Rexy

A four way collab? May sound awesome if that gets to come around

Oh man, I've now got two Tales WIPs to look into Good to see work's being put into these, and i promise i'd come forth with commentary tomorrow unless something crucial happens in the last minute (!)

It's about time this mix came up. I've had her initial recording saved to my hard drive for the past few months, and to see the finished version up on the site at long last I'm pretty much showing relief at what she's done. One can wonder if the wait was well worth it; although I'd tell you now that I appreciated the skill that came around her previous arrangement "Into The Golden Sunset" (which I like most people have found it to make me cry), so that can be firmly taken into account. As an OCR "pianina" myself () I'll be sure to drop my thoughts on all this:- --- Remix In terms of familiarization towards the original it feels very conservative in its linking towards it, so that can help associate firmly with FFVII gamers. The execution of the performance is generally good for the most part, although if there were some aspects that could shake some people they would relate to some sudden jumps up and down in dynamics and slowdowns to match; I think they seem to somehow make the piece feel a bit struggled in some segments, although the natural presentation is still there at heart. Variance on the theme is still available in spite of its conservative tendencies, mainly shown by a total change of key in comparison to the core theme (and the initial recording I came across to begin with, may I add), and enough variance upon the general rhythms and structuring for the source material when noted. The structure, while good, seems to stick a bit too closely to the specified theme but it's still good enough to help keep much of the track's emotive aspects strong, most especially with the more creative ending sequence that managed to come through. So in terms of this aspect of the arrangement, I don't really see this as the most adventurous interpretation of the theme but there's still some good unique aspects in the arrangement that have aided in making its (rather belated) entrance to OCR possible. Creativity In terms of breathing in some extra life towards the song there's been a good amount of changes in mood to help add to the more reflective atmosphere that Susie was looking for. Generally the sections link well even though the conservative arrangement have partially not made that her responsibility; however those who appreciate the game shouldn’t see that as too much of a problem. For me I found some of the dynamics linking into some of the areas could have been a bit more careful in their execution, although I still found that fairly reasonable. I found a lot of fresh expressions with a lot of tense portions shown at the start as well as some more upbeat aspects near the middle and darker moods near the end - those can help provide a fresh pace throughout the course of the arrangement here. I didn't sense too much repetition; she's had a good go at eradicating that aspect altogether by making sure that various variations on the track's melodic structure are given unique rhythmic incarnations to make sure that no segment sounds the same. For much of the time I found the overall performance of the theme to really shine well; while not the most expansive of pieces it's very enjoyable work if you want to take on board piano arrangements and/or Final Fantasy mixes, so that can be of some positive well being here. Well done. Production In comparison to her initial recording of this, I found this to be a lot cleaner and better executed in terms of instrument clarity; one qualm that I've had with the sample was that it made some of the softer sounds feel a little bit on the unclear side, although there's been some good reasoning for the choice behind it. Even through here the processing sounds mainly alright for what it was, although it can be argued that some of the muddy tendencies with the softer segments could be cleared with some bolder EQs; rolling off a very light amount in the low-mids might do the trick there. The recording itself is very clean and well shown in terms of dynamics; was hoping for a little less sustain but it is still well thought out. That has even been shown in the basic sound levels, where much of the recording tendencies are taken at a well balanced quality and have easily allowed the dynamics to be able to come to their own. The panning has been shown well through the overall instrument space, as well as much of the room ambience that was taken around it. In terms of this aspect I noticed a fair amount of excellent aspects taken to the rendering as well as some areas that could do with a closer re-approach, although as it stands I really felt this aspect has been able to make it shine on its own. Good stuff. --- While I personally feel that the recording is a great improvement over the version I found on her website 3 months ago, I still honestly believe that she showed her emotive side much stronger with Into the Golden Sunset. That's not to say this mix pales in comparison; although it plays rather conservatively, it has still been able to take a grasp at the theme in its most reflective and meaningful form throughout, something that I feel that piano arrangements should be recognised more for. So yeah, I can definitely say that the mix's release was worth the wait and it's another well thought out addition to BogusRed's musical library. I hope she comes forth with some good stuff in the future; you know that pixietricks and I can't operate the female mixing scene by ourselves

I think I have a WAV somewhere, may take a while to find it though. Bleh. But yeah, we still need 3 more filled spots out there. We need it

Given his attitude to the site it could spark some controversy... in a similar fashion Crystal Flash did. O.o Hm? But I can't release that track just yet; it's not my birthday for another 6 weeks =(

