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OCR04082 - *YES* Mega Man 2 "The Bubbleologists"


Rexy
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Hello, 
 
Here is another submission from us once again!

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Submission Information

  • Name of game(s) arranged - Mega Man 2 NES
  • Name of arrangement - Bubbleologists
  • Name of individual song(s) arranged - Bubble Man
  • Your own comments about the mix, for example the inspiration behind it, how it was made, etc.

    It's been about 6 years since we made this (with Renoise ofc!), and never tried to submit it in OCReMix, so here we go! I hope you guys enjoy this who hasn't heard it before! (If it gets released I guess :P)  

    This time we have Bubble Man ReMix for you! I think its more trance'ish than the other two tracks we did and more like our Flash Man than the Metal Man ReMix in style.

    We tried to put some water themed samples to it, like beach sounds, some bubbling and also the drowning for ending. I actually fixed the ending too like Rozovian suggested in WIP Forums a few years ago, hopefully it's better now.

    Cheers! Enjoy!

 

 

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  • 4 weeks later...

Right off the bat, this track is brickwalled HARD and is excessively loud. In fact, there's several times it's clipping and peaking over 0db.  The waveform looks like it had the peaks sliced off with a knife. 

image.png.727d9f3da6ee309754e233d0bd6275c0.png

To sanity check this, I compared this to some of your previous tracks and saw that, although those other tracks were fairly compressed, they had much more headroom than this and still had some dynamics to them.

I love this arrangement for all the same reasons I enjoy your other work - it's energetic, full of incredible transitions, and for lack of a better word, it just slaps. 

Evidently my evaluation setup was giving bad readings so please disregard the comment about clipping. All of the other feedback still stands regarding the loudness and overall compression, but without the clipping, the arrangement still puts this over the bar. I'd like to see a less aggressive master on future submissions though!

YES

Edited by Emunator
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  • Emunator changed the title to 2019/10/31 - (1N) Mega Man 2 "Bubbleologists"
  • 2 weeks later...

@Emunator I think there might be something wrong with your setup, I'm not seeing any clipping on my end, and the RMS value is much lower

image.png.40a8df1f8aec972d30c76cd7fdb8eab8.png

It's true that the track is too compressed, although even when it's this compressed I can distinguish most elements, however it did give me listening fatigue after a couple of minutes for sure.  The arrangement is super good here, with some sections following the original pretty close while others (i.e. the whole last section) divert quite a bit and bring more interpretation to the table.  It feels like there's not a moment where things are left on auto-pilot, binging new ideas or small change in the details to change things up. Production-wise, besides the overcompression some bitcrushing effects get slightly annoying here, but those don't last too long.

Even with the high compression, I think this makes it.  Like I said the mix is surprisingly clear to my ears, although the compression can be a bit tiring, the arrangement and mix clarity makes up for the bad things.  I would be ok with sending it back for a more relaxed Master but I think I'm ok with this.

YES (borderline)

Edited by Sir_NutS
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  • Rexy changed the title to 2019/10/31 - (1Y/1N) Mega Man 2 "Bubbleologists"
  • Rexy pinned this topic

I imported the track into Audacity, and while I usually would see red marks where clipping would be, the software gave me nothing - it's entirely under the line.  It does have a brick-walled sound to it, and yet despite this, I can identify all parts in the mix, and nothing seems to stick out.  The main concern that I have other than the choice of compression is a questionable small frequency gap occurring between 300-500Hz and varies in size and location at different parts of the track.  Usually, such a spot is an excellent place to emphasize another instrument if the mixdown is too muddy, but it's not the case and is not a constant issue.

I also echo everyone on the arrangement - it's fun and rarely stays in on place!  The source is dominant, primarily due to the arpeggio filling in gaps during melody absence - and the variety of underlying arrangement, timbres, sweeps, modulation and gates keep it engaging throughout.  But do watch out for dissonance, though.  1:20, 2:40 and 3:22 have a B note in the melody like with the source, but the bass is in B flat.  They sound weird, and I hope you can find a way to fix it before release, but I won't be opposed if it stays.

As it is, I heard a stable arrangement with some minor intonation flaws and a loud master that luckily didn't break itself.  Those values alone are enough to get over the bar, but I hope the experience can teach you both some things about the dangers of over-compression.  Stay safe, and keep making fruitful efforts!

YES (borderline)

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  • Rexy changed the title to 2019/10/31 - (2Y/1N) Mega Man 2 "Bubbleologists"

agree that there's some sausage here, but while it sounds real loud it doesn't sound bad. i can hear everything and i don't hear waveform distortion that doesn't sound intentional. honestly it sounds like i'd expect something like this to sound. it is a big fatiguing but that's personal preference.

i like the arrangement a lot. there's a ton of great examples of how to mix it up demonstrated here, and while the track uses a bunch of sfx, it definitely isn't leaning on them to carry the ear's interest. the breakdown and build from 2:00 to about 2:30 is great, and the subsequent melody lead does a great job taking a theme that's super common and adding some auditory interest to it without adding a ton of notes.

this is a great total package. fantastic job. i'd love to hear more from you both!

 

 

YES

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  • Liontamer changed the title to OCR04082 - *YES* Mega Man 2 "The Bubbleologists"
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