Emunator

Game: NiGHTS into dreams... (Sega, 1996, SAT) ReMixer(s): Skrypnyk Composer(s): Fumie Kumatani, Naofumi Hataya, Tomoko Sasaki Song(s): Gate of Your Dream Way back in day I had thought about doing a NiGHTS EP where I'd find 6 or so people to remix Gate of Your Dream in their own style, compile the mixes together and release a 20-30 minute EP dedicated to this one tune. Though I never did pursue this, Level 99 had started up his own NiGHTS project and had approached me asking if I wanted to be apart of it. I remember asking him not to tell anyone about my contribution to the album. What I meant by that was I didn't want to be credited at all with this mix. No mp3 tags, no linear notes, no mention on the site, nothing. Not that I thought my mix was bad or wanted to pull an Alan Smithee, but I thought it would be unique if the album ended with a hidden or anonymous track, and see if people would be curious enough to figure out who was behind it. The original idea at the time was to create two mixes, one being bright and fun, the other being dark and eerie. I never got around to creating the darker mix and have since lost interest. This remix is sort of a reprise take on my Escape mix where I resample a few elements. I wasn't fully satisfied with the remix that ended up on the album. I liked the idea, didn't like the execution. I've spent the last two weeks going back and touching up a good portion of the mix, rewriting some parts, polishing the mixing, etc. etc. Side note - some things to edit on the artist page: - no longer with deviantart - new homepage: http://skryp6.com - new e-mail: ^ - new YouTube channel with unfortunately wacky link: http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBEPvToEq3DIpP8AW3rZAPg Sources: (brief cameo)

Didn't even think to test this last night, but WOW! The mobile version of the forums is really so much better than it was (i.e. nonexistent!) That seems to be the biggest improvement here by far!

Making a note here that the Review Threads no longer link back to their respective remix pages, and same with forum profiles linking to artist profiles!

Very interesting approach, dude. Really, your treatment of the two sources is pretty straightforward, like most of your other Seven Years material, but the strength in this arrangement lies in how you merged the two sources together seamlessly and adapted it to a much more high-fidelity, expressive sound pallet. Your sample quality is really great - production and sequencing is a bit rough around the edges, but nothing too bad. I agree with Chimp, this is too underdeveloped and short though! Especially ending on a slightly dissonant, harsh sounding flute section, I would have really liked for that section to function as more of a breakdown before building back up into a beautiful climax that's more texturally similar to what you did in the first minute. The way this ended didn't leave a great taste in my mouth. Need more meat! NO (resubmit!)

Hmmm... normally I appreciate your off-the-wall approaches to mixes but I have to be honest that this one isn't working for me. The first 2 minutes of the track suggest a lot of potential with the deep horns jusxtaposed with the distorted synths, but your beat/arrangement is actually pretty static and there's not a lot of development happening once it kicks in, sonically. I feel that those parts need more interesting syncopation, beat patterns, changeups to the brass... something to catch and continue to hold my interest. The last minute of the track is not really compelling enough or fleshed out enough to stand on its own to really stand as nearly half of your arrangement. Again, cool textures and ideas but they don't sound nearly as fully-realized as your normal submissions. Not doing it for me dude NO

Solid resubmission! Reading over my original vote from 4 (!) years ago, I obviously liked the bulk of what I heard, and that hasn't changed in that time! I still think the meat of this track is rock solid, and the addition of some proper lead instruments in the intro was just what the doctor ordered While I know you've learned a TON over the past 4 years since this track first debuted, and I'm sure you could do a lot more with this if you were to rebuild from the ground up, this is comfortably above the bar. Production is ace, the lead writing is interpretive and classy. Memorable moments such as the classic Fanfare transition at 1:36 show that you've always had a great ear for crafting creative, inspired arrangements that demonstrate a level of nostalgia and appreciation for the Zelda universe, even when you first started out making music YES

Lately, I've been listening to a lot of alternative R&B (artists such as FKA Twigs, Banks, Drake, and The Weeknd) and wanted to write a remix that took some influence from that style and married it with my signature chillout style. This originally started out as a remix of Aquatic Ambiance, but I quickly found that the melodies from Forest Interlude fit much more naturally with the style I was working with. You can still hear a lot of residual elements from that first attempt (the opening bell melodies at :38, the breakdown at 1:02, and of course the iconic pitch-bent flute/piano at 1:47 and other scattered points in the song) but over time this grew to be a Forest Interlude mix done in the washed-out, watery style that you'd expect from an Aquatic Ambiance mix. Hopefully it's not too jarring! This shares some similarities to my previous submission, Laguna Tides, on the surface, but this time around I tried to amplify the moodiness to create more tension than I have in previous mixes. I went to extra lengths to use more sound design and effects throughout the mix, as well, to keep things fresh and create various singular moments for the listener to latch onto. Overall, I believe this is one of my most sonically-cohesive, detailed arrangements, and my best production work to-date. Hopefully you agree! Sources: /

