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Video Game Music Mixes
Matt Pollard writes: "A group of video game music fanatics and musicians have opened up a new website at VGMix.com. If you're like us, sometimes you can't get the snazzy tunes of today's video games out of your head. Also, if you're up for a bit of nostalgia, this is certainly the place to go to relive the days of youth when you hummed the Super Mario Bros. theme under your breath during class grade school."
Overclocked Remix deserves some credit. It's a moderated remix website that's been running for a few years.
http://remix.overclocked.org
They also have some remixes. Mostly it's ripped stuff, though.
Also, if you're willing to wade through tons of "inspired by" shit, MP3.com's electronic section has lots of good remixes...many are also on other sites like remix.overclocked.org, though.
There is another site that has been around for a while that deals only with video game remixes as well. Overlocked Remix has listings of numerous MP3 format video game music remixes. The genres range from classical to techno to ambient to rock.
Since you need to create a fairly high quality remix in order to get listed on the site, almost all of the music on that site is worth the listen.
If you want to get Sierra Music, visit Quest Studios. They have music of about all Sierra games, some in MP3 and some in MIDI format.
Like most websites, they want to know what users are visiting their sites. They may be using something like bbclone (http://bbclone.tuxfamily.org/) which uses php scripts to log web page accesses... example of a bbclone report is at http://bbclone.tuxfamily.org/varstuff/bbclone-0.15 .1.html
One of the interesting side effects is that it can be a way to find out who is linking to your pages since it also shows the referrer info...
Knowing which browser you use can help in making sure that their pages work in all availible browsers that their potential audiance uses.
{before you say anything... yes... the pages should be optimised for ALL browsers... but then who said we lived in a utopian world...})
--
Time is on my side
For more great game choon remixes, although from the world of Commodore 64, check out these two commonly known great sites:
http://Remix.Kwed.Org
http://www.c64audio.com
Also, quite recently I happened to hear probably the best C64 game remix ever. It's from the game "The Great Gianna Sisters", by a band Machinae Supremacy. Here's the direct link to the MP3 file at their site, and here's another for a mirror at MP3.com. Enjoy! (And may the Gaia forgive me for starting a
__
Zarathustra.fi
Modern man has no goal, no aim, no ideals.
Hi folks, I'm virt, the guy who came up with the idea and helped design and implement the site (and whose wallet will ultimately suffer for the slashdotting ;))
:)
...really fun.
I just wanted to say thanks in advance for the support and the interest, and to get a couple of things cleared up.
First of all, we KNOW we're not the first. Believe me, we know. We're just the first site designed from the ground up for the purpose of multi-platform game arrangements. Most of us are people who are also (or have been) active contributors to remix.overclocked.org - OverClocked ReMix is the site that really started it all with game music arrangements, and it's incredible how a real living, breathing community can form around a single niche interest. However, OverClocked started out as a personal site that gradually featured other people's music until it became MOSTLY about other people's music. VGMix was made, back-end and all, specifically for harbouring a community. Few things are done by hand, because we want people to be able to put their stuff up without us babysitting, and let the moderation and reviewing dictate what's enjoyed without any one person trying to decide for the whole community. We're mostly musicians first, game players second, but the entire spectrum of musicians/gamers is represented here, and we all really love what we do. We DO, however, have a Panel of trusted arrangers who can pick what they consider to be exceptional songs and give them separate, "official" attention - but it in no way supersedes the original purpose of the site because it's a "side project."
I consulted with an attorney (got 5 of them in the family, holidays are JUST LOVELY) a long time before I set this site up, and there's nothing illegal about writing music inspired or derived from another's work. If it were REMIXES -- the original audio with a new beat slapped on, for example -- it would not only be illegal but immoral, too, if we didn't ask first. But what we're doing here is interpreting the original song in a new and very changed form. IANAL, but I don't like being sued so I made sure I talked to people who are. OverClocked ReMix is in the same boat. I'm sure someone could disagree or be misinformed and bring a suit against either site, but before it came to that we'd probably skip the hassle in the first place and zap the song. Not likely, though. Us game composer types (I also freelance commercially) are usually laid-back and flattered by arrangements, as long as there's no money being made from them.
Now, VGMUSIC.COM is another story entirely. They have nothing to do with us, but they are a fantastic resource for people who ARE with us. Vgmusic is a place where people submit General MIDI arrangements of game music, usually done by ear by a talented (or not) sequencer. It's like sheet-music transcriptions, just a database of music MIDI files. How is this a fantastic resource? Not everyone who arranges has the kind of ear that allows them to capture the melodies and harmonies by ear, so having a file that they can examine visually is a good thing for them.
So, to sum up, we are well aware that we're not the first, we're just the first set up this way; we're not doing anything illegal, though we'll have to work hard to ensure that our system is not abused; and there are other sites in the game music community that can help us through cooperation. We're not so arrogant as to think we're movers and shakers, we're just guys who love game music and we're trying to provide place to share it that is unlike the others that already exist.
