Liontamer

In terms of the NO votes centering on arrangement value (pixie/zircon/TO), I can't glean how substantially you guys actually managed to familiarize yourselves with the originals, but I'll be upfront and hazard that it wasn't substantially enough. I understand how these pieces, the 2 originals & the arrangement, sound similar on a very basic level. But the arrangement is nuanced enough where structural changes and more pronounced dynamic shifts are definitely there to be found, especially in the latter half. While I'd like to give y'all the benefit of the doubt, in particular I definitely don't understand how 3:03-onward arranging "music3" comes across as too similar in terms of instrumentation and mood. I can understand the criticisms more for the first half of the mix seeming similar to the mood of the original, "music0", in terms of a more initial-level response, but even then I don't agree at all when actually comparing the structures of the original and the arrangement side-by-side. Just strange reading such a dichotomy of votes regarding arrangement. Given how strong those NOs were on the arrangement, and how serious a concern that is, I felt it was important to go relisten to this one and give it a fair shake. At the end of the day though, I've gotta reaffirm that I had no issues with the arrangement, only with the production/sample usage. No qualms at all standing behind it as a more dynamic and very viable arrangement in the same genre as the originals.

It would kill me (kill!) if you didn't resub, Andy. But like pretty much everyone has said no matter the vote, this was an awesome track from a listening standpoint. I hope you give this one another go, but it's already one to be proud of.

Remixer name: D-Ciduous Real name: Jayson Leeman E-mail: Dragonninjaakira@hotmail.com Game: Final Fantasy VII Song: Main Theme I know that this is a cliched game and song to remix but I think I have a pretty original take on the theme. I hope you guys enjoy it. And please, if it gets rejected, let me know where I was short in the remix so I can compensate in later remixes. Thanks. ---------------------------------------------------------- http://tzone.org/~llin/psf/packs2/FF7_psf.rar - 201 "Main Theme of Final Fantasy VII" The sounds in the intro up to :55 were pretty weak; it's a decent premise, but the textures ended up pretty flimsy. The sequenced piano in particular was too mechanical-sounding. That's always a bigger negative impact when using an instrument that's supposed to sound organic. The changeup to the more beat-driven material at 1:51 was very awkward, IMO. The textures were decent, but still need more substance. The beats established at 2:15 were pretty boring, and the gated synth on lead arranging the melody was plodding. The keyboard-ish sound at 2:59 lightly in the background sounded pasted in the background and seemingly clashed with the melodic material. Wasn't a good idea to then push it up into the front at 4:08 going towards the finish. Arrangement-wise, there wasn't much direction, development or momentum to the piece. From 2:15 until the end, it dragged its knuckles on the ground, unfortunately. This needs lots of work on both the arrangement and production sides, so if you're not currently using the Works or ReMixing forums for feedback and advice, respectively, then you need to get started. NO

Not enough FF7 usage? - LT Ahoy Dave and Judges! Arrr this be another remix submission from Siamey. My forum # would be 971 My song is called Highwind Throwdown and its a remix of Cid's theme from ff7 (but also contains elements of "sending a dream into the universe") Yes, because it is trance, it "could very well be any melody", but rest assured that I toiled relentlessly on this song for months, knowing it was a cid remix, from start to finish. Thanks for your time, Hope you enjoy my song. -Heath ------------------------------------------------ http://tzone.org/~llin/psf/packs2/FF7_psf.rar - 307 "Cid's Theme" & 409 "Sending a Dream Into the Universe" The transition from 1:38-1:52 was based on the intro of "Sending a Dream Into the Universe". As far as I could tell though, Cid's Theme wasn't touched until 1:52. After that though, things were recognizable on the arrangement side. The melodic treatment at 2:20 with the gated rhythms was cool at first. It's a good idea, but after a while, that was all the work put into altering the melody. I liked the countermelodic stuff (starting at 2:48) going on just behind the melody though, which was very well integrated with the melody. Melody was doubled by a more straightforward synth line at 3:16. I liked the bassline and beat programming, but again, after a while the ideas just felt repetitive and undeveloped. I don't mean to ignore all the work put into the different layers of the arrangement, as there were a lot of good supporting instrumentation ideas. Beyond the genre adaptation, the arrangement of the melody though was really by-the-numbers and could use a more creative, interpretive approach. 3:43 went back into the idea of the intro (again, seemingly all original material), gradually subtracting elements until the finish. Production here was impeccable, IMO. Pretty loud, but the whole track was clean, well-balanced and bringing the power. Everything was clicking on all cylinders there. As far as I'm aware though, the intro and outro were all original material not directly arranging's "Cid's Theme", leaving only 2:05's worth of arrangement material in a 5:17-long mix. My hard and fast rule is requiring over 50.00% of the arrangement being overtly tied to the original, which I'm not picking up here. I'll follow up with y'all to be sure, and could use additional input. If no other meaningful information results, I'll be going NO (resubmit).

