SwordBreaker

You're getting a lot of support on this track, OA. Can't wait to listen to the final product.

Going to get this as soon as I get back to my home town. Can't wait. I've only played a bit off FFIV Advance so essentially this will be a new experience for me. Question: is "you spoony bard" still in and is it voiced?

I'm not a tech wizard here, but maybe the hangs are due to some stupid virus/malware/spyware problem. What kind of protection programs do you have?

I'm done with my recordings. Anyone know where should I send the files to?

I'm interested in lending a hand. Provide me the detail as soon as you can, OA.

Aha. Too bad. Well...in my case the extras more than make up for it. Hate to deviate from the thread's topic a bit, but has anyone picked up FFT A2 for the DS? I'm really enjoying this one. Storyline kind of sucks, but everything else kicks ass.

Preferring War of the Lions in my case. The re-translation is just awesome. Just give it a chance. Ability, job and weapon names are more authentic this time around instead of some of the absurd names in the original. Additionally, you have some nice little extras with the PSP port. The new cinematics are extremely stylistic with that unique cel-shading technique. Voice acting is well-done, too. Two extra jobs. Two extra characters to unlock. Playing as Delita in some parts is pretty cool even though not very significant. Despite the annoying slowdown, the PSP port is definitely cleaner in my case and some of the special effects seemed to be modified (which is what's possibly causing the slowdown). If you can ever get someone to go multiplayer on the PSP port, then you're going to enjoy those missions. Interesting that the slowdown isn't present in the PSP slim, Hawkwing. And what's this about clocking your PSP phat to 333 mhz? How do you do that?

http://blog.wired.com/games/2008/07/why-a-wii-fight.html#more It's really sad to actually read about how this game came together. Konami not giving the producer a budget, Wii third-party games not selling enough, the producer stalking the Konami booth donned in Castlevania attire...it's sad to see the producer, who is clearly passionate about his franchise, forced to do something like this. I did find his thoughts on Mega Man 9 quite interesting, however. I'm pretty sure that he'll follow suite with a 2D retro Castlevania title. This reminds me of how Mr. Inafune can't do a third Mega Man Legends because of Capcom not giving him the budget.

Ah, fanfiction. It's what actually got me into writing in the first place back in the mid '90s, back when fanfiction.net was not full of junk. I actually submitted my first piece to Hyrule.com.ar, which was one of the coolest fansites around. After it shut down, I moved around until I finally stabilized in ff.net. Man, it's been years since I've written something new. Most of the recent stuff that are in my page now (the '06 ones) are actually stuff I revised, edited, reuploaded, or that have been sitting on my hard drive doing nothing. http://www.fanfiction.net/~maniacswordbreaker The pieces I'm most proud of are definitely "Somewhere I Belong" and "Feelings and Memories", the latter of which was my first piece revised and edited. Unfortunately, due to the rules of not including any songfics in ff.net, "Somewhere I Belong" was deleted so I had to reupload it without the Linkin Park and Richard Marx lyrics. The original can still be read here: http://www.legendofzeldaseries.com/main.php?page=somewhereibelong.html Still needs some tweaks here and there. Fanfiction can be done right. If you check out some of my favorites over at my ff.net page, I'm sure there's something that you'll enjoy. "One Last Smash" was a fanfic that especially caught my interest. It's the best one I've ever read. http://www.fanfiction.net/s/2742870/1/One_Last_Smash Check it out.

http://www.miniclash.com/tuo/uke/Tanguy%20Ukulele%20Orchestra%20-%20Megaman9.mp3 A well performed but somewhat repetitive fan remix of one of the tracks from the trailer. At least he changes to MM2's password theme toward the end.

This is sad news, indeed. Love his work, especially his most recent metal version of the Banjo theme that has been popping up everywhere. Best of luck to the guy.

Post your rumors, leaks, confirmations, and most anticipated stuff here, people. On the hot seat so far is Microsoft going all "Wii-like" with a new motion controller that's rumored to be bundled with Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts. Don't know what to think about this piece, actually. We'll have to wait and see. On Nintendo's side of things, franchise revivals are what everyone is the hot topic right now. Kid Icarus and Punch Out seem to be the most likely candidates. Can't wait for those conferences.

I've been a fan of this track ever since you had this on the WIP forums, Sixto. Love the 80s guitar vibe you got going on there. Love the improvements and additions since I last heard this one. I see you got Zircon on board, he really nailed the whole 80s style with those keyboards in addition to the awesome revamped intro. In a way, the final version seems more faithful to the original track compared to the WIP version in terms of melody. In the end, this was one tough track to remix, since the original is as catchy as the TMNT cartoon theme. You guys managed to make it even catchier. Give me more!

Mega Man 2 for worst game music? You must've been on crack when you nominated that game. Its music is some of the catchiest shit ever. In my case, I'll go with Mario Kart: Double Dash. The whistling was extremely annoying and the composition was downright pathetic compared to the previous games in the series. Only one track stood out, however; Rainbow Road.

Wow. Epic indeed. Steppo is a new face in my case. I'll be keeping an eye on you. Glad that you got Sixto in for some kick ass guitars. Enjoyed the improv from good old zircon, too. You managed to score some veterans here, man.

