Liontamer

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/megaman6.zip - Track 14 ("Opening Demo") & Track 26 ("Title") Admirable going for a more tense feel for the intro. That's about where the positives end. :12-:47 felt like a conservative playthrough of the "Opening Demo" with weak sounds. Segued into some very basic, repetitive claps before recycling the idea over again with some slightly different sounds with cruddy effects on them. 1:36 brings in the title and repeats the same flimsy, conservative formula. At least it ended the way it started to come "full circle." The construction is way too simple, the interpretation way too limited. NO

http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=loz3 - "Hyrule Castle" (loz3-14.spc) I crib from zircon's notes because he's correct. And really, if you're going to start off with direct sampling the original track, at least make it transition more seamlessly. Not bad for a beginner effort, but zircon explained why this has all sorts of fundamental problems. Did any of the various beat patterns ever really integrate with the rest of the instrumentation. The answer... NO

http://www.exotica.org.uk/tunes/archive/C64Music/Lowe_Dave/Garfields_Winter_Tail.sid - Subtune 1/1 Just a sound upgrade for the most part. Needs actual interpretation to have a chance. Don't send the original song verbatim with beefier sounds and some basic effects. Try more interpretive stuff like 1:09-1:49/end and run with that more. NO

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/zelda2.zip - Tracks 1, 2 & 8 Though the samples didn't sound ultra-realisitic here, I thought thinks were working well, and wasn't sure where the criticisms were coming from. Everything seemed to start off pretty damn hot honestly. I liked the arrangement here, which was at least well-orchestrated in spite of the flaws. 3:29 had a somewhat sudden change in tone that I didn't think quite worked. Needs to have more of a thought out transition, though it gets somewhat less jarring on subsequent listens. Just as I said that, you switched the theme even more drastically at 3:58, I think even changing the time signature. Just too awkward. Personally, I didn't mind the instrumentation methods here. I felt it was Ryan's place here if he really wanted to focus on the strings. But at the same time, if you're going to have other stuff come in on support such as the piano at 2:15, then give it a more prominent place within your background or forget it entirely. Nonetheless, it wasn't as big of a hit or faux pas with me. I'm much more positive on the concept and execution of the piece than the others are. Frankly, I think some people would think we were crazy for turning this down as is, and to a certain extent I agree. While I could have stood for more interpretation rather than expansion, there were some nice interpretive elements occasionally in there, and I didn't think the source arrangement dragged at all despite being somewhat repetitive. This is totally fine by me. I'd hate to seem like I have a mediocre orchestral standard, but I really can't see what's so lacking here. Maybe some unorthodox sound balance choices, but that's not really a problem for me. YES

http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=tit - "Star Base ~ Where No Turtle Has Gone Before" (tit-17.spc) Yeah, sorry to basically cut and run, but this needs a groove behind it to anchor the track, otherwise it just continues to feel very empty. Plus IMO the track isn't nearly powerful enough given the style you seem to be going for. Not just with the quiet volume, but with the way all of the percussion/beats are so subdued. The arrangement has some personalization, but again still feels like a weaker-energy version of the original. Arrangement could pass at only 2:34-long, but you'd need more interpretation than this IMO. If you get a good groove behind the track and arrange that portion as well with the source material in mind, this could stand a decent chance as a conservative but heavily personalized/stylized approach. Otherwise, move onto new works, but either way I look forward to hearing what you've got next. NO (resubmit)

