zircon

I agree on the broader note that consolidation is a good thing. I am always saddened when I see multiple companies, websites, products, or organizations doing basically the same thing, but as a result spending their resources in an inefficient manner. Some might argue that the differentiation allows for companies to cater to niche markets, or provide some kind of unique product or service that the others don't, but I don't think consolidation would hurt this. The primary issue with having too much differentiation is that you have a lot of redundant backend and infrastructure. Look at XM and Sirius satellite radio. Each of these companies needs to spend resources to have proper delivery of their services, manage accounting, royalties, etc. I would be you anything that after they merge, their operating costs would be proportionally lower even though they'll have more customers.

More votes guys!! OCR is doing well but let's try to get all these songs into the semis at least.

You could say that about most statistics in the Guinness Book of World Records.

It has very little to do with Larry. The issue is that the panel has been completely inert. We have closed out two, maybe three decisions in the last two months. Even if Larry were around, we're running with a crippled panel right now as a number of people have stepped down (we'll make a thread about it soon... we are also adding people) and basically everyone else is extremely busy.

Yeah, I wasn't really trying to hurt anyone's hopes here. But that's the reality of the industry and you need to know if you want to go into it. Programmer? Animator? Modeler? No problem. I cannot tell you how many jobs I have seen for these positions. Basically every other area of the game industry is far, far easier to break into. Music ALWAYS gets the shaft. It's ALWAYS the last priority, and musicians get paid the least (or close to it.) Look at the Gamedev "Help Wanted" forums. Countless posts looking for programmers and artists. Countless posts with musicians offering services. The supply outstrips demand by several orders of magnitude.

Lots of reverb here, and I agree that it sounds kind of muddy. This could really be cut back or low/low-mid EQ could be used to slim things down. The mixing is not really very good either. Harmony is often louder than melody. Throw in the very mechanical sequencing with basically 0 humanization at all and this sounds more like something you might hear on the original PSF. I hear the velocities were edited, and the guitar was nice, but you need to use more automation to do smooth changes in parts. That string lead is just so choppy with no sort of legato between the notes at all. In terms of arrangement I actually thought the original was more interesting. The remix doesn't add a great amount of power or energy in my opinion because the rhythms and tempo are basically the same, and the texture isn't noticeably denser. In fact I think the original has more dynamics because the texture is not as static - instruments come in and out, and the balance is not just a wash. There are prominent leads and the harmony sits under them perfectly. The interpretation factor in terms of the notes themselves is here, even though I don't think the stylistic shift is very drastic. The main issues are the weak sequencing, muddy EQ/reverb, and distracting mixing (eg. harmony parts too loud, melody too soft.) I would have liked to hear some percussion too to differentiate this from the original more, but that's just personal preference. NO, resub

Talk about opening a can of worms with that question. Seriously? My advice is don't even try. It's so unbelievably competitive and high-stress and the music end of the industry is getting increasingly smothered right now. If you want to compose music professionally that's one thing but I would say don't get your hopes up on VGM and focus on just refining your compositional and production skills as much as possible first.

Seph, that's not true, as far as I know. Portal started out as a senior project at Digipen ("Narbacular Drop") and when it was presented at the end of the year, someone from Valve was there to see it. That's not quite the same thing as a bunch of people getting together on the net and working on a mod.

OK, I think y'all know the drill by now... 5/31 - The finals have started! In the next 24 hours, two OCR artists with three songs have a shot at $5,000. Your votes now mean a whole lot! We've got two OCReMixers in the finals this month, thanks to y'all. Jillian Goldin (pixietricks) with one song, "Avalon", and Audix with two songs, "Stylized Chase" and "Rising Impact". Click the following link to cast your votes in these categories. OCR artists have earned over $10,000 (collectively) from this competition so your votes absolutely make a difference here. We all appreciate it! http://www.ourstage.com/judge There are a LOT of possible rounds, but you don't need to do all of them to make a difference. Even one vote in support of OCReMixers is awesome. But please, NO foul play. Don't artificially vote down other songs and don't create alt accounts.

