Liontamer Posted February 26, 2005 Share Posted February 26, 2005 Previous decision: http://www.ocremix.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=49178 Contact Info Your ReMixer name : metaphist Your real name : Paul Ford Your email address : peford@cfl.rr.com Your userid (number, not name) on our forums : the hell? ReMix Info Name of game(s) ReMixed : Ikaruga Name of individual song(s) ReMixed : Metempsychosis (ch.5 theme) Additional information about game if it has not yet been added to the site, including composer, system, etc. composer: Hiroshi Iuchi copyright Treasure, Infogrames Dreamcast and Gamecube, 2003 Your own comments about the mix, for example the inspiration behind it, how it was made, etc. Made in FL Studio 5 -- The flute, sax, strings and bass are all soundfonts I found while scouring the net. The vox samples are from the game itself, as are a few other sound FX you might find familiar. Everything else if from FL Studio. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted February 27, 2005 Author Share Posted February 27, 2005 It's the last sub of this. Second resubs have been done before, and in a worst-case scenario 2 is a fine absolute limit since this never happens much anyway. Paul himself said that it's final and that's it for trying to get it accepted. Less bitching, more voting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Digital Coma Posted February 27, 2005 Share Posted February 27, 2005 No, we can bitch all we want when you're taking such liberty to directly place any submission on the panel. Especially since this mix seems to get worse every time it's "resubmitted" - the same problems from before have now been joined with off-key and generally bad notes in the bell synth and flute leads. Though the mixing/production has improved, this arrangement still pales in comparison to the original composition. Time to drop this and work on something else. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted March 2, 2005 Author Share Posted March 2, 2005 Lemme clarify here that this isn't a second-time direct-to-panel resubmission. The first two times this was submitted, it went through the queue and came to us from Dave's inbox. This is the first time it's been placed directly on the panel. Anyway, our policy as clarified by djp is that, for the very infrequent case of people that had a first resubmission posted directly to the panel and want to resub again, those people are required to do second resubmissions through the regular queue system (the Submissions inbox). Nonetheless, that isn't even the case here, so this argument is over. Onto the mix, I completely disagree with Binnie's take on it. Played it on VGF50 and enjoyed it. I thought there were substantial all-around improvements made to this version as compared with Paul's first version of "Black Ice", which possessed a good vibe but an empty sound. Appreciating the source tune was actually a direct result of listening to the various versions of this remix first, and the mix does a great job of playing up some of the subtle melodies of the source tune. I don't hear any wrong notes in the belltones or the flute lead. The way the track intro put me off initially, but that was actually a unique way to move right into the mix. Takes a while to warm up to. I liked how the strings were beefed up here compared to the previous version, as well as how the melody was brought out a bit more. Some of the glassy sounds clashed a bit until the :40 mark, but it was a minor issue to me. They should have been even quieter, but they were actually scaled down from the VGMix version. I remember the first time that I heard this new version, I wasn't hot on the new synth flute & synth sax work added. If you wanna throw out "off-key and generally bad notes" because of that, I think it's a mistake from another listener's standpoint. My initial problem actually was that they come across as very meandering and lacking focus. At times, I certainly felt like that was the case, but overall they both provided eerily laid-back arrangements of the source material and do in fact possess a measure of focus along with purposeful structure. Whereas the flute & sax could come across as too synthetic and tepid to others, the syntheticness of the sounds was a non-factor in this type of mix, and I got a lonely, echoing, eerie vibe from them. If you give it more than a few listens, and don't flippantly dismiss them, you might come around to how well they work. I thought the drumkit didn't sit well in the mix at times and should have possessed more stereo activity. Otherwise other aspects of the instrumentation and sounds were strong and came together well. The strings were very well-handled, the beeps, belltones, finger snaps & in-game vox and SFX were all used effectively, and the bassline filled things out nicely. The track exhibited lots of changes & development over the course of the 4 1/2 minutes while retaining a cohesive style. I feel as it there weren't are any blatant offenders in the makeup of this mix, that the arrangement was a very creative take on the original, the texture of the instrumentation worked well together for the most part, the production was fairly solid, and the sum total success of the execution cannot be denied. I'm not saying it's a superlative YES, but I am saying that it does everything the site's mission statement wants in a rearrangement and does