* ReMixer name: Written Pages * Real name: Fred Epe * Email address: fred.epe@gmail.com * Website: (see below) * Original game/title/composer: Super Castlevania / Treasury Room / by Masanori Adachi, Sotaro Tojima Coming from a progressive rock/metal background and being a huge fan of your website for over two years now, I thought it was finally time to make a contribution myself. I am an engineer/composer from the Netherlands. Other than my main project - a rock opera with musicians from all over the world - I pretty much recently started recording my own little tributes to the world of game music. I have always been heavily influenced by 80's science fiction movies, the 8-/16-bit era and - ever since I discovered ocremix.org - lots of wonderful gaming remixes. Except for the drums, nothing on this remix was sequenced. I used a number of patches and recorded the instruments myself. After a couple of great remixes of well-known songs such as Bloody Tears, I thought a remix of Treasury Room would be a nice change for once. I remember getting "goosebumped" every time I played that stage on the SNES when I was 10 or so. Hope you like the song! Keep up the great work @ ocremix.org! Yours, Fred P.S.: Try to endure the first part of the piano intro -- -= www.unwrittenpages.com =- -= www.myspace.com/unwrittenpages =- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Try to endure the first part of the piano intro." Always encouraging. http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=scv4 - "Treasury Room" (scv4-16.spc) Man is that an interesting source. Some of that stuff sounds ripe for Shnabubula's style. Onto the mix, the piano intro was extra quiet and I'm not sure why. Didn't seem very different from the source. The dissonance didn't throw me off more than the volume. Things got louder at :32 with some additional instrumentation coming in, followed by a transition into some rock at :47. Really glad someone got the drums right for once, where they actually fit with the rest of the instrumentation. More activity in the percussion writing would have been better though. Cool changeup at 1:15 via the piano and strings, with a nice segue back into the woodwinds leading back into more rock. The drum writing at 1:29 was flimsy. The snare pattern is so boring and doesn't drive the track along. The tone is good, but the volume's too loud and makes the boring snare writing stick out like a sore thumb. Just pull 'em back or something. Then the pattern simply carries over into the e-piano solo at 2:02. C'mon, you've got literally everything else clicking, let's get those drums up to snuff. Even the percussion writing in the SPC is more creative. Work on this some more. I wanna see this up on the main page. Very cool first sub, Fred! I look forward to hearing more. NO (refine/resubmit)

Posting any time is fine. I tend to want at least 1 post per day from us collectively to keep things moving. Post any time.

Talking about music you like is fine. It's good for VGF to have information about material that OC ReMixers themselves like. Surprisingly, I think it's an angle that most people in the community are unaware of when it comes to their favorite ReMixers.

