paradiddlesjosh

This track was my absolute favorite in all of GSM1 - favorite to track, favorite to listen to, favorite of all the rounds.
Game Set Mash! works by having an arranging/recording/producing round that lasts about a week, and then a voting round that lasts about a week. Emunator brought essentially the entire arrangement to the team by day 2, and by day 3 it had all of the guitar layers as well as Paradiddles’ acoustic kit additions (I think cymbals and some toms?) ready to add.
The finished result is a song I’m proud to have been part of, and proud to add to my “lemme introduce you to VGM remixes” playlist.

An honor to be involved in this in any way.  Glad my minor contribution was worked in as this was an awesome team effort.  Emunator drove the car and the rest of us just hung on white-knuckled.
Love the track, it develops in such an organic way and the build up is fantastic.

Everything happening from 1:50 to 2:00 was absolutely phenomenal.  This remix was definitely an absolute jam.  Very well produced, it hits hard and rocks! 

There's not much that can be added on top of the stellar critiques you've received so far, and I won't bore you with technical FFT analysis and stats. Imma just tell ya how I feel about the arrange, and of course take it all with a bucket of salt cuz I'm nobody and this is just my unimportant opinion. ?
It's refreshing to hear a take on 'Blizzard Buffy' that isn't the usual fast paced EDM or Metal. The 'meandering' nature of the piece is part of the charm, and I believe you've achieved a cohesive wintery aesthetic coherent with the theme of the album. The slow building intro and winding outro, on top of setting up the scene properly, also showcase an eye for worldbuilding and composition. As someone who both partake in and appreciate the work that goes into an audiodrama, I give ya props for going the extra mile and adding Buffy's stomps and groans to add context to the arrangement in a way that surely fits this 'filmscore' interpretation.
Now let's talk address the elephant in the room, 3 times heavyweight champion: Mr Glockenspiel. While a fitting instrument choice to an Xmas theme, it has been processed in a way that boosts its natural resonance beyond what a human ear is designed to contain ?. It may or may not be due to the sample itself, but I suspect toning down the salad dressing on the ol' glock would remedy this small, if pivotal inconvenience. 
One thing that would greatly help this remix stand out, especially in regard to the genre you're going for, would be to work on strengthening bridges between parts of the track. The piece as a whole proves you've got the arrangement chops to make this a hit. But each transition feels like an afterthought, almost as if you were ice skating from one part of the source to the next. It's never jarring, but if you put the same care/thought into them as you did for the intro and outro, this could truly elevate the whole song. ?
The bombastic middle section from 2:35 onwards sees the return of our favorite superhero, Captain Glockenspiel, which once again shatters my heart by dancing without a care on top of an entire orchestra that is trying its best to convey the source material. It's a bummer because you've clearly put all the stops for this part, and imho this is legitimately well done. But that repeating leitmotiv on glock should be a background dancer, not the vocaloid Diva it's trying to impersonate. I'd also push the thunderous percs back slightly, as they seem to impact overall dynamics, and to let the orchestra breathe so the source melody can properly dominate the soundscape during the fulcrum point, one of the only instance where the audience can hear your interpretation in an uninterrupted sequence.
The last section before the outro features a kick that's (I'm guessing) intentionally simulating a heartbeat and its acceleration as the piece/fight reaches its conclusion. It feels estranged and anachronistic to the rest of the conventional orchestra instruments. Also its overpowering the lows, as any Trap kick should, except in this case the sample's character is clashing with an already busy composition while trying to compensate for the orch lows you didn't write. Otherwise, that section is a wonderful way to wind down before the outro. 
All in all, this is a captivating arrangement that confidently tells its story in a brave yet understated way. It only needs a little more love to reach its full potential, and I'm confident you'll get there in no time, with all the great feedback from remixers and staff alike. Gambare VQ! ?

