*NO* Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time 'The End of a Journey'

[Chimpazilla]

Contact Information

Remixer name: Kamex
Real name: Erick Nunez
Email Adress: 
Website: https://www.youtube.com/user/GreatGabite?&ab_channel=Kamex
Userid: 32509

Submission Information

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Explorers of Time/Darkness/Sky

"The end of a Journey"
Temporal Tower
Soundtrack https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hSrrXJkHjQ&ab_channel=dialga328

 

This track is what I'd probably consider one of my best works. I was always a huge fan of mystery dungeon music and I'm happy to be able to express my love for the soundtrack through song. Especially this one as it is the last dungeon in the main game, ending your journey which is why I tried to give it a more sad tone to the arrangement. The original had more of a motivational kind of tone, one that says "let's save the world!" but for this remix,I had it more focused on the fact that you cease to exist after completing the deed.

Edited March 1, 2017 by Liontamer
closed decision

[Chimpazilla]

This is super cool!  I'm loving all the drum pattern changeups, especially the breakbeat/crazy breakbeat near the end.  I feel like the mixing could be a little better, the whole track is a bit bottom heavy and some instruments and drums (snare) could have some lows removed and it would all sit better.  The leads and also the backing saw are a bit plain, but it's all used really well.  I love this arrangement.  There's copy pasta going on here, but there are differences added to the final section to differentiate it from the previous iteration, mainly the heavy gating of the saw (which would be so much cooler with some effects or modulation on that dry timbre) and dem breakbeats.  Count me in.

edit 2/20/17:  I still like this track, it sounds good to me, my assessment and crits still stand.  However, I was not aware of Lunar, I hadn't heard the track until now.  This remix clearly seems to be a careful remake of Lunar, following VR's "making of" stream, then adapted to the Pokemon source.  The remake is well done, I must say good job on this!  But ultimately it does sound too close to Lunar for me to give this a pass for OCR.  Switching to

NO

[Gario]

Damn, this is comparably more somber than the source is. That's what you were shooting for, so great work on that front. The source is certainly recognizeable, but you really took it in a whole new direction, and you get brownie points for having a story behind why the direction change (NOTE: Brownie points don't equate to a vote, but they are certainly delicious).

I hear what Chimp is saying on the overall "dark" quality of the production (e.g. overloaded on low end at the cost of the upper end), but in this case I feel it adds to the heaviness of the track. It's a nice effect, though she's correct that the snare should not contribute as much to the bottom end as it does (e.g. highpass dat snare, baby). There are also a few moments where I found the lead to be mixed behind the rest of the arrangement, to my dismay (such as at 0:42). It's not nearly extreme enough to warrent a rejection from me alone, but it does take away from the overall experience a little bit.

The arrangement is pretty damn slick, though, so minor mixing infractions certainly don't affect this mix too much. Seems like a solid pass for me - great work!

YES

[Liontamer]

A fair amount of the synth design was generic, especially the vanilla saw leads. There's something about the beats being plodding. The core beats (bass & kicks) behind the :52-1:02, 1:23-2:04, 2:15-2:24, 2:36-2:56 & 3:07-3:27 sections were too plain and ultimately plodding, IMO, and it's like this for too much of the track. The plain writing of the beats was OK from :10-:40 when you opened the piece up with an understated build, but something more creative and varied should have anchored the piece later on.

Smaller thing, but the articulations of the sampled plucked strings from 1:54-2:06 just sound too mechanical; thankfully, they didn't last too long. I know they're not meant to sound 100% organic, but the robotic sequencing for a sound like that generally doesn't work.

This is going well in the right direction arrangement-wise, and I agreed with Chimpazilla that the subtle differences in the repetition of the verse at 2:25 were a smart idea to keep the writing fresh.

Good stuff so far, Erick, but the synth design and beat-writing both need to be more sophisticated. What's in place is creative, but sounds more like a late-stage work-in-progress than a cohesive, finished product.

