OCR

Featured, Game Music, Music Production

Original SoundCAST: Episode #014 (feat. Andrew “zircon” Aversa)

July 17, 2012 | Patrick Gann | 8 Comments Share this

To us, Andrew Aversa is one of the few people who really represents what game music is all about. That’s because, even in the past year, Andrew has shown himself as a force to be reckoned with on all fronts: AAA game music, indie game music, and fan-made arrangements.

In this episode, Brenna Wilkes and I talk with Andrew for a solid hour about his work on Globulous (which Brenna recently reviewed), on Soul Calibur V, and the super-funded Kickstarter campaign for the OCRemix album under his direction: Final Fantasy VI: Balance and Ruin. This last topic takes up over half of the episode, and it should! At the time we recorded this (Saturday), the campaign was at $60,000, 400% of the $15,000 goal. As I’m writing this post, they’re now at $75,000. I also got *this* in a Kickstarter Backer’s email:

What does that mean? Well, everyone who’s getting a physical copy of “Balance and Ruin” will also get a newly-printed, *all 4 disc* version of Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream as well. That’s good stuff.

Anyway, listen to the episode to learn about everything zircon’s up to. And if you want even more podcast-delivered info on the Balance and Ruin project, please check out this great Nitro Game Injection “after-show” recording with Larry “Liontamer” Oji, which was just recorded on Sunday.

Download: Original SoundCAST Episode #014

If you want to know what BGM we have behind all that talk-talk-talk, click the “more” button. (more…)
Featured, Game Music

Arrangement of the Zelda Goddesses: Chad Seiter Interview

July 9, 2012 | Haroon Piracha | 7 Comments Share this

In the past couple of months, there have been a surge of concerts that have blown audiences away. This concert series is not a mixed bag of video game music like Video Games Live or PLAY! A Video Game Symphony, but focuses on one game series – The Legend of Zelda. Having been to many video game concerts myself, I have not run into an official video game concert where the music director actually arranged the music specifically for a 100+ piece orchestra. Not even the Final Fantasy concerts (“Dear Friends” “More Friends” “Distant Worlds”) hit that mark as they were (mostly) just live performances of arrangements made for previous albums. The music was always there, they just brought together musicians and perform the pieces live. But this is where The Legend of Zelda: Symphony of The Goddesses hits an entirely new realm of concerts for Americans: instead of ripping the music from the video game, or old work being replayed, why not arrange an entirely new piece for the audience?

Recently, I had a chance to talk with the man who arranged the music for these Zelda concerts, Chad Seiter, a man who has put a lot of hard work into the arrangements. I sat down with him at his concert at E3, he was nice enough to share his passion and love for what he called The legend of Zelda: Symphony of The Goddesses.

Read the interview after the Jump. (more…)
Doujin, Game Music, Reviews

Super Fighting Robots: Mega Man – The Robot Museum (Review)

April 25, 2011 | Matthew Gregg | 29 Comments Share this

Another Mega Man fan album. Cynical people like myself will likely look at this release and think ‘’Do remixers only play the same games?’’ Still, it’s Mega Man music so let’s all open our minds as well as our ears!

Frequent OCR contributor Joshua Morse (Castlevania: Symphony of the Damned, Heroes vs. Villains, Bound Together) has taken one song from each original Mega Man game and has the unenviable task of turning them into themes for a ‘Robot Museum.’ Points for originality at least.

Read the review after the jump! (more…)
Doujin, Game Music, Reviews

A Friendly Rivalry: OCR Vs. Bad Dudes in Heroes Vs. Villains (Review)

March 28, 2011 | Jayson Napolitano | Comments Off on A Friendly Rivalry: OCR Vs. Bad Dudes in Heroes Vs. Villains (Review) Share this

There was a lot of buzz surrounding the OverClocked ReMix (OCR) versus Bad Dudes remix project, Heroes Vs. Villains. The concept is pretty awesome: let the OCR guys tackle the hero themes from various games, while the Bad Dudes respond with their remix of the corresponding villain. This creates a friendly competition not only between sounds, but between remixing communities, if you want to call the Bad Dudes their own community.

What you end up with are 20 remixes of some of our favorite tracks that the game industry has had to offer, and even a turncoat, as the leader of the Bad Dudes tackles a hero theme to counter his own Bad Dude!

