Gario

Hey everyone! I'm doing some finishing touches on a track that I've worked secretly on - it's a complex mash-up of every final battle song from the Final Fantasy series 4 - 9 (well, except for FF5's final boss, couldn't get it to work with the others for some reason...) - I definitely wanted to have y'all give it a listen before I go send it off to the panel! I was having a hard time blending all of the different orchestral & choral parts with my 8-bit style, but I think I got it down now. Give it a listen, tell me what you think! Quick note: I used the new OCR tool for mixing/mastering, I think it really helped bring this to fruition. I wish I had the old files for this, but I lost the original files for it while moving some of my hardware around, so whatev's. Hope y'all enjoy! Sources:

Hmm, I think y'all are being a tad harsh on this one. The track is certainly on the quiet side, but the balance of tracks isn't off, save for the lead guitar from time to time,and outside of a little ducking with the kick the production is quite good. The mix isn't perfect, but I don't think the bar is THAT high, here; the theme is easy to hear (which corrects the issue that this had last time), and nothing gets completely lost in the mix. The arrangement does leave roughly -4dBs of headroom, but that's a really easy fix - put the WAV through Audacity and amplify it, not something to reject it over, IMO. Honestly, the arrangement is great, the soundscape is really rich and varied, and while the mixing isn't perfect it's certainly serviceable. I think it'd be a great track to post, as long as the levels were corrected (and I don't think that should be done without a WAV of the track - that'll be up to him). YES (Conditional on the Levels)

Well to get started, you may look into the US legal system's definitions of "Fair Use", which allows for the use of material if it's used for educational purposes, parody, or sufficiently transformative, AND if there is no profit involved in redistributing the material. It's not a bulletproof, anything-goes silver bullet for all things remixing, but it is often the justification used for the distribution of rearranged music on OCR. If you have questions about the whole process, the basic wiki for fair use (and it's links) are a fair place to start, as well as looking at OCR's FAQ section and our content policy section (OCR has a lot of experience dealing with this very issue!). Again, there is no silver bullet, and honestly things are resolved on a case-by-case basis, but in general that's the blanket justification for arranging VG music, which most companies understand and silently comply with. As far as the asshat who is stealing YOUR music, there is no fair use justification for stealing your material and claiming it as their own. You made it, you have a defacto copyright on the material, so if you want to go through the effort you could get Soundcloud to remove it. Up to you, but yeah, that guy has no right to take your music as-is and simply claim it's his.

Overall, the arrangement itself is competent, if too short (1:30 is a really short arrangement). The instrument quality and mixing does take this below our bar, though - the "big band" aspect has instruments that sound hollow and mechanical, with the reverb levels not really helping it sound more "real". The fact that the arrangement sans the piano portion sounds like an upgrade of the source also leave it sounding a bit on the conservative side, to boot. That piano solo, though... man, it's actually quite the diamond in the rough, there. It's got some real spice, it's well sequenced (if it ain't actually performed), it has a real "Joplin" flair to it that give is a whole lot of character, and honestly I think a whole Mario 2 arrangement could be based on that portion alone and easily be postable on OCR (it'd need to be longer, granted). So yeah, honestly the big band sounds more like a vehicle for the honky-tonk piano part, which isn't exactly an insult since that piano part is quite good. I would suggest sticking to one's strengths on this; if you decide to pursue this one, really go all out with that piano. Otherwise, listen to some of the other orchestrated tracks on OCR to gauge what is considered acceptable, as far as "realism" goes, as unfortunately there's a lot of uncanny valley going on with the big band elements of this. NO

Note: If passed, this will need to have a new title. - Gario Contact information ReMixer name: VGHDRemix Real name: Bryce Atkinson Email address: Website: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvEWap9j26rqHhxKCbLDrtg Submission Information: Name of game(s) arranged: Super Mario Bros. 2 Name of arrangement: Overworld Theme (Big Jazz Band) Name of individual song(s) arranged: Overworld Theme Original Composer: Koji Kondo Console: NES Link to the original soundtrack: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBISfv-6hfo Inspiration: Mario Kart 8, Super Mario Odyssey, and Super Smash Bros.