I'm intimately familiar with this source tune and lately I've been getting deep into this futurebass/chillout style you've adapted it to, so on a personal level I was really excited to hear this track. Reminds me of some of the more chill songs off of Madeon or Porter Robinson's new albums There's a couple things holding this back from being ready to post, in my opinion. First, the gating/sidechaining effect that you use on a lot of your sounds is cool, but I think it needs to be applied more sparingly. It knocks out so much from your soundscape that there's often times where you're sitting on a lot of dead space, and it's rare that the song sounds truly fleshed out. 2:51 is a good example of where this song shines, if you could get more of your remix sounding like that, I think this remix would be much more effective. I'm hearing some significant distortion being caused by the filtering you used in your intro/outro, that's something that needs to be looked at and tamed. Your drums are genre-appropriate but also very dry, I think a touch of reverb might improve the sound here. This is especially noticeable during the breakdown around 1:40. On the note of that section... the transition into it really doesn't make sense at all. It feels like it comes too soon in the arrangement and does not flow smoothly at all in or out of that part. There's a lot of issues present, and truthfully I believe it would take a LOT of work to get to a passable state, but I really enjoyed the concept of your track and would love to see this again someday. Thanks for submitting and good luck in the future! NO

Contact Info Remixer - Bass-Sick Name - Lion Cardenas-Heath Email - Site - Soundcloud.com/bass-sick Submission Info Game - Donkey Kong Country 2 Arrangement name - Forest Interlude Composer - David Wise Link to Original -

Wow, this is a very emotive track - I can really feel the power and heart behind your performance. By OCR standards, what I'm hearing is mainly a straightforward cover of the original source adapted to guitar without a lot of original writing or added dynamics, which would unfortunately make it a rejection in my book, but I wanted to panel this to see if other judges might give your adaptation more credit in terms of personalization from the source. To your credit, the rhythm guitar parts gradually become more intense as the arrangement goes on, but I don't really feel like it's enough to push it over the edge, especially when the arrangement is so short... To me, this seems like a very nicely done cover, but unfortunately not what OCRemix is looking for. Definitely interested to hear others' thoughts. Great work on the cover either way, Chris! NO

MP3 Link: Name of Remixer: Geeks and Guitars Real Name: Chris Chirico Email Address: Website: http://www.youtube.com/user/geeksandguitars Userid: 53743 (geeksandguitars) Submission Information Name of Game Arranged: Breath of Fire II Name of Arrangement: The Two Winged Princesses Name of Individual Song Arranged: Left Unspoken Additional Information (OC Remix Song Link): http://ocremix.org/song/14598 Comments: This is one of my favorite songs from one of my favorite games. In my opinion there are few tragedies found in video games as powerful as that of the two winged princesses of Windia. Breath of Fire II and its soundtrack are very underrated and I really wanted to let this song shine, so I came up with this acoustic arrangement. This is my own arrangement and recording and I have played all instruments myself. I have a different mix with drums and bass that I've posted to my YouTube Channel, found here, but I decided to submit this acoustic mix to OC Remix, which I have not posted elsewhere. This is my first submission to OC Remix ... please be gentle! Thanks for listening! ------------------------------------------------------

This is brutal...ly loud. My grandpa ears can't handle it :-\ Seriously, killer arrangement with a lot of energy and great rhyhtm/lead parts, but most of the same critiques from my last vote on one of your mixes holds true... The master track is overcompressed and way too loud, and while I appreciate the effort to integrate synths into your track, the patches you used are pretty generic, mixed dry, and lacking in expression. Your arrangement and playing chops are solid, but I think you need to make some improvements to your mixing game when tackling remixes in this genre. NO (resubmit!)

