Pokémon: Lavender Town (using Golden Sun Soundfont)

[satoka-eldon]

I've been messing around a lot recently with the soundfont for Golden Sun, applying it to other games, and this is one of the products thereof. I started out by using the same instrumentation as for the Elemental Stars Chamber, and ended up incorporating some of the melody, too (albeit adapted to a different time signature).

Any tips on how to improve further would be very welcome! I know there are all kinds of idiosyncrasies at the moment (especially for dynamics and variation of velocities - not sure how much the GBA is able to do), but I'm not sure which aspects I should really be focusing on.

Original tracks:

(I don't plan to submit this particular track to the OCRemix, by the way - I'm just experimenting~ ^_^)

 

Edit: My biggest concern for potential submission right now is whether unhumanised, raw GBA soundfont remixes are acceptable for submission. And, if not, whether treating the soundfont instruments as an orchestra, and applying realistic reverb and note velocity variation, would come across as very idiosyncratic.

[Souperion]

I was expecting a simple cover, but you offered something quite unique and interesting. I was summarily impressed with the variation of the melody(s), particularly around the one minute range where it turned from Lavender town in Golden Sun into its own song. Maybe I'm just a sucker for the the old feel of Golden Sun, but the relatively archaic sound font doesn't really feel that obsolete here. The quiet sadness of Lavender Town mixes quite well with the awe and mystery of the Sanctum. The name "Souless Sanctum" kept popping up in my head.

At 1:39, when the string section comes in, it is a little deafening to the other parts, though. Maybe soften it there a bit, or make the other parts more pronounced. Wish I had more technical feedback, but I can at least say I enjoyed it. And am fairly sad that you don't intend to submit it to OCR. A really kewl concept you have here.

Edited April 5, 2018 by Souperion
spelling

[satoka-eldon]

16 hours ago, Souperion said:

I was expecting a simple cover, but you offered something quite unique and interesting... at 1:39, when the string section comes in, it is a little deafening to the other parts, though.

Thanks for all the positive comments! Actually, I've really been struggling to 'market' this. I tried the word 'mashup' to start with, but it's not quite right; and it's not really a cover of the two songs either.

The comment on the string section is very fair - I added it in at the last moment to try and fill out the middle frequencies and provide dynamic contrast with the first half, but didn't EQ it properly. Will change!

16 hours ago, Souperion said:

The name "Soulless Sanctum" kept popping up in my head.

I think if I were to submit, I'd definitely go with the name "Soulless Sanctum" - much better than the variations on "Elemental / Lavender / Stars" that I'd been stuck thinking about, so thanks again!

(I guess my biggest concern for potential submission right now is whether unhumanised, raw soundfont remixes are acceptable. I know there's no criteria for having to make music that sounds like it came from the game, but I really want to try to keep that Golden Sun feel.)

[Light_of_Aether]

This is really cool!!! As far as submission goes, I'm not sure how the judges would feel about this, but I say go for it! I don't think you need to worry about humanization, though. It should sound like a video game (which it does).

[satoka-eldon]

Thank you very much! I guess I should just give it a go, huh? I will wait a few more days before submitting (since I just realised there are other bits I'd like to change), but I guess the worst thing that can happen is that it gets rejected out of hand.

FWIW I've uploaded a slightly updated version with rebalanced strings (thanks Souperion!) and other minor adjustments.

https://soundcloud.com/eldonreeves/mashup-pokemon-lavender-town-golden-sunelemental-stars

(Note: Soundcloud won't play the updated version unless the cache is cleared.)

By the way, Light_of_Aether: your orchestrations are amazing! Looking forward to hearing the final product from Metroid Reorchestrated~

[Liontamer]

As long as you go beyond the authentic chiptune limitations and incorporate some other production choices, a track like this should be OK as far as the Submissions Standards.

You may run into issues with sample realism, particularly with the choir, and I'm leaning against this in the sense of the piece not feeling dynamic enough as a standalone piece (while going well in the right direction)

IMO, there's definitely notable subtle dynamic contrast within a narrower dynamic curve due to the textural changes from verse to verse and chorus to chorus, so it's there. Despite that, the track tends to feel repetitive and relatively flat for a 3-minute piece. IMO, the choruses didn't sound much different from one another.

If you haven't sent it in already though, let's see what happens. I could just be an outlier.

[Liontamer]

[This is an automatically generated message]

I've reviewed your remix and have returned it to Work-in-Progress status, indicating that I think there are some things you still need to work on. After you work on your track and feel that it's ready for submission to OCR, please change the prefix back to Ready for Review and someone will review it again. Good luck!