*NO* Marathon 2 & Marathon Infinity "Lh'owon" *RESUB*

[Liontamer]

Original Decision

Artist Name: Zanezooked

Howdy judges! Here’s a resubmission of my Marathon 2 and Marathon Infinity remix.

I put my original mix up on Youtube at the same time I submitted it here. It was well-received in the Marathon community. Hamish Sinclair even featured it on the Marathon’s Story site! That was surreal as I’ve been reading that site since my first forays onto the internet as a teen in the 90s.

Your feedback here was largely positive about the arrangement but negative about the production and mixdown, especially the balance of sounds and general muddiness.

I tried posting this revision to the workshop for feedback but got no replies. :( So I did my best on my own. I do think it sounds much crisper than the original.

Changes I made in response your feedback:

• Re-mixed pretty much everything, and changed a lot of the EQs.
• Added more sidechain compression on the kick (there was some originally, but not enough)
• Took treble off the bass, especially when the guitar is present.
• Added a de-resonance step on the master chain
• Swapped the bass in the opening sequence for cello and bass strings. Prophetik found the synth bass there out of place, but I still wanted something in the low end to provide variety from the wall of pads and environmental sound. I really like the result!
• Changed some of the drum rhythms
• Fixed the wrong note pointed out by Prophetik

Other changes:

• Shortened the song by cutting out the reprise of the M2 theme after the middle string section. It now ramps into the guitar rendition of the M∞ theme.
• Restored a high cosmic echo trail effect after the guitar parts which was supposed to be in the original mix but got lost when the plugin’s license reset

I should mention that the goal of this remix is to capture a certain Marathon “feel.” It’s not meant to improve on or sound like the source Marathon songs, which are amazing as-is. It’s intended to take those themes and give them another showing, in a setting that’s different but still evokes what Marathon feels like as a whole — which for me includes not just the original Power of Seven (Psykosonik) music but also Craig Mullins concept art and the philosophical rantings of a rampant artificial intelligence intent on escaping the closure of the universe. I’m not going for a pristine sound, but a dense sound awash in spaciousness, layers, and grittiness that evokes cosmic vastness, ancient mystery, and aggression. Judging by the reception of my original version in the Marathon community, I think I did manage to capture the vibes! So I tried to retain that in this revision, while working to remove muddiness and improve balance. I hope this new version is up to OCRemix’s standards!

Source Breakdown:

The title of this remix is Lh’owon, after the planet on which most of the action in Marathon 2 and Marathon Infinity takes place. It’s ancient homeworld of the S’pht, though it’s currently populated by a garrison of the Pfhor, who enslaved the S’pht a millennium ago. Its extensive ruins hide clues to the fate of a tribe of S’pht lost thousands of years before the Pfhor arrived. Oh, and the planet’s sun currently imprisons a Lovecraftian elder god of chaos which will devour the universe if freed.

The first minute of the remix is about soaking in the ambience on this unspeakably ancient, largely ruinous planet. It starts with some literal ambience recorded directly from the game (and drenched in reverb, as if heard from within one of the rock-like structures you run around in). Pads and strings play the theme that the background synths play at 0:30 in the Marathon 2 source song. The strings fade away with an irregular loss of signal.

Into this planet’s system comes the rampant and only possibly insane artificial intelligence Durandal in a captured Pfhor dreadnought; he sets about bombarding the Pfhor garrison from orbit and teleporting his pet cyborg security officer (the player) around, flooding an outpost with lava over here, saving enslaved humans over there, and then going on an extended archeological dig into the ancient S’pht ruins in search of a weapon that can give Durandal the dominance and universe-outliving immortality he hungers for. At :55 we start to hear the encroaching orbital bombardment, and at 1:25 the security officer arrives and starts kicking alien appendages. A synth grinds out the guitar progression from the beginning of the Marathon 2 title music, then a recessed guitar takes up the melody. After this, a synth bass plays the bass from :30 in the source song, before the cycle repeats.

At 2:39 the strings return to provide a pause in the Total Carnage, playing the theme from Marathon Infinity. The security officer is discovering the oldest remnants of the S’pht civilization, far older than humankind—and some of it is still sentient. Though he doesn’t yet know it, the fate of the cosmos is at stake.

At 3:45 carnage returns as the guitar plunges into the Marathon Infinity theme, while high strings and a buried choir provide a sense of spaciousness and age.

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Games & Sources

Marathon 2: Durandal

Marathon Infinity

Edited 10 hours ago by Liontamer
closed decision

[prophetik music]

thanks for the resub! i really liked the arrangement concept and some of the set pieces in the original mix, but didn't like a few of the synth choices which i found bland and thought some of it needed EQing/reinforcing elements.

track opens with some really big broad strings which sound very rich, so that's fun. there's some more sfx at 0:50ish as the strings glitch their way out, and we start hearing the Durandal synth with the ascending motif. the beat comes in at 1:26 and we get into the blootering of alien backsides. i admittedly like the nastiness of the Durandal synth more than the subsequent synth choices, which still feel bland and rote. there's some repetition in this section too which i still don't care for, but i like the transition at 2:43 and that section just as much as i did before. this section is great. again, the transition into the techno section is also great. this time through the techno stuff feels a little better and less rote. there's a final hit and some sfx, and it's done.

i don't care for the middle minute or so - that more upbeat section just feels really dull when it should be the energy highlight of the entire track.  i get that it's a 90s feel, but at least those 90s techno vibes had more verve to them - this feels more like a framework than a finished section. i'm a bit torn on if it is offset by the great opening and the section at 2:43, which feel really expansive and introspective. i think that, in the interest of not making perfect the enemy of good, this is probably above the bar. i think it sounds solid and there's no big holes in the arrangement.

 

 

YES

edit 2/19: we used this track for our recent judgetest, and i spent a lot of time listening to it as a result. the more i listened to it, the more i felt that the middle was just not there. there's a lot of promise in the opening, but i think that i ultimately originally settled on the wrong side of the bar (in that it was close but not there, instead of barely squeaking by). that middle section needs more verve, better guitar tracking, and stronger instrument choices. i'm changing my vote.

NO

Edited Wednesday at 01:08 PM by prophetik music

[Hemophiliac]

Kudos on resubmitting!

Well done applying our feedback from the first go.  I'm hearing much improvement in terms of melodic focus, which was one of my complaints on the first version. I still like the arrangement and the overall piece flows very well as a song. It does feel like one piece even though there are a couple sources used.

The opening minute strings are lovely even with a relatively flat dynamic, sets the mood for melancholy and dark.

My only complaint now is the percussion and mix glue. The percussion sounds dry and forward, and the other parts feel very separate from the percussion in another space. It's not so far off that I'm going to ding you just on that. I see this as being over the bar now, and you can think about better part glue with compression and careful reverb application amongst parts for future work.

YES

[Chimpazilla]

This is my first time hearing this mix, I did not vote on the original submission.

This arrangement starts with ambiance recorded directly from the game (drenched in reverb, together with the opening strings), we would need to make sure that it is ok to use the actual game audio in this remix.

The opening string part is really nice.  The huge bass blasts that follow at 0:56 are great, big and badass.  I kind of wish there were fewer of them, or at least if elements could be entering one at a time after each bass section.  There are five of them with only the game ambiance audio for company.  Having too many of them in a row with nothing else added causes them to lose impact.  

At 1:26, we are into a beat. There's a rather plain synth playing a pattern together with the buzzy synth (is it the same synth doing the bass blasts?).  These two sounds don't sound good together to me, they don't compliment each other well.  But then there is the drum groove: a very simple kick, hats and vanilla clap.  I get that this simple drum kit is mirroring that of the source tunes, but they sound weak, thin, dry and out of place to me against the heavy buzzing synth.  The kick is very quietly mixed and lacks impact.  The drum pattern itself is simple and repetitive.  In the two source songs, those simple drums fit the 90s soundscape and they are mixed more prominently as well.  This section is a huge departure from the beautiful strings in the intro and the big badass bass blasts.  The soundscape feels disjointed to me.