These resources aren't plug-ins: they're great reference tools!
Brad the Mad's Tempo Calculator (Chart, lists given bpm subdivisions as ms and Hz; chart goes from 60 bpm to 179 bpm) Tuneform's Tempo Calculator (converts bpm to ms) MIDI CC List (Chart, lists common CC uses) Virtual Instrument Delay Chart (Google Sheet, lists delay offsets for most orchestral VST instruments; organized by instrument section, brand, library, and articulations). Use these as a starting point and adjust to your project as needed Tap Tempo (Webapp, click or tap a key in time with a piece of music to get its tempo) I was chatting in the Lounge on Discord with folks last night discussing the importance of tools like the tempo calculators: some time-based effects plug-ins (reverb and delay, but also the attack and release controls on compressors, limiters, gates, expanders, etc) have no tempo sync function. If you can convert the subdivision into ms or Hz, you can manually sync your plug-ins to your project tempo/tempi (plural of tempo).
You can also use this chart to maintain a relative pulse while changing meters: in the example I gave from a project Seph and I are working on, there's an intro segment at 90 bpm, 4/4 time that evolves into a verse in 12/8 using the same structure as the intro. 12/8 is functionally equivalent to 4/4 with a triplet subdivision, but most DAWs only give tempo expressed in a quarter note bpm, so maintaining 90 bpm gives an incorrect pulse from the click. But if you check the chart, you can see that a quarter note at 90bpm equals 0.667 seconds (666.6 repeating ms, or 667 for simplicity's sake) and a quarter-note triplet equals 0.444 seconds (444.4 repeating ms). Scroll down the chart and you'll find 135 bpm has a quarter note value of 0.444 seconds and a dotted quarter note value of 0.667 seconds: for all intents and purposes, the quarter note value of 90 bpm equals the dotted quarter note value of 135 bpm!

very good.
i haven't kept track with how advanced the publically available music a.i. stuff is compared to the text and visual stuff...and i really don't wanna. getting back into music making is freaking hard enough as it is :D
i wanna take my stand against a.i. in my own little way...i have to believe that the value of making music lies in the process, not the results. the personal relationship you form with the notes and sounds while making music.
got a lot to learn until i can completely embody that stance; honestly a large part of me has always been very results oriented, kinda greedy that way.
we artists have to prepare for 'spiritual war' in that sense; like, fuck it, we're doing it live.
but nothing against folks who wanna use a.i. in a creative fashion. 
not for me. idk, i might cave in for deep fake vocals at some point...as long as i write the notes and lyrics myself. basically, as long as i feel like i am doing the damn thing, more than the machine.
like, give me a vocal model of freddy mercury or rob halford or celine dion, and give me all the fine grained controls to make em totally glitch out when i want to.
 

This mix is such a jam. Production-wise, I want some more low-mids in the bass, but I don't think it's a dealbreaker. I'll join the chorus of folks hoping this is OCR-worthy; that said, I think the source is a licensed track from outside the game.

Arrangement: I second Liontamer's suggestion about expanding the instrumentation. The sparseness isn't selling the concept. Additionally, the drop at 0:46 seems like it was intended to change up the soundscape, but in execution, it's a big letdown because it throws all the energy you just spent the first 45 seconds or so building. It would be more effective to start with that more sparse, chordal bit and build the energy into what you've done with the intro. The false fade-out ending allows the interest curve to drop off too soon as well.
Production: The lead synth at 0:16 could use a boost of about 1-2dB. Otherwise, the volume balance of your elements is well executed, at least to my ears. The solo violin at 1:45 is overexposed; if you have a higher-quality sample library you could replace it with or another texture for the lead overall, that would improve the sound greatly.
It's a great relief to be able to recover some work after a crash. Keep pushing on this one, and you'll have something awesome.

https://equipboard.com/xaleph if you want to know my gear
DAWs
Reason Studio Ableton Live Audacity Garage Band Notable VST/REs
Objekt (Reason RE - paid) Serum Vital Kontakt (SAC, and others) Spitfire Labs Spitfire BBC Ugritone (Doom & something else?) Reason ( Kong / Radical Piano / Pangea / Klang / Mimic / Thor / Europa) Notable Effects
Guitar Rig Pro Kilohearts Reason (Audiomatic / Scream / RV7000 Mk II / Echo / Pulveriser / Sweeper / Synch EM / Alligator) Notable Utilities
Psyscope iZotope Ozone Advance / RX Musescore