Hey. Thanks for posting this dudes, this is my first of many remixes that you'll see. Contact Info: ReMixer name: RF SWITCH real name: Mike Reynolds email address: myfriend_mike@hotmail.com website: http://www.youtube.com/basementfactory Your userid: Hubub Remix Info: Game: Mario 3 Song: Mushroom House Remix Name: "Party at Toad's" Comments: I had been listening to a lot of Ninja Tune, specifically Luke Vibert when I made this. I kept picturing Toad hanging out with Cypress Hill for some reason. I wonder if the spots on his head warrant gang affiliation. Thanks again, _mike ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://www.zophar.net/nsf/smb3.zip - Track 18 Cool concept, Mike. Bassline from the original came in at :13, followed by the chiptune-y melody at :25. The melody sounded verbatim, but there were other good ideas complementing it. Seemingly wasn't going to change up until 1:02 finally arrived. Everything was decidedly minimalist, with even the supporting parts not really clamoring for attention. But I can roll with that. The arrangement has some decent dynamic changes, but the textures don't quite click, mostly the percussion, which merely sounds like loops slapped on underneath. More attention to the percussion writing would be good. The sax sampling at 2:31-2:38 felt pretty non sequitur, very Daknit-esque, dare I say. Would have been cooler to hear that sax part extended, but not if you're just using someone else's clips. You were getting some decent mileage out of the variations of the source, including the bassline having some interpretation, but more interpretation of the melody also would have been good. If you can put more work into the percussion (writing it instead of sampling it?), as bringing in a few more ideas with the melody (rhythm, note addition or subtraction, etc.), you'd be in very good shape. Definitely go back to this one and resubmit it after playing around with it some more. NO (resubmit)

* OA * Andrew Luers * andrewluers@gmail.com * oceansend.com * 14963 [ edit] ReMix Info * Final Fantasy 6 * Overture (disk 2 track 7) * Originally part of a planned and abandoned "mini project" where we were going to remix the entire opera scene, I changed it to a single solo mix when I heard that Zircon and Pixietricks were going to be remixing the aria. No way i'm going to: 1. Step on toes 2. Have my mix get pwned by theirs Comments: From the opera scene, the focus is on the conflict between Draco and Prince Ralse. Lyrics were planned and written, but they were way too cheesy, and I grew to love my horn section they were going to replace. Special thanks to my fantastic posse of critiquers, and extra special thanks to Tweek for help with the finishing touches. Here's the timeline of what is happening in the mix: 0:01 Intro 0:42 Draco at war 1:33 Prince Ralse sacks Maria's castle 1:58 Draco's Return Journey 2:57 The Duel of Draco and Ralse 3:21 Fight to the death 4:14 Finale Original: http://youtube.com/watch?v=tJbKFtFM2_M ReMix: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=ff6 - "Overture (part 1)" (ff6-207a.spc) & "Aria de Mezzo Carattere" (ff6-208.spc) http://tzone.org/~llin/psf/packs2/FF7_psf.rar - 120 "Still More Fighting" The intro sounded pretty good, taken from :23 of part 1, though the brass was flimsy (including later on). Cool harp stuff at :19 building things up with the strings coming in, as well as some beats at :42. The beats sounded pretty lo-fi and far, FAR away. Not sure why that happened, but with that issue and the tone being weak, I felt things weren't clicking together. Lots of balance issues that limited the energy of the writing and textures. From :44-on, the brass didn't stand out enough despite being the lead, and the electric guitar stuff wasn't audible enough. And no offense to Brian, but his mixing has been consistently too heavy with the lows, and that's definitely what's going on here. Makes the MP3 sound extra lossy. Do you guys hate treble? Arrangement-wise, I like what you've got going here. The "Still More Fighting" cameo at 2:56-3:19 was a cool idea. But the production needs a kick in the ass. Nice work so far. Refurbish the production and send it on back. NO (resubmit)