At 1:41, we get what sounds like surf guitar, it is loud and drowning in reverb, which makes the drum elements sound even more quiet and dry by comparison.  The guitar is performed well, but it is another odd addition to the soundscape in my opinion.  

At 2:55, after more game audio ambiance, there is a violin (synth) that sounds good to me, very moody.  But this section goes on quite long without doing much of interest.  The bouncy pluck doesn't sit well with the violin synth for me since they have such different vibes (the pluck is lighthearted and playful while the violin thing is moody, so I am emotionally confused at this point).  Good transition back into the heavier soundscape at 3:40.  But now we have violin, guitar, buzzy synth, and the dry 90s drum kit.  I do like the guitar soloing in the final passage before the ending.  

I love the concept of this arrangement, but I feel it isn't there yet.  The elements are mismatched both in timbre and processing, and the soundscape sounds too disjointed to me; it takes me out of the feel of the piece and lowers my listening enjoyment.  I think even just rebalancing the elements in volume, and making the reverbs match better so the instruments and drums sound like they are more in the same space would help a lot.  I also don't hear any sidechaining on anything.  I will spare you the entire sidechaining Ted Talk I usually do, but that would add a ton of groove to the parts of the song that have drums.  

NO

 

 

 

[Emunator]

I can't remember exactly how the previous submission sounded, so I'm also coming into this ostensibly blind.

I really like the tension and atmosphere you've created with this intro, and although there's a few things I would have done differently myself, I think this intro serves its purpose capably. I don't have a lot of critiques, even the way you glitched out the string section at :53 was really cool, and signaled a change to come.

When the beat drops in, my enthusiasm for the mix diminished slightly. I didn't find the sound design to be nearly as compelling or full-bodied, there's a lot of holes in the frequency spectrum that might not feel as off-putting if the intro wasn't so lush right before it . The strange thing is that, although there are relatively few things going on, it still feels muddy. It feels like you might have a lot of sub buildup from your kick drum that isn't audible, but nevertheless is muddying the soundscape. I can't tell for sure, but it might be worth looking at it through an EQ to see if there's a lot of inaudible rumble from your drums. Another thing that can help is shaping the stereo image of your low-end instruments, and making sure that the low frequencies of your bass are summed to mono. Sometimes, if you have sub frequency content bouncing around between stereo channels, it can lead to a mix that just sounds unstable. Also, check your reverbs to make sure you're cutting out low-frequency content that can clutter up a mix as well. Any of these things can lead to what I'm hearing in this mix, where your elements should feel punchy and immediate and they just don't.

Once we progress further with the arrangement and you mix more of the orchestral/sound design elements with the beats, it feels better. I still think the drum programming is underwhelming, but with the strings adding some much-needed texture, it comes together reasonably well. I don't feel like anything quite reaches the highs of the intro, unfortunately, but I don't want to hold that against you as long as the rest of the track is up to the bar, and honestly, I'm borderline on it. There's a lot of great ideas here, the arrangement is dynamic and creative and shows a lot of vision, but just on a gut level, the execution still doesn't feel like it's there yet :( Chimpazilla used the word "disjointed" and, from a processing standpoint, I agree with that.

This is very borderline for me, but I think I need to trust my gut here - I absolutely hear what you're going for with the 90's techno-influenced sections, but the production doesn't communicate that to me yet. I'd be happy to 1-on-1 this with you if it ends up not passing, since I'm sure I can give more actionable feedback if I can get into the specifics with you on individual elements.

NO (resubmit)

[Liontamer]

Pretty sure I heard the voices sampled in the start of WWE's Gangrel entrance theme quietly bookending this piece, but maybe it's just me.

I'm coming into this fresh, having not heard the previous submission (nor have I read anyone's votes here), but boy these Marathon sources sure are catchy; pure 90s dance energy, the Marathon Infinity track in particular.