Hey Xaleph, I think you've pulled some of my VSTs from the Discord server anyway, but here's a list of some stuff I use commonly:
VST Instruments
u-he's Zebra2, Hive, Diva. All the u-he synths are notable for having free versions with very limited paywall restrictions; the free versions don't limit settings at all, they just play static or randomize notes intermittently after 20 minutes of rendering/use. This can be worked around by reloading the instance, and it's obviously an easy workaround for final mixdown. FM8 by Native Instruments - goes on sale a lot FMDrive - very cheap Genesis/Mega Drive synth that can read the original instrument files Roland Sound Canvas - not free but essential for a lot of GBA/SNES type sounds. A lot of them make up GBA soundfonts unaltered; Golden Sun, Pokemon, etc. Sforzando and Samplelord are both worth bringing up as soundfont interfaces; the former is free and the latter can notably read some proprietary instrument files used in E-mu kits like the Proteus. Performance Samples has paid VSTs but also a lot of freebies; I use the strings and percussion a lot. They just require a certain version of Kontakt. VST FX
Guitar Rig - I use Guitar Rig 5 specifically. Its amps/cabinets are really diverse and convincing and I use the reverb effects on pretty much everything. Convology XT has a free version with a lot of convolution reverb presets. I use them in conjunction with these Impulse Responses a lot to emulate how reverb effects were achieved on the PS1. EliteReducer 2 and CMT Bitcrusher are both free bitcrushers. MeldaProduction has a lot of versatile free FX; I use MCompressor for sidechaining and MVibrato for gated/tremolo effects. ToneBoosters has a lot of free legacy FX i.e. Barricade. Tokyo Dawn Records has some good free/paid FX like Kotelnikov; I use the paid version on my master bus pretty much all the time.  
 

Oh man, you gotta add Famisynth to the list! Not only is it 8-bit heaven, it's 100% free.

http://mu-station.chillout.jp/plugins/FAMISYNTH-II/index.html

I was going to give this an official name (something better than "Tools we use"), but I wanted to start a post that lists some VSTs (free and paid) that I know a good number of us use for mixing.  This is not intended to be a clone of a list of all possible VSTs, or like 2 people in our community use it so we put it here.  It's intended to be a place to find out what others use in our space that we find particularly useful.  Just replying with a simple name of a product isn't good enough for me to put it on the list (for the reason I stated above) - though you can always respond with plugins you personally found among the most useful (or just most used in each song).  I want to avoid this being a junk drawer that has no real value.  The value will come with a curated list of tools that we feel are worthy.  
 
For a list of DAWs we use and to find performers of specific instruments, please visit https://ocremix.org/workshop or ask in our discord.
 
 
? Sage Recommended
 
1. Instruments
1.1 Drums
Addictive Drums by xln audio ($159 || complete: $869) [drums]
ML Drums by ML Sound Lab (free) [drums]
Steven Slate Drums by steven slate drums (free || $119) [drums]
toontrack
EZDrummer ($179)  [drums] ? Superior Drummer ($399)  [drums] 1.2 Samplers
Native Instruments
? Kontakt (player: free || regular: $299) [sampler] [instrument building tool] Heritage Percussion by Impact Soundworks (free)  [sampler] [tribal percussion] ? Super Audio Cart by Impact Soundworks (gameboy: free || complete: $149)  [sampler] [chiptune] Shreddage 3 by Impact Soundworks [sampler] [guitar] Free -> Precision (free) [bass] & Stratus (free) [electric guitar] Hydra ($149) [electric guitar] - this one is my favorite of the Shreddage Line Impact Soundworks collection has a lot of instruments difficult to find, such as the Oud ($99) Spectrasonics:
Keyscape ($399) [sampler] [piano]  Trillian ($299) [sampler] [synth] [bass] Spitfire Audio
Spitfire Labs - free [sampler] [textures] [orchestral] [live instruments] 
Notable Lab Instruments: ? Arctic Swells, ? Astral Forms, ? Frozen Strings, Strings, Strings 2, Amplified Cello Quartet BBC Symphony Orchestra (free) [sampler] [orchestral] 1.3 Synths
Native Instruments
FM8 ($149) [fm synth] Massive X ($199) [wavetable synth] Reaktor ($199) [modular synth] Odin (free and open source) [semi-modular synth]
? Phase Plant by Kilohearts ($199) [semi-modular synth] 
Pigment by Arturia ($199) [wavetable synth]
? Serum by Xfer ($189) [wavetable synth]
Spectrasonics:
? Omnipshere ($499) [hybrid synth] [wavetable synth] Trillian ($299) [sampler] [synth] [bass] Spire by Reveal Sounds ($189) [synth]
Surge XT (free and open source) [hybrid synth]
VCV Rack (free || pro: $149) [modular synth]
? Vital (free || pro $80 || subscribe $5/month) [wavetable synth]
Zebralette (free) [spectral synth]
 
