Gario

Yeah, definitely tonally different from the source. What can I say, that's kind of what OCR's all about, in some ways, so nice work on that front. Listening to this on headphones, as well, I can hear what Larry's talking about on the panning being very wide, though there doesn't seem to be any moment where the panning gets unbalanced and distracts headphone users. Concerning the rest of the production the lead guitar could've had some more high-end EQ to help it stand out better, but other than that nitpick it's well within OCR's par. The source usage... I had to go back and listen to the source after listening to this, since it's so outside of what you expect, but it's certainly all there. I'm pretty impressed on just how different this sounds from the source while still technically having the source in there. I can see what others have said about the second half having quite a bit of similarity to the first part for some time, but I don't think it's an issue; the portions that are "repeated" are done so in a different, higher key, which makes it sound like an anthem's callback rather than just straight repetition. This is a solid arrangement; let's get er' done on here. YES

Well then. Good thing SD3 is an ARPG, then.

That's criminal. Bare minimum, you need to play through it three times for the different story line progression possibilities, as well as a few times more so you can experiment with the various character progression possibilities that one can experiment with... Probably the only game I've run through more than FFV, which is actually kind of scary, all things considered. EDIT: Oh yeah, awesome album, everyone should check it out, and all that jazz.

Hey everyone! Just going to come out as a (former) Magic junky, and see if anyone else is eye-ing the open beta for this. I've been playing the closed beta for the last month, and I can personally verify that it's actually pretty darn good (really darn good, actually). I'll be looking for a few friends to play with (now that they're implimenting a friends list), so I figure hey - may as well see if there's any interest on here. Due to the (final) account wipes coming on the 27th (right as the open beta begins), people will be playing on a relatively even playing field, so there's no better time to give this a shot than now. If anyone's a former MTG player, a fan of other CCG's (like Hearthstone, Eternal, etc.), or just want to dip their toes to the expensive world of MTG without spending any money, give this a shot. If there's enough interest I could list people who are playing on here, see if we can get a group goin'. Download the client here. Details on the open beta here.

Loads of variety on the best of this decade - says a lot about the quality of games that have come out over that time. In this decade, I don't think I've played a game that has had quite as much impact on me as Persona 5 - the art, the music, the story, the characters - that game is just phenomenal on every single front. If y'all haven't given that game a shot do yourself a favor and get on it, possibly the best RPG I've ever played.

Well, sure - we used to own a PSP (the battery went bad, kinda ruined the system), and if I really wanted to I own an OUYA (yup, I do still use it) that runs Playstation games to an alright degree. Just sayin' if I'm going to own one of these anyway, I'd like to put whatever games I want on the darn thing.

I wonder if the console will be mod-able, like the NES classic and SNES classic are. My fiance is giving this a solid eye for the holiday season so I might end up with one, and I wouldn't mind doing a run through Legend of Dragoon on it if that's the case, lol.

To be fair, I do think Zircon has a degree specifically in music business and production, so he does in fact have a solid foundation in that area. I doubt he'd say that has nothing to do with his level of success.

Ehhh... Whether or not it happens with one person really doesn't say whether or not it's something that will happen with everyone. Zircon is a talented guy, and he's really made a name for himself outside of OCR with his music and business (which is a pretty awesome feat, by the way), but for every Zircon out there there's plenty of people who have Willrock's experience of virtually no audience transfer. I'm sure having an audience for your arrangements doesn't hurt your chances as a popular musician and/or accomplished composer elsewhere, but there's evidence (at least in this thread, anyway) that it can be a pretty insignificant boon for your other endeavors. A combination of how good you are at marketing and networking is more likely going to give you better luck in having a large audience for your original work than having a large audience for your arrangements, I suspect, which Zircon also has quite a knack for. I understand that it can seem fruitless to logically discuss something like whether or not audiences transfer from one person's composition styles or not, but let's be honest - that's a pretty relevant thing for a lot of arrangers who want to make a living off their music in the future. Whether or not the audiences transfer from your free releases to your work that you profit off of could easily impact whether you're willing to arrange video game music, in the first place (which is how this topic cropped up in here). If someone could crack that nut and figure out how to effectively transfer their audience, that'd be a very useful thing to know. It's at least an interesting and relevant topic to discuss, imo.

If SMK Rainbow Road is the selection, please put me down for it. I will smash that source right down.

