*NO* Final Fantasy 7 "Snowball Fight Outside Avalanche HQ"

[prophetik music ⚖️]

The original idea for turning this into a battle theme was based on the first "tutorial" style battle in Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, where you are in the school yard and proceed to have a turn-based snowball fight to learn the basics. By adding in some higher ends with the use of analog generators and additional samples, I wanted to bring a more nostalgic wintry feel that's accentuated in certain sections and more subtle in others.

My track 0:00, source track n/a
Since this is a battle theme conversion, I wanted to convey a build-up of tension similar to that of the first 17 seconds of the [REF1] adaptation with a bit of an industrial energy, given we might be stretching the boundaries a little to provide them with basic augmented reality. Battle preparations, taking their places on the field outside Seventh Heaven. Unrelated to the source material but it helps convey the additional discordance that is being introduced.

My track 0:24, source track 0:13

The first reference to the main motif in Barret's theme, using the same notes as the original but with less separation between them. This could be considered to be one of the most contentious points of this track but after much contemplation, I do feel that this off-key mix of the lead and rhythm sections compliments everything that comes after it in my submission. The first 37 seconds from [REF3] has a great build-up and was one of the main inspirations behind bringing together the same tones of Barret's Theme while also introducing some discordance and disparity between the notes. Reducing the time between the notes also accentuates this greatly.

You could consider it as a warming up phase of the battle - participants haven't really found their footing yet and are fumbling a few of their throws. You can't expect to perform perfectly from the very start and "feel the flow" as a certain character would say, referencing a previous comment about "Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL".

My track 0:49, source track 0:39

This is my interpretation of a more traditional upbeat JRPG progression - possibly something you'd see on the Super Nintendo in a game like Chrono Trigger with those organ samples. I do enjoy making some interesting transitions to other similar styles where possible, without ruining the cohesion too much. I hope that it doesn't jarring when dancing between multiple ideas within a single track such as this. In this instance, I think the transitions do make sense and it's something that I continue to explore within compositions and arrangements such as these.

My track 1:13, source track n/a

0:49-1:10 from [REF3] showed that I wanted to have a classic lull in proceedings - something to begin building the tensions once again as I feel that is particularly important when it comes to battle themes as opposed to general area or town tracks. Music from the Halo and Spyro the Dragon franchises showed me how important that was when it came to the works composed by O'Donnell/Salvatori and Copeland respectively. Having something that constantly "all-out" constantly active would be far too much for the listener and it's almost impossible to keep up that level of activity without losing what really makes your track sing, introducing too much repetition or adding melodies for the sake of it. I do enjoy employing negative space where possible - less applicable with battle themes but very much underappreciated in atmospheric tracks too.

My track 1:38, source track 1:05, 1:27

The middle of the track also serves as the very meat of the experience - what I feel really makes this a battle theme. The contrast between the high notes once again and that lower-pitched lead along with a slightly more "active" bassline are what brings this entire sequence together. There is still a slight mix of hopeful yet combative energy coming from this. Maybe it's the determination that is such an important trait of being a member of Avalanche, never to give up regardless of one's position however bleak it may look.

It also makes a callback to the very end of the loop during those overlapping lead chords which I think works particularly well and isn't overpowering. The repositioning of this element of the source track allows us to add our own interpretation of an outro.

In the second half of this section, the complexity is reduced and the higher notes are removed, allowing for a more natural progression to the following section - a second lull in proceedings.

My track 2:27, source track 0:00

A cheeky little callback to the very beginning of the source material. A chance to cement a wintry feeling by introducing a clean high-pitch square instrument with a touch of reverb. Also a chance to dance around the keyboard a little too! I beefed up the bass too by introducing a low guitar sample which adds a nice counterpoint to the especially higher octave blips from that square. While it references the beginning of Barret's theme, it also vaguely resembles that of the lower notes included in the main motif but this may have been by design from Uematsu-san.

My track 3:01, source track 0:13

The second callback to the main motif in Barret's theme, this time without the disparity between the lead notes and the bass/chord tones to convey a culmination of everything that's happened up to this point. It's getting to the end of the skirmish and everyone's ready to battle one more round to see who is victorious! Also including an additional slightly heavier counterpoint to the lead instrument to really drive home that upbeat energy at this point.

My track: 3:26, source track n/a

"Wait, what's that in the distance - is that part of the simulation or are those people really running in fear towards our location?" A harsh reminder that yes, this is still the Sector 7 slums and some things have or will never change. One minute, you can experience utter joy but at any moment, that euphoria can be stripped from you entirely, leaving nothing but the reality of your existence. Shinra still know about your location and things won't stay the same forever - for better or for worse.

