Emunator   Judges ⚖️

Wow dude, nice to see you around these parts again! I was a fan of your previously posted mix, and this one is speaking to me even more. I really love how you built the majority of your remix around some very simple piano/bass loops, but everything else around it is constantly evolving. You do a great job keeping things interesting without losing sight of the source tune, which really doesn't give you much to work with from the outset. Excellent sound pallet overall. My gripes with this should be pretty easy fixes, but your mixing needs to get a second look before this is ready to post. The overall track is very loud and way too compressed for the genre, I think laying off your compressor would make this sound a LOT better. Kristina also accurately pointed out that the bass is pushed just a little bit too hard. Maybe fixing the compression issue would resolve it, but once you do that, double-check your bass mix to see if it's still sounding overblown. Nitpick - your 808 snare sticks out as a weak spot... it's drenched in reverb and just doesn't seem mixed very well. The thicker snare that comes in when you switch to more of a breakbeat rhythm is much better, but I think that first snare could stand to be sharper and cut through the mix more. Other than that, you've got a very enthusiastic YES vote coming your way if you can make those mixing tweaks I really love this track and hope you send it back soon if this doesn't pass! EDIT: 3/7/15 - No need to hold this one up any longer! I've revisited this track and realized that my gripes are actually pretty small in the grand scheme, and while I would love to hear some improvements this should be good to go as-is. YES

Yikes... this is a really long, daunting track to judge, but even from the first few minutes of listening I'm noticing some huge dealbreaker issues that would prevent this from passing. The overall mastering is one of the quietest I've ever heard, so that's something that definitely needs to be addressed. In general, the instrumentation is very sparse, and there's never too many ideas going on at once. I can appreciate the more minimalist approach to orchestration, but in this case I don't feel like you have enough ideas present to justify a 12 minute arrangement. A lot of this arrangement is just one or two instruments covering the melodies of the source tune without a ton of interpretation or flow. The section from 8:00 - 8:40 was one of the most interesting parts of the mix - I think if you could trim down your arrangement significantly and focus in on moments like that where you build up your orchestration more fully and take a more interpretive stance on the source material, and I think you might be onto something. As it stands though, most of this just feels too sparse and quiet to hold a listener's attention. NO

Wow, Chimpazilla left a fantastic vote on this and I'm not really even going to try and top that. She said what I had in mind much, MUCH more eloquently. To quickly summarize, I think you have an excellent idea on your hands here... Gruntilda's Lair has such a playfully-creepy vibe and I think your glitch hop treatment managed to mostly capture that vibe while still personalizing it enough to make it your own. I love your use of negative space to imply the Gruntilda melody without explicitly running through every note. That was a great touch that really made this your own. However, your production and detail work is holding this back. The dry string leads and the awkward-sounding gating going on hurts your track overall, that's the biggest component of this remix that doesn't click for me. Additionally, I don't feel like you paid as much attention to detail with your drums as you did to the bass/synth processing (which was pretty cool overall!) Your snare sound was weak, as well - experimenting with layering multiple sounds together will help you get a snappier, more interesting sound... I feel that this could apply to your kick, as well. In general, more variation in the drum patterns would help this along - there's a TON of opportunities for interesting syncopation and fills but that aspect of the mix is falling flat comparatively. This has a lot of great potential and I hope you can overcome your personal hangups and take some of this feedback to heart, so we can hear this one again with some revisions and improvements. NO (resubmit)

I have to be honest, I wasn't feeling this very much. The synth sounds, while mixed and arranged pretty nicely, aren't grabbing my attention at all, and the arrangement is very static so there's not enough time to compensate for the simple sound design with a compelling, dynamic arrangement, either. There's very little in the way of grand, exciting breakdowns or transitions (in fact, I noticed the same filter sweep re-used a couple of times, which was off-putting for such a short track.) The writing and adaptation is probably the most interesting part of this, but as the other judges have pointed out, the source is only present half the time. Not sure what to say, there's not much to latch onto here as a listener. I think Jivemaster did a great job summing up how I felt here with his vote :-\ Sorry dude. I've heard some solid submissions from you in the past but this one isn't clicking for me. NO

