DarkeSword   Administrators 🎮

Anyway, I should judge this. Personally I don't believe it sounds too similar to the source tune. The form may be there, but it has some excellent playing and a good, moving interpretation of what is essentially a battle theme. As for the Black Mages comment, it's not transcribed from the Black Mages song; its just that the ending part is an arrangement of the outro from the Black Mages track. I think it's a good enough interpretation pulled off quite nicely. YES

Hey I know that drumloop! ... Nice drumwork, but not much of an arrangement, you know? Very sparse; exactly as Prot said. Single-lead over a loop won't cut it. For the love of God man, some pads would be nice! NO

It seems to me that you don't really have an understanding of how percussion sounds work together to create a beat. The percussion is very boring... ...as is the rest of the mix. Sounds like Sytrus presets assigned to a MIDI file. I can't say if this is a MIDI rip or not, but the way it's arranged seems to indicate as much. Try to actually write an arrangement, rather than cutting, pasting, and rearranging. NO

[EDIT I AM DUMB] Here's the Black Mages version: http://www.darkesword.com/jenova-bm.mp3

Whoa nice beats. Wish they'd change up once in a while though. Oh wait there it goes! Groovy, yeah. Percussion's kinda repetitive, but the other cool stuff makes up for it. YES

Gecko really loves his Streets of Rage, doesn't he? Samples are cheesy, but good in context. Very groovy too, good development. Not much else to say here. TRES BIEN!!! OUI

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Er, please, no.

Rather simplistic and sparse; would have been more interesting if you'd been able to bring the ideas about meter to the actual song, rather than having a strange-metered drum intro. It's a bit repetitive too. NO

A saxophone patch hardly counts as a 'soundscape.' The textures between Angel, Party in the Snowland, and Space Drifter are unique among eachother. Look past the lead.

Yeah. I mean, they even have the same snare drum riff, synth bass, Slayer VST guitar, oscillating TS404, filtered white noise, and choir patch!! SO UNORIGINAL!!! ... The only thing common is the sax sample. Look deeper.

That timpani is annoying as hell. This sounds like the original with some different samples and maybe a drum part added. NO

YES Decent sounds, nice arrangement. Quite solid. Don't like how you changed the melody though.

Too repetitive. As soon as the melody was iterated for the third time, I knew this piece was pretty much over. The drum beat never lets up. Ever. It's the same boring beat over and over again. Do something new please. Boring arrangement. NO

There are some balance issues with this. Strings are boring. Nothing but sustained chords, all in the same place the guitar and sax are; everything sounds crowded. They're a bit too far forward and loud. The guitar playing is alright but it's pushed far back. Sax solo sounded unnatural and amateurish. I don't like the sax sample either. Repetitive too. NO

Borderline NO as well. I'm not a big fan of the piano sample used. In this setting, there are times when it seems too bright. Coma's comment about plateau development is dead-on. This song goes somewhere in the beginning, gets there, and stays there until the end. A bit boring. I think more attention could be paid to the velocities; either that or use a velocity layered sample that doesn't have such a sharp sound (in texture, not in pitch, kthx). Decent, to be sure, but I think some more development is warranted here. WORK ON MORE AND RESUBMIT!!!

Pretty sparse and boring as far as the coverage of the actual tune goes. Beats are cool, the atmosphere is cool, but all you have in way of rearrangement is the original melody on sustained chords. I listened to the original song and it seemed to me that a lot more was going on in this song than what's presented here. Some arpeggios would be nice. Maybe some counter melody. Just do SOMETHING other than dropping the original melody over sustained chords and cool beats. Nice, but NO

Yes! I was actually going for a Cowboy Bebop vibe, which was the main reason I used the saxophone. That's right...the sax had a purpose.

Not a big fan of how you used Slayer here. It's very droney and buzzy and doesn't add much at all to the texture of the song. Percussion lacks a high end, as Malcos mentioned. Drums are quite loopy, and very lo-fi. Not a bad groove, but it seems much to simplistic. The original sounded cleaner and more interesting. This arrangement is pretty weak. Not a lot of highs and lows in the progression of the song. Sounds seem quished into one area of the spectrum. NO

ok. Here's my question, then : Besides the soundfont player, WHAT can I use to make my stuff sound good ? (and how do I use it ?) And if this isn't the right place, WHERE can I ask this ? Use effects on your sounds. Learn to use the Mixer in FL. It allows you to add reverb, delay, and a whole host of other effects. This will help your music to sound less dry.

I'm going to side with Prot here. This is just really repetitive as far as OCR standards go. I like the sounds, and the texture, and the arrangement is really neat in its atonality, but I think that some more interesting things could be done with the timpani and the strings as the mix progresses; as it stands, those parts are a bit stagnant. Nice work, but I'm gonna go with a NO, because of the lack of evolving arrangement.

If you have specific questions about FL, then go ahead and ask, but don't ask a general question like "how do I use this?"

It's a fairly uninteresting arrangement, with looping and layering being the primary technique. Not particularly bad, but I find the mix to sort of drag on, even though it's pretty short. It's a rock mix, right? With some kind of electric guitar sound? It needs a SOLO. That's what guitarists do. They SOLO and MAKE UP CRAP. I want some made up crap! Well. Not crap. You know what I mean. Do more with the arrangement. It's rather mediocre. NO

I have no idea what's going on with that. Are you using a full version of FL with the full version of SFPlayer?

Are you using the decompression tool I provided? Make sure you extract the .sf2 files. Then load them with the soundfont player in FL.