Opens with some solid strings around :05 with an extended intro that I'm not immediately recognizing, but seems taken from one of the sources somehow. I do, however, recognize that phat lead at :56 with the first few notes of "Durandal"; nice presense, it's just filling up the space in a huge and impactful way.

OK, now I'm hearing how this could have gotten NOs when the (very bland & boring) clap groove comes in at 1:26 and sounds too loud/bright/upfront, then from 1:56-2:11 & 2:26-2:41, the texture is so thin and empty despite the volume. Bummer, as this is piece definitely well in the right direction; it's a shame you have corny grooves here that are making the writing seem too simplistic. The electric guitar sample at 1:41 has very stiff, quantized-sounding timing, so while the sample's tone is thin yet decent, it sounds extremely stilted and exposed; even moreso on its return at 3:43. High strings from 2:39-2:45 sounded super fake also.

On the other hand, the sweeping SFX from 2:26-2:35 was a nice touch (among other well-integrated sound effects). I dug the string leads at 2:55, which had more of an e-violin feeling the way they were produced; great tone to those!

3:45 was another example where there's a great energy ramp-up, but then the mixing's imbalanced; way too much emphasis on the (vanilla) beat pattern while the bassline's registering but quiet, and the high strings are very robotic-sounding and exposed, as well as behind the beat/slightly off-time.

I'm unsure if this was checked on headphones, but the issues stand out on them. For every section that sounds solid enough though, you have others that are imbalanced, so this should get another production pass for some TLC. Same with the parts that sound very robotic with their timing, mainly the electric guitar, the higher bowed strings, and the overly simplistic and plodding clap groove (which need more body and sophistication to bring energy).

I can somewhat understand why this is split based on the arrangement's potential, though I think these YES are way too lenient. The arrangement structure's fine, but the mixing & production aren't getting it done at all. I'd ask a ton more question on the Workshop forums and/or in the Discord, because your current tools aren't being used to their fullest potential. Even though my vote isn't close with this as is, Zane, it's a good base here, don't drop it!

NO (resubmit)

[pixelseph]

Coming in fresh on this one as well!

This track uses all the meat on the bone and then some between both source tracks. Durandal has a lot of repeated parts for its 3-minute runtime, and the Infinity theme is a quick A-B in under a minute. Intro uses a creative interpretation of the Durandal B section string backing; A section builds with the Durandal A section and some pauses. 2:42 finally introduces the Infinity B section, which leads to the outro at 3:45 with Infinity’s A section.

I’m enjoying the attention paid to the dynamics of the track - ambience in the right places (:00 - 1:07, 2:42 - 3:45), synth bass stabs as builds (:56 - 1:17), four-on-the-floor kick drum in the “choruses” (1:25 - 1:41, 2:11 - 2:41, 3:45 - 4:28). There’s a story being told by the piece to guide the flow, and for the most part, everything is in service to that premise. There’s more room for variation within each section, as there are some sections that are copy pasta (1:41 - 1:56 and 2:11 - 2:26 are identical in the waveform). Even something as small as changing the drum fills in one of the sections makes a huge difference. The build-ups and downs are great, on the other hand! The way the space is treated at :56 is especially good when it uses the ambience to make space after introducing the phrase.

For me, the instrument choice and implementation need more attention. I think the strings are serviceable for their role in the piece (no crazy fast articulations here, just swells and padding) but the guitar programming is not. While the parts at 1:40 - 2:00, 2:10 - 2:27, and 3:44 - end are hitting harmonically sound pitches, they lack realistic expression and articulations. Except for the bends, all of the notes are articulated the same way (down-pluck, no round-robin (sample swaps to create variation on the same note), no slides or hammer-ons/pull-offs (legato)).

Look for ways to embellish these articulations on the guitar's phrasing, and I can sign off on this one!

NO (please resubmit!)

[paradiddlesjosh]

Howdy, Zane! As a new judge, I’m coming in blind to this track too. Thank you for including a source breakdown and introducing me to some VGM I haven’t heard before!

