Liontamer   Judges ⚖️

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/punchout.zip - Tracks 23 & 22 ROOOOOFL at these crappy beats up to :39. Put some effort into them, even if you're going for some contrast with the rock. It IS filling up 1/3rd of the track. Percussion patterns after that were nice and beefy, but somewhat boring. Production doesn't have to sound pristine and antiseptic and all that, but it sounds a bit rough. Those obviously minor issues all mean more when you have such a short track. Cool cover, but no meaningful interpretation to speak of besides adapting the tune to the genre. 2:19-long? Didn't even develop the theme into anything, and when it ends, it's simply because y'all stopped playing, not because you wrote a meaningful ending. Rock covers are cool, especially if you don't want the theme interpreted (OMG liek dont tuch it!), but you gotta go beyond that if you wanna throw it up onto here. The mix title doesn't even have a creative name. Interpret the material more and add some original ideas here to personalize your approach further. NO

http://project2612.org/download.php?id=37 - 12 "Metropolis Zone" Guitar performance is REALLY rough and sounds off the entire way. Percussion patterns are boring as hell, and the various Sonic SFX taken from the game sound tacky. Sound balance and production are really unpolished. Repeating the same arrangement ideas at 1:25 and simply fading out for the finish. You could have taken the arrangement in a new direction. 2:05-long? People need to learn this short undeveloped stuff doesn't cut it. NO

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/guardian.zip - Track 21 (also 22) Very muddy and lossy atmosphere, everything sounds too wet. There's some light warbling in there and there ain't much treble going on. Doesn't even sound like it's in stereo, but it doesn't particularly matter. For a 192kbps encoding, this sounds more like 80kbps. Arrangement evolves a bit, but the texture is very simplistic. Decent effort at personalizing the arrangement, but it's really repetitive and boring. You change the feel and tempo around a bit during the two minutes, and have some original writing via the vox and strings supporting the piano melody, which is good. But you're arranging the same few bars of the source tune over and over again. There's more to that song than that, so incorporate some of it into the mix. 2 minutes will almost never cut it here anymore. Develop the ideas further, and learn more about production techniques via the ReMixing forum. NO

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/madcity.zip - Track 2 Too fucking loud. Too. Fucking. Loud. Moving on, this is a nice lil' dance conversion. Care to reign in this volume and substantially interpret the source material? It's somewhat personalized, but still not much more than a glorified MIDI rip with beefy sounds. Read the submissions guidelines next time. Connservative and under 2 minutes will almost never cut it. Would have kept this if it didn't break my ears. NO

http://www.zophar.net/usf/lozmmusf.rar - 111 "Milk Bar" "You can tell this is gonna be a good song." Rightz. Decent stuff, just doesn't fill out the soundfield enough, the synth design is weak, and the drumloops are even weaker. The original's arguably more catchy, and the arrangement isn't particularly creative. Needs more everything. Everything needs more. NO

http://snesmusic.org/spcsets/loz3.rsn - "Dark Mountain" (loz3-13.spc) Grove bias. Very bleh synth design, very stock, uncreative beats with plain-jane patterns and a lack of interesting processing. The arrangement does try to do something interpretive in terms of the overall feel, but you're basically just following the structure of the original with a poor dance/trance genre conversion. Some interesting stuff at least at 2:26-2:40 for that break section. Last part at 3:20 for the finish is a lame, barren way to close out the track. And don't throw in a tacky cymbal shot at the end. It's like branding yourself right on the ass like a cow and screaming out "I am new! Please don't hurt!" Keep at it, and read up on the ReMixing forum to learn how to use your existing software more effectively, then post the material to the Works forum to have the punwashed masses gauge your results. NO

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/ff1.zip - Track 1 http://www.noderunner.net/~llin/psf/packs/FFX-2_psf2.rar - 101 "Eternity ~Memory of Lightwaves~" Uh, this sounds nice and all, but isn't very heavily interpretive, and isn't expansive enough to pass on that level. You just faded out the Prelude at 1:26 then faded in Eternity at 1:30? C'mon, write a transition or something. You didn't even develop or interpret the Prelude theme before moving on. Eternity is a least a bit different in terms of the instrumentation style, but the composition is basically the same. If you don't mean to interpret the material greatly, it has to be very creatively expanded, which this isn't. The song just cut out abruptly at 3:56, which may have just been a foul-up with my download, but nonetheless, I've really heard all there is to hear. Most of the arrangement deals with Eternity. Why even bother tacking on the Prelude like that for barely a minute? Not gonna say much else. NO