ReMixer Name: DusK Real Name: Dustin Branscum Email: Website: http://www.itstartsatdusk.com User ID: 24328 Game: Pokémon Arrangement Name: "Technomagmar" Songs Arranged: "Battle (Vs Trainer)", "Battle (Vs Gym Leader)", "Opening" Platform: Game Boy Composer: Junichi Masuda Release Year: 1998 Sources: Come on, you know them already. Link to ReMix: Comments: Get it?! "Technomagmar"? It's a play on words or something. Real instruments are the shit. Don't fuck around. Pokémon Yellow was my favorite Game Boy game. I practically obsessed over it. My brothers and I shared it, but I got a hold of it first, so my brothers had to play a character named Dustin. HA! From a "I want to do this" standpoint, this is a remix that's roughly two years in the making. From a "okay, I'm gonna do this" standpoint, this is kinda recent. Not as recent as my Titanfall remix ( and I kinda wish I could have used those greatly improved tone sets for this track), but recent. Originally, this track was just straight up metal. But I wanted to go off the beaten path, and create something a little closer to the feel of the soundtrack. Using several "keyboardish" synths, I set out to make that happen. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Jmty_NiaXc - Battle (VS Trainer) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9OO5VAKk0d8 - Battle (VS Gym Leader) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdJQopRuH1E - Opening

First off, I gotta give you props on your arrangement here - even for a 6 minute arrangement you still manage to pack in a TON of ideas and pretty much eschew any direct repetition, without feeling unfocused. Some highlights for me include the great synergy between the bass writing and the engaging beats, the square synth soloing, and the occasional introduction of that iconic Ruby/Sapphire trumpet sound Lots to love here. The source usage is definitely an issue - I'm not having any trouble hearing how you adapted the Littleroot source when it is present, but the bigger problem is how many extended breaks you have throughout the song and how often the source usage that is present becomes marginalized in the mix by other non-source elements. It's a bold, ambitious attempt but by OCR standards, I think you fall short on source usage. I won't spend too much time retreading the production issues Kristina brought up but they're spot-on critiques that need to be addressed before this track is ready to be posted, as well. I find it hard to suggest a resubmission on this track because it sounds very complete as an arrangement as-is, but if you were able to polish the production and sample quality in a couple of troublesome places, and were willing to make the source usage more dominant in the arrangement, this could stand a good chance at passing. Regardless of whether you send this back, I appreciated the effort that went into this arrangement and hope you continue to send more stuff our way! NO (resubmit)

Another cool, crunchy guitar/synth jam from Eino! I find your stuff growing on me with each successive listen. Although your tracks generally seem pretty texturally straightforward to me at first listen, there's a deceptive amount of craft and detail that goes into each arrangement that makes them enjoyable. This track is no different. Love the use of distortion effects and lead guitar tone. I feel like your guitar work is outshining the synths in terms of expressiveness, but they fit pretty nicely regardless. Overall, this is firing on all cylinders - the only reason I paneled it was because some of the source usage went off rails at times, and I wanted to make sure it jived with everybody else. Eino himself said it was more liberal than usual, but the breakdown seems to check out for me. Quality work! YES

Hello, here's another submission of an arrangement from the Game Boy 25th Anniversary EP project for consideration as an individual release. ReMixer & real name: Eino Keskitalo e-mail: forum id: 20708 Names of games arranged: Mega Man II (Game Boy) Name of Arrangement: Miljoonamiehen muistelmat Names of individual songs arranged: Title theme Source: MP3: FLAC: This is another PRC tune I decided that the Game Boy EP project would motivate me to finish. This comes from the quite recent round number 270. I had won PRC268; I picked a theme from Death Rally for round 269.. no mixes seemed to appear. As an incentive of sorts, I promised to make an entry for the next round. Yami won that round with a pretty sweet, mellow electronic tune and chose the title theme from Mega Man II. I started early figuring out a couple of bass lines, and when the finishing rush came about I recall spending about a day recording bass, guitar and clavinet over copypaste drums. It must have taken more than a day surely though, I just don't work that fast. All the feedback from the compo version was citing problematic structure & flow so I worked to fix that, thanks to everyone who commented. Extra cheers to the round winner OneUp, who seems to have been a fan of this one. Post-compo I added two synth tracks from my Roland SH201, padding it up a bit + replacing some of the constant guitar noodling. Pretty much everything apart from the drums was assembled from live takes, with lots of the usual editing & patching I do. This was a very fun track to do, kind of back to alt/Finnish rock roots for me. Finishing it in time for the GB EP was a bit exhausting but I'm happy I got it done. Thanks to Brandon & Alex for running the EP & giving direction. Especially thanks to Brandon for the idea to slap some effects on the guitar here and there. And as always, many thanks to my fiancé Pirjo for insight & support! She remarked that this sounds much like our old band Claudius, which was a surprise to me, but it's true. Back to roots indeed. Source breakdown: Source link: The source has been transposed half a step. 0:00-0:11 original intro/bridge 0:11-0:30 "fast verse", bass follows verse chord progression (0:00-0:22 in the source); guitar lead plays the verse melody (0:01-0:20 in the source); 0:26-0:30 synth plays the ascending line at 0:21-0:22/0:37-0:38 in the source half-time (19s) 0:30-0:47 "half-time verse", bass variation on chord progression; guitar noodling loosely based on the verse melody (17s) 0:47-1:06 "fast verse", synth & guitar play the verse melody; the synth plays the ascending line half time at 1:04-1:06 (19s) 1:06-1:19 "chorus", clavinet plays the source riff from 0:22-0:37; synth plays the ascending line at 1:18-1:19 (13s) 1:19-1:38 "fast verse" synth solo based on verse melody (19s) 1:39-1:56 "half-time verse", guitar noodling loosely based on the verse melody; synth plays the ascending line at 1:54-1:56 half time (19s) 1:56-2:05 original intro/bridge; the synth plays the ascending line at 2:05 (1s) 2:05-2:37 "chorus", bass solo! source on the clavinet; ascending line at 2:36-2:37 on synth (32s) 2:37-2:58 original intro/bridge 2:58-3:17 outro, original 3:17-3:46 outro, verse melody references on guitars at 3:21-3:24, 3:26-3:29, 3:31-3:33, 3:35-3:37 (15s) Source usage: 154/229 seconds (67%). Even if counting the half-time verses & the synth solo with only say half source usage, detracting about 27s, it's still at 55% prominent source usage with 127/229 seconds. It's a bit less source usage than I realised while making the piece, that long ending jam sure has an effect there. Aaand that'd be all. Cheers!