My track: 3:35, source track n/a

The question remains - is Avalanche able to prevent Shinra from dropping the plate that exists above Sector 7's entirety? Instead of looping around to close off the track, I wanted to leave a question for the listener to ponder as a small cliffhanger. A very short and minor reference for the ending sequence 0:44-0:54 from [REF2] helped to shape this. While it doesn't carry the same sense of "almost" impending destruction or loss, it is still somewhat unnerving.

Video references:
[REF1] 壱番魔晄炉 Battle Edit (Mako Reactor 1 - Battle Edit) Reference
[REF2] Dead End (Final Fantasy VIII) Reference
[REF3] 忍びの末裔 Battle Edit (Descendant of Shinobi - Battle Edit) Reference

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Games & Sources

Source track: Barret's Theme (Final Fantasy VII)

In a way, I think Barret's theme from Final Fantasy VII has been associated with the beginning of the game, almost a part of the tutorial if you will. The original track is very friendly and upbeat which I feel matches the energy of the start of the game - a successful raid on the Mako Reactor and Cloud, along with the friends in Avalanche, has safely made it back to the (currently) safe slums.

They are a very close-knit group whom I believe would definitely enjoy playing competitive sports and other games outside with each other, especially with the younger generation like Barret's daughter Marlene. Now, I know that the Sector 7 Slums are part of the Midgar undercity and many of those residents would never see the light of the surface but if it ever did snow outside Seventh Heaven, this would be the battle theme that played while both teams attempted to pelt each other with compressed snow. Maybe some snow was able to be miraculously preserved with Mako energy after shipping it in from the Icicle Inn from the northern continent or with all their technological advances, a simulation could be developed that converts a small area into a playing field, much like the augmented reality duels from the "Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL" anime. I know, it's a bit of a reach with it being the slums but I would feel that a close unit like Avalanche might put together some funds for something like this for the younger generation, especially given Barret's relationship with his daughter Marlene. He's just a big old softie with a tough outer shell for sure.

As the original theme is more a summation of Barret Wallace's overall character, I wanted to skew it towards a battle theme with additional instrumentation and more traditional percussive beat. To do this, I wanted to take some additional inspiration from Nobuo Uematsu's recent arrangements for FF7R. There were two tracks that really stood out for me that take an original area theme and turns them into an incredible battle theme, coined the "Battle Edit" - "Descendant of Shinobi" and "Mako Reactor 1" from Final Fantasy VII Remake.

The adaptations from Uematsu-san were what inspired me to try doing something along the same lines. They are an absolute masterstroke in how to turn a cheerful, slower-paced track into something incredibly hype-inducing and combative in nature.

 

Edited Friday at 08:18 PM by jnWake

[prophetik music ⚖️]

opens with some wide synths. the kick rhythm is a little confusing as there's no beat here to hang your hat on, so it's not clear where the down beat is initially. the melody comes in at 0:24, and you're right, it is questionable. polytonality is a technique i recognize, but it really doesn't work here - it just sounds off-key outright.

0:49 is where the track seems to be more settled. there's a recap of the beginning with some low synth blurbs at 1:13, and those synths kind of step on each other since they're all in the same freq range. the beat picks up at 1:38 and this has a pretty neat vibe once it gets trucking. i'll admit i don't really hear the original in this section.

2:27's lead synth doesn't really make a ton of sense to the rest of what's going on around this section, and it's so highly embellished i definitely wouldn't have caught that it's a reference to the opening without calling it out. right after the main riff here, the track just continues hammering that one note for a pretty long time without significant adds. the melody comes back finally - again, pretty heavily ornamented - and then gets some weird notes around the 3:28 point before the track is suddenly done.

so right off the bat - i think that the arrangement has legs. you've got some really creative concept work behind each part of the track (to be honest, probably too much - if a book is needed to understand a 4-minute piece, you're not doing enough as the arranger). there's a lot of padding that can be trimmed, and you need to work on transitions and the opening sections so that they're approachable and understandable.

that said, the instrumentation isn't close to being there. if this is supposed to be using some retro sound chip, ok, but evaluating this as a pickup piece of music, the audio quality isn't up to par. there's buckets of free stuff that's better across the board out there, and separately there's a lot of mixology you can do to get better sounds out of the instruments you're choosing.

i think that some serious time in the workshop discord would help a ton on this, and i think that some time spent finding ways to get better sound quality from all of your instruments is helpful too. you can do nostalgic with real synths and make it sound like a modern song still.

 

 

NO

[paradiddlesjosh ⚖️]

Howdy, Jonpon!

This will probably sound like I hated this track: I fully agree with proph's notes. 