The levels really don't sound where they need to be on this track. Your rhythm guitars are eating up pretty much everything else, and while I understand that the rhythms are a primary focus of the mix, they're causing everything to sound squished and indistinct. This is an issue I've noticed on a lot of your recent mixes - for example, your Apex 2015 mix or your Technomagmar track from Gameboy 25th were almost painful to listen to without turning down the volume because of how much you're pushing your compressor on the master track. This track, while I don't think it's quite as bad as those other two, still falls victim to some of the same issues. In general, I like your arrangements and you're obviously quite capable on the guitar, but the way you're mixing everything is just a little bit overdone and it makes it difficult to fully enjoy what you've made. Also, in general I feel like the synth design here is pretty basic and doesn't really excite me. The majority of your synth sounds are dry and lack much expression, and the patches themselves aren't very intricate so that element of the track is rather forgettable. I feel like the guitars steal the show here, so it's good that the most prominent element in the mix is as strong as it is, but I would love to see some more compelling synth sounds from you in the future. Let's see what another pass at mixing can do for this one! NO (resubmit)

Remix Title: "Witchy Glitchy" Remixer Name: Spike Caravan Games Arranged: Banjo-Kazooie Songs Arranged: Gruntilda's Lair, Bridge to Gruntilda's Lair I've been trying, off and on, to get something accepted onto OverClocked Remix for the best part of a decade. Everything I've ever submitted has been smacked down for the admittedly excellent reason that it wasn't very good. So this, dear judges, is my final attempt - it is as good as I know how to make it, and I believe that I can do no better. If you find it to be sub-par, I shall hang up my remixing hat once and for all and move on to pastures and projects anew. So, that being said... here is my remix! It is the Gruntilda's Lair theme from Banjo-Kazooie, reworked in a style that I suppose you would best describe as glitch-hop. I made it using a frankly prehistoric copy of FL Studio 4 and, I think, mostly free samples and soundfonts. The source is as familiar to me as anything can be and I have been consistently humming and whistling Banjo's soundtrack since 1998, so you may find the arrangement to be liberal, although in my own head it never strays unreasonably far from the point. Your mileage may of course vary. Anyway, I've been listening to this for so long that I can't even tell if it's good or what, so... I hope you enjoy it, perchance even green-light it, but either way, I enjoyed making it, and that, at the end of the day, is really the goal, isn't it? - Spike Caravan (PS please don't publish my real full name, thank you ) ----------------------------------- Source:

This one really caught my ear when I was going through the inbox. I was totally on board with giving a YES vote to this track... until I saw the length 2 minutes really isn't long enough to create a fully realized remix in most cases, and especially with this track, it feels like you fizzled out just as you were getting into a solid groove. As Chimp said, this has room for at least another 2-3 minutes of material. Other than the length, I really enjoyed what you have in place - each of the little sonic elements contributes to a wonderful, afternoon vibe that I could listen to on loop while driving or running. It's all very pleasant, but you've gotta give us more content than this! Just to be clear, too... we're not looking for you to just loop your track for another 2 minutes, because that won't fly, either, but at least another minute or two of substantial development to your ideas without using direct repetition would be enough to sway my opinion on this NO (PLEASE resubmit!!)

Remixer Name: Faseeh Real Name: Faseehudeen Email address: Website: https://soundcloud.com/gottagofas User ID: 52345 Game arranged: Sonic Colors (Wii) Name of arrangement: Evening Mist Name of individual song: Planet Wisp - Act 1 Comments about the remix: I feel this is one of my works that I really like. Thinking it'd be nice to get this out, I decided I could put it out to OCRemix. The remix is inspired by French and Chill House that I had been hearing. I wanted to do something minimalistic and something that'd keep true to the original source, while giving a different musical dimension. Planet Wisp is a beautiful place, and just imagine being there with dew on the leaves, mist surrounding you, sky all purple and you're lost in the serene beauty. Source:

I was considering this for a DP but the overall structure and some of the transitional passages were really unconventional so I wanted to get this vetted by the panel instead. Will listen more and vote later. EDIT: The vote's already been closed out at this point so I'm going to keep this brief, but since I commented initially, I'd like to formally put my vote behind this track as well. This is insanely creative, full of spirit and atmosphere, and does a lot of fun stuff with the source. I can feel personality oozing from everything you do Joe, and this is no exception. YES

This is for Brandon's FF2 Album REMIXER INFO Remixer Name: XPRTNovice Real Name: Joseph Zieja Website: http://renmanstudio.com REMIX INFO Games Arranged: Final Fantasy II Name of Arrangement: Miles and Miles Away Name of Individual Songs Arranged: "Magician's Tower" Remixer Comments: You seriously don't want to hear the first time I tried to mix this. Brandon wanted me to do this, and I thought, cool, I'll try my hand at something prog-metal ish. It was ass. I spent 8 months creating an utter failure, then promptly threw it away and accomplished this mix in less than 24 hours. Many thanks to Brandon for mastering. Warning: Guitar, clarinet and drunken yelling are live recorded in my basement, where both of these things go together. Source:

Remixer name: YamaYama Real name: Milo Fultz Website: http://www.yamayamatheband.com Userid: milothefultz (http://ocremix.org/forums/member.php?u=49032) Game: Mega Man II (NES) Name: The Locker Room Songs used: Bubble Man -- Milo Fultz // Upright and Electric Bassist // Bass Teacher and Music Theory Tutor w: www.milofultz.com Source:

Contact Information ReMixer name: ladyWildfire real name: Elizabeth Carter email address: ladywildfire05@gmail.com website: https://soundcloud.com/ladywildfire userid: 11659 Submission Information Name of games arranged: Sonic Chaos (Game Gear), Sonic 3 Name of arrangement: Atlantis Name of individual songs arranged: Aqua Planet Zone, Marble Garden Zone Sources:

hello again, ocr =) this one's a touch old (i finished it in 2012), but it's still a track i'm quite fond of. remixer name: prophetik music real name: Brad Burr website: i shut down prophetikmusic.net, since i wasn't really using it, so i have no website currently. userid: 8761 name of game: witcher 2 name of arrangement: Caemm elaine luned individual song arranged: dwarven stone upon dwarven stone (#4 on the soundtrack, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_jizNCiInw). the track is quite spacey for most of it, and not really a true 'song' until 1:55, so that's where my arrangement started. your own comments: i contacted katethegreat19 in 2011 for some assistance remixing this track, for an unrealized album. she professed to being quite busy (this was before her album came out), so she recommended a Finnish friend that she knew through YouTube, "ShyTooShy" (that's Merrigan's YouTube channel's name). i got in touch with her and she was quite interested in putting this together. we nailed down some initial background tracks, got an idea for the actual melody and how we wanted to do the vocals, and she wrote some original lyrics using the Lore pages on the Witcher's wiki in in-game elvish (that are startlingly applicable to the storyline in the Witcher and the Witcher 2, actually). . real life hit, then, and i spent almost a year struggling to find time to compose. i finally was able to put some time in to finish the backing tracks when my wife finished her masters work. Merrigan recorded her parts, and we were able to get them mastered and into the track. then, in true prophetik fashion, i sat on the track for a year and a half while doing nothing with it even though it was finished. i figure it's time to let this one out into the world. on the technical side, the majority of this was done using FL Studio and Melodyne, with Omnisphere, EDIROL Orchestral, Elastik, and Kontakt 4 making appearances. nothing complex on the mastering side, since i'm not very good at that part anyways =) enjoy! Lyrics: Caemm elaine luned Mire belleteyn eate blath esseath feainnewedd gar'ean ilamas invaerne Va faill eate ceadmil gwen tedd Midvaerne shaent Me wedd, caelm caerme dice dearme, evelienn esse... Gynvael, evelienn esse gynvael A'taeghane minne, me Luned Translation: Come, beautiful daughter Look at the blossoming summer-flower You are a child of the Sun consider the maturing winter Farewell summer Greetings white season Midwinter song My child, slowly destiny says goodnight everything will be... Ice, everything will be ice Today love, my daughter. Source: https://youtu.be/d_jizNCiInw?t=1m55s

remixer name - TheWereSloth real name - Scott Hanks email - website - http://www.redheadgames.com game - Metroid arrangement - Kraid’s Layers songs arranged (original) - Kraid’s Lair Thanks! Source:

Hey there OCR, This was my first submission from The Sonic Zone Remix Competition 2014. My zone theme was Metropolis Zone from Sonic 2, which is arguably one of my favorite zones in the game. I wanted to do a remix that captured a lot of the energy of the original source, but turned things up a notch with some layered synth instruments and some tasteful SFX and scratch sample use; something I think it particularly relevant in the Metropolis B melody section. Hot Crater makes an appearance in some of the backing parts throughout, but also is featured more prominently in the middle section of the track, as well as in the counter-melody that is playing off the classic Metropolis melody at the end of the song. Above all else, I wanted to create something both full of energy and a lot of fun. Enjoy! My Contact Info: My ReMixer name: SuperiorX My real name: Matt Keller My email address: My userid: 28286 Submission Info: Games arranged: Sonic 2 (GEN), Sonic Advance 2 (GBA) ReMix Name: Urban Renewal Songs arranged: Metropolis Zone, Hot Crater Sources: Metropolis Zone (Sonic 2)

Hey OCR! Your ReMixer name: Garpocalypse Your email address Your website: Garpocalypse.blogspot.com Forum ID 31287 Name of game(s) arranged Mega Man 7-Shademan Mega Man 10-Ballade Name of arrangement The Underwater Adventures of Shadedog This was my second entry for the 2013's WCRG. I absolutely love the soundtrack to Aquaria and after playing it a little while one night I thought it would be fun to try to adapt the Shademan theme to have a more watery feel to it. Source Breakdown: 00:24-01:27 Shademan 01:28-01:49 Ballade 01:50-02:10 Shademan 02:11-02:53 Ballade 02:53-03:35 Variation on Shademan 03:35-03:58 Ballade 03:59-04:19 Shademan 04:19-04:40 Ballade 04:40-End Shademan Sources:

Hi, Long time no see! Been fairly busy since my first post 2+ years ago and haven't spent much time on remixes since then. However, last July I did find time to remix the title track from Sean Hogan's Anodyne soundtrack. It was done for a remix album he was putting together for the game - I had no intention of ever submitting it to OCR - but I just relistened to it after including it on my original album and thought, "Hey, I actually enjoy this. It probably won't get accepted, but why not give it a shot?" So... here you go. I love the original track - it's short (under a minute long), with not much going on, but it has this wonderfully dreamy and nostalgic sound that instantly transports me to the game world (like most of the rest of the soundtrack). I wanted to keep the dreamy feel, and ended up turning it into a chillout remix, my first attempt at that genre. Hope you enjoy! -Josh Contact Information Your ReMixer name: Drakken Your real name: Josh Freund Your website: drakken.bandcamp.com or soundcloud.com/drakken Your userid: 26449 Submission Information Name of game(s) arranged: Anodyne Name of arrangement: Dreamscapes Name of individual song(s) arranged: Anodyne Composer: Sean Hogan Game was released for PC in 2013 Link to the original soundtrack:https://seagaia.bandcamp.com/album/anodyne Source:

ReMixer & real name: Eino Keskitalo e-mail: forum id: 20708 Names of game arranged: Portal 2 Name of Arrangement: Motion Sickness Names of song arranged: Reconstructing Science Source: This is a tweaked version of my PRC220 entry. (http://compo.thasauce.net/rounds/view/PRC220). I got lots of great feedback from the competition & in the workshop, especially Gario and timaeus222. Fun side note: I did music for a game jam game just before the round ( ) and used that piece as a template to get the compo submission done quickly. Polishing the mix to this point took the usual two years, though.Arrangement-wise I've taken the basic 8-note melody/figure and based the bassline on it (I've "shifted" it to the offbeat, rhythmically) and built from there. I introduced a bit more obvious/conscious source connections thanks to Gario's workshop mod review. The title is a bitter one, I would love to play Portal 2 (co-op!!!), but I get motion sickness from the game. Some source breakdown follows. Here's the bits I've used from the source: 0:51-1:05 "half-time" main riff 0:00-0:07 "fast" main riff; the variation/ending at 0:05 is only referenced once at a bg melody. 0:29-0:36 background stuttering melody-ish support bleep 0:22-0:29 bassy line 0:00-0:08 revving up, no source 0:08-0:23 stutter support bleep 0:24-0:53 bass line made from the half-time main riff, stutter support bleep 0:53-1:08 bass line made form fast main riff, slow square wave bleeps use half-time main riff 1:08-1:10 actually has a quiet "ticking" line based on the fast half-time main riff 1:10-1:19 half-time bass line with original lead 1:19-1:24 the above continues, with secondary melody based on the fast main riff (from 0:02 and 0:05) 1:24-1:26 ticking 1:26-1:40 square wave lead plays the half-time main riff 1:40-1:48 in addition, the ticking plays the fast main riff 1:49-1:56 in addition, the filtered saw lead is based on the bassy line from source 1:56-1:58 it's the ticking! 1:58-2:13 original section, though there's some ticking and stuttering in there from the source 2:13-2:43 the fast bass line + the half-time riff on the square lead; original leads, ticking & stuttering from source in the background 2:43-> the ticking.. THE TICKINGGG Yeah. Cheers! Source:

You know, I noticed that shaker issue too but I let it slide, but now that I listen again it's really bothering me. Since someone else noticed it too, I'll make a tweak and pop out a new version when I get home. Thanks guys

Holy hell this is a stellar remix, guys. I can't sing enough praises about how seamlessly your styles mesh, and just how goddamn cool this is. Definitely one of the best high energy tracks we've had in a long while!

Quick notes: pretty nice sounding, but there's times when the dynamics are TOO strong on the loud notes. The sample quality is better than I normally hear on acoustic guitar but the lack of expression on anything other than velocity and the occasional pitch bend is off-putting, it's hard for me to feel engrossed in this. What is here is nice, but something feels incomplete about the mix - there's enough secondary elements so that it doesn't feel like a solo guitar arrangement, but not enough to really feel like a full composition. Can't tell if it's an arrangement/writing issue or if the mix is lacking in low frequencies? Gotta listen to this more. EDIT 2/10/2015: After giving this a break and listening again, I think I'm going to stick with my gut reaction on this. Each of the issues above would not necessarily be a dealbreaker alone, but this just doesn't feel like a complete concept. The sequencing on the guitar is better than most attempts I've heard at sequenced guitar, but still not convincing enough to work for me. The way the background elements flutter around the guitar without really grounding the track makes this feel slightly directionless. On repeat listens, the strings also sound unhumanized and unrealistic to me, as well. It's really hard for me to pin down what I would recommend to make this work. I feel like there might be some limitations on how far you can take this without enlisting the help of an actual guitar player, but aside from that there's some structural/flow issues that I feel need to be addressed too. It's tough to do this because I actually really like your concept and inspiration behind the mix, and the way you derived this from the source tune was very cool. But the execution just isn't totally clicking for me. I'm interested to see how this vote pans out. Good luck either way! NO (resubmit)

Quick notes here... strong mix of sources, as usual, but this feels very "paint by numbers" to me... nothing jumping out as very memorable. Noticeable lack of bass for the first part of the song compared to later on. Mixing is a bit troublesome, but I need to think on this to determine whether it's solid enough to pass despite feeling generic and by-the-book. EDIT: Honestly, on my second listen through I feel like I didn't give nearly enough credit to this with my initial impression. There's actually quite a bit of personalization going on here with the synth design and I can tell that, although it sounds fairly similar to your usual work, there was still a tremendous amount of attention to detail put into crafting this. I'm not sure what I was hearing on my first listen, but my second impression of this track was much more positive. The lack of bass at :48 still seems like a big error, when you compare it to 2:14 and onward, for example. I feel like that would be a relatively quick fix, but beyond the scope of a YES (conditional) vote. Other than that, I have no issues with this that would keep it from passing, but the lack of bass presence for the first 2 minutes ends up being a dealbreaker in my book. NO (quick resub please!)