Although the whole album rocks, I'm currently addicted to Dhsu and Ailsean's tracks. They're so chill!

Interesting point. I especially agree with you regarding the aforementioned two composers. When Mitsuda goes celtic, he's immediately recognizable. Like when he remixed Pikmin's overworld theme for Brawl, when I first heard that I was like, "typical Mitsuda-style there". I did hear that he tried something radically different with a Japan-exclusive game called Armodyne for the PS2. He went all rock/metal with that game...or so I hear. Regarding Mega Man X, one of the reasons I love most of the series' soundtracks is because of the rock influence. Even the most recent game in the series, Mega Man X8, had some truly kick-ass tunes. But yeah...once you look hard enough, you can easily find "influences" of mainstream music in game music or the other way 'round. Do you have anything that comes to mind, Risingforce? Like a few particular tracks that immediately come to mind?

Thought of making a topic about this after experiencing something like this recently. My friend had this old 80s CD which we were listening to in his car. There's this song called "Faithfully" by Journey. Very nice power ballad which just says "80s" everywhere. But what interested me the most is that the main riff of the song is similar if not identical to the main riff of "Elec Man's stage song" in Mega Man 1. Somehow, it made the song even catchier to my ears. So...take it away, guys.

Your track kicks ass, man! Very catchy. Loving the sax, piano, and electric guitar playing.

http://www.vgfrequency.com/the-bad-dudes-announce-no-balls-no-glory-a-remix-project-based-on-technos-super-dodge-ball/ http://www.NoBallsNoGlory.net. Super Dodge Ball remix album. You guys, I'm really, really enjoying this. I downloaded this album with low expectations. Best Bad Dudes album ever. Seriously. Tight production, wonderful sounds. I'm not even familiar with the original material. That'll hopefully change when I pick up the DS remake. Speaking of that, it's nice that you've collaborated with Asksys on this. Does this mean that these tracks will make it in the game itself or is this just a marketing promotion? All in all, just wanted to point out how cool this album is and thank the "bad dudes" behind the music. I'm pretty sure that most if not all of the tracks are OCR-worthy. Going to keep this on my playlist for awhile. BTW, the OCR Dodge Ball project has a lot to live up to after this release. Good luck, guys.

Basically, what Darke and Sixto did was take the original songs and implement the 80s-style rock of the 3D Sonic series. Brilliant work with the arrangement there! The vibe I got from this track is exactly like when I first listened to the Angel Island Zone Brawl remix. Only thing that's missing is some vocals.

Yeah, we'll have to wait and see how fresh this "custom creation" mechanic gets. But as LittleBigPlanet proves, the concept can get very appealing...especially if it's this deep. Obviously, there's going to be negative reaction from fans of this "new direction"...and I hate the fact that these people call themselves fans if they're expecting the third installment to basically be a bigger and more polished version of Tooie. Because let me tell you, Tooie bored the hell out of me because it was a bigger version of Kazooie. The first game had the right balance of platforming and exploration...Tooie, on the other hand, is almost like a sandbox-style game with millions upon millions of things to collect. I only liked Tooie when they changed things up a bit with FPS elements and innovative transformations. Kudos to Rare for doing this. Seriously, it's rare to have unique 3D platformers these days, and the genre itself is basically dying because the whole "collect-a-thon" formula doesn't hold up so well this generation. Stuff like Mario Galaxy and Ratchet and Clank are excellent because they've added new concepts or mixed other genres onto platforming.

http://www.1up.com/do/previewPage?cId=3167777&p=4 http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3167781 Trailer looks AMAZING. The rock version of Banjo's main theme sounds so cool! And LOL @ that last bit of the trailer...don't know if that's a tribute or a satire to Mario. Either way, that was cool. Loving what I'm reading in the preview. This quote is what I've loved the most: "The platform game genre -- it's quite traditional in its approach," continues Mayles. "So we thought, 'If we're going to reenter that genre, we need to do something that's going to make people look twice,' rather than just dismissing it as, 'It's Rare, there are going to be millions of things to collect, and everything will have googly eyes.'" I'm so glad they realized one of the stale elements of the platforming genre. The whole "collect-a-thon" idea is seriously getting old and tedious. I mean, I was fine with it in the original Banjo Kazooie and Mario Galaxy, but Banjo-Tooie seriously turned me off because there was millions of things to find. So yeah...with this new installment, I'm loving the fact that things stay "traditional" in the overworld, while being machine-based in the actual levels. The fact that you can create these things from scratch kicks ass. Not only that, but your creation adheres to the game's Havok-based physics engine. So your machine may not move as well as you'd like (or just topple over) if you have the dynamics wrong. Very nice. As I predicted, online multiplayer is in. Looks like it'll play like Twisted Metal. They better add offline support, though. No talk about any "innovative" controllers bundled with the game. Thoughts?

This is one EA game I actually don't mind buying at all. Finally, an ORIGINAL and GOOD EA game for a change instead of the crap they've been feeding us for so long.

I hear Mega Man 7's "Spring Man" and Dragon Quest's "Overture" in there too in addition to the other stuff you guys pointed out. Nice stuff indeed. Too long, though.