NO (resubmit)

[DragonAvenger]

I'm on the YES side here; I think the arrangement is fresh and the subtle changes later on work out nicely here. The mood change to being a little more sombre works or pretty well, and gives the track a new direction. I can hear a tiny bit of the low-end issue, but it's not as much an issue on headphones, nor do I think it's a deal breaker. 

Great take on a great source!

YES

[OceansAndrew]

Some good ideas here, but i think the execution isn't quite where it needs to be. The general production seems a little subdued and could stand to be brighter. A good example of this type of sound really clicking would be here:

Notice how the percussion and synths has a nice sheen to the high end? I think emulating that a little would have the song sounding cleaner.

 

I also think that a lot more modulation on the lead would improve things, as compared to the chords and rhythms that it feels slapped on. The lead needs to come alive more and have some personality.  There are some articulations Larry mentioned that should be addressed as well

 

No

[MindWanderer]

It's not the most sophisticated synth and beat design, but I feel like both are adequate.  And while the high end is a little subdued, that seems to be the intent and I don't feel like it's a substantial issue.

From 1:02-1:12, there's some odd pumping in the saw.  It seems to be intentional, but it's inconsistent in intensity and duration, so it sounds to me like a compression error.

At 1:13, there's a backing instrument that's slightly detuned and it makes the saw sound off-key.

Even though there are a number of production issues, I don't feel like they're significant enough to detract from what is otherwise a creative, dynamic arrangement.  I wouldn't be sad if this got sent back for some cleanup, but to me this is worth a

YES

[Jivemaster]

Simple but effective intro and build-up. Agree with Larry regarding the fairly generic trancey backing synth featured throughout, which from a sound design standpoint is awfully static. Also agree the drums plod along the track for too long without much variation. Despite these problems the overall soundscape does work, with the parts complementing each other fairly well, with appropriate stereo balance and mostly acceptable mixing. I did notice like some of the others that things are a bit bottom heavy which during the busier sections begins to cloud the mix (nothing major though).

The break at 1:48 is a nice departure from the sounds used from the start of the track, although is very minimal in composition and very robotic. Second half of the song begins to feel a little copy paste until the short riffing drops in. Things pick up near the end and then trail off for the outro.

A few issues:

• The arrangement structure is ok, but I feel some more could've been done with some parts - sections are borrowed heavily at times with minor edits.
• The backing synth would've benefitted greatly from some minor tweaks/modulation over time to give it more character (the synth plays such a large role in the mix and doesn't do all that much)
• The drums could've evolved more over time and they weren't that complex to begin with which made the relatively continuous pattern stick out more.

Individually these things would not have been a big deal but combined I feel these points pull the mix down. I wouldn't mind a possible revisit to address some of these (and the other judges) concerns.

NO

[Sir_NutS]

I've been mulling over this track for quite some time now.  I've mentioned this before to other judges, but this track seems to straight up lift some elements from Virtual Riot's "Lunar" track.  The chord progression is basically identical, and the few growls thrown in here and there seem to be taken from VR's stream of the "making of" of this track.  Some arrangement choices, such as the change to the faster double-time after the "Lunar" melody at around 2:46 seem way too similar to be a coincidence, imo, as well as the way the Lunar hook is presented at 0:42, with the kick emphasizing the start of each chord but then changing to the normal half beat the next measure, then the low-passed filter on the beat buildup to the drop is also very similar.  The biggest clue to me here is that the "Lunar" hook is nowhere in the original, nor something even similar to that, which leads me to believe even more that the many similarities I hear are not coincidental.

Using parts of a non-vgm song is something that's specified in our submission guidelines:
 

Quote

3. Any incorporation or arrangement of source material not from games (mainstream, classical, etc.) should be extremely limited.

So the question here is whether the usage of Lunar here is limited, and in my opinion, it constitutes a big enough part of this track to not be allowed.  I only went through the most obvious similarities but there are also other details here and there, however what's shown is proof enough imo.

Besides the inclusion of VR's track in this remix, I would have probably sided with a NO anyways.  Jivemaster points out the issues I heard very well, while I will also add that I felt the lead pulse instrument felt very static, and due to the nature of being a remix of both Lunar and Pokemon MD, the structure felt blocky and sometimes transitions felt forced.

