SuperiorX

There is a whole lot of Brandon Strader on this album Great job everybody, I'm really digging this album! Is the sequel going to be called 'Final Fantasy II - With Bated Breath' ?

Yeah you really did do a great job. You're never going to be able to make everyone happy when it comes to a public voting system. And hot damn Anti-Syne I just saw that you were the person that made the Johnny C. Bad mix! That song was right down my alley, I love the jazzy/funky feel and the cheesy vocal clips (probably cause it reminded me a lot of my Sonic CD song I made recently ). Awesome job on that! It was one of the few '5's I gave out!!!

REVIEWS YEAH! I noticed I'm one of the few people that still write reviews, so I hope you enjoy reading them. If not, then too bad, I'm still going to write them anyway Brandon Strader: Yeah this was the song I was hoping you were going to make all along. I really dig your more rock/metal stuff. I think this genre fit the two sources quite well, especially how you used Under Ground as more of the background rhythm part of the arrangement. You've got some pretty sick guitar solos in here too. I really like the break at 3:14 too. I thought the song was over, BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE!! The re-entry is particularly rocking. Great job all around sir, probably my favorite of yours from the compo so far. wildfire: I'm glad you finally did a song with vocals, I was hoping you would since when I first saw you sign up for the compo. I love the chill atmosphere that starts out the song, the entry of the vocals at 0:40 is a subtle, yet really nice touch. The intro section feels like it lasts just a tad long, but it's not a big deal IMO. Starting at 1:36 I really start to enjoy the direction of the song. Great job on building on the previous vocals there and introducing a more steady percussion pattern. The build-up to 2:10 was really well done. I feel like this is really the meat of the song starting here, which I guess is my only complaint about the previous 2 minutes is that I feel it could've been trimmed up a bit to keep things a little more captivating up until this point. Nice break again around 3:45, cool vocal effects there and nice synth work again at the 4:00 mark and onward. A lot of your Under Ground coverage feels pretty similar to your previous two pieces, but I think this song is the 'definitive' version of your theme, by far my favorite song of yours so far. The ending drop off with the vocals is just golden too. The whole song just has this really cool new-age vibe to it. I love it! Gario: My oh my sir you have outdone yourself. This has to rank right up there with 'Trash FM' as my favorites of the entire compo so far. Really cool panning effects with the synths in the intro (and throughout really). I listened to this with headphones on and it sounded really neat. I really enjoyed your use of vocal clips too. Vocal clips are rarely utilized well, but in this case I think they serve to move the song forward and add a bit of extra spunk to the arrangement. They aren't in there just for the hell of it. The bass in the dustep part could be a bit stronger, as could the drums, if you're really going for that 'dub step' feel, but from just an all-around electronica standpoint I think they're fine. Oh I love the "drop bass zone" vocal bit in the middle there, that's genius. Great build-up of the synth textures following that section as well. Amazing job! Syllix: Wow this is a suuuuupper chill arrangement. Beginning takes a little while to get going, but I think it sets the atmosphere quite well. I definitely feel like a 'cloudwalker'. Really cool instrument selection throughout the song as well. I especially like the percussion and swooshy effects. Pretty good use of the SFX too. The first transition at 1:51 feels a bit forced, not quite as smooth as I'd like, but the piano following it sounds really cool, and the 2:15 part is well executed as well. The transition at 1:52 back to the main Sky Sanctuary theme I think was much better than the first transition, good job there. The following sections build on some of the earlier textures quite well. I really enjoyed this piece, great job overall and great job showing some variety from your previous two mixes!! Wow great job overall guys! This was a very solid round overall! We got 4 great songs that were each very distinct. And it looks like voting is going to go down to the wire on both match-ups, how exciting!!!! Rexy & Amphibious, how are your guys' mixes coming?

jazzy jackrabbit featuring Mario 64? what the heck is this!?!?!?! Nice job though, I dig this so far. The beginning reminds me a bit of the original Deus Ex soundtrack actually (which is a good thing). I really like the different textures and instruments you introduce throughout too. The lead synth in the second half of the song has a good sound, but it sounds kind of muffled, I don't know if it just needs some EQing, or maybe trying raising it an octave? I'm kinda busy with some other stuff, but I'll give this a more in-depth listen later. Nice job to start though! Cool source selection! OOOH MIX TITLES I HAVE ONE: Koopa Kruisin' cause the beat keeps the song driving ahead and stuff. and yeah I'm not great with mix titles either. Actually I take that back, I'm either really good with mix titles, or absolutely terrible. I have no middle ground.

