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Wild Arms: ARMed and DANGerous - History


Jenz Drake
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I still think the best project on this site is protricity's super metroid project, it was the VERY first one, he created the concept and successfuly executed it. Its an extremely cohesive album that works. A lot of the projects i have been involved in are not cohesive and the reviews show that. Its got to have an album feel and that takes lots of work when multiple artists are involved.

And see, there are people (like me!) who feel the exact opposite. I love projects that have a lot of variety and different approaches to the same soundtrack; I hated Relics of the Chozo because every track had the same feel to it (and Children of the Monkey Machine's tracks all sounded more like annoying noises repeated for a few minutes at a time than actual music). Chrono Symphonic felt tired and devoid of life, even during the most energetic of tracks. And hell, as hyped as I was for Summoning of Spirits, it had a definite rock bias that got kind of old kind of fast.

In fact, I still think the best project on the site yet is, ironically, not an OCR project - Bound Together. There was simply so much variety in tracks, from Ailsean's quick hard rock to Morse's... whatever it is that he does and is so damned catchy, to your own trance-y Snowbound. It kept changing and stayed interesting and I still end up just listening to the whole thing in order long after its release.

Though that may be misinterpreting your statement - I'm taking "cohesion" to mean "same genre and style throughout," which I'd attribute more to single-artist albums. In a multiple-artist release, I think something more varied is far more valuable, where you can use each artist's strengths to your advantage, and have each do tracks that suit them. Really, if I wanted "cohesiveness," (as I understand your use of it, which I'm beginning to wonder if I do) I'd stick to single-artist releases.

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I think the tracklist should be a selection, we dont need to cover everything, but everything that is mixable and worth covering should be. Just my thoughts anyway

Well, I partially agree with this. The songs that aren't as special aka "aren't worth covering" I feel should still be claimable, but they shouldn't have to be done for the project to be considered finished. You never know what crazy idea someone could come up with for the most boring source...

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And see, there are people (like me!) who feel the exact opposite. I love projects that have a lot of variety and different approaches to the same soundtrack; I hated Relics of the Chozo because every track had the same feel to it (and Children of the Monkey Machine's tracks all sounded more like annoying noises repeated for a few minutes at a time than actual music). Chrono Symphonic felt tired and devoid of life, even during the most energetic of tracks. And hell, as hyped as I was for Summoning of Spirits, it had a definite rock bias that got kind of old kind of fast.

In fact, I still think the best project on the site yet is, ironically, not an OCR project - Bound Together. There was simply so much variety in tracks, from Ailsean's quick hard rock to Morse's... whatever it is that he does and is so damned catchy, to your own trance-y Snowbound. It kept changing and stayed interesting and I still end up just listening to the whole thing in order long after its release.

Though that may be misinterpreting your statement - I'm taking "cohesion" to mean "same genre and style throughout," which I'd attribute more to single-artist albums. In a multiple-artist release, I think something more varied is far more valuable, where you can use each artist's strengths to your advantage, and have each do tracks that suit them. Really, if I wanted "cohesiveness," (as I understand your use of it, which I'm beginning to wonder if I do) I'd stick to single-artist releases.

Yes I agree about your points 100%. It wasn't necessarily genre specific cohesiveness, but everything had a similar tone, one string that made it work or glued it together. One idea thats been discussed is having genre specific cd's so you don't have some super soft piano or orchestra piece and then it slam into a rock or dance song thats decibels louder in dynamics. The ff4 project had that problem especially when my stuff came in. Thats why I offered to at least mix and master tracks so it has a similar quality or tone (gear wise) throughout. That offer still stands and something I definitely excel at is production and production quality, I have thousands of dollars worth of plugins and gear that can bring quality sounding mixes and masters (and I am experienced in mixing all genres) The earthbound project point I actually mentioned in an early post. Joe cam had a project that worked because he knew exactly what he wanted because he knew what artists he wanted. All the artists involved knew their craft and consistently put out quality music. The cohesiveness there was quality. Genres need to be separated at the very least, so your ears don't have to adjust so much, or at least the track order needs to be considered by genre.