The 7th Guest Soundtrack - 03 "Dolls of Doom" I have to say, "The American Album" is one of the best things to come out of the community in 2005. I loved several of the tracks on there, and this one was no exception especially on the arrangement level. Played this back on VGF72 as part of a 5-episode run where I gradually covered the entire album. Chris listed "Microscope", "Cake Music", "Dolls of Doom" and "Coffin Dance" as the source tunes, although the official soundtrack only lists "Dolls of Doom" on there. Luckily though, there's more than enough arrangement taken from just that one theme to qualify everything else here. Just loved the sound choices, loved the various voice samples, loved the time signature. I could loop this tons of times. Actually, I can and I have. The guy's a master at his craft. "COME BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK" with another submission from the album anytime, and thanks for the service you've done for the people out there with this top-flight work. YES

http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=ed2 - "Battle #1" (ed2-108.spc) Rather sad when even I can identify clipping. Soft clipping, I'll never be able to call out, but this kind of stuff, yeesh. You're clippin' 'n cruddin' right out of the gate. No sense of judiciousness in the sound until :25, but that was a welcome change of pace once things at least simmered down a bit. Of course, clip-clip-clip came back later, so it wasn't a total win. Arrangement was pretty conservative until we got the guitar wank at 1:08. Tone could have been meatier, and the performance more polished, but it's not bad. The main thing though is that the arrangement otherwise isn't very interpretive/creative. You did have some good supplementary ideas like the synths coming in at 1:53 to add some other dimension there, but they were pretty buried in the song and thereby didn't do much to enhance it or stand out. Glad we had some new ideas at 2:15 as the drum pattern up until then was dragging out for too long. It wasn't very creative in the first place. Damn, came back at 2:38. Play around more with the instrumentation and arrangement ideas you had from 2:15-2:38 to break up the monotony for longer. Decent stuff on the rock cover route, but it needs more creativity beyond the additions you've made. If you're sticking with the verbatim structure and tempo, you really have to do something more with the supporting instrumentation, mainly the drums, to creatively compensate for that. Also tone the levels down and balance out the sound more. Go for some additional interpretation beyond those other criticisms and you'd be in much better shape. I look forward to hearing your future work. NO

http://www.zophar.net/vgm/phanstar.zip - "Village" Yeah, the drum patterns were energetic enough IMO, right up until you slowed things down at :45. Then all of sudden, they were really basic and plodding, with the guitar not doing much to compensate for a very empty, sterile track. Not sure what the point was at 2:17-2:42; not particularly musical, and I agree with zircon, directionless. 2:53 until the fadeout ending offered a very barren, mechanical drumloop finish. The piece could use more direction sure, but more complexity for the plainer drumkit stuff and creativity during some of the staler parts would help. Decent arrangement ideas here, especially of a mere 19-second-long original, but the execution is too spotty. Some good ideas, but mostly underdeveloped. NO

I concur. Dis iz much ripz.

http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=ewj - "Buttville ~ The Descent" (ewj-07.spc) No interpretation, this is structured too similarly to the original only with very plain, thin electrosynths and plain, boring beats. The only new thing seems to be these almost piano-style rhythms on top. Overall though, just no meat on the sounds beyond some basic effects, and no production refinement or balance. Arrangement just drags on after a while; whereas the original went for 2 iterations, this goes for 4. NO

http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=kdl3 - "Ripple Field 1" (kdl3-12.spc) Kirby 3, I had to assume Kirby's Dream Land 3 no thanks to this sub letter. Nice original. Hahaha! "Hi!" sound effect was overused a little bit for the intro, but was actually a nice touch. Reused again at 2:31, nice! Yeah, I like the groove here, but the instrumentation is thin and generic; creating a very swampy soundfield via effects helped fill it out, but other than that, there wasn't much going on. Arrangement started getting out there at 2:37 as you seemed to building some decent guitar over your base only to bust out in a terrible, off-key, non sequitur piano solo. Nonetheless, you brought it back to coherence at 3:08 once you had the source tune notes to refer too. Decent variation of your sounds in the last section here to at least have a slightly different feel than when you started. Pretty much listen to zircon with these basic but informative and critical tips he has, take advantage of the of the ReMixing and Works: OCR forums, and continue to improve. Nice effort for a first submission. You show promise provided you keep at it. NO

