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*NO* Final Fantasy 13 'Shadow Puppetry for the Blind'


OceansAndrew
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Remix Title: Shadow Puppetry for the Blind

Contact Information

ReMixer name: evory

Real name: Jeremy Ng

Email: jeremyngyd@hotmail.com

User ID: 31417

Submission Information

Game arranged: Final Fantasy XIII

Song arranged: Blinded by Light (Battle Theme)

Game information: Masashi Hamauzu; PS3 / Xbox360

Source:

Additional information: (cue, verbal diarrhoea)

The first that caught your eye should have been the title "Shadow Puppetry for the Blind". Actually nothing should have caught your eye because (1) you should be listening to the mix rather than doing anything else, and (2) you're supposed to have been blinded by light (but since this is an inferior remix, it'll hardly serve that purpose). Anyway, even if the title didn't catch your eye (and I doubt it did), mentioning this serves as an excuse for me to explain the the title.

The title is essentially a rip-off from an old short story I wrote involving light, darkness, a magical grand piano, and as many biblical allusions as Google could find me in a bid to make the story complex to the point of convolutedness. While I stole the title because it sounded nice, it actually makes sense because, as with shadow puppetry for the blind, the remix (1) lacks any solid sense of clarity and direction, and (2) is utterly pointless.

The source should be pretty clear throughout, it starts with a slightly mutated version if the bassline, moves into a slightly more mutated version of the source, and finally into a disfigured, degenerate and defenestrated hack of an excuse for the source. Oh and Those Who Fight is thrown in somewhere because it fit the rhythm almost perfectly, and saved me the trouble of thinking of my own buildup.

This aside, I feel pleased and clever to no end for sneaking in a quote from a chinese orchestral piece (飞天, translated as Flying Asparas. If you read that as 'asparagus' you're not alone, and if you have no idea what an asparas is, you're not alone either.). Granted, it's only one bar, and granted, it's buried somewhere in the melange of muddy melodies, and granted, it's entirely pointless except for the reason of self-gratification. Which makes it perfectly congruous with this remix. Yay.

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Some of the sequencing is pretty stiff, especially early on when things are more exposed, though it gets better once the toned percussion comes in. The bassoon range seems a little high for the instrument, and the brass melody is a bit rigid, but the flute stuff is really pretty nice.

The good news is that the dynamics are pretty solid, and the flow and transitions are nice. The arrangement is pretty classy as well, and adds a few nuances to an already strong melody.

The sequencing isn't perfect, but overall the feel of this is good enough for me, and the arrangement makes up for some of the flaws. The production is clean and the samples are pretty good.

Yes

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Overall things feel just a tad quiet, and strangely a little muffled. I'll agree with Andrew that things feel somewhat mechanical, but when it all starts coming together it's less noticeable. I think it's the biggest detractor from the piece, as the arrangement is fine in my ears, and the sounds themselves are pretty good.

Touch up the sequencing, and I think this is good to go.

NO (resubmit)

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  • 2 months later...

Pretty nice arrangement. It's not a lot different from the original in instrumentation, but goes in a softer direction, and plays with different orchestral textures. The toned percussion that OA mentioned was a highlight.

I don't think this quite has the realism it needs though, when you compare it to other orchestral arrangements on our site. The brass has realism issues almost across-the-board, and was a major thorn in the paw. Some of the samples need to be better and the articulations need to be more realistic. I also thought the intro was too stiff, and there were some slow attacks here and there that also detracted. With those issues fixed, I don't see why this wouldn't pass.

NO (resubmit)

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  • 1 month later...

Intro is pretty weak. Sequencing is very mechanical, coupled with a very dry and slightly dodgy set of samples make the quality level here very distracting from the arrangement. It has it's moments (brass bits aren't too bad) but you definitely need to work on bringing out the emotion of the piece through your samples. Just put youself in the seat of each performer and ask yourself what nuance you would add if you were playing each line, and try and match what you hear in your head. All I'm getting right now are solid notes of uniform length aren't really speaking to me. Humanization through automation, you can does.

NO

Also lol ff7 twist. I heard it. Nice.

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  • 1 month later...
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