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Well, I partially agree with this. The songs that aren't as special aka "aren't worth covering" I feel should still be claimable, but they shouldn't have to be done for the project to be considered finished. You never know what crazy idea someone could come up with for the most boring source...

Absolutely. We shouldn't limit but there needs to be some kind of theme to stick to as well. Lots of points to consider...

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The earthbound project point I actually mentioned in an early post. Joe cam had a project that worked because he knew exactly what he wanted because he knew what artists he wanted. All the artists involved knew their craft and consistently put out quality music. The cohesiveness there was quality. Genres need to be separated at the very least, so your ears don't have to adjust so much, or at least the track order needs to be considered by genre.

You mentioned Joe Cam, but not specifically BT, so I wasn't sure. But I'm glad to know that the cohesiveness you're referring to isn't "make it all the same genre and style." That gives me more faith in any projects you lead.

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I have to agree with The Mutericator-- the soundtracks that have been so focused down to one single genre have been very forgettable for me, on the whole. Don't get me wrong, I think there was a lot of talent involved in both Relics and Chrono Symphonic, if you're not a fan of orchestral or ambient there's just not a lot to like about them, despite the effort that was put in by the contributing artists. These kind of albums alienate a lot of people, unfortunately.

Theives of Fate, DQD and Voices of the Lifestream were fully cohesive and listenable as whole albums, but they had a lot of genre variety between songs.

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I don't think that he's even talking about similar genres, he just doesn't want the album to sound like a bunch of jumbled crap crammed together and called an album...He just wants the CD to have enough similarities that it flows together really well, other than that, I think he probably would encourage originality over conformity.

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Theives of Fate

Mmmmmm. Second place for best remix album in my mind. Definitely cohesive, but still so much variety. I think the only song on that whole thing that I don't like is that six minute marimba ending one that just keeps going. But being on the same album as Scar Sealing Girl makes me very tempted to forgive it.

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I don't think electronic would suit the whole album, in my experience with video games, there are just some songs that would fit other genres better. I however need some help, I can't draw for crud, and drawing on a computer for me would look like super crud, I need to collaborate with someone to design some concept art, what I'm needing are some renders of the characters made in a variety of poses so that I can create banners, graphics and stuff for support and a webpage, as well as stuff for the album itself, I'd like to get some basic stuff together for Jade and Blind to look at.

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As soon as I get the download from Jade finished, I'll be able to listen and familiarize myself with the soundtrack. I want to help Jade with this project as much as I can, I have a love for RPG's and I like what exposure I have had with Wild ARMs, I'll be playing the game tomorrow and hopefully will finish it up, I'm really wanting to get a feel for the game itself, especially since I need to play the game to get an idea of backdrops for the concept art I'll be working on.

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Glad to see this taking off - Wild Arms has a unique style to the music it seems. Although I haven't gotten to play the original yet, I'm playing through Alter Code F as my first Wild Arms and find some of these songs quite interesting.

I am very curious what Jade & Jordan have cooked up so far, but that'll be for them to say :-) .

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Glad to see this taking off - Wild Arms has a unique style to the music it seems. Although I haven't gotten to play the original yet, I'm playing through Alter Code F as my first Wild Arms and find some of these songs quite interesting.

I am very curious what Jade & Jordan have cooked up so far, but that'll be for them to say :-) .

Thanks Bahamut... Your support matters to me a lot. I just got 3 straight no's from 3 artists I really wanted so I've been so bummed out tonight... :( But I gotta get used to the rejection and keep going right??? ::must be determined::

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Thanks Bahamut... Your support matters to me a lot. I just got 3 straight no's from 3 artists I really wanted so I've been so bummed out tonight... :( But I gotta get used to the rejection and keep going right??? ::must be determined::

I had gotten so many rejections with SoS, they all start to kind of blur together. Just keep on truckin' and finding new talent to provide great music. There's a ton of remixers out there, and even if you can't get your favorites on board, you'll likely stumble across someone who will just blow you away with what they do for your project.

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