Liontamer

I'm responding to feedback newmajoe and others gave in the DoD Discord following this decision, so any quotes are from there: newmajoe was upset that his second panel decision took too long to be made and that he got conflicting feedback between the first and second decisions. In Joe's case, this second decision actually took only 4 days. It'll seem like I'm trying to take arrows for the judges and direct the issues to me. I'm just saying that they actually weighed in very quickly. I saw at several points that Joe was upset about not hearing back sooner, and being encouraged to resubmit the track, but I'M the one who made that process take longer, and I'm the one who encouraged him to resubmit. That's all on me alone for delaying releasing his specific decision because I wanted to fully explore: 1) whether the track should be examined as potentially outside of our Submissions Standards [which didn't get analyzed/criticized as an issue in the first vote]; 2) whether it meant we had to revise the wording in our Standards [we decided no changes in the wording needed to be made]; and 3) how to summarize letting Joe down, especially because any rejection can feel on some unavoidable level like a value judgement on the musician's skills and abilities. Couldn't have said that better. For that last part, I'll see what I can do to add a point in our Judges Panel FAQ (to do our best) to short-circuit that negative interpretation of a NO vote; not a "solution" but making clear we recognize that artists can take rejections personally when they shouldn't. We actually didn't need to clarify the wording of the Submission Standards, because the current wording we had explained why the judges didn't pass it the second time: ("The source material must be identifiable and dominant.") Re: Joe's points above, the spoken word/narration using in-game text (vs. completely original narration) wouldn't be a factor for or against the track. It was mainly about: 1) the spoken word feeling like the "dominant" element of the track; and 2) the VGM arrangement feeling like "subordinate" accompaniment. It's very rare that a submission viewed as falling outside of the submissions standards by the judges panel even makes it to the panel in the first place; we'd never encountered this kind of piece. I paneled this due to me assuming the narration style wasn't a problem for OCR's standards. Yep, I'm sorry that we collectively messed up here with poor communication within the two decisions; we should have recognized and hashed out the Standards concern the first time, not the second time, and Joe was justifiably mad. Again, part of it was due to me being in favor of the track yet being out of step with the other Js, which is also pretty rare. Had I known it would have been a Standards issue on this level, other Js and I would have never encouraged Joe to tweak it or resubmit it in the first place, so he should blame me for that too. I never intended to "waste his time" or stress Joe out, and ended up doing both. I could have let Joe know that it wouldn't be posted right after seeing how the resub's votes landed, but, as jmr correctly noted, this actually was an unprecedented situation for us, so I also wanted to: 1) have most of the panel fully consider our Submissions Standards wording vs. this type of track, since it wasn't thoroughly considered by the group the first time; and 2) exhaust every chance to make my case, again something where I'm to blame. We did speak with djp on it, and with the vote so lopsided, he stood by the panel's consensus from their reasoning. Several people chimed in to praise my demeanor or perspective. I do appreciate being called "rad" and being vouched for by several people. Unfortunately, I'm far from perfect - the time it took to handle all of this and the process of summarizing & delivering the bad news, that was 100% my direction and my responsibility, and something I have to learn from to improve our process. (BTW, holding up the voting on PuD's "The Hot Pink of Blues", that was me too, which I stood by; I wasn't counting what I perceived as implied chord progressions as direct source tune usage. So I get plenty of bad guy points. :-D)

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

Just an FYI, from our Submissions Standards: We mention that games/music eligibility is at our discretion. Currently, OCR won't accept any arrangements of original music created for unlicensed fan-games. As far as the Workshop goes, we're of course always happy to give arrangement/production feedback regardless, as that's what this forum is for. But sending in stuff from unlicensed fan-games, we're never gonna post that stuff. I could only see that happening if a company retroactively published a fan game and thus made it official. For example, if Sega published the fan-game Streets of Rage Remake, THEN any original tracks from it would be eligible to be arranged for OCR. Just making that clear so that you don't set yourself up for any disappoint on that level.

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

I'm liking the instrumentation to start. The steel-string guitar's not mixed properly to be the true foreground lead. The sampled brass at 1:04 was super fake & exposed, but brief. Really awkward transition of the instrumentation at 1:08 and again at 3:01; it then thinned out into more of a combination of the flamenco-style instrumentation along with orchestration at 1:26 and again at 3:19. I'd argue those latter moments should have appeared somewhere BEFORE 1:08 and 3:01 to serve as a transition into the full-on orchestration. Melody redux at 2:13, annnnnd it's a full-on cut-and-paste repeating verbatim, which was disappointing. Writing a new ending section instead of doing cut-and-paste stuff from 3:49 until the end would have been good also, even if you varied things up before then. Yeah, the mixing/balance could use touching up, and the transitions where the flamenco instrumentation drops out don't work, IMO. The level of interpretation/personalization is good, but then you rested on your laurels and didn't develop or vary the arrangement any further. You've gotta NOT just recycle the theme past the 2-minute point. C'mon, Paul, finish the story! NO (resubmit)

Sorry to Joe, Michelle, Sam for the holdup in this decision. Since the discussion on this piece's overall eligibility didn't get talked through the first time around, I asked to extend this voting, then double-checked that we didn't need to update our Submissions Standards to be more explicit that audio dramas or narrations would have a more difficult time passing due to this aspect of the Submission Standards and, lastly, wanted to take the proper time to cap this decision. Especially because Joe submitted this to support our Mario Month event, I'm afraid of making the artists upset as to what amounts to a belabored decision involving technicalities, and these delays were entirely on me: No one here would want or expect Joe and crew to compromise the vision of this piece just to have it accepted in some form for OCR; the criticisms about this being a storytelling format are strictly made with those specific standards in mind. Based on this outcome, I'm not sure audio dramas or story narration have a place here, though I'm always game for anyone else continuing to test this out. Doing my best interpretation of a dissenting Supreme Court justice, I'm very disappointed that this didn't fare better strictly from the up-or-down voting. "Dominant" was the most relevant word quoted above. I obviously disagreed that having spoken word delivery over the top of an arrangement is a case where the source material isn't "dominant" -- similar to how prominent original vocals/lyrics on top of arranged VGM has never disqualified anything -- but I'm hugely outvoted; we as a group discussed this specific aspect of the Standards when it comes to this piece internally and in this vote, so the consensus is clear, which I think is summarized best by DarkeSword's vote. No matter what, this was a very fun track concept, one I also would have loved to have had on our childrens' album (Esther's Dreams) way back when. Would love to hear all involved again, and hope we do get to hear more great arrangements come our way from Newmajoe.

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

Go for it!

It's not unpleasant, but it's also not pleasant; the opening minute's just there, so we'll see if it goes anywhere interesting. 1:19 shifted more toward the opening moments of Act 2's version (and you hear more of Act 2's backing writing invoked from 2:10-2:45). I know there's a method to Michael's madness. I've also heard tracks of his that I enjoyed that I know others wouldn't, and I think this is more in that vein, except that others may enjoy it and I didn't. I don't actively dislike it (and I wouldn't soft-pedal it), but it doesn't hook me. It's certainly a valid sound design exercise where I like some of the moments, and I hear and recognize the source material being in there. Do I wish it were more melodious in the treatment though? YES

Usually when we have a posted mixer get straight NOs across the board, I like to sanity check things just to be sure. As soon as the melody kicked in at :30, I thought this was too muddy and overcrowded; I definitey couldn't get behind a track mixed like this all the way; the parts are just too indistinct. Yeah, I heard the main verse at 1:25, and it's a little clearer, but basically mixed like this the whole way through; the melody doesn't cut through, the drums take up all of the space. By 4 minutes in, I also agree that the arrangement was just recycling the Terra theme over and over and I would have loved to have heard other arrangement/interpretation ideas. At 5:27, there was finally a dropoff and new writing; though I still felt the balance of parts was misguided/off, mixing like this would have worked better. But at 6:57, the same machine gun drumming and crowded soundscape came back for the finish, essentially sounding like a rehash of what came before. It'll seem like I just don't get the genre, and I know, for example, Emunator has stuck up for tracks/genres with unorthdox mixing in the past. I just don't believe this approach works as properly balanced mixing, even accounting for stylistic authenticity; the overall musicianship is clearly there, but the production on this is too messy. It's completely unclear what the listener should (or even can) focus on. NO

Nice variations of the intrumentation of the theme, because, yeah, it initially sounds so close to the original that I wanted to know if it was sampled; it's thankfully a non-issue as far as our arrangement standards go. Sometimes I wanted the lyrics to cut through, but everything's well mixed. Cool atmosphere; you could definitely see this getting used for some TikToks and YouTube Shorts to do some Zelda clips videos with an edge. YES

Yes, I've been working on getting Shea to send something in. No need to put OCR on a pedestal. Two key critiques I've had for some of Shea's past arrangements are that 1) some of the concepts haven't been fully developed (i.e. ~2 minutes long and could be more substantive) and 2) the percussion was on auto-pilot, which led to a plodding feel. That wasn't uniformly across her content, but I'd see it enough that I knew untapped compositional and dynamic potential was there just waiting to be realized. The track was 3:20-long, so I needed to identify overt source usage for at least 100 seconds for the source material to be considered dominant. The hand percussion's also derived from a 3-beat pattern at the foundation of the source from :01-:03 that underlies the whole source tune, and it's used every other measure here in the arrangement. I could be not recognizing something else within the soloing, but didn't have a problem with the source usage: melody - :00-:56.5, 1:56.5-2:08.25, 2:35-2:37, 2:54.5-3:19 = 94.75 seconds drumming - :59-1:01, 1:03.75-1:05.75, 1:08.5-1:10.5, 1:13.25-1:15.25, 1:18.5-1:20.25, 1:23-1:25, 1:27.75-1:29.75, 1:32.5-1:34.5, 1:37.5-1:39.5, 1:42.5-1:44.25, 1:47-1:49.25, 2:11-2:13.25, 2:15.75-2:17.75, 2:20.5-2:22.5, 2:25.5-2:27.5, 2:30.25-2:32.25 (most audible example of the rhythm if you want to compare it to the source), 2:39.75-2:41.75, 2:44.75-2:46.75 = 36.25 seconds This is the good stuff, y'all, straight up pro arrange album material. We've HAD official FFMQ arrange stuff stolen, submitted, and POSTED way way way back, before my time, so it's nice to get something that would pass the sniff test as a fan arrangement that sounds elite & pro grade. I love the treatment of the theme, with the arrangement taking a basic source-soloing-source sandwich approach. If you had told me this was released back in the mid-90s on an official Square album, I'd have said "No doubt, this sounds great!" and went investigating on VGMdb for who made it. I just said in the writeup for "Song of the Desperado" that Shea and her fellow string players needed to stop wowing people so much, but she doesn't listen. :-( For the last hit of the melody at 3:12, when she elongated that final note, I yelled [cuss words of amazement & friendship] at the screen again! Elegant, silky, smoove. Strong stuff that illustrates how DoD encourages folks to bring out their best! YES

