Liontamer   Judges ⚖️

They're $60, so die, you dirty rat!

I PMd Claudo about this and it still hasn't been changed. Anyone else I should talk to? Message StarZander, since he's the webmaster.

http://www.ocremix.org/detailmix.php?mixid=OCR01266 Bottom of the page, n00b.

http://www.zophar.net/usf/lozusf.rar - 68 "Gerudo Valley" Not a bad intro, all things considered; it was at least different. The plain, boring beats were the first major issue I had here though, as they dragged the mix down. Work at writing more thorough and varied percussion parts. The arrangement was too straightforward/basic/safe/uncreative/simplified/uninterpretive (ha, 6!) for the first few minutes, basically following the original progressions verbatim with different sounds. You guys finally did something wholly original from 1:34-1:58, but it was short-lived. 1:58 had some decidedly more energetic/rock-based arrangement, where you guys had some good personal flair in the guitar work (even if it sounded terrible). Unfortunately, once the Gerudo melody came back again at 2:37, it was back to the same old, same old Gerudo melody + beats. Blatty brass came in at 3:08 for the close. Can't you at least use a different style of instrumentation rather than the original's for that? Eww, the horns abruptly cut out at 3:28 and followed up with the cymbal shot for the beginner-ish finish. Production was "OK" but pretty messy, but I'll leave that to someone else to highlight, as I've already said enough on this mix to last me a while. Not bad for a first submission, AZN homies, but your arrangement is gonna have to get more interpretive with the melody here, not just sandwich some brief rearrangement or original inside a "disco/rock" cover of Gerudo Valley. Y'all have the right idea though, as some of the guitar synth ideas with the source tune around the 2 1/2 minute mark were very creative. You guys certainly have some potential. Stick around the community and strive for improvement. NO

http://www.zophar.net/usf/MarioKart64_usf.rar - 18 "Rainbow Road" The synths are terribly used, IMO. The track is amazingly grating and clippy. Amazingly. The arrangement is basically a mere cover and does nothing substantial with personalizing the arrangement. Might as well be a rip. Read the site guidelines that we have regarding arrangements more thoroughly at some point. At least you did some small stuff with the arrangement at 2:11 and in the track's intro, but it was ultimately meaningless in the long run. Try mixing with headphones next time. And use the ReMixing & Works forum to avoid submitting something so problematic in the future. NO

http://snesmusic.org/spcsets/ewj.rsn - "New Junk City" (ewj-01.spc) Man the timing on this was so off the whole way through. Sounds very sloppy. Beats were rather simple and lazy. Instrumentation was relatively generic and sparse and resulted in a plain-jane result. After a sloppy transition section from 1:41-2:04, it briefly switched to some rock-based stuff until 2:38. Same problems, different sounds as far as I'm concerned. I go blehz on this. Not bad for a beginner's effort, but decidedly uncohesive and apparently proud of it. If you're not proud of it being like this, then bury your nose in the ReMixing and Works forums to learn more and allow people to criticize your material. I saw you look down on overly "meticulous" critique here, but it's clear you're in dire need of some. Especially as a n00b, you need to be receptive to criticism, especially detailed criticism. Keep at it, Kiefo. NO

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/castlev3.zip - Tracks 1 ("Beginning") & 11 ["Deja Vu (Vampire Killer)"] Decent a capella stuff. Ultimately the synching of the tracks is too loose. It may be difficult for you, but there are nonetheless a lot of rough spots where the collective timing sounds too shaky. Gotta get it sounding more cohesive and in time. Also, the structure of the beats and harmonization still leaves the track sounding very empty. It isn't until 1:36 that you had some basic but nice effects on your backing tracks that really attempted to fill out the background. Use those types of effects and techniques appropriately to beef up the rest of the voices, or work on adding more supporting vocal tracks. You also may want to double your lead the entire time, just to give it more body. Just some ideas, which you're free to take or leave. Arrangement was alright. I'd be interested in hearing a college a capella group give this arrangement a whirl with a lot more people involved. OL ReMiX could use this. Cool shit, Tom. If you really wanted to fill this track out further and get the timing down with everything, this could be something really solid. As is though, it sounds too rough in the execution. NO (rework/resubmit)

http://www.tzone.org/~llin/psf/packs2/FF8_minipsf.rar - 119 "The Man With the Machine Gun" The dance kick used here had no beef, and the overall texture was too subdued for the energy you were obviously trying to create. The atmosphere was dull and slightly lo-fi. Synth design and breakbeat style were both pretty plain, though I did like the melody being doubled with that chiptune sound (albeit briefly). Chorus right at 1:25 almost sounded out of key; probably wasn't, but just weird. Seemed to fix itself when it repeated. Relatively uncreative/conservative arrangement, as the source melody isn't really manipulated very much, only given a genre adaptation. Doesn't do enough to distinguish it from the style of the original. You gotta be more. Use the ReMixing & Works forums here in order to do that. NO