2. Effects
Deelay by sixthsample (free)
? Guitar Rig by Native Instruments (player: free || pro: $199)
Helix Native by Line 6 ($399) [guitar amp]
illformed Effects:
dBlue Glitch (free but may require jbridge) [glitch] [stutter] Glitch 2 ($59.95) [glitch] [stutter] iZotope: 
Stutter Edit ($199) [glitch] [stutter] Vinyl (free) [vinyl record] ? Kilohearts Essentials by Kilohearts (free)
Slate Digital
Fresh Air (free) [vintage exciter circuits and advanced dynamics processing] TH-U by Overloud ($269)
Valhalla Effects:
? Super Massive (free) [reverb] Vintage ($50) [reverb] Delay ($50) [delay] Xfer:
? OTT (free)  
3. Utilities
FabFilter (Pro Q 3: $169)
iZotope Utilities:
? Ozone (elements: $49 || standard: $199 || advanced: $399) ? RX (elements: $49 || standard: $299 || advanced: $799) SPAN by Voxengo (free) [eq analysis]
TBProAudio
ISOL8 (free) [Mix monitoring tool] Tokyo Dawn
TDR NOVA (free || ge: €60) [equalizer] Kotelnikov (free || ge: €50) [wideband dynamics processor] 4. Non-DAW Tools
Brad the Mad's Tempo Calculator (free) [Chart, lists given bpm subdivisions as ms and Hz; chart goes from 60 bpm to 179 bpm] Tuneform's Tempo Calculator (free) [converts bpm to ms] MIDI CC List (free) [Chart, lists common CC uses] Virtual Instrument Delay Chart (free) [Google Sheet, lists delay offsets for most orchestral sample libraries] Tap Tempo (free) [Webapp, click or tap a key in time with a piece of music to get its tempo] Notes
? Native Instruments offers a starter pack with several of the recommended tools called Komplete Start (free)
Free(ish) DAWs (https://bedroomproducersblog.com/2015/11/11/free-daw-software/ - he updates this regularly):
Reaper Cakewalk Sibelius GarageBand Audacity (audio) Cheap Stuff / Sales
Black Friday / Day after Christmas / Spring / Summer usually have sales Humble Bundle often has VSTs, sfx, and samples. Heavyvocity has some good textural tools (instruments & effects)
 

Sample Packs:
99 Sounds’ (free) 99 Sounds’ two 99 Drum sample packs (free)  
To Add
To Review
SINE Player, Soundpaint, Musio
Orchestral Tools, 8Dio
NES VST
 
 

I figured I should share my Equipboard as well.
DAWs
Presonus Studio One 4 Ableton Live 10 Notable VST Instruments
Adam Szabo Viper (Virus TI emulation) Arturia Analog Lab V Intro Decidedly DecentSampler (the VSTi is free, with free libraries available at their website and Pianobook) ML Drums by ML Sound Lab (Essentials, Luxe, Meld -- the free version is a stripped-down Essentials kit) NI Battery 4 NI Kontakt 6 and Kontakt Player 7 (Pianobook also has many free Kontakt libraries -- full version of Kontakt required for those) 8dio Claire English Horn The Alpine Project Ferrum Free Edition ISW Shreddage 3 (Precision Free, Stratus Free) ISW Heritage Percussion ProjectSAM The Free Orchestra Orchestral Tools Free Series (Layers) Orchestral Tools SINEfactory (Clutch, Crucible, Dynamo, Gearbox, Helix, Lucent, Manifold, Ratio, Rotary) Plugin Alliance x Brainworx bx_oberhausen Steven Slate Drums 5.5 Spitfire Audio LABS Spitfire Audio BBC Symphony Orchestra (Core -- Discover is free and covers all the basic articulations/techniques, and the top-level Pro version has more soloists and mic placement controls) Spitfire Audio Originals (Epic Strings, Epic Brass & Winds, Cinematic Percussion, Cimbalom, Media Toolkit) Toontrack Superior Drummer 2 Vital Notable VST Effects
Arturia MiniFuse Bundle (this came with my interface) Arturia Chorus JUN-6 Arturia Delay TAPE-201 Arturia Pre 1973 Arturia Rev PLATE-140 Korneff Audio El Juan Limiter (a free emulation of the legendary L1 Limiter) NI Guitar Rig 6 LE (free with Komplete Start) NI Supercharger (also free with Komplete Start) Plugin Alliance Ampeg SVT-VR Classic Plugin Alliance Black Box Analog Design HG-2 Plugin Alliance x Brainworx bx_console Focusrite SC bx_masterdesk (Classic available for free in the PA FREE bundle) bx_opto bx_rockrack V3 (Player available for free in the PA FREE bundle -- only does presets) Plugin Alliance Maag Audio EQ2 Plugin Alliance PA FREE bx_cleansweep V2 bx_solo bx_subfilter Double MS Free Ranger niveau filter Tokyo Dawn Records TDR Nova UrsaDSP Lagrange (granular delay) Voxengo SPAN Notable Utilities
Akai EWI-USB Evans x Sunhouse Hybrid Sensory Percussion v2 Presonus Notion 6