http://snesmusic.org/spcsets/ff4.rsn - "The Lunarians" (ff4-41.spc) Some wind SFX to kick it off, followed by piano with residual effects at :10. Piano's pretty similar to the style of the original. Melody kicked in at :29, following the original in a fairly straightforward manner. Melody and countermelody are used verbatim, so I'm hoping to hear something more interpretive develop. Some harp in there at :59, though the ambiance until 1:34 sounds extremely lo-fi and panned too hard to the left. Some major jumpiness done with the volume (forgot what you call that) starting at 1:42. I see what you were going for, but felt the effect was used a bit too extremely. Last section at 2:53 goes minimalist with the piano & wind. Overall, the source really isn't being interpreted much, as you said in your submission letter. It's just the original with better samples and wind ambiance underneath. IMO, it's not even much of an enhancement. It takes a lot more expansion than that for this site. Make something more unique and don't follow the structure and tempo of the original so rigidly. Not gonna NO Override, because you tried to do your thing with it, but it's nowhere near the interpretation that's generally accepted. I'd be interested in hearing your future work though. NO

Commenting on V's WIP: Nice delicate sound here. Piano sounds fairly well-performed albeit noticeably mechanical. Fairly straightforward but decent effects to fill out the soundfield, although things did feel sprase nonetheless. Strings come in at :51 and sound REALLY lossy, the way a low-quality audio stream warbles. It really drags the whole things down whenever it's in play. Left-hand piano part from :51-1:02 sounds a bit too rigid and looped. Audio skip at 1:15; could be my file, who knows. Woodwind synth joins in at 1:27. The synth sounds decent, but rather plain-jane. The overall effects meant to thicken the instruments are ok, but the track still manages to sound somewhat thin, like the reverb's simply there to overcome any shortcomings with the texture. More bass string writing in here might help fill it out. 2:16 rehashes the string writing from earlier (:54), which felt too samey since the texture and number of instruments in play isn't too much different than before. Harp brought in at 2:49 sounds a bit mechanically sequenced, but the writing is ok. Ending is rather sudden and anti-climactic. I see how you were trying to wind things down, but I don't feel it resolved very strongly. Good ideas in place so far, and this is without comparing this to the original. It could simply be a matter of the samples chosen, but most of them sound pretty generic, and the processing involved doesn't really do anything to change the tones and create something that sounds more unique. Tempo and style felt like an issue. If you're gonna have the tempo the same the whole way, the piece may need to evolve and change more drastically over the 3 3/4 minutes. Right now, the arrangement is promising, but it kind of drags. You should really get some feedback from another available J just to get another perspective. I'll give some more comments once I have time to compare with the SPC.

It's actually an official but alternate cover. But yeah, I found all that rather funny myself. I think two of analoq's tracks were right on the previous version. 8th is Next My Generation from Metropolis Zone, and 19th is Sonik Caves from Mystic Cave Race. Or did he change the names after?? I had it all sorted out. The mix on OCR now has the original and correct name, i.e. "sonik metro". The Mystic Cave Zone 2-Player mix is "Next My Generation (sonik caves)". analoq titled it "sonik caves" as a WIP but changed it to "Next My Generation" since he felt like ending his streak of tracks with names of "sonik something". Perhaps Aaron can submit the real "Next My Generation" down the road.

Boo-urns, fo' sho. But in all honesty, I'd rather have the fix, even if it takes a while to wait for one. I'm a patient man.

http://www.zophar.net/gsf/goldensun2.rar - 124 "Aqua Rock" It would have helped immensely to provide some info as to what was being mixed, especially with a 100-song soundtrack. The information might have been in your original submission letter, but if you fall it through you've gotta at least let a judge know what you're arranging. Luckily for me, it wasn't too far into the soundtrack to cause me to give up. Opening piano sounds ultra-fake and rigid, and needs more body to it. Beats are limp and the bassline is thin, quiet and bleh. The looped rain SFX is the best thing you've got going on in here. Lead synth brought in at :50 on top of the piano sounds too generic/out-of-the-box and needs more effects to stand out as unique. It's a nice synth that's capable of much more. Rinse and repeat the arrangement verbatim from :07 at 1:33, SFX and all until 2:37. Are you kidding me? The arrangement at least changed up the rhythms and feel of the original a little bit, but it's not that good that you can just loop it for 2 1/2 turns. Boo-urns on this. The last section from 2:37 to the end just kept slowly dropping out instruments, which isn't a good idea when things sound so empty for the finish. You need to learn how to actually give the sounds enough meat on them so that a minimalist approach doesn't sound like you have practically nothing filling up the soundfield. Cuts out at 3:01 with 6 seconds of silence left at the end. This was entirely too underdeveloped on both arrangement and production, and ultimately resulted in something that has potential but clearly sounds beginner-ish. I completely agreed with Malc upon reading his vote afterward. Good first effort, but you've got a long way to go. Spend time learning how to better your skills at the ReMixing forum, then post your Works for people to comment on before you submit again in the future. NO