http://www.exotica.org.uk/tunes/archive/C64Music/Hubbard_Rob/Sanxion.sid- Subtune 1 ("Thalamusik") Yeah, read the submissions guidelines more. This is nothing but the original with slightly meatier synths and some flimsy, simplistic, boring, repetitive beats. The arrangement doesn't do much to interpret the original, and that's not what we're about. R:K:O is a better home for these ultra-conservative takes. NO

http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=sd2 - "Angel's Fear" (sd2-01.spc) Yeah right off the bat, this is very vanilla/generic in terms of the sound choices. Production left this sounding too thin. Something in the club would probably have more delay to thicken it out and go for the club-friendly-atmosphere. Source melody at :58 felt so pasted on top of these trance beats, like it was almost an afterthought, though I do hear the trance groove following the progression. Nonetheless, the plucked string synths don't really integrate with the trance material well. Rather odd changeup in the style at 1:51, but I'm willing to roll with it. Pretty ballsy actually, and you actually had a transition for it, so I'm down. Picked up with some trancy saw-type synths at 2:15 which were too loud and needed to be pulled back a little bit, though I actually liked the idea there. Back to the bread & butter trance at 2:44, which had some decent genre adaptation ideas, but the melody didn't stand out at all, so it just seemed like nothing interesting was happening all the way until 3:34. Ewww. Terrible synth choice fading up from 3:36 that didn't even seem to gel with the groove since it wasn't accomodating the melody. More trancey goodness at 4:02. I'm looking for some better sound balance here. Everything's too loud and the melody gets buried amidst all of these very abrasive electrosynths. You gotta watch the sound balance. Meahwhile the beats are dragging out too long. You could cut some serious fat out of this one and it wouldn't undercut the message here. Pretty good stuff in place overall, it just needs some refinement with the sound balance, and like zircon mentioned, some additional work with some of the synths to get them away from that overly generic level. Do those things and cut out some of the fat, and this would be much more polished and streamlined. NO

Deus Ex Game of the Year Edition OSV - (04) "UNATCO" I'm a big fan of "UNATCO" as well, though I've very biased towards "DuClare Chateau" thanks to OverCoat's arrangement of it. Ha. Goes for a creepier vibe here with some warbly type synths. I liked the lil synths skipping around the stereo field during the intro. Arrangement was conservative but ok. The boom-tss here really wasn't filling the soundfield out and sounded like a weak dance beat. After about the 1-minute mark all of the various parts you have going on around here seemed to basically be at the same level, making it hard to focus on any one particular element. Beeping dropped out at 1:55 only to be replaced by some more tame beats. What the hell was going on at 2:41? Doesn't even sound musical, sorry. Yeah, Vig's right, over time, you're not changing the groove here, just swapping some of the supporting parts while playing the delayed source and recycling this groove. I like the potential here, but you've got to further develop it. It also pays to place a little more emphasis on the melodic arrangement and not bury among this soup of synths. NO

Katamari Fortissimo Damacy - (15) "Katamari Stars" Yeah, unfortunately, this feels like an oversimplification of the original. The beatwork dragged on after a while. The rigid sequencing actually seems purposeful here, but merely drags the track down because the piece doesn't evolve or develop. Arrangement/structure is given pretty conservative treatment and fails to really tread any new territory as a result. Rearrange the piece with more interpretive ideas earlier on. The section from 4:18-5:33 was a good example though of at least giving the arrangement a different enough feel while playing with the rhythms and structure a bit more. Some nice potential here; keep working on it. NO

What's causing bad notes around 2:30? Sounds to me like the same groove's been going on for a while, and I never heard anything dramatically change, so I don't know what part you were talking about. The stuff at 2:15? The swirly pads at 3:20 (numbers reversed)? In any case, I really can't say I heard anything bad. Track's getting better and better per the listen. Smooth bias.

Ha! I'm slippingz!