Remixer Name: Shea's Violin (https://ocremix.org/artist/18601/sheas-violin) Real Name: Shea Henry Email: Websites: youtube.com/sheaviolin linktr.ee/sheaviolin User ID: 18601 Name of game arranged: Final Fantasy Mystic Quest Name of arrangement: Forest Through the Trees Name of individual songs: Beautiful Forest (a.k.a. Level Forest) OCR song link: https://ocremix.org/song/12616/beautiful-forest More sound information: https://vgmdb.net/album/81348 Comments: I started this arrangement for a dwelling of duels competition. I've done a lot of covers that don't transform the original material very much, and I think this arrangement and production represents a lot of the experience I've gained over the past two years. The very first track that I talked about in the workshop channel on the OCR discord was a bossa re-imagining of Celes' theme from Final Fantasy, but at the time it was more of a mashup between celes and terra and had a lot of improvisational elements that didn't pass the 'original material dominant' sniff test. I had been a little discouraged about entering since then, but after a few conversations with folks in the OCR discord (and my very first mixpost as a collaborator!) I decided to actually submit one of my tracks. All of the instruments on this track are live, and I was aiming for a classic violin and guitar bossa nova. The tempo is faster than the original to give it a little more of a pulse. The improvised solos are harmonically conservative because they were recorded and created "live" without writing something down, and I didn't want big execution risks to ruin my takes. I kept the solo sections short so that the original material wouldn't dominate the arrangement, and I tried to create a transitional line in the improvisation to tie back into the last theme of the original song, which I think I succeeded at! Thanks for encouraging me to submit something! I've been an OCR fan since very early on, and when I finally do get a submission accepted (some day!) I'll be so happy to have contributed something to this community that's fostered so much wonderful and creative music over the years. THE LINK!

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

Or, in other words... ;-D

OC ReMix Presents Final Fantasy VIII: SeeDs of Pandora! May 8, 2023 Contact: press@ocremix.org FAIRFAX, VA... OverClocked ReMix today released its 78th arrangement album, Final Fantasy VIII: SeeDs of Pandora. The album pays tribute to Final Fantasy VIII, released by Square in 1999 for the Sony PlayStation. Featuring 80 tracks from 97 artists, SeeDs of Pandora is the OC ReMix community's largest-ever album, directed by OC ReMixers Darkflamewolf and Jorrith "Jorito" Schaap, and is available for free download at https://ff8.ocremix.org. SeeDs of Pandora includes a diverse roster of musicians honoring composer Nobuo Uematsu's classic second score from the Final Fantasy PS1 lineup -- boasting some of the series' most enduring themes, including "Eyes on Me" and "Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec" -- by arranging the soundtrack in a myriad of styles, including folk, rock, jazz, mariachi, pop, bebop, rap, metal, EDM, chiptune, new age, experimental, and loads more. SeeDs of Pandora was made by fans, for fans, and is not affiliated with or endorsed by Square Enix; all original compositions are copyright their respective owners. Our goal is to provide something new and transformative with these songs", declared album director Darkflamewolf, who previously directed OCR's tributes to Skies of Arcadia (Arcadia Legends) and Jet Force Gemini (Mizar Attacks!) before helming SeeDs of Pandora. "So go in with an open mind and know that this listening experience was carefully crafted to take you on a journey". Visual artists from Game-Art-HQ once again teamed up with OCR -- a collaboration first forged with the Final Fantasy IX: Worlds Apart album -- to provide full album artwork, including pieces for SeeDs of Pandora's five discs featuring FF8 locations as well as character art including Squall, Rinoa, Zell, Seifer, Laguna, and more. "We managed to interest a lot of people from the VGM community, with a good mix of OC ReMix veterans, people from other communities, and newcomers", explained album co-director Jorrith Schaap, instrumental in helping SeeDs of Pandora become OC ReMix's biggest community album collaboration, resulting in 5 1/2 hours of music. "I hope all the fun and joy we had while creating this album for you shines through, and that you, dear listener, enjoy this fresh new take on the music of Final Fantasy 8 as much as we enjoyed making it." SeeDs of Pandora completes OC ReMix's tributes to the mainline Final Fantasy series' Sony PlayStation entries, following 2007's Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream and 2015's Final Fantasy IX: Worlds Apart. "Coming back to the series after being gone from it for so long was like coming home", director Darkflamewolf added, along with their hope that SeeDs of Pandora may "rekindle your fond memories of your time playing Final Fantasy VIII". About OverClocked ReMix Founded in 1999, OverClocked ReMix is an organization dedicated to the appreciation and promotion of video game music as an art form. Its primary focus is ocremix.org, a website featuring thousands of free fan arrangements, information on game music and composers, resources for aspiring artists, and a thriving community of video game music fans. About Game-Art-HQ Founded in 2011, Game-Art-HQ is an artistic community featuring fan-created drawings, as well as cosplay photography, sculptures, and crafts inspired by video games. Influenced by the quality standards and community of OverClocked ReMix, Game-Art-HQ houses individual pieces alongside themed collaborative art projects tributing major video game franchises. ### Preview it: https://youtu.be/WVx6a1JHaDk Download it: https://ff8.ocremix.org Torrent: http://bt.ocremix.org/torrents/Final_Fantasy_VIII_-_SeeDs_of_Pandora.torrent Comments/Reviews: http://ocremix.org/community/topic/52180