For starters, the instrumentation and production simply aren't up to par.

The lack of a rhythmic constant makes the intro difficult to follow. The transformation of "Barret's Theme's" A section melody you've given from 0:24-0:48 is nearly unrecognizable, and the dissonant layers underneath aren't doing the section any favors, either. The rapid descending arpeggios in the intro callback from 1:13-1:38 sort out the intro's rhythm problem, but proph's right that a bunch of parts are just stepping all over each other because they're playing in the same range. It seems like the organ is carrying the melody line at 1:38-2:03? I can barely make out the "Barret's Theme" C section melody; without Nobuo's stepwise figuring from the source material, your interpretation is tenuous. The lead at 2:27-2:44 has another tenuous source connection; as a nitpick, I don't agree with the highly active lead line over the top of a pulsing pedal tone bassline and no other rhythm section. There isn't any setup for the ending at 3:32.

It's not all doom and gloom, though. The organ lick of the source B section melody at 0:49-1:13 is solid. The segments that truck along like 2:03-2:27 feel great. The reprise of the A section motif at 3:02 works much better than your first statement at 0:24. There's a cool story behind your arrangement.

You've got an arrangement with promise and potential here. If you haven't already, I highly recommend taking this to the #workshop channel on the OCR Discord. It's more active than the forums these days, and the folks there can help you take this track to the next level!

NO (resubmit)

[jnWake ⚖️]

Very interesting approach to the arrangement here, let's break it down:

Track begins with a pad, bass and an irregular kick pattern (it doesn't bother me as it did other judges though). Things seem to be in E minor here but at 0:26 the B melody from the source enters and there's a big point of contention, since the original is on F major (for this section) and you didn't change the key, which creates a huge dissonance. Of course, write-up shows you actually intended this but I don't think it's effective. Dissonance is a valid tool but I don't think flat out slotting a melody over an unfitting key works without extra effort, it's something you probably need to set up effectively. At 0:49 we move into a new section, with bass and melody on A major, an odd choice after the dissonant part. The beat here is cool though, the hi-hat pattern is very Chrono Trigger-ish. 1:13 seems to be kind of a reprise of the intro that leads into an actual reprise a bit later. A fun drum fill moves us into a new section at 1:38. I like the energy here. The lower of the 2 melodies seems to be playing some liberal variations of the souce and 1:51 echoes one of the chord progressions from the original. A fairly odd synth arpeggio leads into a section with distorted guitar around the 2 minute mark that's basically one riff played over a set of different chords, would've been a good spot for a solo or something of the sort. At 2:27 there's a bit of break/keyboard solo over a static 8ths rhytmic pattern which leads into a repeated arpeggio starting from around 2:45 to 3:01 in a small "drum solo". We then get a reprise of the 0:26 melody but without the dissonance, much more pleasant! Finally, at around 3:35 we reach a take on the source's end of loop section and the track ends.

On the arrangement side, this is definitely an interesting piece. Changing Barret's Theme into a "battle theme" is a fun idea. Generally, I think the structure of the arrangement is solid but I have some criticisms. First is the dissonant section. You mention it "compliments everything that comes after it" but I don't really see it, the section right after the dissonance is an extremely upbeat one which is just a big whiplash that makes the dissonance lose purpose. There's some pay-off for the dissonance with the reprise at 3:01 but I feel that reprise would've still worked well without the big dissonant part earlier. Second is that there's a few parts where we basically have a bass part and percussion without nothing particularly interesting happening on top, like 1:01-1:13, 2:03-2:26 and 2:44-3:01. I also have a bit of trouble catching the vibe of the arrangement as it moves from tense sections to very upbeat melodies often. As a positive, I enjoy the general rhytm of the track, it's energetic and fun!

On production, there's a big issue with the samples used... they're simply not high quality enough. I won't bet on this but some even seem taken directly from SNES soundfonts, which is a valid approach if you take the time to write and produce them well. Bass, particularly, suffers from this, as the sample picked doesn't really cut well through the mix. Even if you can't find better samples, it'd also be a good idea to invest time into sound design. As an example, the synth doing the backing from 2:27 to 3:01 could really use some effects to sound more interesting. I don't have big criticisms of the mix itself other than sample quality really, the track sounds well.

Overall, there's a lot of potential here. Arrangement has interesting ideas but it needs some refinement. Production needs more work, focusing on making the instruments sound better (either by finding better samples or by mixing the existing ones in smart ways to make them better). I'd recommend hitting the workshop on the forums or the Discord and hopefully you hit us with a revision in the future!

NO

Edited Friday at 08:22 PM by jnWake