I had to do a double-take to make sure that this source tune was actually from Guild Wars. Pretty cool backstory behind how a song like this made it into a game like that Anyway, this track started off pretty deceptively and shifted through a couple different styles before settling into a fidgety electro house style. Pretty creative approach here to adapting the source, the mix of acoustic and electronic sounds is actually very interesting and produces some unique textures that I haven't heard in a mix before. Pretty engaging beatwork and cool modulation on your synths leaves a lot to like here. I've got a couple of gripes with the track though. After :51, you pretty much settle into a mode that doesn't change up or break down until the end of the song, and uses a lot of wholesale repetition of parts (for example, the section that begins at :51 repeats several times throughout the track with very little variation.) Maybe I'm missing some of the more subtle changes throughout the remix, but my initial impression is that this is a very conservative with too much direct repetition. Production-wise, things are pretty abrasive and overcompressed, I would recommend easing up on your volume levels just a bit so this isn't so harsh on the ears... not too much, because loudness can definitely work in your favor for an aggressive electronic track, but I think you overdid it just a bit. Arrangement is the big point that needs to be addressed here, along with some additional finesse to the production, I think this has some potential but it's not quite ready yet. NO (resub)

Remixer: Burningsticks Name: Tobias Löfkvist Email: Game: Guild Wars 2 Arr: Sunny Balalaika Original track: Sunny Glade ( ) I used an old balalaika I found to record this track, therefore the name! thank you!

Have to co-sign with the judges above - there's a very washed-out quality about the mixing that is not sitting right with me. The overdone reverb levels, the boominess of the bass, and the overall blending that affects the whole soundscape causes this to sound very underwhelming for an arrangement with so much energy. This is a really solid effort for a first attempt at metal, and especially since it was done so quickly, but I don't think I can sign off on the mixdown as it stands :-\ Hopefully Nabeel can make some tweaks here on short notice and get a revised version in our hands. NO

First time hearing this one - you really did an incredible job expanding on the simple melody from the source and breathing new life into it with your unique chord changes and harmonies. I like this arrangement a lot. The repetition that Chimpazilla mentioned did not bother me, to be honest - in my opinion, there's enough sonic additions and development throughout the track that the arrangement doesn't really need to be touched. Production feels lacking on several fronts, however. Most significantly, your piano tone is extraordinarily bright and tinny, which surprised me because I thought the piano sample used in your previous FF6 submission was quite full-bodied. It makes me think that the way you chose to mix and produce the sample in this remix just isn't working, and that it's not a sample quality issue. I understand that you don't want to use the same production treatment for a solo piano mix as you would for a more upbeat electronic track such as this. However, I think you went too far in EQing frequencies out of your piano sample and that you should shoot for a more full-bodied tone. Kris nailed it with regards to the drums - your kick and the occasional cymbal crash are really one of the only audible percussion elements in the song, with pretty much everything else being drowned out. The beat and the bass aren't sitting where they need to be in the mix. I think you would benefit from taking this to the Workshop forums for some more specific feedback. You've got a stellar arrangement but this still is not ready for primetime due to mixing issues. NO (resubmit!)