The show is currently on, and Kale is playing as we speak!!

Yeah, considering it doesn't even list what games the remixes are from, I don't see how there would be a way to search that way.

Bustatunez used to do a lot of sequencing under the name "Cloud_Strife", I believe, and Jose the Bronx Rican also does quite a bit.

Dude, you are a hero! Downloaded this and went through... love it.

You can filter servers so it only shows those not playing with custom maps. I imagine a lot of people do this.

It can handle multiple instruments provided they are playing in different ranges - eg. if two instruments hit C4 it can't differentiate.

Riding a moose? Chopping down trees and harvesting syrup? Watching hockey?

What you need to do is give Kontakt a port. In the upper right of the Kontakt wrapper you should see a box with ---. Change that to, say, "2". Now, go through your MIDI Out channels. Make sure they are all set to Port 2. Then, in Kontakt 3, load up your instruments. Each one by default is set to MIDI channel. That MIDI channel will correspond with your MIDI out notes. So, if you load a guitar, that's going to be on Midi Channel 1, Port 2, by default. Any MIDI Out that is set to Channel 1, Port 2 will trigger the sound in Kontakt 3.

http://www.celemony.com/cms/index.php?id=dna&L=0 Indeed.

http://downforeveryoneorjustme.com/ Awesome site to check this kind of thing.

Wingless, when we meet, I shall strike you a blow that will shake the very cosmos. An addendum that I meant to write about earlier but didn't have time to; Jill and I are interested in actually doing some periodic special features again, like we did with VGDJ. OCR as of late has been more and more involved with stuff like VGL as well as composer interviews, and thanks to thinks like HD Remix we're becoming more and more respected as a community. One of the most fun parts about VGDJ for us was being able to do those special features, like reporting from Otakon, for example. Jill has been so busy with school that it hasn't really been realistic to continue doing that, and I've been pretty busy as well, but we think it would be cool to pick it up again now that she's done and has significantly more free time. This doesn't affect what I posted earlier, of course, that we're interested in seeing a pilot from people interested in doing a more regular show.. after all special features might only come up once in awhile.

All of you need to check out this page. It's not really about sound effects, it's more about music samples and synth patches, but it's just awesome - and it was updated recently. http://www.synthmania.com/Famous%20Sounds.htm

I appreciate that you're putting a lot of thought into this, Brushfire. Jill and I actually agree that a weekly show in many ways is not ideal, looking back, because it's not only more of a drain but as you said, sometimes there's just nothing to really talk about. To answer your question at the bottom, there was limited swearing on VGDJ. I'd say it was about PG-13 level.

I can't stand Wusikstation. I've tried to like it, I really have, and I just think it sounds thin with annoying, weak presets and a flimsy interface. Bleh. Zebra 2 is my recommendation for a soft synth. It is incredibly powerful with a character like a hardware synth but an incredible ability to sit in a mix well, plus one of the most powerful (and easy to use) synth engines anywhere.

Friggin' steam, man. I tried to connect all last night and couldn't. I would love to see Warpath & Granary, or Granary and (X). It really is a fun map when you get down to it, I think people just need to give it a chance.

RD, just as an addendum, I wouldn't expect that anyone would immediately have something as polished as VGDJ where we left it. That's not the standard we would use then, to be fair. After all we had plenty of episodes to practice and hone our skills, not only in presentation of content but in editing, delivery, writeups, site maintenance, etc. But certain core qualities would have to be there, such as motivation and a sense of responsibility (again so that the show doesn't just stop after a few weeks), community involvement, a format that generally "works", etc. In consideration of that last point, I'm curious but slightly skeptical of a single-person show: even on VG Frequency, a big part of the fun was that Larry regularly had call-ins and live conversations. Some kind of interpersonal dynamic is, IMO, an important component in engaging listeners or viewers in almost any format.