Nah, I think you're right, and I agree with you. The writing though is really cool. No luck on any game rip of the source material, though I will keep looking. The style is otherwise excellent, but I need to see a bit more development as well as have a copy of the original to confirm the depth of the arrangement. If the structure had more variation and development (zirc had some good tips about varying the percussion later on, for example), I wouldn't have reservations on it beyond confirming the source. Definitely tweak this one and resubmit, akumabito. This is icy hot so far. NO (borderline/resubmit)

Wait, what did I do?

http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=top - "Mint" (top-111.spc) For some lesser crits, :17-:22 sounded a bit barren now. There was also droning buzziness in the low-end, which was definitely bothersome, starting around :28 and lasting until around :50 before coming back a few other times. Still, some decent tweaking of the sound balance there. Nice job adding some strings to back the guitar, with some good ideas there to fill things out; you really hear some beautiful harmonization from 2:40-2:50, for example. The way the woodwind stopped at 3:41 felt a little abrupt. I would have done some effects to have it taper off a bit more gradually, but ah well. Chris did a solid job revising this and adding a bit more complexity while basically keeping everything else intact. While understanding the criticisms from last time, I was firmly on YES before. Everything positive I said last time around applies here. And with a stronger package now, there's no reason for me to change my mind. Nice work by Chris in touching this up. Now you just gotta get a solo piece up; good luck, bro! YES

Y'all mind fashioning a real ending? It would be for everyone's benefit, frankly.

Andy wins the "McVaffe" pronunciation contest.

Your first post was nothing like this one. Moved to ReMixing where it belongs. Not a bad idea here, but it's impractical to some extent. Hopefully someone can get it done. I don't like how the post implies that stuff the community here is doing currently sounds like robotic FL-n00bery with generic sounds and textures, but it wouldn't be the first sweeping generalization of the material here and it won't be the last.

Witold, PM me your latest copy of the WIP you wanted me to critique. It fell through the cracks a while back, but I liked what you had in place at that point and wanted to comment further.

Cool piano-based intro. Percussion coming in at :10 sounded a bit too loud. The way the beats combined with the piano, they sounded a bit pasted on top, rather than "in the same room/area" as the piano. I think the combination sounded a lot more seamless in "Tears of Contention". The beats dropping out at :41 merely to come right back in at :43 felt awkward. The progression :54-1:01 also felt slightly off. The somewhat exposed bass synth at :59-1:01 didn't sound particularly strong either. Would have preferred the guitar from 1:22-1:42 to be more prominent, rather than at similar levels to the beats and piano. Same at 2:04 when Phil broke out some grungier stuff, so perhaps revisit the sound balance for something less distinct. The guitar just cuts out abruptly at 2:23, with an awkward pause/transition that I felt didn't quite work. Y'all could have stretched out the pause longer with a pad fading up or the last guitar note hanging on its own for a while. Decent ideas for the finish at 2:26 (and I was glad to hear the guitar placed more in the forefront for once, if only for 20 seconds), though I felt like this section didn't possess any direction or bring the arrangement to any sort of resolution. The ending faded out too suddenly at 2:50, I think everyone else who voted agrees on the track simply petering out. Either fashion an ending or go for the gradual fadeout, but do one or the other. The last section was the kicker that helped me decide which way to call this. As is, everything here is creative and promising but can and should be more cohesively put together. Very close here, but it honestly doesn't quite feel up there with the most recently passed material. NO (refine/resubmit)

Tales of Symphonia Original Soundtrack - (221) "Fatalize" Ah, a submission with a female. Automatic YES, isn't that how it goes? The track is imbalanced towards the right channel and could use some less distinct panning. The drum writing was ok, though the tone didn't quite gel with the guitar work for parts of the first 1:30 or so. Once the speed picked up, the percussion was fast, driving, and IMO more complimentary. I wish the bass presence was louder, as it didn't play much a factor until the (excellent) bridge section. Short and sweet, this was a nicely personalized and interpretive arrangement, with plainly observable energy. Can't ask for more than that, and it's great to see LuIzA finally make her OCR debut. Listening to her previous submissions and her material from Dwelling of Duels over the past year, she's come a long way with her work. Certainly hope to see both Christophe and Luiza both submit some solo material in the future. Of course, strong synergistic collabs like these are also welcome. Solid work y'all, and a good representative of KyleJCrb's Summoning of Spirits. Looking forward to hearing more from the project. YES

Just quoting Stephen's link here, since we can't leave up illegal MP3 links in the Decisions.

