DragonAvenger Posted December 29, 2013 Share Posted December 29, 2013 (edited) Contact Information User: Lashmush Name: Rasmus Sorber Site: http://lashmush.newgrounds.com User ID: 27698 FB: http://www.facebook.com/Lashmush Submission Information Game(s) arranged: Secret of Mana Name of arrangement: Emergence Name of individual song(s) arranged: "The Dark Star" Comments: I would've submitted this sooner but I must've blindly glanced over the 3 week interval thing and as such assumed I had to wait until my previous one was approved or not. Anyway, I been sort of spellbound by this song and the events that unfold in Secret of Mana for its rather brief one-time appearance. The song got my usual flavor of metalization but I also experimented with various instrumentation and the trumpet particularly gave me an idea for an underlying Ennio Morricone vibe. Sort of a "Man with no name" touch. Other than that, it's a pretty straight forward adaptation. Has a few ups and downs, drops and breaks, and I'm quite pleased with it but obviously I need outside perspectives or I might get a bit too comfortable, you know? c: ---------------------- Edited March 26, 2014 by Liontamer closed decision Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chimpazilla Posted February 10, 2014 Share Posted February 10, 2014 (edited) This song is pretty epic! Moody orchestral intro, lonely trumpets, marching snare, choir, even a church organ, and of course shredding guitars. Drums are appropriate and exciting, and everything is mixed well. Very cool. I wish this track had been a little more interpretive with the source writing, the melody is played verbatim and usually by the choir/brass. I would have liked something to break up that simple line a bit more. My other big criticism is the lack of transitions. The guitars are jarring because they aren't signaled at all. Yet when they arrive, they are awesome. There's a teeny bit of drum transition but a little more would have been nice. Still, it's moody, varied and badass. edit: I'm revisiting this song, and I have to agree the piano and brass are very stiffly sequenced and written. I'm going to go no for now, the piano needs to be humanized and some of that brass should probably be replaced with something else, maybe even strings. The melody needs to be made less blocky as well, with maybe one verse with something other than choir as lead. NO(resubmit) Edited March 26, 2014 by Chimpazilla Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OceansAndrew Posted February 20, 2014 Share Posted February 20, 2014 Some of the sequencing was stiff and the transitions were abrupt and a little underwhelming, but the rest of the track was solid. I really enjoyed the guitars and while I think the snare was a bit lost, the energy of the kick came through pretty well. Mixing otherwise was decent, though maybe a bit more room cut out for the melody from the rhythm guitars would be good. Between the piano and the choir, the melody was very rigid and blocky, though the guitars felt a lot more alive. I definitely think that humanizing the melody to have a more lyrical feel would improve the song a good deal, and having some crescendos and stronger releases between transitions would be the final layer of polish this track needs. I think it is super close to the bar, but hearing this I can definitely hear you have the chops to polish this to be great. No, please resubmit Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nutritious Posted March 17, 2014 Share Posted March 17, 2014 I'm having weird deja vu here where I feel like I've critiqued this one already. Anyway! As Larry loves to point out, I have pretty extensive experience working with the samplesets you're utilizing here. Off the bat, the brass is sounding pretty blocky in the way it's sequenced, despite the use of reverb to smooth it out (:21-:29 especially). I'm not sure you can pull off a soft-section at that register with the trumpets (at least with EWQLSO), so you may want to consider some woodwind substitutions or rewriting the part. Wrong note in the low strings and/or low brass at :53. Fix dat up . This whole section from :54 - 1:22 feels underdeveloped and exposed to me. It's supposed to be building up the action to the heavy 1:22 section, but there isn't enough instrumental support to fill things out. At 1:22 (later, 2:03, 3:27!), everything starts getting overcompressed and cluttered with the addition of the drums, electric guitar, voices, & glock. I know from experience that it's difficult to mix so many elements well, so extra care needs to be taken to try to get it right. The glock gets a bit hard on the ears after a while, because it's being boosted to be heard above everything else. On the positive end, the guitar is well exectued here. Drum writing is varied and appropriately instense for the genre. I guess I'm not feeling this one is quite as close (or ready) as my fellow j's. Main points would be to develop some of the orchestra sections to properly support the partwriting & work on the mixing on the louder sections to declutter and get things more clean sounding. Good luck to you, whichever way this goes. NO resubmit, please Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarkeSword Posted March 26, 2014 Share Posted March 26, 2014 Super rigid piano and overexposed brass are really killing this mix for me. The metal stuff sounds good (though I agree on everything sounding compressed) but your sounds and sequencing on the orchestral parts don't really match the more expressive rock parts. Also when the guitar is playing the melody I can barely here it, and I don't believe I heard any section where the guitar really takes off and is showcased. It's a bit weird when that's the best stuff in the mix, you know? Would like to heard you rock out a bit more with maybe a solo or more exposed melodic content in the guitar. Needs work. NO resub Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts