Sinewav

The three year delay made that punchline all the more hilarious.

I participated in a couple of the beta weekends and I felt there was very little in the way that kind of mundane questing and grinding. Plus, EA and Bioware aren't in the business of making movies and TV shows, and who knows if they'd be any good at it. It was never trying to reinvent the wheel. It takes what has worked for other MMOs, fixes some of what didn't work, and puts some excellent, immersive storytelling on top of it.

Good point. There wouldn't even be ads. And if you wanted to donate, you couldn't go through PayPal. You'd probably have to put cash in an envelope and send it to David directly. All 12 of you.

Still, that would pretty much be a death sentence. Blocked domain --> no new visitors --> decreased traffic --> decreased revenue from ads --> no more ocremix.

To elaborate on your point a bit more, remember that little thing with the OCR YouTube account recently? Imagine that with the whole friggin' site. That's perfectly possible under the terms of this bill.

I'd be lying if I said that nostalgia wasn't a small part of it (I do enjoy some good ol' Mario, Zelda, and Mega Man 3 from my childhood.) But for the most part, my enjoyment comes from hearing the interpretations. Most of my favorite remixes are from games I didn't play until recent adulthood (Chrono Trigger, Street Fighter II) or games I've never even played. When it comes to chiptunes, I absolutely adore the sound of the C64's SID chip, but I didn't even know what a C64 looked like until about a year ago. I'm probably one of the rare few who actually enjoys video game music more than the games themselves. It amazes me that there's this whole world of utterly brilliant composers who go unappreciated because of the medium for which they compose. Something about the simple, yet powerful melodies that get me. With a few exceptions, movie soundtracks don't seem to do that nearly as well (or often) as video game soundtracks.

I think this is a really neat idea. I haven't actually sat down at a piano with this one yet to find out, but I wonder how both songs would sound harmonizing with each other... like both melodies played at once, or in a round, or something like that. Could have some fun with time stretching and reversing too.

I enjoy open worlds, but it's not like every game has to (or should) be one. Some stories are better told in a linear fashion. It's a matter of knowing what you're getting into, and appreciating a game for what it's trying to be, not what it isn't.

Yeah, same here. I retweeted MAGFest and wrote out my own.

Yeah, ever since they shut GeoCities down, the whole thing has gone straight to hell.

Good idea! I'll go over to the hardware store and pick up some tubes.

I don't want to live on this Internet anymore.

Best remix ever or greatest remix ever?

Had to do a double take to make sure I was on the right website haha. This song is already a classic. I can't play castlevania anymore without hearing these lyrics in my head. Actually considered making it my ringtone in the past.

With Braid, I skipped straight past the story bits and just played through the levels. To this day, I still haven't even bothered to find out what the story even was, but I thought the game was hella fun.

Bahahahahaha

Very nice! I voted. Best of luck.

Man, do I wish I had a job right now. I'd love to go to something like this.

You realize you just said that you don't like Nobuo Uematsu on a website dedicated to the appreciation of video game music, right? Hope you're wearing your flame resistant suit.

Nobuo Uematsu did Rad Racer? No way. That soundtrack was legit, bro.

While we're on the tangent, there's an old Extra Credits episode that addresses the topic of old/new VGM and good melodies versus "epic trite" extremely well. One of their best episodes, in my opinion.

QFT. I'm probably alone in this, but more and more, it's the music that inspires me to play a game, not the other way around. I played Chrono Trigger because I loved the soundtrack. The only reason I ever even touched Seiken Densetsu 3 was because I heard so many good remixes here. I really dislike the Halo series, but Martin O'Donnell's soundtrack is brilliant. Personally, I remix based on what songs I like, not what games I like, or even what games I have played. For me it's more of an exercise in honoring brilliant pieces of music that most people don't give a second thought. If you consider where video game music lies in the grand scheme of music appreciation, there is not a single soundtrack that is overrated... in fact, our most overrated soundtracks are still underrated in the big picture.

I said this when it was posted on IGN, but I'll reiterate here: this is one of the most beautiful video game remixes I have ever heard. Possibly one of the most beautiful songs period. I can't believe this was done in such a short timespan.

I think we're arguing two different things. I'm saying that morally they did right by the donors. You're saying that legally, there are some chinks in their armor. I think we're both right. The donors donated, knowing that they were exceeding the amount necessary for the surgery, and not knowing what EC would do with the extra money. They trusted the team's judgement. Now they all seem to adamantly defend that EC represented their wishes and spent the money wisely. Morally, I feel EC did right by them. (No comment on if they did right by The Escapist). Legally, however, it certainly seems like they are treading on very rocky ground. If it goes to court, I'm guessing it'll come down however the lawyers convince the judge to interpret the contract between EC and The Escapist. This is kinda hairy, because the contract between them is so vague. I could see it going a lot of different ways. But I'm not really an expert on law, so this is mostly conjecture.

I've been following this story on multiple websites since James started posting about it on Facebook earlier this evening. What you're saying make a lot of sense Coop. But the truth is, I have seen countless posts of people complaining that their donated money was not meant for The Escapist, and that they fully support this indie game publisher venture. I haven't seen a single post from a donor complaining that the game venture was a misuse of their money. In other words, yeah, it was silly to keep accepting donations when they hadn't stated what they were going to do with the extra money... but the people donating the money all seemed to recognize that and be perfectly at peace with it (under the assumption that their money was going to Extra Credits rather than The Escapist). Don't know how that argument would hold up in a court, but it seems pretty clear that so far no relevant party besides The Escapist has voiced disapproval of the publishing venture.