I appreciate Deia for the additional feedback she gave me on one of my mix submissions, it was very helpful! I would appreciate her even more if she YES's it when I resub

The system you guys used was probably the best you could've done given the situation. I do a bit of survey design and analytics in my job, and 5-point scales are the most commonly used because they're usually the easiest for people to understand. But yeah where things get tricky is everyone does their own interpretations of what a "5" is and what a "1" is. For example, a song had to be really terrible for me to give out a 1 (only gave a few), and likewise a song had to absolutely blow me away to get a 5 (like I gave 3-4 of those). Now that leaves the majority of my votes in the 2-3-4 range. Given most people probably followed this same thinking, you can assume most people gave out 2-3-4's. Mix in everyone's different musical preferences and you can see how most songs got a pretty similar average score range. 7-point scales have been shown to generate greater variability in survey responses, but can sometimes be difficult to define, which is why 5-point is kind of the standard. The only thing I could think of that might have improved voting variability (and I didn't think of this until now) would've been to clearly define what each number "looks like" in the voting instructions, so for example, say a "5" is: Excellent production quality (mixing, balance levels, frequency range, etc.) Creative & inspiring arrangement (takes the song in a fresh, new direction) Practically no production flaws With a "1" being the exact opposite of a "5", poor production quality, generic unoriginal arrangement, numerous production flaws, etc. You'd do something similar for each number. You get the idea. All in all, music is subjective and so are even these terms, but it may have helped a bit. Also just curious, was a song number key ever posted anywhere? Or having the songs available properly tagged? I didn't see either anywhere yet. Thanks!

Thanks for the clarification Greg, that helps a lot. And thank you everyone else for your feedback as well, it's greatly appreciated! I think I'll make some of the overall fixes and then play around with a few different arrangement modifications to that 1:34-2:30 section to see what sounds best. I'll probably end up throwing a couple different versions up here depending on what I come up with to see what everyone thinks. Thanks again!

IT'S-A-HIM-A GARIO! And it's his birthday! Happy Birthday man! Thanks for always being so helpful in the WIP forums and being an all-around awesome dude.

happy birthday dudes!

Well it's still super early obviously to make any predictions. All 4 songs this round are absolutely amazing. I love all of them. They are each very distinctly different songs too, so voting will probably come down to genre/mood preferences. It should be very interesting!

Jordan yes please. Here is your opportunity

And Robotnik Round 3 songs are up. The first post and graphic are updated as well. Good luck this week Rexy & Amphibious! Should be an interesting Sonic Bracket Finals!

Great match-ups! Congrats Rexy & Amphibious! 2 people only voted in the Phonetic Hero vs. Amphibious matchup, so those votes were disqualified. SuperiorX: 15, Rexy: 20 Phonetic Hero: 16, Amphibious: 19 Sonic Bracket Finals: Rexy vs. Amphibious

NUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUTTTTTSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Ok I've gotten Brandon's song now, so we're all set. I'll begin to prep these for upload. Sonic Round 3 voting ends in just under a half an hour! Woooo!

And if it's a matter of waiting for your song to render, I'm not going to disqualify you if you're a few minutes late. Darke's done similar stuff in the past while waiting for people to turn their songs in. I think everyone would agree they'd rather have a song from you then disqualify you over something silly like waiting for your song to render. That's plenty fair, in my opinion! EDIT: And my gosh, you voters like keeping the suspense up don't you? All of this last minute voting

He's got over an hour still... said he had to wake up to finish the guitars and then mix the song. Soooo we're all good.

I've received 3 of the 4 Robotnik tracks so far. I just need Mr. Strader's, but I have a feeling he'll be submitting his at 11:59:59 it sounds like Take your time sir! And oh man, this is going to be a strong bunch of songs I do believe...

I really enjoyed this song from the GRMRB 2011. It was by far the hardest matchup to decide between in the entire compo in my opinion. Both TGH and Gario had stellar tracks. It's great to see this one up here, nice work!

What's wrong with YO's, yo? EDIT: nice preview Brandon! Sounds pretty epic, I hope you can turn something in at least!

Yeah is there a chart mapping what the songs were numbered in the survey to the actual names? I wrote down the numbers I liked best, so I'd like to see who made them and how they did. Thanks!

LOAD ALL THE SAMPLES!!! do it

No can do chief. If you move on, I request you do a jazzy piano bit, maybe with some female vocals? Hand percussion? Maybe a jazz flute too?

Try if you can sir, unless you're kidding. Either way. Yeah. Rock out with some Planet Wisp!