http://www.tzone.org/~llin/psf/packs2/Chrono_Cross_psf.rar - 111 "Drowning Valley" This is very, very far from "in ya face". These stock breakbeats are incredibly sterile, and all of the synths and samples in play sound default-y. The piano sounds the best, but that's to be expected as it (arguably, I suppose) has a reasonably nice sound to it as is. In any case, the texture here was terrible, the sounds lack energy and drive, and the arrangement was weak. The section at 2:15 left me shaking my head. All a shame, as the drum & bass approach here was interesting given the source tune, just poorly executed the entire way through. Well, get yo' read on 'n shit at the ReMixing forum to learn more on how to work with Reason and beef up your work, and use the Works forum here for more feedback before you choose to submit something again. Right now, this is entirely too beginner-ish. NO

http://snesmusic.org/spcsets/ct.rsn - "Corridors of Time" (ct-3-04.spc) Nice job adding the electric guitar. The production improvement on here has definitely been significant. I don't have a huge problem with this passing ultimately, but IMO the sound balance really needs to be addressed here. The overall volume is generally too quiet; I had to boost this +6db in Winamp to get more satisfying levels. Also, the snappy beats were too loud vs. everything else, but that's a more minor/subjective complaint that I'm not docking points for. More importantly, the lyrics are mushing into the instrumentation and need to be placed more in the foreground. To me, it's a problem for most of the track, but really stick out in areas like the chorus at 1:27-1:55. Sounds like the vocals could better occupy their own space by EQing them higher. Right now the vocals sound a bit obscured/indistinct and lo-fi. In any case, I think everything still sounds great on the arrangement front, but just needs some last refinement to correct any imbalances that are dragging it down. I might be the sticker here, so good luck with the rest of the vote Jovette, and I'm glad to see you actually reading the prior decision, as you've had a lot of good stuff that I think could make it if you ever decided to revisit it. Much success to you with Avex Trax, by the way. NO (refine/easy resubmit)

http://www.snesmusic.org/spcsets/soe.rsn - "Introduction" (soe-02.spc) Well, it's certainly different than the last time around. Awfully sparse, minimalist deal you got going on. The percussion REALLY drags on after a while; it sounds way too beginner-ish. Source tune isn't really being meaningfully arranged, IMO. 1:46 continues on the same path only with some added synth instrumentation. The arrangement isn't "crazy", but somehow seems all over the place. Man, no offense, but this is like Shnabubula, only without any skills. Seriously, it might be Sam's bastard half-brother that no one in his family ever talks about. Nice try at avant-garde or whatever, but there's simply not much going on in terms of polyphony/texture, synth design, or arrangement. NO

Thanks for providing the original, even though I hated it. Brandon has definitely had some better stuff on Deus Ex. At 2:31-long, this is gonna have a hard time passing unless the arrangement and production are very strong, which is not the case for either. The percussion is really plain-jane and doesn't lend any energy to the mix, plus it repeats way too much. The foreground instrumentation also sound tepid and somewhat generic though the choice of sounds isn't terrible. Beyond 1:31 though, you've basically heard all that there is to hear. Really not much going on here melodically. Lacking meaningful direction and very underdeveloped. Not bad for a first submission though, Anis. Stay involved in the community and use the ReMixing and Works forums to learn more on music making and obtain criticism. NO

Well that's awfully disappointing. You were certainly groove-biasing me with the way this opened up. Too bad the beat goes non-stop like this. Aside from the beats though, you at least tried to go off on several minorly different variations of the melody, which turned out ok. The synth textures, IMO, were working pretty well here. Go for even more interpretation with the arrangement, and more dynamic contrast. (Weak as hell BTW, that shitty and eternally tacky cymbal shot ending. It does not get any more uncreative as an ending. Work on that close!) What was comparably holding this back though was the production. The sounds in play were nice and beefy, but the soundfield was too cluttered, and there were some occasionally piercing frequencies. You need more separation of the sounds in play with some judicious EQing, and despite the full atmosphere you need a cleaner overall sound. For a 165kbps VBR encoding, this sounds more like 96kbps CBR. It's a long way from say, bLiNd's quality. Look in the ReMixing forum for help on that so your stuff doesn't inadvertently sound lo-fi. Keep making use of the resources here to improve your material bro. This was a promising start. I don't believe you're at the level to get this passed with one resubmission, but I don't think you should drop this one altogether. Get more experience under your belt and then revisit it. I'll be hanging onto this, for verily thou hast groove-biased mine ears. NO (rework/resubmit) When's Bladiator gonna work futher on "MC Jazzer" and submit that? This game needs more love.

http://www.vgmusic.com/music/console/microsoft/xbox/morrowind.mid - "Morrowind Theme" Generic trance sounds, boring perc patterns, and arguably too liberal arrangement approach (though you guys should be able to hear the connections), and clipping like a motherfucker. Yuck. Unfortunately nothin' to love here. NO