ReMixer name: trickwaters Real name: Patrick Waters Email address: waters.patrick@gmaNOSPAMil.com [remove NOSPAM] UserID: 10346 Game: Dragon Warrior Source work: Overture Comments: I began planning and composing /Overture Variations/ for wind quintet in September 2006, shortly after I enrolled in graduate school. With my education demanding more attention, I set the project aside until January 2007, garnering some recent revisions in June for improved voice leading. Heavily inspired by the works of Brahms, the variations cycle through disparate keys and styles of counterpoint. ---------------------------------------------------------- http://www.zophar.net/nsf/dq1.zip - Track 1 Some verb would be nice to flesh the sounds out if no more sounds were added. At times the instrumentation feels too mechanical or exposed, hindering the emotion and dynamics meant to be conveyed in both the writing and the intimate setting. In light of Vigilante's POV below, I realize the production's not a dealbreaker, and the writing and sequencing was obviously very solid. Having been told by Patrick that Track 1 was the only source tune, I didn't recognize anything from the source in the arrangement material from 1:02-2:55. I wish there was a lot more overt usage of the actual source material, integrated into the wholly original sections, as I'm not a huge fan of this sandwich method of interpretation (source-original-source, A-B-A). But there's enough source material to get by, and that itself was well-handled. Nothing wrong with that approach as long as one doesn't forget where the primary focus should rest. YES

Wassup Judges, DJP, Here's a mix by me & Luiza. ReMix Name: No Man Is an Island Contact Info Remixers: The Joker; LuIzA Real Name: David L. Puga; Luiza Carvalho Emails: Jtown_music(at)yahoo.com; lu_carvalho177(at)hotmail.com Websies: None that I know of. Google it! UserIDs: 8669; 6052 ReMix Info Game: DooM 2 Song Mixed: Into Sandy's City Orig link: Into Sandy's City Comments: Tell me kid, you ever danced with the devil... while he's wearing a dress, the color of the pale moonlight? uh-um, though, this is a collab between Luiza & I, my words will have to do, as she's on her way to... another country, I forget which. As you've probably gathered, this is a remix collab between Luiza & I, done in... electro/symphonic/rock. Or, whatever you want to call it. I started this song with the intention of getting Luiza to sign on. She was my first & only choice for the track. I sent her the old beta I made, she signed on, & long story short, we made this awesomeness! Long story kinda long, I did the Synth/orchestral/drumworks, while Luiza did the Guitar/Electric Bass/Guitar FX, each of us having input on the others work (I was pretty much happy from the get go with Lu's work). Anyway, I've taken up enough time. Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy the mix! P.S. The name as well as the tone of the mix was isnpired by the John Donne's poem of the same name! I'm gonna include it! Yay! "All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated...As therefore the bell that rings to a sermon, calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come: so this bell calls us all: but how much more me, who am brought so near the door by this sickness....No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee." - John Donne ------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://doomdepot.doom2.net/music/doom%201%20&%202%20midis.zip - Doom II: Map 09 ("Into Sandy's City") Interesting intro. Source finally came in at :28. Once things picked up at :47, the atmosphere seemed pretty lossy, so I'm not sure what happened there, especially for a 169kbps VBR encoding. Sounded like :58-1:15 had a cameo of Doom 1's E1M8 "Sign of Evil". Cool alterations to the rhythm of the source melody, by the way; very creative. Hmm, around the 1:48 mark, the textures didn't seem very cohesive. On the production side, things don't sound like they're in the same room, especially the guitar and the bowed strings in the back. Maybe another J could elaborate on the issues there, since I'm not able to hone in on what's wrong. Same issues at 2:59, it just sounds like the guitar is pasted on top of the other music and not like they're in the same soundscape. Meanwhile though, some downright nasty guitar playing from LuiZa at 3:00. Sick stuff! Loved those effects from 2:40-2:59 alongside the beefy drums as well leading up to it. This could use some production refinement to get everything sounding like it's cleaner and in the same room, but this is put together well enough. Deserves some tweaking, but this had a really creative arrangement and good energy throughout. Good combination of your talents, y'all. YES