Larry thinks it's anything that uses source less than 50% of the time in the arrangement. I kid, but it certainly is an interesting question. I remember ages ago where Deadmou5 accused someone else of "stealing their material" because the song in question used a similar chord progression to one of their songs ("Some Chords", I believe), and the community was pretty split on it. I was of the belief that chords are universal, but I was havin' people accuse me of not being a musician because of how wrong they thought I was. Oh boy. So yeah, there is a level of subjectivity and culture laid into that question. I'm personally of the opinion that there is nothing truly new and original in tonal music, so if the music transforms a theme or source even a little bit I consider it something new and interesting. However, that's coming from a musical nihilism of sorts - the belief that since nothing is original anymore, everything becomes interesting and worth listening to in it's own right, regardless of how small the variance. Hell, even different performances of the exact same piece can grant a keen listener a very different experience, as long as you don't hang yourself up on the originality of it too much. That certainly doesn't cover any legal definitions of when something becomes the arranger's own piece of copyrighted music, but as far as I'm concerned if you're putting your own spin on some music (changing genre, re-arranging the themes, etc.) that piece philosophically becomes your own.

I'm a fan of your music. :3 Yeah, I don't remix much anymore (I tried to force myself to do so in a compo, which was a crushing failure), though I consider this a temporary affliction. The combination of work ramping up and my computer literally aging itself out of the ability to run my music programs (as in it doesn't have the capacity to play my music back anymore, outside of some really basic shit) has put a real damper on my progress. When I finish taking care of some essential purchases for my new apartment, though, I do plan on fixing this issue. You hear that, Prophetik? I'mma be coming for you and your computer building skills... soonish.

Hmm... Well, I'm willing to go back and re-listen to the track with this in mind, especially since I actually really did enjoy this arrangement otherwise. I'm sticking to my guns on my criticism, though, since that remains unchanged - the mixing of the leads is consistently problematic throughout the track, often getting buried completely. However, looking back at a few other decisions I'll check to see if this is actually a deal-breaking breaking issue. Looking at this from a different perspective, while the mixing is problematic throughout, it's oftentimes a bearable issue, only really burying the lead at 1:23 - 1:46 and 1:53 - 2:30 (2:30 - 2:40 the lead is an octave out of the range of the background, helping it stand out). Much of the rest of the track the lead, while not being mixed much differently, does stand out because it doesn't share the same register as the backing instruments. For those paying attention, this is often an easy fix if you're having issues with the lead getting buried in the middle/background: just bump the lead up an octave. Seriously, this can fix the issue about 50% of the time, since often it's less a mixing issue and more of a crowded EQ range in a soundscape. It's still a mixing issue here, sure, but having it share the same soundspace as the accompaniment really compounds the issue. Rather than being an unbearable issue throughout the track, it's closer to being a noticeable issue throughout, with it being really problematic for about 20% of the track. Yeah, I think I might've come down a little too hard on this the first time around, but please pay attention to how you mix your leads in the future in order to save your future projects from such discrimination. YES

Well I can definitely hear Larry's issue with the source being primarily in the background of the track in the first half of the track. I'll never criticize a track for having the source in the background rather than the foreground, but I will point out the weak, almost GM-like quality of the instrument carrying the source at that point. The instrument quality is even more apparent when it's exposed at 1:40 - it's just thin, and it doesn't blend well with the relatively high quality instrumentation of the rest of the track. The performances are pretty darn good, and the arrangement is solid, for sure. I can say outside of the strange choice of source carrying instrument throughout the first half there are some great, haunting SFX that are used to great effect. Production quality on this one is a mixed bag. The first half, while having some concerns with the actual sample quality is mixed well enough, de-emphasizing the source for effect (which was kinda cool). The second half of the arrangement has some mixing problems, though - portions where the lead should be popping out (like at 1:58-2:14) are getting buried behind the rhythm guitar, and the doubling at 2:45 makes the lead sound like a muddy mess. There's definitely something here that would be amazing with some polishing up, but there's just too many things going on at a time that hold this back to justify me giving this a thumbs up this time around. Upgrade the instrument carrying the source in the beginning of the track to something more appropriate to the quality of the rest of the track, and clean up the mixing & muddiness and I'd give this a clean pass. NO

This is definitely different. Ironically, this was submit way back when Dubstep was a new thing, and he came back over five years later to complete the track when it now feels like a callback (it was too short upon initial submission). I've got to hand it to him to come back to this one, he did a great job on it overall. There's quite a bit going for this one, to start with. The production values are very high, first and foremost, and the dubstep hits you hard (in a good way). The FX used throughout are all well implimented, as is the use of space overall in this. The use of space in particular does a great job keeping things clean. The arrangement of the source is... interesting. The source implementation gets pretty stale over the three minutes that it's present, as that main hook plays almost unaltered over a changing background. It isn't bad, per se, but it could've used a little variation without losing the spirit of the arrangement, just to keep it interesting. Other than that minor complaint, I'd have to say the source is pretty well represented throughout, and when it's not the main portion the source is handled in a variety of ways, from being the foreground to accompanying original content in the background. I'm glad to see you come back to this one - I think you'll make a fine addition to OCR's roster! YES

CONTACT INFORMATION: Maksim Ezavskih SUBMISSION INFORMATION: name of game - Yie Ar Kung-Fu name of track - "Kung-Fu Step" Konami, 1985, Miki Higashino COMMENTS: Well, it all happened spontaneously. I've been enjoying the music from the OC ReMix community for 8 years. I was fond of this game in my childhood because it was one of the first game that i played. I have never heard remixes on this melody, so i decided to make a contribution. I found it interesting to transpose this music in dub step style, which is in trend today. I had a CD with samples from Vengeance that I used to write the track. I didn't suspect that it would come out so fancy. I hope you enjoy it! (New Comments) Hi! It's been about 5 years since my last message. In the end, I found the time, and the most important is inspiration to finish the work on the track. I tried not only to extend the track time but also to diversify the structure of the track. I hope this time everything is going to be all right about track. I set the goal to be in the ranks of OCREMIX

To answer the question on how late we are in general... well, right now the judges are slow on our end at the moment (this includes me!), and as far as workshop moddin' things have been fairly slow as well. We've taken a few steps to try to alleviate this as Rozo is on vaca and I'm unfortunately divided on my own attention to the forum, things are definitely not as active as I'd like them to be. On the broader point that OCR ain't what it used to be, yeah, the forums are considerably slower, likely due to the population's switch to Discord channels (which has a robust WIP channel in itself), FB, Youtube, etc., but the staff does still pay attention to the forums. I won't expand on too much more than that, but your observation ain't off too much. On topic, generally we do pretty well with a PM, though, so send one our way and we'll surely get someone to help you out soon. I apologize that I can't give this a fair shake at the moment. I do appreciate the bump, though!

This is both fascinating and hilarious that no one can ID these songs (me included). I'm not as convinced as others that these are taken from other JRPG sources - the handling of the instruments are pretty rough for a professional game release, imo, particularly how cluttered and messy things get when lots of instruments come together (particularly in the first track). Even taking the recording quality into account, I don't think these have the polish necessary for a released VG soundtrack. The arrangements are top notch, though - from a compositional standpoint they're really well done. I can hear where everyone is putting these into PS1/PS2 era games, though; the samples are from that era, and the style is just... so JRPG. I still think these are likely custom for the flash animation at the time, though.

*Sigh* Yeah, this didn't happen. I'd give a million reasons why, but at this point it'd just be excuses filling in for what was just regular ol' irl exhaustion. Still look forward to the entries, though, and can only apologize repeatedly for not stepping up like everyone else here has.