Status? I can't speak for DarkeSword, but I'd gather this is getting close to being bumped off Site Projects at this rate.

No problem, sorry for interpreting the letter hastily. Checking the original soundtrack from my usual sources, I couldn't find anything like the submission, but I'll hit up Kaleb Grace & CHz and see if they can provide any insight (perhaps along with a source track). EDIT (6/28): Looked long and hard for this one, but don't have a physical copy of anything just yet. I'll let you know if I come up with anything later. Kaleb confirmed it's indeed from some sort of in-game jingle. What it sounds like, I've got no idea, so I'm just gonna have to stick to judging on quality. For the record, the jingle is "D-A-A#-G-C#", confirmed by CHz. In the future, please provide audio of the source material, so we can compare it to the submission. Some of us "not be havin' da music theory skillz." Onto the actual submission... Interesting intro, with some decent effects, though the sirens were a bit too loud (and potentially tacky). Still cool for being something different. I'm guessing the arrangement is based off the first few notes at :41. Everything sounds too swamped, though I see what you're going for there in terms of the atmosphere. Could afford to be less buzzy. Switches to a somewhat rigid-sounding piano at 1:08, along with a woodwind joining in upfront at 1:22. Fairly straightforward at first, but at least decent expansionist of the brief original. Track sounds rather buzzy and loud from around 1:40-2:06. Nice to see you switch to some different instrumentation ideas at 2:04 for the variation, though everything has way too much reverb and still sounds swamped. Same at 3:05 with another variation, though the stuff from 3:45-4:41 was nothing we didn't hear before for a long while (2:37-3:05), so it simply made the song drag and feel repetitive. After 4:41, it was just some modulation effects or whatever for the eerie-style close; not a bad idea, though it could have been more effective. You have decent arrangement ideas in place here, but the production drags this way down. The swamped atmosphere covers up the fact that there's actually not too much going on at once in terms of the instrumentation and texture. Need some more knowledgeable comments on what could be done to alleviate the problems here. As for the arrangement, you've gotten some decent mileage out of the source material via variation, but it still managed to drag, especially thanks to the 3:45-4:41 section. You need to either cut the fat ot continue to provide more variations if you want to prevent an arrangement of a 5-note phrase from wearing thin. If you cut down on the gross amount of reverb, refine the production, add a bit more depth to the orchestration with some more instruments/elements for the background, and keep the writing well varied, you'd be in much better shape. Good ideas so far, and sorry for reaching a hasty conclusion to your submission based off of the submission letter. If you have the patience to learn more about ReMixing, you should continue to work on this. Otherwise apply the general points to your next arrangement. NO

Dave had been thinking about a DP, and the conflict with the panel over it made it get lost in the shuffle. Don wrote to me asking about the status of this MM6 mix a week or two ago, and I let him know how several on the panel had not been hot on the relative conservativeness of the arrangement as well as the EQ work. He also felt the EQ work wasn't his best once he relistened to it and let me know he would tinker with it, plus he redid some of the concluding guitar work (3:18-onward) presumably to help drive down arrangement concerns. Now that the revisions are done, I promised Don he could have a Fall-Through. The current version is 4:00-long. The old one is 4:01-long. ------------------------------------------------------ http://www.zophar.net/nsf/megaman6.zip - Track 8 ("Knight Man Stage") As per the previous version, the arrangement starts off pretty conservative, basically a souped up cover of the original. The soundfield was still swamped sometimes (e.g. 1:07-1:17), but never for any long periods of time. From 1:28-onward, the arrangement proceeded to get more liberal and interpretive. Don showed off again how he's one of the most effective in the community at sequenced guitar part. When he went back to the more straightforward rendition of the Knight Man melody at 2:38 he made sure to push up the guitar part so that it was more audible, which stressed the interpretive embellishment on it moreso than the old version. Since the volume on it was raised, it sounded like the guitar flubbed at 3:05 moving into the source's bridge as the guitar note cut off loudly and abruptly; maybe we can get that fixed? One particular example of the old version feeling swamped was from 3:12-3:29 during the big finish where the guitar, vox, bells, and (especially) strings all mushed together indistinctly. The new version rebalances everything so that there's a clearer foreground and background. Dunno why that wasn't done with the 1:07-1:17 section, but it wasn't a big deal. I just commented on some various points in the track just to share some thoughts on it. Overall, the approach started out very conservatively (albeit very personalized), but eventually moved over into some more interpretive material. A bit on the loud side, but fairly well produced with good energy, and the instrumentation choices gelled together nicely. Nice work. YES