's OK to have a cover-ish arrangement, but you've really got to do more to personalize this arrangement. Alter some rhythms, change the structure or tempo. Right now it's original piano on top of a super-close sound upgrade with some brief cameos of different ideas. It's definitely cool and well-made, Greg, but it's falling outside of our scope on account of the arrangement approach. NO (resubmit)

Starting with the negative first, the layering of Ken's theme over the Cammy theme from :41-1:05 had little, if any, synergy and just seemed to be drowning Cammy's theme out. Also, the notes from 2:09-2:10 & 2:23-2:24 were intended to be stylistic, but just sounded like a mistake. I'd love to hear those sour notes altered, and it would improve the track, but I'll live. Aside from those two issues and some the non-dubstep sound design feeling bland for the first minute's buildup, I thought this was solidly put together. The sections with dubstep elements had a good deal of power behind 'em. Props too on the usage of the heavy damage version of Cammy's theme for a big portion of the track, a theme I loved back in the days when I played it on the arcade. Short and sweet, it gets it done. YES

http://ocremix.org/forums/showthread.php?t=1175 If someone doesn't want to use lyrics for a source tune with lyrics, some just play the vocal melody on an instrument instead of singing it. You also could change the vocal part entirely, or just arrange the instrumental parts of a source tune and disregard the vocals. As long as the end result sounds like a fully fleshed out piece of music, we're open-minded to whatever direction someone wants to take a source with lyrics.