but what do you mean megaman was on playstasion for as long as i remember

Arceace - Oh shit, this is freakin' awesome. That opening just raised some hairs, here, and the overall track delivers superbly with all that gating. The fact that the sources are quite well integrated certainly helps. With a stronger, meatier kick, a little less delay on some of the chips and a hair of re-mixing so the foreground pops out a bit more and I wouldn't be at all unhappy seeing it on the panel. That last chord being major was a bit of a funny way to end it, though - kinda clashed with the rest of the track. AxLR - I was interested to see what ideas you wanted to push, and this didn't disappoint. Very sample-heavy, very trippy, but y'know what, this is pretty cool. I can definitely see what you meant when saying you were worried that people might not catch the source in this - it does sound like something completely different. I think I'm missing the use of Airman (which could be corrected if you point it out), though I hear Metal Man clear as day. I'd say it's hard to argue that you don't use the sources in this, considering you literally sampled the sources to make something different. As much as I love OCR, it sometimes makes me sad that I know we'd never be able to accept something like this for a variety of reasons (direct sampling being the only source reference is a big OCR no-no, for example) - you can get some really awesome results if you open your mind to really making new music from older pieces. If the competition for this one wasn't one of my favorites of the compo so far I'd have been more than happy to send a vote your way for this one (provided you could point out where Air Man was in this). Nice work! Mak Eightman - Solid metal fare. I think the sources sound kinda funny in that genre, but it works well enough. Can't say the sources are lacking, and the production values are decent, so overall nice work. RonaldPoe - Ironically, I think this is how I imagine music for MM1 sounding like in a strict upgrade. The soundscape is pretty thin, though, with little bass to balance out the rest of the arrangement. I'm feeling that Fire Man is pretty lacking in this one, though. pixeltea - Nice. This one jazzes it up in a big-band sort of way, with some slick sax and piano action complimenting a more frentic overall arrangement. While the instrument samples don't make me all that happy, the arrangement and integration of the sources more than makes up for it. The interpretations on Crash on the piano were a real highlight of this track. You've got an excellent sense of how to handle harmony and change things up - looking forward to more from you, in this compo and elsewhere. Ridiculously Garrett - Slow and chill, this one's pretty good, as well. While the other track has a bit more going on with some of those reharmonizations and such, this one brings on the heat with a cleaner, thicker production, and it ain't like this one is lacking in the arrangement department. Yikes, this will be a really hard vote, from me - both of these are absolutely great tracks, and for different reasons. SuperiorX - Nice production values, and some great Ground Man. Not sure the Shade man was handled in the best manner, though; it's used as texture (which is cool), but the texture didn't seem to mesh well harmonically with the rest of the track. Aside from that, though, pretty excellent track. Supercoolmike - I'm glad you posted this - I think you had pretty strong potential to take this round with that gothic set-up. Tough to integrate Ground Man into it, but the soundscape was actually pretty cool. Alas, the downsides of being unable to finish! Thanks for giving this some love regardless.

The download is in the public voting thread. Get er' done.

Me too. What're you gonna do, though - lost the coin toss. I sure hope Realme moves forward, though; would be a real shame if I didn't get another crack at it sometime down the road 'cause he didn't move on, so I'm rootin' for ya, Realme! *Sigh* Welp, Cloudman it is. I'll do my darndest with it, for sure. On the bright side, Freezeman is a great theme, so not all is doom and gloom from me - I got a great match-up, lol.

Wait, are we asking if it's better to get one-on-one, personal training from a professional over random public feedback? I'd think that's almost comically obvious - of course it's better to have one-on-one teaching from a professional (assuming the professional is worth their salt). If you can afford personalized training and education, that's the way to go. That's sort of like saying a healthy balanced diet is better for you than McDonalds, because of course it is. However, the caveat is pretty easy, here - also like a balanced diet vs. McDonalds, it's better if you can afford it, and it's better if you can dedicate the extra time required for it. Many casual artists simply don't have those kind of resources, and unless they push toward making it into a profession it's difficult to justify the time and financial investments required for such one-on-one interaction. Sometimes you can get lucky and get some attention from a willing professional for funsies, but outside of that you've got to put in some real resources in order to get something like the one-on-one mentoring you're talking about. You won't get as much out of something like public feedback, sure, but getting less out of it is certainly different than getting nothing out of it. With online forums and chat servers today it requires much less investment from an artist - dropping a quick link and asking "Thoughts?" is faster and cheaper than sitting with a mentor to discuss your music. tl;dr of course personal mentoring is better than public feedback, but public feedback is more accessible, and it's better than nothing at all (provided my caveat I presented earlier).

Perhaps I'm biased, but I'd argue that feedback is more often than not helpful when someone is specifically asks for it, no matter the skill level. However, if no one is asking for the help and they're just sharing their music it can be counterproductive to point out all of the track's flaws. It took me a few years to realize this myself, but if you pour your critique of someone's music when they're not asking for it, it can take the fun out of the craft and possibly drive people away. Context is important, so if you want to be helpful pay attention to what the artist wants from you. It sounds a little counter-intuitive saying even experts can benefit from critique, but given the right circumstances it can help make things go faster. Sometimes, for example, if I'm working on something and I need a fresh set of ears I ask for some feedback (I haven't written anything in months, so you'd likely not notice nowadays). It's harder to accept feedback when you're more seasoned, but you can still get some use out of it if you remains somewhat humble about it. Most seasoned musicians will likely fine tune the track eventually, sure, but it can help make things go faster if you just let more fresh ears listen to something and give some honest feedback. So yeah, if people are looking for feedback it's quite helpful for them when they receive it no matter the skill level, but it's markedly less so when they're not looking for it.