Emunator Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 (edited) Contact Information Nick: NyxTheShield Name: Felipe Montero Email address: Website: https://www.youtube.com/user/felipe95951 User ID: 53205 Submission Information Name of Game: Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy Kong's Quest Name of Arrangement: The Forest of Melancholy Name of individual song(s) arranged: Forest Interlude and Mining Melancholy Comments: David Wise has always been one of my major inspirations, as a child i had a SNES, by luck i was able to play most of the classics of the system (TLoZ ALttP, Mario All Stars, ISSD), but Donkey Kong Country was one of the few games where i would just pause it for a couple of minutes just to hear it's music. Consider this remix and mashup as a tribute, i hope you enjoy it. Download Link: If the link doesn't work by any chance, the song is attached as well, thanks in advance. Sources: Edited November 25, 2015 by Liontamer closed decision Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Emunator Posted November 24, 2015 Author Share Posted November 24, 2015 I wanted to panel this one because I remember Nyx had this marked as Mod Review but never got any staff feedback, and some of the artist's comments in Workshop thread came across defensive to me, so I felt it appropriate to send this here to give some more feedback. To me, this feels highly conservative and doesn't introduce very much original writing or ideas to the melody, though the few harmonic variations and the overall mashup of the two sources does have some merit by OCR standards. Using the drum loop and the "birdcussion" as a sample is cool, though I feel like you mixed the metallic percussion kind of loud during the transitions - for example, the fill at :38 is startling and out of place, to me. The metallic loop sounds really nice when it's mixed lower and more in the background. The delay effects are well-used and help give the track more texture and movement, I like how you utilized that. Production-wise, the samples and synth design are not very exciting and introduce very little texture to the mix. Experiment with some more interesting synth sound and fills and effects - Skrypnyk and Timaeus gave some really good feedback in the Workshop thread. The arrangement sticks very close to the structure/feel of the original, and there are some sections where you have a lot of countermelodies playing but no lead where it just feels aimless. Sorry to say, this track just isn't working for me on a lot of levels My guess is that, by this point, you've moved onto other projects and I already know you've improved your craft with more recent remixes, but I wanted to make sure you received more validation on the feedback you received in the Workshop thread because I feel like they were very good critiques that still apply to the final submitted version. I'm excited to see what you submit to us in the future NO timaeus222, Eino Keskitalo and NyxTheShield 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chimpazilla Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 Wes hit every issue I would have also brought up. The track is lovely but needs to be rebalanced, most especially the metallic percussion. Turn that down and add some really nice delay. Leads are buried, sometimes it's just competing countermelodies and no focus. Bass is very quiet and lacks any kind of impact. The arrangement is very conservative. Still, there are a lot of good ideas going here. Lots of work to do but I think it's a good start so far, use this as an opportunity to bump up your production game. I'd prefer a proper ending other than a fadeout but that's just my preference. NO (resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted November 25, 2015 Share Posted November 25, 2015 The metallic percussion's just sampled from the original audio, which already is a ding against it vis-a-vis the standards, because it's pretty wholesale sampling with no changes. I agreed with Emu on the balance being off, and when the sampling was in play, it was just way too loud over the top of everything else. The driving beat of the sampled material didn't click at all with the ambient material.IMO, get rid of the extensive SPC sampling (which is only cluttering the piece), and then focus on more melodic development & variations of the arrangement, as well as more dynamic contrast.NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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