Liontamer   Judges ⚖️

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/ninja_ga.zip - NSF Track 3 Very very amateur, but not a bad vibe until things start getting all WTF with the xylophone (:37/:45) and vox (:57). Terrible notes everywhere, and the ending was terrible. Prot has some good advice for ya though. Awfully nice of him too, because frankly this track wasn't worth it whatsoever. More effort into making this musically coherent would have at least merited legit commentary. Form rejection all the way. NO

http://www.snesmusic.org/spcsets/loz3.rsn - "Credits" (loz3-31.spc) Pff. Everything's the same. The timing of the notes matches up perfectly. You might as well have ripped this, if you didn't actually do so, which you did actually. Merely below average orchestral sequencing done note-for-note. No matter how much effort you put into this, we don't accept mock-ups. Frankly, that kind of stuff doesn't deserve one's name on it or a new title. NO OVERRIDE

http://www.zophar.net/usf/sm64usf.rar - "Staff Roll" & "Super Mario 64 Main Theme" I'm in agreement with Ari over this one. Certainly not a bad remix, but it's not notably interpretive on any level per the general guidelines here. I thought the integration of the SM64 Main Theme from :43-:59 would surface elsewhere in the track and provide something slightly substantial on the rearrangement front, but it never came to pass. I wasn't bothered much by the minimal variation in the drum patterns, but 2:23 retreading the chorus was not where it's at. The Mario sample at the end was tacky as well. Very tacky. Straightforward/cover-style arrangements have to be substantial upgrades compared to the source tune to make it here, and this ain't it. Throw this one at VGMix and see how the listeners react there. NO

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/marble.zip - NSF Track 4 Pretty sparse sounds throughout. Not bad breakbeat-style stuff, but there's not much cohesiveness or observable structure here. The lead is incredibly generic-sounding and flat. Too bad too, because I liked the attention to panning heard in some portions of the mix. Interesting slowdown dealie at 1:00 only for a new section to take over at 1:38, but that also was sparse and flat just like the very beginning of the track. The delivery here is so flat that it tanked this one out of the gate. As elements dropped out at 3:12 going towards the finish, I was reminded of how incoherent the whole thing turned out. As an arrangement idea it sounds unsalvagable to me, since it deals too minimally with the source, so it's best to just wrap this up with a NO.

http://www.snesmusic.org/spcsets/ts.rsn - "Zue" (ts-25.spc) I've certainly heard better sounds used by Young in the past, but this was definitely some quality rearrangement beyond the time signature change, including plenty of instrumental variation. I also could have gone for the bassline being more prominent as well as the percussion being thicker, but the overall product is solid work. Though this doesn't stand out to me versus Ziwtra's other mixes, it's cool stuff nonetheless. YES

http://www.tzone.org/~llin/psf/packs2/LoM_psf.rar - 123 The Darkness Nova The synth guitar strums here are really sparse, though the drums at :28 helped thicken things up. Nonetheless, the lead melody is very atonal/flat in the delivery and lacks presence over the synth guitar stuff, and that kills this one immediately. The rearrangement isn't particularly engaging either, and lacks significant development & energy throughout. Better luck next crime. NO

Yeah, I remember KyleJCrb requested for me to play this on VGF once it came out, and I turned it down due to how ridiculously overcompressed this is. Crunchy the whole way, with no high-end whatsoever. Danny B absolutely laid out the problems on this one. Production is grating/shrill/terrible and this needs more rearrangement compared to the source tune. It would be a more servicable offering if you guys just toned this down and refined the sounds. NO

Indeed, this was just a poorly done cover. The bass coming in at :08 is flat-out terrible, and doesn't anything to this. The piano could have used more meat on it. Rinse & repeat at :45. Um...1:22, what the hell? Sonically, there's no depth to this at all. Decent enough ideas at making a mix that doesn't stay in one place for too long, but jeez. The chorus of the third track being mixed here (2:45) was probably the best part of the track if I had to name one. Anyway, like Ari said, everything is poorly thrown together. Bleh all over. NO

Correction! Today is VGF #22 from 10:05 PM - 1:35 AM EST, so head over to Ormgas to check it out and follow along with the playlist. Join #ormgas on IRC/EntertheGame (irc://irc.enterthegame.com/ormgas) to chat it up. NOW NOW NOW! VGF22 is really good. And that concludes my pimping of THAT one. Good way for me to recycle the previous^5 message. Bitch.