NO

[Liontamer]

On 2/20/2017 at 9:26 AM, Sir_NutS said:

I've mentioned this before to other judges, but this track seems to straight up lift some elements from Virtual Riot's "Lunar" track.  The chord progression is basically identical, and the few growls thrown in here and there seem to be taken from VR's stream of the "making of" of this track.  Some arrangement choices, such as the change to the faster half-beat after the "Lunar" melody at around 2:46 seem way too similar to be a coincidence, imo, as well as the way the Lunar hook is presented at 0:42, with the kick emphasizing the start of each chord but then changing to the normal half beat the next measure, then the low-passed filter on the beat buildup to the drop is also very similar.  The biggest clue to me here is that the "Lunar" hook is nowhere in the original, nor something even similar to that, which leads me to believe even more that the many similarities I hear are not coincidental.

So the question here is whether the usage of Lunar here is limited, and in my opinion, it constitutes a big enough part of this track to not be allowed.  I only went through the most obvious similarities but there are also other details here and there, however what's shown is proof enough imo.

Thanks for pointing that connection out. I looked in the comments of the Kamex's YouTube video for this track, and he said to a fan making the same connection: "Indeed it was [an inspiration]! It's like one of my favorite songs to date. Kalbur showed me the song and I really wanted to make a remix based on it. Really good ear for catching that! ^^"

OA also mentioned that piece to compare the production, but he didn't point out the writing similarities, so thanks for pointing those out. Part of the problem for Kamex with this track is he has nowhere near the polish of Virtual Riot (not that that's expected or the bar here), so any comparison makes his attempts looks weak. 

I thought the beats at :42 were too close in writing to "Lunar", but the faster half-beat at 2:46 simply seemed derived/inspired by the structure of "Lunar" (albeit flimsier) without copying other aspects of the song, so that didn't bother me as much. The sweep at :36 leading to :42 was also an idea taken from "Lunar," which wasn't a problem in and of itself, but I can see how paired with the kicks at :42, it can feel like too many writing ideas are worked in from that.

I think his is a "crime" of not stacking up to VR in the style department, but I don't think he was trying to cheat as much as trying to mimic. It'd be one thing if he was trying to lift original audio; this guy's trying to do soundalike stuff; it's not the same, but it's copying the techniques. To me, that's two different things. To me, that wasn't quite enough to NO it on too much non-VGM grounds, but enough to ding it for cribbing some outside compositional ideas in too straightforward of a way, especially without acknowledging it in the submission letter.

[Nutritious]

Honestly, 1:25 felt like a bit of a let down after the big build.  Returning to the same basic core beat pattern here really sucked the energy out of the section IMO.  Overall, the core beat is repetitive throughout much of the track, with an occasional extra hit thrown in or the drums just suddenly dropping out.  The double-time was a welcome change, but it soon regresses back to the core beat again after the buildup.

Overall mix is pretty clear, though I felt like the song had a general dull tone to it.  Like the high end of the mix is toned down a bit too much.  Minor nitpick there for me, though.

Nice incorporation of the original into your mix.  The use of the original melody feels pretty laid-back and unpretentious, but I like it for this mix.

2:25 felt like it's retreading what we've already heard near the beginning of the track.  The section at 3:07 also is very similar to an earlier section, with the same elements in play, but different lead writing.  I think there's room for more development to keep things more fresh as the track progresses.

Definitely hearing the inspiration from VR in this track on the harmonized synth chords and even the beatwork in places.  I've also taken inspiration from other tracks as well, but I always try to diversify myself much more than this to attempt a similar "feel" but never to the point where the listener would be tempted to say "hey he lifted this writing" from the original.  I'll acknowledge there's a hefty amount of personal opinion in this and to be fair, this is by no means a copy of the VR track.  Still, I'd recommend being very careful in how you incorporate your inspirations into your own music.

This is a good solid base you've put together here.  Ultimately, I think this could be a go with more varied/exciting beat work and some more development in the writing.  On a personal level, I'd like a bit more "space" between what's your writing and what's from VR's Lunar as well.

NO resubmit please