Source usage is crystal clear, even without the breakdown in your notes. We get the B section of “Durandal” from the intro to about 0:56, a double-dose of the A section of the same track from 0:56 to 2:39, the “Infinity” theme from 2:39 to 3:42, and a guitar treatment of “Infinity” from 3:42 to the finish.

Nice pad and string usage in the intro with the sampled in-game audio. The string glitch-out at 0:53 makes for a great transition here into the bass blasts of the “Durandal” melody at 0:56.

I can see where the other Js are coming from about the drums at 1:26. The patterns here are generally good – the driving 4-on-the-floor kick is good for the style and the general palette makes sense, but the drums need some production attention here, for sure. More subtle variations in the patterns are needed; and so is grit (compression, saturation), because these grooves need more flair and impact for the mood you're evoking.

Other Js also noted the guitar lacking depth and realism at 1:41-2:39 and when it returns from 3:42 to the end. Seph has specific call-outs as to what isn’t working with your current programming, but suffice it to say the part isn’t expressive enough in execution to sell it.

The use of tempo automation and filter sweeping on the transitions into and out of the “Infinity” segment is on point. I’m not as bothered by the string programming in the transition at 2:39-2:45 as Larry is, given the style you’re going for with this piece, but more realism is always nice to have.

I think I can make out some shakers way in the back on the guitar-driven “Infinity” segment at 3:42 – these can come up in volume some, and an extra layer like this is sorely needed earlier during some of the “Durandal” A segments. Solid ending, fading back into the game SFX.

Overall, your arrangement is great – well-handled transitions, clear sections, and no unintended dissonance. But you’ve got production elements holding this one back, the biggest opportunities for improvement being the guitar programming, the drum mixing, and the drum patterns themselves.

NO (resubmit)

Edited yesterday at 04:27 AM by paradiddlesjosh

[jnWake]

Wanted to start by saying I really love the enthusiasm I get from the write-up with the lore mentions and all!

K, this one begins with some strings and pads setting some ambience, with some melodies based on backing strings from one of the sources. I like that the strings sound appropriately synth-ish to give the space vibe. At 0:55 some dark synth bass hits, teasing the main riff of the same source. At 1:25 the beat drops but, sadly, the bass itself seems to heavily drop in volume/presence so we’re left with a surprisingly soft soundscape instead… I’m really missing some more oomph in here, be it some punchier drums, some distortion on the rhythm synth, more bass, anything! A lead guitar joins a bit after and we then move to a different section, with a new riff on synths. There’s a few repeats before we move to a new section at 2:45. There’s some neat bits of sound design in all of these sections with the pads that sweep over the track, I dig that. On this new section we get some atmospheric build-up again, with melodies of the other source on strings. 3:45 continues this, now with some actual bass which is sadly very soft in the mix.

On the arrangement side this is pretty good. The medley nature could be argued against it but you do a good job of transitioning between sources and the genre is cohesive all the time so the source A →  source B structure doesn’t really bother me. I also like how you shift between more atmospheric sections and more energetic ones to keep it varied.

Sadly, I don’t think the production is letting this shine, mostly because the low end is very lacking. There’s basically no bass on this track and that is a bummer since you’re going for a very electronic vibe, which really needs a good bass (as an example, look at how the sources you picked approach it!). It’s extremely noticeable on the first major transition since you use a very loud distorted bass to introduce the first energetic section (1:25) but then basically drop the bass from the mix so the energy levels drop heavily. Drums are also nowhere nearly as energetic/punchy as the writing is asking for. The synths doing the main riffs are also super soft. Those riffs are asking for something dirtier. Finally, I think the lead guitar is also a little dull sounding. On the bright side, I really like your work with strings and pads, they sound awesome and there’s a ton of small details on the sound design that I loved.

Overall, I think this needs a second pass on production to get posted. To really nail the vibe you're going for you need to improve the bass and drum mixing as both are very lacking in power, we need that "oomph! As a “tip”, I looked at the EQ of the track and you can notice how the lower frequencies only really activate when the kick hits. Moreover, if you grab an EQ and boost the lower end (around 100hz) you’ll basically hear no bass instrument.

NO