I'm happy to announce a couple of staffing changes here at OCR. First up, I wanna welcome @Hemophiliac to our Judges Panel! Hemo's been putting in the work for the last few years as one of our Workshop Evaluators, and has also stepped up in the past few months to handle a lot of the visualizers for the remixes you see on our YouTube channel. He's an active presence in our community and has a lot of helpful advice in the Workshop. We're glad to add him to the panel. Look forward to getting some fresh new NO votes on your tracks!
Speaking of Workshop Evaluators, a few months ago we retired our Ready for Review process in the Workshop because we felt that it was a cumbersome extra layer of evaluation prior to submitting to the Judge's Panel. Our Evaluators did a lot of great work over the years but we're retiring that role. In it's place, we're introducing our new team called Sages! Sages are active artists in our community who'll be in the Workshop giving feedback on remixes, posting tutorials, and coming up with their own ways to revitalize and energize the Workshop. Our three new Sages are @Xaleph, @pixelseph, and @paradiddlesjosh!
We're glad to have some fresh faces on staff, and I'm personally looking forward to seeing what these folks have in store for us.
-- DarkeSword

Awesome to see this Sage business! This is important stuff. Just yesterday I was talking about OC ReMix's rare feedback culture to a musician friend of mine. Can't wait to see what you come up with.

I'm really excited - we have some cool stuff planned ahead!

It's a huge pleasure to be fulfilling this role!
Over the coming weeks, you'll be seeing my mug replying to your posts in the workshop and (if I'm doing things right) I'll be providing you with means to make improvements to your writing, arranging, and/or mixing. Can't wait to hear more of what y'all have cooking out there!

yeah, i got lucky a few days back, in the morning. this old fav tune sprang into my mind, green hills (actually, stage 5 in the 8 bit sonic 2!)
it's pretty WIP-y after 2 minute mark. i'm a bit stuck for now, but idea is a buildup of course, to something.

Voted. ♥ :)

Voting Guidelines
Teams were tasked with writing three mashup arrangements of two songs each, one from a Metroid game and the other from a Castlevania game.
In order to make your vote, listen to the remixes and, for each pair, choose the remix that fulfills the following criteria (listed in order of importance):
The remix arranges both source tunes in an interesting and identifiable way into one cohesive piece of music. The remix is well-produced within the conventions of the genre. The remix is enjoyable to listen to. Stream the remixes via Soundcloud or Download the Round 3 Remix Pack (MP3).
For your reference, here are the source tunes for each matchup:
Super Metroid vs. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Theme of Super Metroid Door of Holy Spirits Metroid Prime vs. Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow
Menu Select Theme Forbidden Realm Metroid Fusion vs. Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse
Neo Ridley Boss Theme Mad Forest You can also use this thread to leave comments about the tracks. Remember to be kind and constructive. Thanks for listening, and thanks for voting!

Let's $^@%ing go gamers

Voted! ^_^
100% agree with Seph on every one of these, (so, ditto!) I wanna see them on dat Panel and passing!
I LOVED every single one of them, (and all of y'all are killin' it.) ♥
Looking forward to the Final Round! :D