I sent you a Battletoads surf city remix on January 2017, and yeah you were right, it just wasn't there yet then. Though for now, I've remade the track and wanted to try again: Artist - OJJ real name - Olli Vainionpää email - website - http://ojjmusic.com/ Game - Battletoads (NES) track - Surf city (level 5) Original - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sw3bp0Of_ys Composer - David Wise I Agree for all the terms and rights to give this remix for free for everyone! Hope you like it this time and it's gonna get released and I can finally, after 10 years of lurking OCremix - be a part of the greatest community in the web! Olli

Seeing Stars, remix of Star Maze from Super Mario Land 2 Remixer name: Quasartur

Your ReMixer Name: Lucas Guimaraes Your real name: Lucas Guimaraes Your Email Address: Your website: https://twitter.com/Thirdkoopa Your userid (number, not name) on our forums, found by viewing your forum profile: http://ocremix.org/community/profile/33965-thirdkoopa/ Name of Game(s) arranged: Secret of Mana Name of arrangement: Hallucinatory Province Name of Individual Song(s) arranged: The Dark STar Link: Other people that helped: ImAFutureGuitarHero, Stemage. Stemage opted not to give his email but gave me the blessing; I can get him added in here if necessary. This track was on the Pixel Mixers album "Whispers from a Verdant Grove". This was my first shot at doing the "Psychedelic Rock" genre where I got influence from three eras; any psychadelic rock after The Doors, The Doors, and some psychadelic rock before (which explains the Tabla and the Sitar). I'm super proud of how it turned out; especially with the fantastic performances of my friends ImAFutureGuitarHero, who provided the Bass, and Stemage, who provided the Guitars and Drums. While I never got to finish Secret of Mana myself, it's music always stood out to me, and this part of the game definitely sticks out. Hope I did everything right again; lmk if anything else is necessary

Hey! Your ReMixer name: Guido1291 Your website: Guidomusic.org Name of game(s) arranged: Legend of Zelda Name of arrangement: Lost Woods Remix Name of individual song(s) arranged: Lost Woods theme Made in Reaper. Made from scratch.

Hello again, OCR Judges Panel! Let's try with a Legend of Zelda remix. The Main Theme! Link to the file: Contact Information: ReMixer name: Glejs Real name: Glenn Liljestrand Email: Website: https://www.youtube.com/glejsmusic User ID: 34608 Submission Information: Name of game arranged: Legend of Zelda Name of arrangement: Main Theme (Deffo Deffo Remix) Name of individual song arranged: Main Theme My own comments and info: First of all, this must be one of the most recognized and played videogame music tracks out there.. But I guess these melody lines are legendary, everyone will love them forever. Initially, I started laying out some ideas for a Legend of Zelda Main Theme remix a few months ago already. But it's been on ice since then, because of the Skies of Arcadia OCR remix project and other things. Last weekend something happened. It was a long time ago I finished (and felt great about the result) a track so quickly! My remix is a rather easy going, summery mood kind of piece. You have some filter sweeps and a steady dance beat. I put in some grit in the groovy bass mid section, and slowly move everything back into the main melodies of the game. I'm really satisfied with this one. Mastering, mixing and arrangement. Hope you'll find it fitting for the OCR family. All the best, Glejs (pronounced "Glaze")

Please find my submission details below. Contact Information Your ReMixer name - Pyrus Your real name – Andy Bryer Your email address – Your website - https://www.youtube.com/user/pyrusFTSC/videos?shelf_id=0&view=0&sort=dd&view_as=subscriber Your user ID - 35471 Submission Information Name of game(s) arranged – Super Metroid Name of arrangement - The Loneliest Bounty Hunter in the Universe - [Lower Brinstar - Super Metroid Metal Cover] My submission YouTube link: Name of individual song(s) arranged – Lower Brinstar theme – Super Metroid Link to the original soundtrack - Super Metroid OST – Lower Brinstar -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zj5DWB5a2n8 I never really played Super Metroid as a kid but I recently had a chance to play through it a bit. One of the first things I noticed was how atmospheric it was, and how depressingly lonely and hopeless it would feel to be Samus, on that planet - to be surrounded by nothing but peerless terrain and horrible aliens. I tried to capture some of that feeling in my composition. It is all my original arrangement; I played guitars, synthesized bass, drums, and other effects; and mixed and mastered everything myself. Unfortunately, YouTube has compressed the track slightly, so in some louder parts it is not quite as clear as I would like. I hope you enjoy. Kind regards,