Usa, I'll see if i can burn your WIP to disc and listen to it tomorrow sometime. I'm often interested in seeing how you come along ^^ And yeah, I know this is a little bit off-topic here, but I really want to release something at VGMix on Sunday, however I don't know what to put forward. >.< I have my first 2 WIPs at VGMix and my DoD entry to choose from; they'll eventually get released over the summer, but I can't decide what to put out there first. Major bummer. That aside, even though I am in an unstable state to work on music over the summer I've still been able to send the Fighting of the Spirit closing track towards Kyle a few weeks back. And now, I've been able to extract a portion of the recording and render a demo of what I've done to share with the masses. And yeah... all these prog-like tracks have made it fitting for longer mixes than the usual. But hey, thank goodness virt isn't involved or we'd have a 40-minute rendition of The Law of the Battle.

Wut? Metal Heads can be such crazy bastards Yet, we love them for what they do. And... a 4-CD set? Are you sure djp will allow this?

While I do feel that this is one of Sefiros's strongest efforts that i've witnessed in his expansive music collection, Maverick still has his opinion stated here. Nonetheless, there's a lot of emotional garb reflected in the source music that has made it do justice and provide something fresh for this game's coverage at this moment in time. Again I'll quote in my VGMix review to summarise my feelings over this at the time of its completion. Within the months that have followed leading to its posting here, I had a few doubts on whether it would make it or not. My main issues here relate to a conservative composition (which I think isn't usual in some of his other experimental work) and some really, REALLY synthetic orchestration. I just saw that as a way of showcasing high-quality samples, although some of the attacks, releases, note lengths, velocities and timings (mainly on the violin) were rather synthetic. I was more than surprised to see this mix managed to come through; not quite the strongest synthetic mix to date, but there's definitely a lot of heart and soul placed into it that have easily welcomed Sefiros within the OCR clan. Well done, you wee scot; let's see you keep things up in the future

Unluckily for you Roe, i've got the MP3 on my hard drive and i'm not taking it off anytime soon.

Let me tell you now that DJ Orange, while not the most technically minded arranger you'd see here, has a very unique sense of creativity within his own arrangements from picking uncovered source material through to his wide range of styles that make him worthy of his username. This mix is no different; while it didn't catch me on the first few listens it eventually grew and became one of the happiest mixes I'd ever witness in a long while. Kudos to that. For a fuller emphasis i'd rope in my VGMix review. It was a pleasure going over this one In a nutshell I found some of my technical quirks to match those with Pretzel's, interestingly enough. I have had to disagree with some of the judges on pan flute processing as I swear it could have been a bit more humanised to fit the tone it was seeking for, but the thoughts on some of the sudden transitions are roughly the same. But they haven't stopped a fun piece like this from making it onto OCR. It's definitely weird in its technical sense, but it's still unique, interesting and insanely upbeat enough to fit as a very good FF5 mix for the site. We need more FF5 in the future. We also need more Orange in the future too. Keep up the good work

Agreed; it's got my eyes scarred for weeks! I haven't registered over there yet but i'll run through a few of his pointers right here. No way man, if you want the world's worst DJ you should see some local college radio. Some of the DJs at my uni stutter like Hell, which is something that Larry often comes around with his interviews. That's because crap isn't supposed to be good in the first place. Pwnt. He's not meant to play video game music; he's here to play video game remixes if mostly anything. And even if you do edit it to say "most of it is crap that isn't video game re-arranements" I will prove it to you by going through a random show. VG Frequency #60.99 had a lot of tracks played, yet only 9 of which weren't relating to videogames. Point proven again, considering you thought that 80% of the tracks played aren't VG music? i'll shaddap and see what the mob wants with him

Neither did I, but i'm still having my fair share of enjoyment through this. You still should join, especially with the type of music you offer to the community and all.

If you need help with the hosting I'd offer some webspace in your direction

Spell my name right! (LT: Booyah!) And... yay, glad to see the status concerning the VG Freq shows here. I don't know whether to push you into uploading the 3 finished edits (it's been, what, 2 months since #56 went online?) or wait a bit longer (because good things come to those who wait), but whichever comes out of it I am of high anticipation of the files. Now if you excuse me, I've got the anti-VGF topic to read to... who in heck would hate your show anyway?

Spell my name right! Worth a total ROFL... way to go Shariq.