it fairly well. It'll be a shame if this is rejected, since I feel this could only be rejected on subjective grounds, relatively minor issues and/or a lack of listening to the track enough times. YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarkeSword Posted March 3, 2005 Share Posted March 3, 2005 I enjoy the way this piece slowly evolves. The percussion has a lot of nice, subtle nuances thoughout which makes for some good variation. Texture is really nice too; bells, flute, and synthethic sounds all work really well in tandem. I don't hear any bad notes anywhere, either. There are some tastefully used accidentals, but that's about it. The only thing I don't like about this song is that the melodic ideas meander a bit; this is just a small personal gripe though; I would have preferred something stronger, but in this case, it works as an atmospheric mood piece nonetheless. Nice stuff. YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zircon Posted March 3, 2005 Share Posted March 3, 2005 Introduction seems a little lackluster to me.. not a great opening to the mix. The kick sound in particular is just completely out of place. The hihats and snare seem like they would fit best in a breakbeat, while the kick sounds like it belongs in some sort of four-on-the-floor house music. I'm not being nitpicky here either.. it just strikes me immediately as being detrimental to the 'airy' feel of the rest of the mix. The same goes for the bass instrument. In terms of other production values, I'd say the chopped up/processed vocals (or synth vocals) don't work well, and the nature of most of the sounds is very static and not at all progressive. My other complaints: the ghost notes on the finger snap are annoying, and some of the sounds are distant for no reason (like the timpani and marcato strings). Not really hearing any egregious bad notes.. but I would say that some of the parts don't flow together as I'd expect them to. I feel that the problem with the arrangement is more with the structure than anything else - it doesn't go anywhere. The original was an exciting, upbeat, and dramatic tune with a lot of dynamic aspects to keep it interesting throughout. However, this mix only timidly interprets it, slowing it down and taking the 'edge' off without adding anything to make up it. I was waiting the whole time for some spacey synth sweeps to come in, or fast breaks, or neat processing, but nothing happened instead. Ouch My best advice would be to upgrade your percussive samples, focus on creating more dynamic drum parts, and writing a more substantial structure. You definitely have some of the fundamentals down, so just keep going with it. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Malcos Posted March 12, 2005 Share Posted March 12, 2005 I like the production on this, and the huge bassline. Drum sequencing is interesting, and the way the drum sounds are used (out of their 'genre') makes it all the more unusual. However, I felt that the bell melody was all over the place and at times it sounded off. I think this needs more attention in terms of arrangement. Nice production, but the arrangement in terms of structure wasn't at the bar imo. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
analoq Posted March 22, 2005 Share Posted March 22, 2005 i'm gonna have to side with the no votes here. the intro just jumps right in as if i was listening to the 'preview' for the track on iTunes. the melodic components don't line up, they sound messy. all the parts just come off as weak and unprocessed. i don't really feel the build, it evolves, but there's no climax -- and this mix could've used one. nice use of vocoder sounds though. no Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GrayLightning Posted April 2, 2005 Share Posted April 2, 2005 Ok, this is an improvement from your first version and though this is definitely more polished than your first two versions, I still enjoyed the first version the most. At least this is an improvement. I don't completely agree with the assesment that you need to give up on this mix, because this has a lot of great potential. I think you're getting there now. For me the main issue was the one analoq mentioned. The melodic elements just sound a bit off. I love the bell synths/pads and flute sounds here though. Don't change a thing with the sound. I also don't think a piece in this kind of ambient genre really needs a climax either. A lot of genres, especially of an ambient nature like this don't need it. In this context, I feel it fits well in the mold of this style. Oh, and I really dig your percussion. Fix up the main issue and it's a yes from me. This bears several listens. It kept growing on me the more I listened to it. I know you've submitted this twice already, but hope you have the heart to resubmit this again though. I'd like to see it pass. Borderline NO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GrayLightning Posted April 21, 2005 Share Posted April 21, 2005 Since no other judge has closed or continued to vote on this for a while now, I'm closing the vote. Part of the reason for the delay was the Vote to 6 policy. As the vote stands, it's 2 to 5, with a vote that's fairly conclusive. We do hope to hear more from you soon though. Our sincere apologies to metaphist for the delay. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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