Today is VGF #26 from 10:10 PM - 1:40 AM EST, so head over to Ormgas to check it out and follow along with the playlist. Join #ormgas on IRC/EntertheGame (irc://irc.enterthegame.com/ormgas) to chat it up. VGF26 features old-school OC ReMixer (and now Emory alum) Electron as my guest host! Be sure to check it out for a number of tracks from him as well as plenty of other good stuff. Good way for me to recycle the previous^4 message. Bitch.

Today is VGF #25 from 1:55 - 6 PM EST, so head over to Ormgas to check it out and follow along with the playlist. Join #ormgas on IRC/EntertheGame (irc://irc.enterthegame.com/ormgas) to chat it up. Good way for me to recycle the previous previous previous message. Bitch.

Bought a new laptop for myself. Next Saturday, we will back with regular VGFs all da time and so forth. During the next few weeks, I'll be working to gather up lots of stuff I lost, but will hopefully have BGM and VGM and all that crud to play. I'll be hoping to do 4 extra shows (I believe I missed 4) in order to catch up with all the material put out in October. Keep an eye out for crud. Yep. Crud.

Other people may have it, but it will be temporarily mirrored today only by fellow Ormgas staff member Cartoons: http://oc.ormgas.com/forum_viewtopic.php?18.7884. Make sure to change the filename to show it as VGF #24. Starts in 10 minutes from this post, and lasts 4hr40min on the Ormgas.com stream. Enjoy, peeps.

Today is VGF #24 from 5:40 - 10:20 AM EST, so head over to Ormgas to check it out and follow along with the playlist. Join #ormgas on IRC/EntertheGame (irc://irc.enterthegame.com/ormgas) to chat it up. It's the April Fool's 2004 episode, indeed widely considered to be the best episode of VGF ever. You need to check it out. Good way for me to recycle the previous previous message. Bitch.

Rab basically said this was just him fiddling with some ambient pads and sound effects for a couple of hours or whatever; not too much effort involved on the creation side, but I judge on the finished product not necessarily the effort it took to get there. Loved this mix ever since I first heard it and it's one of my favorites off KiC. I didn't compare this with "Misty Menace" for a while after listening to this track, so though this mix doesn't have much of a melody, it really expanded things upon actual comparison with the source a few months ago, which was a very pleasant surprise. Though simple and straightfoward, lots of subtle elements came together to form an enjoyable ambiance, and Rab's sure to pick up some fans who enjoy this relaxing, yet melancholy and ominous soundscape. Get ready to loop this one. YES

Wait, that's an AIM noise I hear at :54. This makes this submission either suspicious or stupid, honestly. Not a bad string-based with some rain ambiance, but it could use more development within it's mere 2:31, since I doubt the source tune is very minimalist. Plus, we don't need AOL discovering that AIM sound and suing Dave for billions of dollars. NO

Definitely flat delivery here; work on providing contrast between your instruments. Too bad, since there are some solid rearrangement ideas. The bass guitar synth or whatever that is at 1:10 sounds awful compared to the rest of the sounds, which weren't sequenced that strongly, but at least sounded a measure better. The ending indeed sputters out. This could be so much more. NO (refine the sounds & resub for a YES)

Not a bad over-compressed vibe to start off with, but the intro's way too long (with no particular substance) for a 2:49 track. Some simple ambient textures come in at :59, along with a nice addition to the beats at 1:13. The melody coming in at 1:28 is totally in the wrong key compared to the beats, along with the percussion support coming in at 1:42 (which sounded too muffled). The idea for the ending at 2:26 was very anti-climactic/I give up-ish. Not terrible, but I'm definitely not feeling how everything came together, given how it ultimately turned out. The intro needs the fat trimmed off, the notes to not clash, and needs much more substance crammed into the rearrangament for such a short track. NO

