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OCR01058 - Breath of Fire "Flames of Valor"


djpretzel
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Whoooa this is some hi-quality orchestral. Especially the percussion. The timpani hits, snare rolls, and cymbal crashes are all well articulated and well-placed. The samples as a whole could be better, but I find the arrangement is so well done, it overcomes it well. I think the oboe section is the best part, because I love oboes. But of course the whole mix is good, even if I wouldn't give it a highly reccomended. But maybe I just don't know enough about orchestral to really know what pushes something over the bar. I noticed during transitions, there's often a really long high note that is kind of annoying, but other than that, all good things outta this mix.

:nicework:

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It sounds a little muddy in places... but that is to be expected...

there are also moments that i feel that the sound image is a little empty...

a little heavy on the reverb....

Kamikaze said it before I could... The samples are a little weak.

the string pads feel a little out of place for me.

But this IS a great arrangment... (Bonus points for using a harpsichord.)

and its worse than that hes dead jim.... I rarely get to hear an english horn. (its not an oboe.)

I play the oboe and English horn... not enough music really uses the more beatiful tones they are capable of, rather it tends to use the honky and more undesirable imo articulations... You capitalize on the VERY best of the double reed sound.

But largely I wish it were longer!!!

(VHD was this made with eridol? I feel like ive heard these samples before.)

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Samples are weak? :roll: This sounds like Miroslav or Squidfont.

Quality samples. Amazing arrangement and orchestration. But I can't say I personally enjoyed this mix, it was too meandering for my tastes. It feels like it moves through several themes way too quickly without immersing itself in one for too long. I prefer VHD's previous mixes at vgmix. Despite not personally enjoying this mix, the technical aspects of this mix is most impressive. At the end of the day that's all that matters. Excellent job as always VHD.

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First thing I thought when listening to the opening of this... "AWSOME! I LOVE IT!" The drums in particular sound amazing.

Second thing I thought when listening to the opening of this... "That horn sounds fake."

Unfortunatly, it is really noticible. When the above reviewers said some of the samples were weak, it's true. Some of them are... that one horn in the beginning specifically. In my opinion, most of the other samples hold their own quite well though, but that one sample just spoiled the opening for me.

The arrangment, the sheet music so to speak, is lovely, beautiful, stirring, wonderful. And this mix is as well, throughout. If the one single half-arsed sample I heard was near the end, or in the middle instead of at the beginning... well, you know what they say about first impressions. Once I heard the first not-so-perfect sample, I started PAYING ATTENTION TO THE SAMPLES... which is something you want to avoid.

The transitions were perfect, by the way, in my opinion. And this is quite a rousing peice, and I'm VERY glad it was accepted at OCR, and I'm keeping it, and I will likely listen to it quite a bit. Just... ooh, I wish there had been a better horn sample at the beginning. Just at the beginning, really.

...

Oops, I was typing this while listening for the first time, and it just ended. Argh! Even though it's six minutes long, it's still too short!

I think I know why too, although you have perfect transitions (well, perfect from where I'm standing, YMMV) this peice is really just a collection of songs from BoF strung together. You didn't develop any individual theme very much... each theme was really rather short! I heard themes I definitely recognized, not so much from the game (which I played YEARS ago) but from other mixes on this site... consider 'Epitaph of Alan And Cerl'... DarkCecil took just one of the themes you explored (and let me say, for the short amount you touched this theme, you did it just as well as he did) and yet managed to pull it out for a full three minutes, not the minute twenty seconds (3:38-4:58) you had.

All and all, great stuff. I have to keep interspersing my critisms with comments that I love this mix... because I do. The only complaints I can muster (though I mustered them verbosly indeed) is the one sample I didn't like, and the lack of extra development for each individual theme.

I hope to hear lots more from you on OC here! I like what I hear. I like what I hear indeed.

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"Whoo, a Breath of Fire arrangement" is exactly what I thought when I saw this. This mix, however, is both disappointing and satisfying. Although I felt that the first 1:22 proved to be a great introduction, the arrangement of the first overworld theme that follows lacks depth. The mix really shines when the beautiful "Alan and Cerl Forever" part comes in. Couldn't have done it better myself :wink:

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I feel that the samples were somewhat lacking, but I really don't care much about the samples. Some of them actually surprised me in the quality, while some left me a little disappointed.

What really disappointed me was that the mix seemed to spend very little time on each song. It just danced across tons of tunes instead of picking a few and sticking to them. Because of that, it changes ideas way too rapidly for me. Of course, all of the transitions are very smooth, so at least it gets from one tune to the next very smoothly.

