Palpable Posted November 3, 2009 Share Posted November 3, 2009 Remixer name: illustrationism Real name: David Schooley Website: http://www.sakari-infinity.net User ID: 13253 Game: Mystic Quest: Final Fantasy Name of song: Beautiful Forest Game and OST: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final_Fantasy_Mystic_Quest ---- I was organizing my old SNES games earlier, and suddenly stopped when I came to Mystic Quest. I stared at it and pondered... I looked at the clock - surely I had time to play it for a few minutes. The organization could wait. "I must play this game", I thought to myself; and I did. The music from FF:MQ has always been particularly enjoyable to me, and music I considered quite good, despite the lack of Nobuo Uematsu at the musical helm. The Level Forest song started playing, and I found myself humming along. "Surely", I thought, "There must be some remixes from this game up on OC Remix". Alas, I found only 2 remixes. Thus, I started my own mix. Using Logic, I loaded up Kontakt and started out with some stringy strings. I couldn't help but whisper out some words to represent the hero's goals. I almost whispered "The tree is blocking the way", or "You found a withered branch", but decided it'd be a little too goofy. But then again, I am remixing a video game song... Heh. I found myself needing a good beat, so I put together some percussive bits; I also wanted something chilled, so I used an electric guitar to carry the melody, and some synths for harmony. About 1/2 through, I wanted to switch things up a little, so I managed some new percussion, switched the melody to a worldy-windy synth, added some dance moves, some crunchy electric guitar, some harmonious reverby synth keys, and some more whispered dubbing. I ended it with a likeness to the beginning - stringy strings and whisper dubbing. It seemed fitting enough. I couldn't have asked for that crunchy guitar to fade out any nicer. Well, that's the story, and I'm sticking to it. I thought that maybe I'd sit on this for a while and work on it later, but... I end up sitting on them forever; eternally unhappy with the songs imperfections. So here we are, 5 minutes and 9 seconds later, with a remix for OC. ---- Thanks, David ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=ffmq - Beautiful Forest (ffmq-06.spc) Though it was not without its problems, I'm happy you submitted this because it had some cool ideas, and personally, I've found the best way to learn is to have other people tell you what could be improved. The arrangement here is pretty cool, but there were some weird bum notes, especially in the second half, and I'm not sure your new chords really fit. They did sound pretty though, and I liked the crunchy guitar buried in the mix in the second half. Very cool shoegazey effect. The first half sounded empty and a little underdeveloped. The lead could have used a thicker sound and more expression, since there wasn't that much going on. The drums weren't filling the back very well, and the loop you used in the second half was better for that purpose. One last thing but I found the oscillated panning of the strings in the intro to be distracting. Good ideas, but a fair deal that could be improved upon. I'd be interested to hear another version of this if you decide to do another. NO (resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OceansAndrew Posted November 6, 2009 Share Posted November 6, 2009 This is definitely chill, but dang the intro is long, and the effect on the strings is a little bit vertigo-inducing. The mixing seemed to be either too empty, or too crowded, there wasn't really a happy medium. The feel of the second half i preferred, but the melody was a bit buried, and some of the noodley guitar bits had some definite off-key notes. I found the whispered vocals to start out mysterious but since they were constantly cut-and-pasted throughout the track with no change in intensity, they got to be sortof annoying. I think if you varied it up with the voice getting more insistent, it's work a lot better. Overall some cool ideas, but some changes need to be made for this to pass the bar. I'm glad that you made a FFMQ mix though, what an underappreciated soundtrack! no, please resub Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CHz Posted November 19, 2009 Share Posted November 19, 2009 The above votes are pretty comprehensive, so I won't say much. The arrangement is pretty rad, though maybe a bit stretched out for how much actually happens, especially the first half. The production is not terrible, but there are a lot of areas that could use some work. Not a bad effort overall; I enjoyed the direction you took the original. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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