Hmmm... I don't really know how I feel about this. Chimp noted that she wanted to hear "more" from this arrangement, and I agree entirely. This feels like there's a lot of unrealized potential here compared to what I've heard Shaun in the past, but at the same time it doesn't feel like an incomplete piece, either... it's just a little underwhelming. Breaking out into some more bombastic percussion or some more interesting sound design in the breakdown sections would certainly have helped ramp this up in my eyes. Curiously enough, even though you were trying to get away from synths and get back to more organic instruments for this arrangement, I actually really like how you handled the synth parts of this, and think this is a great example of how I'd like your synth leads to sound in other tracks (such as your recent FF4 submission, "Eclipse.") The acoustic instruments overall work pretty well. The percussion has its fair share of flourishes but mostly resides in the background. Yeah, I dunno... this isn't your strongest showing but I think it's just solid enough to get by. I like that you're experimenting with some different sound pallets and styles though! YES (borderline)

Hey Mads! Been a while Really made me happy to hear some new stuff coming from you. I agree that I like this track in a bubble. The intro/outro are quite spacey and it's great hearing your acoustic guitar coupled with a more fleshed-out soundscape. I really want to give you more credit for source usage on this, because I'm hearing a lot of hints of Pikmin throughout the song, but the percentages really don't work out in your favor... The chord usage in the first minute is identifiable but not dominant. It's not until the switch at 1:00 where things really click into place. I tried to connect 1:30 in your remix to :48 in the source, but the phrase never seems to resolve so it ends up feeling more "inspired by" than anything. But that connection might be worth looking into for Chimp/other judges, they might find more of a connection there than I am. Production-wise, things are mostly solid - your acoustic guitar is impeccable as usual. The metal passages aren't as bulletproof - 1:30 - 1:59 felt lacking in bass although I could hear how you were emulating traditional black metal production style so maybe that was intentional? Guitar tone is working, drums are slightly stiff (watch your hi-hat patterns) but nothing was seriously wrong with it. Really, this comes down to source usage for me more than anything. I want to give more credit but most of this feels more inspired by the source than anything. Keep sending stuff our way and definitely resubmit this one if you feel you can introduce more overt source into it! This version just isn't cutting it for me... will keep this on my playlists regardless, though! NO (resubmit?)

Very heartfelt, moving performance. Instantly, the concept, original and cohesive lyrics, and the expansion from the source earns some major points in my book, despite some of the flaws I'm going to elaborate upon. Your vocal style has grown on me with repeat listens, and I especially have to give props for how expressive and emotive you became from 3:37 onward. Everything really came together in those final sections I have a bit more to critique on the production side than some of the other judges. First of all, I agree that the guitar sounds over-compressed and/or lo-fi... generally just plain off in the mix. Regarding the strings, I felt that the samples and the articulations you're using work great when playing the long, sustained swells that comprise most of the backing track, but the faster legato passages from :26 - :34 or :10/3:04/other places throughout the track fall flat to me in terms of realism. The piano sample was also distractingly low-quality in the higher octaves at 3:17 - 3:54. On the topic of vocals, I didn't hear most of the autotune issues that Will chimed in on. The vocals don't sound totally professional, but for an amateur fan site like ours I thought Dustin's recording/processing work was more than enough to get the job done here There were a couple of curious anomalies that bothered me, namely the abrupt vocal cuts at 1:17, 1:38, 3:41, and 4:36 that just felt like slightly sloppy editing. It would be nice to have those ironed out but it's not a dealbreaker by any means. I found the arrangement to be pretty static up until the 3 minute mark. I would have preferred that section to be more condensed, or feature more variation. The breakdown around 3:01 was a welcome change, and the higher-intensity sections that followed felt like a natural expansion on the groundwork you laid down. Overall, all of my nitpicks pale in comparison to what your arrangement gets right. As a whole, the blemishes are relatively minor and infrequent, and for the majority of the time your production is more than adequate for the concept you were trying to execute. I went back and forth on this track for a long time but I feel comfortable passing it in spite of its shortcomings. Best of luck with the rest of the vote YES