It also felt like there was too many moments of just melody and chord. I would have loved to see a lot more movement going on at a lot of points, while some I feel it was just right.

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What really disappointed me was that the mix seemed to spend very little time on each song. It just danced across tons of tunes instead of picking a few and sticking to them. Because of that, it changes ideas way too rapidly for me. Of course, all of the transitions are very smooth, so at least it gets from one tune to the next very smoothly.

I do appreciate the reviews thus far, and I'm glad to see that this arrangement seems to be fairly well enjoyed overall. There is a point, however, that I feel bears mentioning: there are actually only three pieces from Breath of Fire used throughout this arrangement; I can certainly understand how someone might not realize this, though, as two of the themes are arranged in "pieces," with the first part of the theme being presented in one way, and the second part presented in a rather different way (an example of this would be the last minute or so of the arrangement, which is simply the second half of the BOF Intro which begins "Flames of Valor"). Anyway, most everything I've read so far has been very insightful, and I thank those who've taken the time to listen.

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oh and this mix is really good. i didn't have any problem with the samples used. i never complain about brass samples because i know there does not exist a perfect brass sample.

i'd guess it's miroslav, for those of you asking about the samples, maybe with a few other more specialized libraries for certain instruments.

but Dan could probably give you the best answer as to what they are.

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This sounds like Miroslav or Squidfont.

haha. sorry man, but there is a vast difference in quality between Miroslav and Squidfont :( i barely even use squidfont because it's nothing special. however, if i had miroslav, i'd be overwhelmed with happiness.

unless that's not the point you were trying to make.

uhh

yeah

This has been discussed somewhere before. If I remember from past threads squidfont is miroslav mini, or an edited version of it. Several people and even judges in the judging panel have also confused the two. A lot of the patches do sound alike. Of course the full miroslav version has more articulations and stereo patches, etc over squidfont.

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Contrary to my post count, I've been coming to this site for years, and thus I can confidently say that this is an exceptional remix.

This is really just an exciting, refreshing, and deep piece to listen to. Great care went into every aspect of this song, which is saying a lot considering it's just over 6 minutes in length. Just a few days ago I burned an OCR MP3 CD for my MP3 CD player, now I'm wishing I had waited to put this song on there.

It is songs like this that make OCR so great. Awesome work!

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Like a breath of fresh air man..

I particularly like the climax ordering.. I'm a big one for climax ordering.. this song is definitely one of the best at that, if not the best....

As for creative inspiriation and originality, I'll give you an OK, it sounds similar to the old track, but much improved in many ways, when I first listened to this, I thought.. no way did you make this for no money.. but on second thoughts, I've said that of many tracks made by DJpretzel and MCVAffe...

I've been coming to the OCR for a while, had my acct for less than a week, but this is probably the best orchestral piece on the site.. I like the horns.. I don't care what you say!

Props on the the sound from about 4:05 thru 4:30, And i'm lovin 5:20.. has a Howard Shore feeling to it

EDIT: Songs like this DO make OCR great!

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Shameless adoration:

Fan-farkin-tastic! Definitely on /my/ top-10 list, if I had to make one! The arranging is superb. The use of instruments was masterful and the innumerable subtle touches made it FEEL like a reach orchestral arrangement. It never gets too much of that cheesy film score feel either.

The use of the harpsichord was brilliant. Not too much and always in the right context.I love the section around 1:40 where there's a soft interplay between the instrumental sections with snare on the offbeats. Great technique. And the rhythms of 2:33-3:10 made me want to jump around with happiness. The use of interesting rhythms is /everywhere/ in this thing.

Constructive criticisms:

Using the windchime thing twice in the same piece was just too much.

:P I mean, generally I have a hard time stomaching its cliche-ness even once.

The patches were a bit on the artifical side for my liking. The brass patches weren't so bad for me. The exposed sections at 2:50 5:30 were really very good. They captured very well that brass "blend" thing, the way brass instruments are supposed to blend in chords the way only brass can. The strings patches were what irked me. I remember the first minute or so blended a little awkwardly because of them and that 10 second exposed section at 3:32 was downright out-of-tune.

But you have to take those with a grain of salt, I've had a lot of firsthand orchestral experience, especially with brass and strings. =P

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  • 3 weeks later...

This actually surprised me. I didn't think it would turn out this well, to tell you the truth. Boy, did it surprise me. This is one of the best orchestrated pieces I've listened to on the site, and being there is a lot of them, that means a lot. Thanks for the tune.

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  • 8 months later...
  • 4 weeks later...

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