I really love the chords, I love the overall handling, the soundscape - I'll start by saying that I love this arrangement. I think some might find the static background a bit much, but I actually feel it's unchanging nature enhances the overall atmosphere, especially with the subtle changes that occur throughout. The only this I've got against this is... er, why is this so quiet? I checked; you can easily push ~10.5dB using an amplifier alone, and with minimal limiting you could easily get another 5 dBs without noticeable loss. This is just too quiet for OCR, and there's no reason for it. I'd actually be fine with letting us do the basic amp'ing of the track if we had a WAV, but this time we just have the Mp3 so we should ask her to boost the levels as necessary. YES (Conditional on Levels)

RebeccaETripp Rebecca Tripp http://www.crystalechosound.com/ ID: 48262 Game(s): Majora’s Mask Song Title: Heart Medicine Songs Remixed: Song of Healing

Contact Information Remixer Name: Mizztery Real Name: Brad Mizzi Email Address: Website: https://soundcloud.com/bradleymizzi User ID: 30273 Submission Information Game Arranged: Dynamite Headdy Name of Arrangement: Tempus Fugit Name of Song Arranged: Sky High Link to Arrangement: Link to Original Song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxufD4mx9Nk Dynamite Headdy was a brilliant game from the Sega Genesis. My brother and I used to play it all the time back in the day. There's plenty of guys that have done brilliant covers of this song (GaMetal for example), but I felt like giving it a run myself, as something short and sweet. Enjoy!

Oh hell yeah, this is a kickass arrangement of a really short source. I'll be the first to admit that the arrangement meanders, but the quality of the chips and blending of nice meaty drums with other modern synths more than make up for it. The source is in this in spades, but it avoids playing the same thing twice. Fill in another gap to my favorite Megaman game soundtrack with this excellent little tune? Yes, please! YES

ReMixer name: bsolmaz13 Name of game: Mega Man 3 Name of arrangement: Rock The Masters Name of song arranged: Stage Select Comments: I've always loved this short classic tune and wished many times it was longer and had more variety to it. So I set out to create just that myself. The track starts out in an 8-bit style -even gets to a recreation of the original at one point- and suddenly evolves into something modern. Essential to me was to add and alternate between enough newer elements so the track and it's samey (although awesome) melody doesn't get too repetitive. Also important to me was that I kept using 8-bit channels/instruments throughout the modern part to create some sort of retro-modern hybrid which I really like. I hope everyone else does too!

ReMixer name: Michael Hudak Real name: Michael Hudak email: Name of GAME: The Legend of Zelda - Skyward Sword Name of ARRANGEMENT: Takeyabu Resort Promo Package, 1991 Name of SONG ARRANGED: Bamboo Island Link to song: The Bamboo Island theme from Skyward Sword was the perfect choice for a vaporwave track. It's a genre that kind of started as a joke but took on a life of its own, one that's usually inseparable from its nostalgia aesthetic, and very fun to listen to in short bursts. There was a resort somewhere in Japan, built during the heyday of its economic boom, and every year this place would send out promotional video packages to lure customers to a week of fun and compulsion. Imagine! Maybe the place still exists as an invitation only club, with no Google Maps presence, somewhere deep in a bamboo forest... (Takeyabu is Japanese for wild bamboo grove. As opposed to chikurin, which is a...well-kempt one.)

Not my style of music, so I'mma differ to others saying this is typical to the style so I can accept that a lot of the pumping in this is stylish. I've heard things in this genre before that sounds like this so... yeah, I'm going to place that in the "Not my taste, but not necessarily bad" category. I can't give the copy/pasta a pass on this, though; the song is quite short, and a good portion of the song is simply a repeat of the body. More could (and should) have been done to distinguish it from the first half of the song, because with something that has as little change to the soundscape as this song does throughout the issue compounds into something that makes this hard to finish when you're listening to it. Change up the second half so the copy/pasta isn't nearly as much an issue anymore and I'll give it my stamp of approval. NO

ReMixer: Sebastian Bash Name: Sebastian Frisk Mail: Website: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfiXo7-qAWuqBhBSLchLplg ID: 35461 Video Game: Splatoon 2 (Octo Expansion) Arrangement Name: Fly Octo Fly ~ Ebb & Flow | Metal Cover Song: Fly Octo Fly ~ Ebb & Flow Composer: Toru Minegishi Game System: Nintendo Switch Original Song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wk4Hcjqn3VE I really love this song, and got inspired by another Youtuber who made a rock cover on the song! I’ve always wanted to give this genre an honest try, and this is what I ended up with. I spent extra time with the drums so that they wouldn’t drown in the mix and sound dry, and I think it came out pretty well! I recorded and mixed everything in Fruity Loops 12. I hope you will like the cover, and accept my submission! Many Regards Sebastian

