zircon Posted December 27, 2004 Share Posted December 27, 2004 The guy submitted early October, says he got the confirmation letter but nothing else. Also, the link he provided doesn't work for me, but going to his website and downloading it from there does. Maybe you guys will have better luck. So: Contact InfoYour ReMixer name: PLBenjaminZ Your real name: Preston Lee Benjamin Bautista Samoranos (Yes, very long name Confused) Your email address: plbenjaminz@hotmail.com Your website: Your userid (number, not name) on our forums: Uhh I can't find it lol... PLBenjaminZ? ReMix Info Name of game(s) ReMixed: Chrono Trigger Name of individual song(s) ReMixed: Underground Sewer Additional information about game if it has not yet been added to the site, including composer, system, etc.: Nobuo Uematsu Link to the original soundtrack if it is not one of the sound archives already available on the site: (That .spc SNES format file thingy, iono...) Your own comments about the mix, for example the inspiration behind it, how it was made, etc: My second remix ever, first submission ever, I made it so it could possibly be posted around Christmas, but no.... haha. My inspiration behind it... was I heard it a lot of times while playing the game... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Israfel Posted December 27, 2004 Share Posted December 27, 2004 Nice, somewhat gothic arrangement here. The samples don't always do the writing justice, but for the most part they get the job done. The arrangement is quite strong in my opinion, though, and so this gets an easy 'yes' from me. YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vig Posted December 27, 2004 Share Posted December 27, 2004 enjoyable remix overall. The remixer certainly has a good understanding of dynamics and composition. there are some problems holding it back firstly, the mixing needs work. even in the quieter sections, some instruments arent as loud as they should be, in my opinion. (piano, drums) more objective is the issue that in the louder sections the sound becomes quite cluttered. starting around the 2 minute mark the lead isnt loud enough and the harmony brass is either too loud or too busy. the other problem is that there are a couple of off notes. (2:15, etc) the melody is played correctly, but the busy harmony brass line plays a clashing note. the mix is good, and it could easily pass, buti it's only about 75% there. tweak it a bit and it's gold. NO resubmit plz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danny B Posted December 28, 2004 Share Posted December 28, 2004 Damn. What a cool ReMix. The style is real nice - hippity hoppity but not trendy or goofy. Nice. However, the criticisms i will levy against the the track are ironically some of the rarer shortfalls that plague ReMixes. This track is too complex. As my hallowed compatriot Vigilante so succinctly summarized - the brass clashes. It's too busy and active for its role. It should be a supporting cast member that shows off once in a while, while the star of the show, the melody, is taking a break. You've got hammy brass. You've got some decent samples here, it's a shame to hear them all fighting each other for control. Given the moderate length of the track, i'd suggest fleshing out some of these ideas in their own sections rather than trying to smash them all together. Unfortunately, I'd say that between the few "off" notes that vig mentioned, and the overcluttered nature of the apex of the tune, this mix is a few bucks short. "tweak it a bit" NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted December 28, 2004 Share Posted December 28, 2004 http://www.snesmusic.org/spcsets/ct.rsn - "Underground Sewer" (ct-2-16.spc) I'm "bleh" on most of the Chrono Trigger soundtrack. Probably just got too cliche for me. At least this tackles one of the Uemtasu tracks, I suppose. These opening beats sounds exactly like something TO would use [e.g. "Electrion (Guitar Mix)"] except with no energy. Then you have the NoppZ-style orchestral stabs starting at :24 with some very plain/flat drumwork. Though I can get past that as long as the arrangement itself is strong, everything sounds kind of tired on the delivery. Watch the way the strings suddenly stops at 1:10 & 1:23; sounds very unrealistic. Moving from note to note, it needs to sound a bit more natural. Moving into the slightly more energetic part from 1:59-2:48, everything's louder along with more instruments, but it's way more crowded. It just seems you just threw more stuff in to be louder and turned up the volume. Might wanna create some separation in the instruments by EQ-ing something to fill out the high end, or, like Dan mentioned, use some separate sections to highlight different sets of instruments. Just watch the clutter there. Pretty good piano ending from 3:12 onward though. Not really a fan of the extra note at 3:51, as it's rather late, but that's just a minor nitpick. The samples aren't the best, but I don't care about that as much as I care for them to be used at their best. Check out the ReMixing & WIP forums for any advice on how to get the strings & brass sounding more natural for some areas, and weigh in the VGMix reviews you receive as well. As long as you do anything you can to address what you yourself have observed as the weaker points of the track, you're likely good to go. The remix name is pretty "eh" to tell you the truth, but in all seriousness, you're basically there, Preston. Sorry for your mix falling through, but at least it sounds like an easy resubmission. NO (revise & resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GrayLightning Posted December 28, 2004 Share Posted December 28, 2004 This is completely awesome and amazing. I love the style, the writing and the orchestration. Samples are well above the bar. BUT there's one major problem here, there's so much clipping/audio distortion/deformation/poping issues throughout, particularly in the louder build up sections. Does no one else hear this? Also Very light compression is in order here, and it looks like you've limited the track to 0db. I would set the limit at the respected standard of -.3db and/or go back to the mixing stage and work on your levels a bit. I've asked Zircon to contact the mixer to resubmit a rerecorded version. Once most of the issues are fixed, it's a Yes from me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zircon Posted December 28, 2004 Author Share Posted December 28, 2004 My vote is essentially the same as Gray's. I am really impressed by the structure and arrangement of the mix. It's rare to see a first time submitter have a complex arrangement with an actual build and lots of subtle layering work, but this mixer did it. The production is fairly good all around - I think the technical problems people are hearing are from some of the percussion, and the brass swells. For instance, it sounds like some deliberately lofi drum samples were used (bit-degraded) which would cause an unpleasant ringing/buzzing effect. I think the instrumental samples are generally solid as well: in terms of quality they seem on par with the type of soundfonts Unknown and Darkesword use, for instance. However, I will agree that some extra production/mastering work could be done to reduce some of the muddiness in the track. I'll definitely talk to the mixer and see if he can fix the obvious technical problems like the ringing/buzzing and possibly clipping due to the brass swell. Assuming he fixes that, this would earn a yes from me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted December 28, 2004 Share Posted December 28, 2004 Y'all are obviously "NO (resubmit)" as well. We might as well just close the decision and wait for the resub, especially since it may not come immediately. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zircon Posted January 1, 2005 Author Share Posted January 1, 2005 Alright, I just finished talking with PLBenjaminZ over AIM - I explained the situation, but he basically said that he deleted the project file because he didn't thing the mix would get accepted However, he did say he was thinking about redoing the entire track, which I encouraged him to do after checking out the final decision here. So.. that said, I guess we're voting with this version, in which case my vote would be NO for the reasons stated in my earlier post. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted January 1, 2005 Share Posted January 1, 2005 Alright, I just finished talking with PLBenjaminZ over AIM - I explained the situation, but he basically said that he deleted the project file because he didn't thing the mix would get accepted Now no offense, but seriously, who the hell does that? ... Don't do that. If you only made the music for getting it posted to OCR, and now see no point in keeping it, that's a stupid reason to delete it. Have confidence in your work. We get enough scrubs & MIDI rippers having overconfidence. We don't need the good people dumping their work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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