ReMixer name: M2S7N Name of game: Earthbound Name of indiv. song: Get on the Bus (bus riding theme) Basically I took the original track and turned it more into what it was obviously intending: an upbeat surf song. Of course a surfified version of the track already exists in Shadow's "Bus!", but I assure you, mine has something completely different to offer (except a more original name). I love Shadow's version as well, but while his basically updates the original with more realistic sounding guitars, organs, and such, I went for more of the 60s surf band feel (a la Dick Dale), with all live instruments (except the drums, due to lack of a drumset). It took me a while to figure out how to get a good sound from my amp to my computer, and the mix may still sound rough at times, but honestly I like it sounding a little rough around the edges. Overall I think there's enough variation in arrangement and instrumentation to offer a completely different take on both the original and Shadow's version. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The bar has risen a lot since Shadow's "Bus!" over 4 years ago, so I'm not sure if you looked at it as somewhat where the arrangement bar is. There were some slight variations on the source from :59-1:38, but it was more from a subtractive perspective and didn't do much else in terms of modifying the structure. There was some decent electric guitar freestyling of sorts on top of the basic progression of the original later on (1:54-2:12), which is an alright idea that others have certainly done before. Better stuff on guitar at 2:35 giving at least more substantial personalization to the melody for one last run. The drums were too clean and upfront in contrast with the really muddy guitar work. Things didn't sound like they were remotely in the same soundscape; it sounded like the drums were added underneath as an afterthought. The drum patterns were also really bland and placeholder-ish; let's get something more creative or at least more comfortably couched in the soundfield. Arrangement-wise, this was moving in the right direction, but the delivery needed more personalization and flair to stand apart from the original. 2:35 was the best example of that here, whereas other sections were closer to a 1-for-1 approach without enough personalization in the delivery. Work on giving this more of an edge in terms of the arrangement and performance, and rethink the sound balance and drum writing. NO

Ooooooh! Check out the video footage of Tim Follin on Re:Loaded.

Any comments on my time at VGL last weekend would be appreciated!

Video Games Live. VG Frequency. Naturally.

DjSammyG managed to get his picture in a Washingtonian blog article on the event: http://www.washingtonian.com/blogarticles/artsfun/afterhours/4468.html I finally had time tonight to write of my own experiences at Video Games Live, courtesy of the VG Frequency blog. You clearly want to read of the experience of someone who was on stage at one point!

1. Sonic the Hedgehog 'Love Hurts' 2. Castlevania II 'Down Town' 3. Final Fantasy VI 'Cantata for Dancing: I. Mors ego sum mortis' 4. Chrono Trigger 'Time Chill' 5. Super Mario World 'Monstrous Turtles!' 6. Xenogears 'Pillar of Salt' In the middle of 'Pillar', the house lights went up and it was time for the show.

Remixer name: Darangen Real Name: Michael Boyd email: darangen@hotmail.com website: www.darangen.com URL: Game: Final Fantasy 7 Song: Electric De Chocobo This song was made for the Voices of the Lifestream project in progress. Made it a while ago but wasn't sure whether to submit it or not, but here it goes I originally had the leads an octave lower, but Zircon recommended the higher leads, which do sound a lot brighter and fit better in the mix. It's fairly short, and sticks pretty close to the original except for a bridge I threw in there to keep things a little new. I'm really proud of the outcome, since I did almost everything in Reason and the only live instrument is my acoustic guitar and bass. Anyways, hope ya like it. ~ Mizike ~ Philippians 4:8 Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - if anything is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://tzone.org/~llin/psf/packs2/FF7_psf.rar - 207 "Electric de Chocobo" It's a cool track, but where da rest? Drums from :22-:37 felt rather flimsy. The textures are cool, but don't seem very complex or involved. 1:12-1:41 had a well-written original section before transitioning back to the source chorus with a redux at 1:57. In terms of the treatment of the Chocobo theme, it just seems to play it too straight. On top of that, the arranged melody just repeats, with the variation mainly coming from the background instrumentation. For a 2-minute track, I need more substance with the arrangement of the melody itself to give something this short the go-ahead. Sorry, Mike. NO (resubmit)