Hit the jump for our review of the free OCR album. (more…)
Doujin, Game Music

OverClocked ReMix Shows Their Strength At MAGFest

January 22, 2011 | Patrick Gann | 1 Comment Share this

I was late arriving at MAGFest, in many senses of the word (I skipped the first day, and then the traffic/parking fiasco held me up for much of the second day). The first thing I actually did when I arrived at the convention? I headed to one of the Panel rooms to hear from the fine folks at OverClocked ReMix (abbreviated OCR).

This panel served as a lengthy advertisement for the long-running fan-based VGM community. The event opened with OCR artists doing a live performance of their well-known rock arrangement “wander on the offensive” (from Shadow of the Colossus).

After this, the panelists, all arrangers, performers, and judges for the site, presented current and future activities. They highlighted 2010 album releases, including the first in a five-part series for Final Fantasy V and Donkey Kong Country 2. They talked about future projects, like the upcoming “Heroes Vs. Villains” album, a joint project between OCR and “The Bad Dudes.” Their full list of planned 2011 projects is daunting, though they admit they probably won’t finish all of them this year. Already this year they released the Armored Core tribute album, entitled THE ANSWER.

They also gave away T-shirts and limited edition physical CD prints of their albums throughout the event. I nabbed a shirt, but it was Medium (whereas my body size is LARGE AND IN CHARGE!), so I gave it to a friend.

More important than the album announcements or the freebies, however, was the time dedicated to highlighting the success of OCR contributors. The site’s founder, David “djpretzel” Lloyd, got somewhat sentimental when he noted the accomplishments of OCR members. Jimmy Hinson did work on Mass Effect 2. Other OCR members are working with BioWare on the MMORPG Star Wars: The Old Republic. And so many more are doing original compositions for indie games, such as Danny B. on Super Meat Boy.

In describing all these successes, djpretzel told the audience that this is what he envisioned from the moment OCR was born. He wanted to see many fans of games and game music come together and express themselves by arranging these classic VGM tracks. But in doing that, he knew that people would hone their skills, and he always believed the site had the potential to serve as a springboard for musicians to move on to bigger and better things. These days, he’s saying that dream come true, and that’s something everybody can be happy about.

As always, OSV will continue to cover OCR’s contributions to the game music scene. On a personal note, I would like to thank the OCR panelists for coming to MAGFest and presenting what they did; being my first taste of MAGFest 9, it set the tone for the rest of the weekend.
Game Music, Reviews

New OCR Project, Final Fantasy IV: Echoes of Betrayal, Light of Redemption (Review)

July 17, 2009 | Patrick Gann | 22 Comments Share this

OverClocked ReMix has taken on a number of ambitious projects over the years, including the official score for Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix. Two years ago, they released Voices of the Lifestream, which featured remixes and rearrangements of every single song from the Final Fantasy VII soundtrack. Now, it seems, they’re at it again.

OCR founder David Lloyd (a.k.a. djpretzel), project director Andrew Luers (a.k.a. OA), and many other high-level members of the OCR community, acted as judges in picking which submitted arrangements would go on the new Final Fantasy IV tribute album, “Echoes of Betrayal, Light of Redemption.” The album is “three discs” (though, of course, it’s downloadable-only), and it hits every single one of the 44 tracks from the Final Fantasy IV soundtrack.

After the jump, I share my thoughts on this massive, nearly overwhelming collection of remixed music. (more…)
Game Music, Reviews

You Must Defeat (Sheng) Long Game Titles To Stand A Chance: Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix OST (Review)

January 30, 2009 | David Hsu | 3 Comments Share this

This review started as a part of the “behind the scenes” post I wrote last month, but the article was beginning to get so massive that it threatened to collapse under its own weight and form a black hole of text, sucking the rest of the site into itself. Fortunately we realized this before it was too late and split the review into a separate post, averting certain disaster. Now you can safely read the monster that almost annihilated OSV, after the jump.

To recap for those of you who haven’t felt the touch of a computer in a while, Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix is a remake of Super Street Fighter II Turbo by Capcom and Backbone Entertainment, featuring updated high-definition art by the UDON team, re-balanced gameplay, and of course the first ever official soundtrack arranged entirely by fans, courtesy of OverClocked ReMix. The game can be purchased on both Xbox Live Arcade and the PlayStation Store, and the soundtrack has been made available completely free for download in both MP3 and lossless FLAC on the OverClocked ReMix website.

(more…)