This is yet another quality addition to your growing body of work, Brad. Your music always has a very professional, cinematic quality to it, which is impressive because every one of your submissions seems to tackle a completely new genre. Your arrangement maintains the solemn feel of the absolutely-gorgeous source tune, but expands the instrumentation in a very natural way. Merrigan's superb vocals feel like a perfectly natural addition, I was truly surprised to find out that the original source didn't already have vocals included in the first place. Very easy call YES

I'm going to agree with Palpable, he really did a good job highlighting the strengths of this arrangement. Very cool harp runs throughout the track and a creative, expansive take on the Stone Tower melody are some of the high points for me. He also touched on a couple of major issues. The drum writing is not all that exciting to me, you could explore some more fun rhythms and fills to prevent the arrangement from becoming plodding. I also agree that the drum machine sounds were very out of place. OMG, the flute lead is extremely shrill and absolutely drenched in reverb. It's making parts like 1:28 - 1:44 and 1:48 - 2:08 almost unlistenable. There's some major audible distortion around 2:04... you've gotta look into that. Truthfully, I'm also not sure what's going on with the low string instrument at 2:08 or elsewhere throughout the track. The sequencing exposes some very odd decays/attacks and does not sound natural at all. The riff that the instrument plays also sounds aimless and doesn't add much to the arrangement, in my opinion. It has a very cool tone but the unrealistic sequencing and directionless writing is not clicking for me There's a lot of work to be done on this track, but I think you've got some great potential here as well to build off of the elements of the track that are working. NO (resub)

This is an extremely competent mix with solid production and sound design, but I found myself mentally checked out of your arrangement about halfway through. When you drill in and pay close attention, there's a lot of subtle detail work that makes this a substantial improvement on the original track, but I agree with Palpable... while it works exceptionally well in the context of background music, as a standalone arrangement I just don't think there's enough variation or attention-grabbing ideas. I can't find much fault your effort on the track, it sounds like you achieved what you set out to do and the co-sign from the original composer is always a plus, but at the same time I don't think this really satisfies the criteria for what we're looking for on OCR. Sorry! Would love to see something more from you in the future. NO

Source usage is super-easy to make out on this track, but it's sufficiently personalized. Not going to dwell on that portion of the track. Arrangement-wise, I'm somewhere in between Larry and Kris on this... It's true that you retread a lot of ground, but ultimately I think you introduce breakdowns frequently enough that it falls into a fairly traditional song structure that works without feeling too static, especially when working with a repetitive source tune. If you go by the numbers like Kristina did, this is a repetitive arrangement, but just going with my gut, I think this has enough variation in its current form. Mixing is causing problems here during the busiest parts. There's really nothing I can add on top of what Larry said, so I'll quote him again: This all rings true, and I don't think I could actually get more specific than he did, it's just something you'll need to spend a bit of time tweaking and ironing out. Perhaps you'll have some luck on the workshop forums but my best advice would be to pick out a couple of mainstream/professional reference tracks that sound similar to what you're trying to achieve here, and do some A-to-B comparisons in your DAW and experiment with different mixing/compression settings until you achieve results you're happy with that keeps the intensity of your current mixdown without becoming overcompressed and too loud. Good luck dude! Hopefully this should be relatively easy for you to revise and resubmit! NO (resubmit!)

I actually found myself very impressed by this arrangement after coming into this with some reservations based on Larry/Kristina's comments, but I found myself engaged and interested with your arrangement all the way throughout. True, everything sounds tonally similar and utilizes mostly the same instrumentation throughout, there are some significant changeups such as the introduction of some light percussion around the 2 minute mark, or the transition into "Chasing The Black Caped Man." To me, when you consider how many different sources were pieced together across multiple different soundtracks, the fluid arrangement and consistent mood you were able to achieve is actually even more impressive. Your sample set is decently strong, thankfully the harp sound that you've built much of the arrangement around is a strong, emotive sample. The flute is a little bit less convincing but it's not bad... everything else is more than enough to get the job done No real complaints there or on the production front whatsoever, you did a very nice job there. I really want to YES this track, and this might be an instance where Larry yells at me for "making perfect the enemy of the good" () but once you pick up on the chimes, it's really distracting. Like, enough to push it to dealbreaker status for me, and I hate to do that on such an otherwise-strong track, but it's debilitating to a point that I really think this needs to be sent back to deal with the constant chime hits. It's definitely overdone here and it does impact my ability to enjoy this remix fully. Regardless of how the rest of the vote goes, what you got right here was done very well and I have to give you major props on that Good luck! NO (resubmit!)