Oh, neat - the game isn't released yet, but this sounds pretty slick. Quick question: you used the "Submitted" tag, but I don't see it in our inbox (actively mulling through it, have been for a spell). Were you planning on submitting this to OCR? It would be a shame to miss it because of a misunderstanding. If you'd like to submit, you can find instructions for it here. If not, sounds pretty neat regardless so thanks for sharing it!

Link RebeccaETripp Rebecca Tripp fern.ivy@gmail.com http://www.crystalechosound.com/ ID: 48262 Game(s): Final Fantasy 4 Song Title: Streets of Mysidia Songs Remixed: Mysidia

The Native Dialect Your real name (prefer not to use) https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCA-MBhBSUewOn6dheufa0Rg User ID: 19224 Street Fighter III: New Generation "Bronx Bomber" Jazzy NYC (Underground Edit) Originally composed by Hideki Okugawa for Street Fighter III: New Generation, released in arcades during February of 1997 for the CPS-III arcade board. https://youtu.be/zxqRI_bfxgQ I produced this arrangement in GarageBand, and mastered it in Audacity. I performed the guitar segments on my Ibanez Talmon electric-acoustic guitar using an iRig interface. Total production time was about five hours split between two consecutive days. Victor Wooten and Cliff Burton were both influences in my approach to the bass line, which I treated more like a small solo from the 0:18-0:40 mark. The drum rhythm is directly inspired by Joe Daniels' drum performance on the Local H song "Bound for the Floor," while I attempted to emulate the timbre of Janet Weiss' drum performance on the Sleater Kinney song, "Jumpers," specifically her live performance from Big Day Out 2006. The synth melody that appears from 0:18-0:40 is styled after the famous synth progression from Kool and the Gang's "Summer Madness." I also drew quite a bit of inspiration from A Tribe Called Quest's "God Lives Through," specifically from the horn section of the song's sample.

ReMixer Name: DusK Real Name: Dustin Branscum Email: Website: http://www.itstartsatdusk.com User ID: 24328 Game: Sea of Thieves Arrangement Name: "A Shark Hunter's Tale" Song Arranged: "Summon the Megalodon" Platform: Xbox One/PC Composer: Robin Beanland Link to source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dG0DVnB0do Link to remix: Comments: It feels really good to be remixing VGM again. With this track, inspiration hit mid-game. I was sailing, pulled out the hurdy-gurdy, and this track hit. I could kinda hear the arrangement in my head right then, and immediately set out to work on it. I wanted to really maintain that Golden Age of Piracy feel in the track; it had to be heavy, but still something you'd hear during the tavern scene of a pirate movie. Lots of staccato strings and a fiddle. At the end, I decided to fade it into a soft campfire scene, a drum and a whistle, just like the character that brought the shanty to us during the Hungering Deep event. Anyway, I hope you guys like it! And if not, I look forward to reading Larry's essay.

Well, honestly I think this sounds great - the production values on this are pretty high, and there are some neat textures in the background that add some flavor to an otherwise already exciting battle track. There are two issues that make this problematic for OCR, though. first, despite the change from orchestral to chiptronic, it does still sound identical to the source. I acknowledge the small arpeggios in the textures that try to help this stand out, but the tempo, the structure, the... well, everything else is note-for-note the same as the source. I'm going to call this one too conservative for OCR. The second issue is that this track uses an exact repeat in order to pad half of it's length - this is essentially a 1:30 song that's padded out to a 3:00 track. For what it's worth I still think it sounds really cool, but I don't think I can justify posting it on OCR since it doesn't really fit the site mission statement of interpretive arrangements. NO

Download link(s) ReMixer Name: Sera Real Name: Nick Puccia email address: Website(s): https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCh8dsWVDqMamaiP2yG0fUBA https://soundcloud.com/sera_official https://sera.bandcamp.com/ UserID: 35428 Name of game: Octopath Traveler Name of arrangement: Octotronic Altercation Name of songs arranged: Battle I Composer: Yasunori Nishiki System: Nintendo Switch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gU9Lfn7lPCc