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Preview Final Fantasy VIII: SeeDs of Pandora: https://youtu.be/WVx6a1JHaDk Download Final Fantasy VIII: SeeDs of Pandora: https://ff8.ocremix.org Torrent: https://bt.ocremix.org/torrents/Final_Fantasy_VIII_-_SeeDs_of_Pandora.torrent To talk about SeeDs of Pandora, I feel I should start with Secret of Mana. It was my first RPG that I have ever played and it sparked the flame to play more in this genre. It ultimately led me to playing Final Fantasy VI (III at the time) for the SNES. I was hooked on the RPG genre and I wanted more Final Fantasy. Sadly, Sony had moved on from Nintendo at this point and all the cool new games, VII, VIII, IX, and more, were released on PlayStation systems - systems I was too young to have money for with parents who weren't willing to shell out more for additional consoles. So it would be near a decade before I had a chance to play Final Fantasy again and this time it was on the PC with the PC ports of Final Fantasy VII and VIII (strangely, IX never got one). And of course, my first Final Fantasy played was VIII. Coming back to the series after being gone from it for so long was like coming home and Final Fantasy VIII just seemed to be this perfect welcoming party of a game for me. I loved its characters, its world, and its music - the battle/junction system and card game would grow on me later. Fast-forward to now and I was given the opportunity to direct a defunct FFVIII OC ReMix album project. It was attempted once, but for reasons, it fell through. I was offered, due to my experience in directing Arcadia Legends and Mizar Attacks!, the chance to direct and revive this album - being the last Final Fantasy of the PlayStation era not to have an OC ReMix album. Directing an album isn't easy, especially one of this magnitude that could easily reach 40 tracks or more. I mean, it took us 3 years to finish Arcadia Legends and that was 36 tracks! Enter Jorito, my co-director and essentially my lifeline throughout this entire process. If it weren't for him, I highly doubt this project would have gotten off the ground, let alone finished in record time. It was his insistence and push to give the entire album a year's timeline to complete all claimed tracks - a decision that paid off well and gave incentive to remixers to strive to complete their claims in record time! Jorito is just as much a director as I was on this project and is truly the star MVP of the album. Despite having a solid directing team and the backing of OC ReMix to revive this project as an official album straight out of the starting gate, we still needed a solid vision for the project. We could have gone the traditional route and just do a chronological ordering of tracks from the beginning of the game to the end and let remixers decide what theming and genre is best for their claimed tracks - or we could go a more unique route and create special, themed groupings of tracks. Taking inspiration from the Spectrum of Mana album, directed by Nate Horsfall, I divided up FFVIII's soundtrack into three distinct styles: CALM - Chill and slow remixes that had a cultural bent either via arrangement or unique instrument use that gave visions of a specific culture. CRAZY - Toe-tapping, floor-thumping, heart-pounding beats and fast, frenetic energy in remix form. GOOFY - Songs that are remixed in ways you would not expect, for example taking a waltz and making it death metal. Constantly surprise the listener and betray their expectations. With the vision set, we recruited far and wide for remixers and artists. The unique flavoring of the three discs drew interested creatives to the project and helped nurture fantastic remixes and artwork. It was around this time, as musicians flooded in to claim tracks, that we might have more finished tracks by the end than the planned three discs could handle and thus the further theming of the album began to revolve around the three Gardens in the game: Balamb, Galbadia, and Trabia. However, the need for that fourth disc loomed and the only other option left which made the most sense was the Lunatic Pandora (or the Pandora) disc. With these themes locked in, the artists went to work straight away and created some fantastic pieces that matched the original vision. With the help of Jorito, it was an amazingly smooth experience and we managed to get a complete album finished in just over a year's time with a whopping 69 tracks! But wait, there's more! In the 11th hour, weeks before we were to submit the album to OC ReMix, ZackParrish, among others, spearheaded a crazy