This round is another hard one to vote! Both teams brought forth polished mixes and executed really creative ideas.
Infected Waters: Psytrance heaven! The gated vocal, triplet transitions, and distinct sections make this a wonderful listen. The Bloody Tears motif from Purification comes through strongly even with the syncopated line, and the Maridia theme holds tightly throughout the piece.
Pure Zebes: Enya vibes proudly on display! Despite having zero melodic correlation to it, this piece would feel right at home in RuneScape - I’m attributing that to the instrumentation (flutes and strings and pads over light percussion). Both themes are strong throughout; the 3/4 meter helps bring both ideas together.
Livin' Out Our Last Days: It's Metroidvania but if the Gorillaz did it! I love nothing more in a mashup than taking the structure of one piece and applying the melodic and harmonic content of another to it, and this track does exactly that - Feel Good, Inc is clearly the template here. I'm hearing Overture in the "theme"/verse riff and Tallon in the choruses. The organic instruments (guitars, bass, and vocals) are well performed, and the mix is tight.
Cruisin' Down Overture Blvd in the Depths of Tallon Traffic: Synthwave magic! That Tallon bassline rides through the whole piece and never once gets stale. Love the way the melody trades Overtune and Tallon back and forth, and the little chromatic splashes here and there keep the lead interesting.
Smoke and Marbles: Live jazz club sound! Great mix on the quartet throughout - the lead trade between piano and guitar on the Marble Gallery theme is brilliant. Bass and drums hold the groove tight. Environmental Mystery as the bridge is another brilliant choice for such a short source.
Gallery of Mysteries: Progressive metal time! Periphery and Tigran Hamasyan meet a sort of Darude vibe on the intro. Lots of time signature shifts for those wanting to count - 4/4, 5/8, 7/8, 5/16... math music nerds, get in the comments! Love the use of Environmental Mystery as the arp throughout the piece.
---
Great job everyone! As with round 1, I can't wait to see these pass the panel!

Thoughts on the round 1 entries:

Red Harvest vs. Wir Sind Team Peitsche: This one was really close but in the end it came down to production execution.  Both arrangements were very good and mashed up the sources in very creative ways.  I really liked the last section of Wir Sind Team Peitsche with the group chanting.  That was a great way to bring everyone together onto it.
A couple specific notes on Wir Sind Team Peitsche.  The brass in the first 0:36-0:58 is very "blatty".  Would like to hear more humanization on that section for the orchestral samples. 1:53-2:32, I didn't even notice there was chiptune elements here until multiple listens.
Red Harvest: 0:41-0:50 the melody for Brinstar here is very washed out, like when you turn the wet on reverb all the way up and dry all the way down.  IMO it got very buried here.
Adrift Eternal vs. Back in Cold Blood (Dracula Flow): Difficult to vote for a "joke" track.  When I say that I mean, the track was for laughs rather then to be taken very seriously.
Back in Cold Blood: The production on the background work is pretty clean and stands on it's own pretty well.  I know I mentioned it on voice to you, but changing to the Alucard audio at 3:18 of the way through was a good choice to keep the track moving forward and preventing the Dracula Flow bit from being stale.  Good call on the change.  Some percussive elements ping-ponging left/right are a little disorienting.
Adrift Eternal: This is starting to sound like the modus operandi of Emunator at this point.  I have no idea who contributed what on this.  Electronic cinematic take on both themes seamlessly transitions back and forth between sources.  Very well done.  At 4:23 it's suddenly major for some reason did feel a little odd, but I can understand wanting to change the color at the end of the piece to bring more energy.
The Heart of Atlantis vs. No Castle for Old Belmonts:  This was the toughest call of the 3 pairs.  For me I chose No Castle for Old Belmonts due to how the melody was interpreted, used, and embellished upon.  Both had good production, and it came down to arrangement/usage.
The Heart of Atlantis: The organ echoes of the guitar such as at 2:07 and 2:43 were a little awkward for having close intervals in a low register, makes them get harmonically muddy.
No Castle for Old Belmonts: I don't know why, with the title I was expecting this to be country song-like "Take me home country roads".  The bass is a little muddy, sounds like someone humming doubling the bass in the first ~minute or so.  Not sure if that is a production issue or recording thing.  The guitar playing from 2:57 to the end is fantastic and I absolutely love the embellishment here.  Whip sfx towards the end is fitting and I'm surprised I had not heard it in any of the other tracks at this point.  Production could have been a spoiler on this one, but I preferred the arrangement here.

Voting Guidelines
Teams were tasked with writing three mashup arrangements of two songs each, one from a Metroid game and the other from a Castlevania game.
In order to make your vote, listen to the remixes and, for each pair, choose the remix that fulfills the following criteria (listed in order of importance):
The remix arranges both source tunes in an interesting and identifiable way into one cohesive piece of music. The remix is well-produced within the conventions of the genre. The remix is enjoyable to listen to. Stream the remixes via Soundcloud or Download the Round 1 Remix Pack (MP3).
For your reference, here are the source tunes for each matchup:
Super Metroid vs. Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse
Brinstar (Red Soil Swampy Area) Beginning Metroid Prime vs. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Phendrana Drifts Lost Painting Metroid Fusion vs. Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow
Sector 4 (AQA) Heart of Fire You can also use this thread to leave comments about the tracks. Remember to be kind and constructive. Thanks for listening, and thanks for voting!