Still a little ways from being passable, but he's on the right track and needs feedback to continue moving in the right direction, IMO. This was enough of an improvement from the first version where I was willing to post it direct to panel rather than reject the resub. ------------------------------------------------------ Original Decision: http://www.ocremix.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=78366 http://www.zophar.net/gym/sonicspn_fixed.rar - "Toxic Caves" Piano intro seems OK. A little awkward at first, but it's fairly solid. Percussion coming in at :30 is fairly good; good sounds, and more importantly good writing at the outset. Seems like the piano velocities starting at :39 are really similar, but someone should confirm that. Most of the notes sound like they're at the same intensity. The sequencing there still sounds very rigid and mechanical, which is too bad. Every time you repeated the melodic stuff from :46-1:02, it sticks out. Spots like 2:20-2:42 show off some decent refinement, before going right back into mechanical mode. Sax sample at 1:02 still sounds bare and flimsy. And too fake. The solo on it at 3:17 just exposes the synthetic quality even more, even though the sample is an improvement. You need to do something with the production to give the sound there more depth/body; it's not filling out the soundfield. Short bit with the bass basically alone from 1:10 was decent. The sample is weak, but better than last time; you're making it work for you somewhat. Using some effects/processing to get a thicker/richer sound on it could help. Watch the percussion writing over time. You're throwing in a very nice amount of fills and subtle variation, but overall it's still too plodding at the core. Maybe it's just me, but the main beat pattern dragged out for a long time. 1-2, 1-2, 1-2, ad nauseum. Someone can explain that better, but that's the gist of it. Things still sound barren on the whole. You sound like you only have 2 or 3 elements going on at any particular time, and the bass and sax still need meat on them badly. I would think another supporting instrument/part would help fill this out, but you really wouldn't need to add anything if all of the existing material sounded richer. Arrangement is fairly solid, and the execution is improved substantially from the first time around. The ending at 4:11 is too sudden. Extend the last note or do something else in to let the ending trail off somehow. Use the Works: OC ReMixes and ReMixing forums to get more feedback from people before you attempt another resubmission, and to go for more info on refining the sax and bass samples you're using to achieve better tones. Please don't be discouraged, Tom. You show some great potential, and at this rate your work will gain the polish necessary to have it sounding its best. I look forward to hearing this sub or any other future submissions. NO (resubmit)

Nah, I wouldn't want to do that. Just reviewing some old stuff that hadn't been commented on in a while. Page 29 of ReViews is a lonely place.

Never really paid this one any mind before, but the arrangement was very strong. Possesses a great deal of personality and variation. The percussion stuff coming in before 1-minute mark was rather bleh for part of it, but the changeup at 1:27 was a great idea, and the track evolved quite nicely from that point on.

Glad we have this mix here. Thanks go out to Ariel Asulin, the originator (and king) of groove bias.

Not much love for Life Force it seems. What's this doing on page 29? Doesn't deserve that at all. Great stuff from Vinod, who's a very consistent arranger who I wish we heard more from. Adds a lot of energy to the source material with a fresh approach. Glad it passed, although I didn't feel it was a borderline case myself back when I read the decision.

What a goddamn weirdo. Anyway yeah, it's repetative and one finds oneself losing interest as a result, but the arrangement ideas here are good overall. Certainly lends a different flavor to the source material. Nice work adding some original material to interact with the melody from 1:48 until the end. Good stuff. Somewhat disappointing that this guy was only a one-shot mixer back in the older days.

A decent enough remix if you're not demanding. Really just drags on as soon as the melody comes in. Everything after 2:36 has almost nothing to do with SoR except for that siren. It's just not well put-together. If this is the "Short Edit", then don't put me anywhere near the full version, sorry.

Rather disappointing due to the length, as it's merely 2 loops of the source and it's over before it starts. Yeah, a very cool piece if you just want a conservative playthrough of the original material. When it comes to SoR2's music, that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Only thing that saves it from it's near-complete MIDI-ripness is Pat's guitar performance of the melody. If you set that aside, it's brief and enjoyable for what it is.