Sounds nice to see your thoughts on all this, but I still have to scroll a fair bit on my browser especially in a horizonal direction. It may have helped if the banner was shown in a top row, not part of the right hand column. These are the thoughts i have in mind for its design, in ASCII format - |----------| |THE BANNER| |__________| |B|========| |U|========| |T|OPENING=| |T|========| |O|==BLURB=| |N|========| |S|========| ----------~o I hope you understand what I mean O.o [EDIT: Okay so now I just realised that my thoughts were the same as what was on the main page, which seems to work a bit better through my browser in terms of scrolling. I still think some frames would make some aspects that bit cleaner. O.o]

I've been familiar with a fair chunk of Ziwtra's work in the past, and even here I'm impressed with this mix. I can't say I'm too hot on Terranigma but it's cool to see some expansive coverage for the game score outside the countless Crysta mixes it has mainly spawned. So yeah, it's about time I managed to catch onto a light write-up through listening to the mix, using the same analysis stylesheet that I adapted to as a Sonic Revolution judge. Having looked back at the judges decisions I feel that much of my qualms relating to the track are similar to Liontamer's on the quirk on that I've heard some much better production work from Ziwtra. But even with that into mind the overall arrangement, although a little bit over-liberal in parts, was still very cool and expansive for even source material like this one. So yeah, it's not the hottest of Ziwtra works the site has on offer but it's still a goodie if you want to see some slick quality Terranigma coverage. It was worthy of my time and it can be of yours too if you're a fan of the game/genre/musician. Hope to see more work from this user in the future!

Kyle, not everyone has a monitor resolution as big as 1024x768

I think he means having the organisational stuff on one page without having to scroll much. Have you tried frames? That can be an option to stop that happening. Mind you, good design so far ^^ Even though there's nothing on the links button (it's just the same as the main page) it's coming along firmly enough. Nice work, hermano.

How much does it cost? There's no need to panic too much about donating a bit of cash for doing a remix, i assure you. In terms of studio software for Windows, I think Cubase is a good program to use. I'm not sure if there's any demos of it online but I use it rather frequently in encoding my own piano works.

Well I can say I was fine with the singing, which seemed to blend in well in creating that haunting feel to it; it was just the talky bits in the intro that made me think that they could have been from the game given the rather different encoding quality taken through. O.o Still appreciating the decisions taken, I assure you.

Rock without guitars? How daring! But it is possible, I do believe.

Sorry to see that had to happen Sora. I'm sure you'll be able to manage to visit the web sometime before the semester starts again, although your efforts were well thought out. Blue: Yep... it's about time I came forth with my thoughts on your WIP ^^ Now I like the James Bond feel that has managed to come around this one. I think that has managed to add to a lighter chilled formation on that side of the mix, and I dig the direction that managed to come around it. Kudos on getting the record set up so far, and I appreciate much of the technical terms that came to it. I understand how tough it is to be able to mix the theme given its restrictions in terms of length, but I think there needed to be a bit more granted to it. So far I found the arrangement to be really conservative; I was hoping for some expansions to match with the level of New Beginnings or A Warrior's Path, which is what I usually come to expect from you. But knowing you I feel you might be able to get that established later on in the mix. I tell you what, sometimes it helps to look on remixes of other short themes and see how they got established to what they were. There were quite a few on Relics of the Chozo that did just that and still sounded slick (Premonition of Fell Purpose, Escaping Retribution and Unsettling Nature were a few of which that did just that), and much of the tracks for PRC 2-15 (you know, the Ghostbusters thing) also had their own specific techniques on broadening on a very short piece of music. Even the OneUps fleshed out their skills on a short piece of game music with "Isle de Kirby". Whichever happens, I'm sure you'll come up with your own strategy on how to make yours branch out. Nonetheless, best of luck with the rest of your mix!

As much as I love to see the vote continue (and in fact i do ) I'm feeling a little bit curious over the speed of the MP3s. Any idea when #51 will come out? Most students have started their summer vacation at least two weeks ago and yet nothing much is happening on that front o_O

Ah, more PriZm-y goodness and the site's first Xenosaga mix to boot. First of all I want to say congrats for what he has done in getting the mix onto the site - that's showing that with his second submissin he's become a firm establishment right across the community as far as the audience can see. For full emphasis i'll quote my VGMix review when it comes to sharing my thoughts behind all this :- As far as i'm concerned I actually digged a lot of the components that came together, and I found it to be one of the cooler mixes that managed to come out of the community on first exposure. I now understand where he's coming from with the ending sequence after he explained it to the judges, although it still feels a bit unsatisfactory in its execution; plus, EQ-ing out some of the hiss on the sound clips could help make them stand out a little bit better for what they were worth. But those are just two minor grips that I've had with a rather spectacular addition towards the site. Well done PriZm, and best of luck in future works and the judges' coordination on "A Star Freezes Over".