Agreeing with TO's assessment here, the arrangement was very conservative, the composition was very sparse, the performance sounds too rigid, the production is awful, and the piano sample here isn't very expressive. The jazzy section from 1:54-2:52 was sloppy and didn't have anything to do with Blue Fields, which isn't normally a killer but contrast poorly with such an uncreative arrangement of the source. Yeah, please make use of the ReMixing and Works forums here to improve your game. For a beginner Mattias, you certainly have the right idea in terms of your arrangements, but just don't have the know-how and experience yet to turn out a solid finished product. NO

http://snesmusic.org/spcsets/ct.rsn - "The Brink of Time" (ct-2-13.spc) & "Guardia Millenial Fair" (ct-1-06.spc) http://www.zophar.net/usf/lozusf.rar - 26 "Zelda's Theme" I do wonder why you gave 0 additional info about this 2nd resub, since the submission letter is almost exactly the same as last time. I said that last time around, Ken, and you really managed to bounce back in a big way on this one with the production, creating a much more ornate atmosphere. I'm glad you persevered here. The low-end sometimes got a bit cluttered, but other than that it was smooth sailing. After hearing some 2nd resubmissions not get the job done, this was a refreshing change of pace. The arrangement was already there beforehand, but adding more definition to the sounds improved the overall product in a synnergistic way. Congratulations, bro, and be sure to thank Sil. Very relaxing listen. YES

http://exotica.fix.no/tunes/archive/Authors/Game/Iveson_Martin/Jaguar_XJ220.lha - mod.worldmap I remember first hearing this off VGMix, and I can't lie when I say I was very unimpressed. I don't mind you trying new stuff of course. That's definitely encouraged, but this just isn't clicking. The beatwork is incredibly lazy, defaulty, and repetitive. It doesn't morph around and develop, and this is too LOOOONG track at 6:16 to let that happen. You get points for trying to entend a 41-second source tune, as there are some nice ideas here. Loved the breakdown at 2:40, for example. The section from 4:20-4:44 though was poorly written, IMO. The arrangement is decent but overly conservative, plus there's not enough evolution here. You could easily cut out some filler here and make this feel more varied. Definitely rewrite the percussion though with a lot more effort, as its weakness killed this from the outset, Nicolas. NO

http://vgmusic.com/music/console/sega/genesis/jp_youlose.mid http://vgmusic.com/music/console/sega/genesis/jp_grantstory.mid http://vgmusic.com/music/console/sega/genesis/jp_mapmusic.mid http://vgmusic.com/music/console/sega/genesis/jp_pstation.mid I somewhat agree with Koelsch that this is the best he can get it to sound, but it's still a NO go. Higher frequencies are still gone and the atmosphere now sounds incredibly dry, especially detrimental to the sampled instrumentation. There's still light but noticeable hiss here on my headphones. Couldn't you have de-essed the first version or something? (Prot: "Learn to de-ess.") Your initial setup being so bad in the first place ultimately messed this up. Sorry man, it's certainly not for a lack of liking the arrangement.

Still playing catch up on some back episodes. Feel free to pick 'em up as I wait to start the show again around January 22nd. Thanks for listening: VG Frequency #64 MP3 (249MB) VG Frequency #64 Playlist: http://oc.ormgas.com/forum_viewtopic.php?18.12265 VG Frequency #64 Chat Transcript VG Frequency #66 MP3 (125MB) VG Frequency #66 Playlist: http://oc.ormgas.com/forum_viewtopic.php?18.12550 VG Frequency #66 Chat Transcript

Best best is to mail Susie and find out if she has anything, as in general we really don't have many fans writing sheet music or tabs for work that isn't theirs. But AFAIK what's on her site is the only material that's available. With that said, let's please not treat the thread as a sort of request thread. But I'll be glad if it serves as an impetous though for others like chthonic to start proving tabs and the like for their own music. Thanks to everyone who has provided material so far, it's greatly appreciated.

Yeah, that's no issue at all. Irregardless of its relation to the game, as long as the SFX usage is tasteful and well-integrated into the track, it's fine.

Dunno any of the particulars, Mike, but why not take the opportunity now to PM a bio StarZander; I'm sure he'd replace the bootleg one with that.

To clarify, my vote on Fröhn 'Remastered Gabber Mix' cited both the arrangement and sounds as lacking. I felt the arrangement was too straightforward to pass regardless of sound choices. I'm really not concerned what the industry currently or retrospectively thinks of the 2A03 chip. Some like it, some hold it in no regard. I'm just saying that IMO, the arrangement sounds pleasing and well-written in spite of the "primitive" sound choices and more importantly pushes the limitations of the sound format. I do not hold the 2A03 format itself or its limitations as inherently a violation of guidelines or below standards provided the arrangement is comprehensive and the soundscape/atmosphere is solidly constructed, which both need to be the case for my YES. Ultimately I feel that is the situation here.

ATTENTION - If you are here to comment on the Chrono Symphonic: Regular Edition album, please direct your comments to the Chrono Symphonic Comments/Feedback thread. This thread is exclusively for the continued development of Chrono Symphonic: Special Edition. Any and all comments/feedback merely on the currently released album will be mercilessly deleted as we have no way to move them. Please enjoy the album and post in the correct thread.

VGF75 will have it if the Chrono Symphonic Special Edition isn't out by then. Otherwise VGF76 and probably a couple of episodes after that if I don't catch or don't have time for everything.