Pretty muted and dry presentation. No meat behind it whatsoever. Seriously learn how to thicken up the sounds on this and fill this out. Like Vig said, and I'm sure Prot will say, extend the ideas here with more material as well. Not much else to say, as the rearrangment had some decent ideas. This would need a lot more substance and stronger sounds to pass at a mere 2:11 though. NO

http://216.40.213.39/%7Eadmin216/digital/lsl1cd/LSL1Track17.ogg - "Eve (Closing Scenes)" Ben PMed asking for feedback while this was in the submissions process. I'm surprised it even made it here, but here were my comments. Finally getting a hold of the source tune, the second half of the mix was decent in trying to do at least something with the source, but this was just a poorly done rip for most of it. Not trying to be mean, but to me you basically took the original MIDI, messed the timing up in the attempt to remix it and came out with an arguably worse product. No dice, bro. NO

As a genre adaptation piece, this could have been much more interpretive and more creative. That's already been gone over well by Dan & DS. Once this retread into the same stuff at 2:56, you knew this wasn't going anywhere in particular unfortunately. The conga work wasn't particularly invasive to me, but it certainly wasn't working there. No real variation to speak of within about 5 of the 6 minutes. You just gotta be more, bro. NO

Not bad stuff. I'm certainly interested in what Disco Dan would have thought about this one. Fairly spacey-sounding, but this could have sounded a bit cleaner production-wise. The rearrangement wasn't too bad, but there could have been more substance there when tackling the actual source tune melody. The tempo was a little plodding at times, and there could have been more substance with the drums; nothing crazy that would have disturbed the flow here, per se, but there could have been something more creative done there to vary things up. 3:00-3:06 felt like there was going to be some cool "one mo time fo da bass" transisition, but nope. At 3:08, you retread into the same source material coverage with only a little variation around the 3:45 mark before heading into the close with another minute left. If this wasn't going to tread any new ground there, it should have been trimmed down, as it gets repetitive while not really maintaining interest. Felt bad for those strings only being used at the very beginning and the very end. Just check out the observations I had and make your own refinements based on those in case you want to resubmit. Good foundations are in place, Jay, but there need to be some more ideas/developments present in a mix that's 4:47 long. NO

Pretty laid back, but like the others have said, the execution is lacking. The bass sounds pretty exposed and too artificial. The whole effort is laid-back, but too dry-sounding in the delivery and lacks in sound balance to me. All of the sequenced material (organ, guitar, bass) is dry. The sax and drums (but not the trumpet) needed more presence, as the sequenced material was louder than the live work most of the way through. The arrangement was decent I suppose, but took no risks. Prime material for a resubmit. No sarcasm intended, but OneUp Studios' fans would certainly enjoy this laid back, mostly-live work. It shows a great deal of effort and promise. Hope y'all give this another few takes to spice up the delivery on the live instruments, try and address the sound balance issues, and possibly add some more rearrangement ideas to expand the scope of the track. Hope you hear from you again. NO (refine & resubmit)

The bad before the good. Stuff like that damn slap bass, bah, that's already an Ari staple but it sounds like trash, and I thought the half note drum snaps were overbearing at times as opposed to the other drums hits which were too sedate and didn't fill out the track as well as I felt they could have. The presentation here felt WIP-ish, analogous to how the sounds with "Forest Birdcussion" weren't quite as full last February with his OGG WIP, before he looked at everything and went for fuller sounds in the final version for that mix. No particular problems here though. Some people won't like the sound choices here and on that level I'm sure there could have been more refinement there, but in many ways (and I know this isn't a great analogy), like I mentioned to Ari on VGF when I talked to him about this, many of the sounds really came across to me like someone pushing the limits of the SNES's sound chip. The synth guitar along with most everything else had a very good 16-bit type texture, which wasn't anything Ari was actively going for as far as I know, but it was there in spirit. Very creative work, and I enjoyed most aspects of the medley; great arrangement ideas, and good transitions on the whole. YES

Pretty cool stuff overall. The only glaring problems I had were from 1:49-1:52 & 2:05-2:09 with that glassy sound you guys used, as it sounds odd compared with the key of the track. Also, 2:53 had a somewhat piercing synth for support that lasted until 3:11. I would have brought the volume on that synth down just a bit. Very excellent variation throughout the mix, as there were several permutations of the groove throughout each verse to really keep things moving. Played this one a month ago on VGF, and it was all good. Mike & Allen are turning into quite the collab team. Quality stuff from them as usual. YES