I mailed the artist about the source tunes, since I've got no idea what they're supposed be; any help? - LT Remixer Name: MarcstaR (spelled like this now) Real Name: Marcus Sartor Email: motb2@hotmail.com Website: www.myspace.com/Marcstar1 Game Remixed: Final Fantasy XI Song Remixed: The three songs that the bard class can play Game Info: Final Fantasy XI. PS2, PC, and Xbox 360. Compsers on FFXI are: Nobuo Uematsu, Naoshi Mizuta and Kumi Tanoki. Game Soundtrack: It's hard to find the FFXI soundtrack for download, the best I've found is a page with midi versions of the songs: http://ffxi.mmosite.com/downloads/midi/midi.shtml Remix comments: I made this remix using a combination of Reason, Digital Performer, my Yamaha Motif and my guitar. Here is a link to the song: Thanks for your time, MarcstaR LT EDIT (9/28): DarkeSword's speculation that the sources weren't in the soundtrack was dead on. Finally heard back from Marcus via Facebook, and he provided the low: No worries about the inconvience. Just glad to have reached you on this. Indeed, though the 3 melodies are harmonized in the YouTube video, they're easily distinguished.

remixer name: alexhhhh user ID: 15569 game remixed: Super Mario RPG song remixed: Weapons Factory I've been working on this song for awhile now, I actually submitted it back in may last year i think but it must have fell through. either way I'm glad because it was a pretty terrible song. So uh there's a range of influences in this song, at first I wanted to make a Boards of Canada type song but some Crystal Method influence got in there. not to mention this is my first time doing a full out dnb/big beat type song, hopefully it doesn't sound too forced together. This isn't really the easiest song to remix since it's basically two repeating phrases, the only melodic variation coming from the key change between C and F#, so the source is used pretty liberally in the first half and the outro...hope that isn't an issue. so uh yeah enjoy --------------------------------------------------- http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=smr - "Weapons Factory" (smr-217.spc) You need some meat on these beats! I liked the drum programming, but it sounded too flimsy. The bassline was also really quiet; no idea why though. Give it more presence. I was feeling the changeup at 2:03, focused on some unintelligible vocals. The strings brought in at 2:28 sounded ultra-rough; the bow movements were very mechanical, and the intensity/velocity of each note sounded too similar. There was also some weird muddiness going on from 2:28-on where I couldn't quite place the reason. Things sounded pretty cluttered, the distorted synth upfront not helping at all. As soon as the electric guitar-like synth came in at 3:18, the sound balance was thrown way off. The strings were barely audible, and the distorted synth just gave off a crowding out effect towards the other sounds until 4:07. Really nice ending section though; loved the voice samples at the very end, and the sounds were well chosen. You need to bulk up these textures and get the sound balance sounding better during the cluttered sections. Good arrangement ideas so far, Alexhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Keep working on this one. NO (resubmit)

Hey now, Sammy got in the costume contest fair and square. Besides, it was the crowd who voted. We were extra loud, but it took the whole crowd to give him the win. q-pa and Kroze only filtered it down to the main contestants. YOU MAKING US LOOK BAD!

Read the whole thing, you cracka-ass cracka! By the way, I've blogged ya up! Congrats on the pending nuptials, bro. Hey, can I get a metaphor with Kuribo's Shoe? No dice? What a drag.

Welcome aboard, Cain.

Xoc's got some new stuffz pimped out in the blog. You gotta go check it out.

Nah, it looks good. I fixed only a few things for spelling/grammar (95% of it was impeccable), then added links galore and keywords for the post. Thanks a lot, Mattias, and welcome aboard.