last-minute bonus disc with 11 more tracks (get it, 11th hour?!) to cover any last, remaining songs on the OST the core album couldn't. It was a fun, insane rush to the finish line and with a final tally of 80 tracks in total, we have officially broken the record as of 2023 as being the biggest album ever produced out of OC ReMix! We are kings (and queens)! Kudos to all the talented people who helped make this album a reality! It was a joy working on this and seeing it come together. Finally, one final note to you, the listener: If you are expecting these remixes to adhere close to their original inspirations or to have faithful adaptations of well-known and beloved tracks, then this album might not be for you. The intent with this album was to embrace the remix aspect of OC ReMix fully and to interpret the original melodies in ways you might not have heard before. Our goal is to provide something new and transformative with these songs. So go in with an open mind and know that this listening experience was carefully crafted to take you on a journey (I should know! I ordered the tracks specifically to flow in a way that felt natural). We hope you enjoy this album and may it always rekindle your fond memories of your time playing Final Fantasy VIII. From the SeeDs of Pandora team to you: Happy listening! - Darkflamewolf I've been hooked on JRPGs and Final Fantasy in particular since discovering SNES emulators back in the late 90s, and that hasn't changed since. The very first console I owned was the original PlayStation (PSX), and the starter game I bought with it was Final Fantasy 7. And of course two years later I also made sure to get myself a copy of Final Fantasy 8. To this day I still distinctly remember the "WTF is going on" near the end of the game and, whatever the story was trying to tell me, it flew right over my head. Fast-forward about fifteen years, and I got into VGM remixing and became an active member of the OC ReMix community. So when an album project got started to remix the Final Fantasy 8 music, I of course had to join and make a track for it. Unfortunately that album initiative got stranded early on in the process, something that always left me feeling a bit sad. At the time I was just wrapping up the OCR Secret of Mana album and was in need of a break, but I always kept the FF8 album in mind to potentially pick up as a (co-)director later. Given the sheer size of the OST I didn't want to do it alone though. So the idea got shelved for a few years. That is, until Darkflamewolf randomly brought up the comatose FF8 album on the OC ReMix Discord in August 2021. We started talking about the album, djpretzel pointed out that I had expressed interest in helping out a few years before, and after a few chats we decided to team up and rejuvenate the Final Fantasy 8 album and make sure that the only missing OCR Final Fantasy PSX game album got the tribute it deserved. I did have one specific aim though: I wanted to get it done in about a year, because I know how much work these album projects can be and how hard it can be to keep people motivated long enough to create and deliver their tracks. All set and done, we outlined a rough planning, Darkflamewolf sketched out a compelling vision and tracklist suggestion for each disc and came up with a title, I started recruiting far and wide (apparently being in the VGM community for a while and doing lots of collaborations is a good way to build a network), and we were off to the races. And boy, what a journey it was! We managed to interest a lot of people from the VGM community, with a good mix of OC ReMix veterans, people from other communities, and newcomers. We created a Discord server for the album to help coordinate things (not a small feat with I think in total some 70+ people), many fun conversations were had there, and the setup overall led to a positive, supportive environment that made the whole experience very enjoyable. And of course I would be amiss if I didn't mention the collaboration with Darkflamewolf; we worked really well together as a directing team, each of us with their own areas of expertise and roles yet always united to get the album done and cheering all the artists that joined us on this journey. All in all it was a very smooth experience, and I think all everyone involved should be very proud of what we've achieved together. I hope all the fun and joy we had while creating this album for you shines through, and that you, dear listener, enjoy this fresh new take on the music of Final Fantasy 8 as much as we enjoyed making it. - Jorrith Schaap (Jorito)