It's a really tiny niche community but it's
-j
If you don't know what it is...use the SPC as the example. SPC is the file format for an SNES sound file...extracted directly from the game. The player emulates the hardware, so it sounds EXACTLY like it does on the SNES.
A few links:
- GBS (Gameboy)
- GYM (Genesis)
- VGM (SMS/GG)
- NSF (NES)
- SPC (SNES)
Links to the players are provided on the individual pages, but the best multi-console music player is Meridian Advance.When you get sick of remixes, check out the originals and remember your childhood
You also have a very good point, one that deserves some more attention. For anyone reading who does not know what we're talking about:
A big point of contention in the freelancing community is the retention of copyrights. Generally the way it's done among beginners is that you sell your music and your rights for a flat rate, and then they "own" the music. However, once you get more into the business side of things and you start writing and revising your own contracts, or adding items to theirs with legal advice, you can switch it around so that you take a pay cut in exchange for the rights to the music.
This is how Tommy Tallarico (a very popular game composer) has a mansion and several sports cars - and undoubtedly many Fly Bitches. The REAL money comes from licensing, franchising and -- for example -- the use of the same music, all for separate royalties, in a PS2, XBox, and Gamecube game, and then a soundtrack album, a television show, a Best-Hits-Games CD-Rom, a commercial excerpt, etc.
That said, some companies who DO own the copyrights might decide to be a little more stringent about sites like this. However, Stateside, I've never heard of a company going after an amateur arranger who is not posing any financial threat to the company. The market for arrangement albums in the US is so amazingly sparse that it just doesn't make sense to throw money at interpreting copyright law to vilify fans who do this as a hobby. And yes, the law would have to be interpreted, as it's always been vague about derivative works. Based upon everything I've heard (from real, living lawyers) doing something like this for fun and COMPLETELY -not for profit- is totally legal.
So, yeah. They could go after us. But that doesn't mean we've done anything wrong, it means they think we have. That's what the law is for. For now, though, it looks like we will remain unbothered by nasty letters just like other arrangement sites.
-j
Yeah, but we were still around 9100 when the story broke on Slashdot. We've been mostly overwhelmed and slow, but our single server has - amazingly - weathered the entire thing so far, 5k hits (in 3 hours or so!) later. If you guys are looking for hosting for a similar-sized site, I can heartily recommend rackshack.net. Cheap, fast, and they have extremely responsive staff.
And of course, because I said that, the entire data center will be struck by lightning and incinerated while I'm asleep.
-j
- Tetris
- Korobeiniki
- Korobeyniki
- Korobushka
Good ones includeOr just go to Russia2000 and get 'Korobeyniki' (which incidentally mixes perfectly from "Barbie Girl" by Aqua).
Will I retire or break 10K?
It's also unavailable unless you're paying a premium for dedicated hosting. What do you suggest for virtual-hosted users?
Will I retire or break 10K?
"music inspired by other music is not illegal, though, i must add."
Perhaps I have not made myself clear.
THESE. ARE. NOT. REMIXES.
In fact, the only reason we called it "VGMix" is because "VGArrange" sounds awkward. Arrangements are something else ENTIRELY. They are a completely different type of interpretation. The only case in which copyright could pose a problem is if audio samples from the original song are used. Remember the whole MP3.com fiasco about using sampled material in songs? That was that.
These songs that we have on our site do NOT use the original audio (there are exceptions, of course, but only in tiny snippets, samples. These are completely original, 100% from-scratch pieces of music that are only inspired or loosely melodically / chordally / rhythmically based on the original song. This is a hobby that must often be explained in-depth, but what it really is, down at the core, is composition practice. This is one of the reasons that midi-sequence repositories like vgmix.com come in handy - we're doing it all by ear!
I'm sure I will have to repeat this over and over again over the course of this article's visible lifespan, but vgmix.com does NOT deal in remixes. It's about derivative/inspired works that are created completely by us. We just don't really have a great term for it, so some people call them "remixes" because it's catchy, even though it's completely inaccurate. I just go with "arrangements."
-j
Ever since Genecyst first came out,
Bloodlust's emulators (NESticle, Genecyst) are very dated.
Did the Genesis have any analog components that make it impossible to get it perfect (like beyond-the-ability-of-the-ear-to-ever-tell-perfect )?
The Genesis has a 6-channel Yamaha FM chip and a simple 4-channel tone generator similar to the ones in the Game Boy and NES. A typical game (such as Zero Wing or Sonic the Hedgehog) uses FM channels 1-5 for music, 6 for drum hits, tone generator channels 1-3 for simple 8-bit-style sound fx, and 4 for 8-bit hi-hats and explosions.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Generic:
http://www.2xtreme.net/zero-g/generic/sound.htm
The Minibosses:
http://www.minibosses.com/
Guitar Tabs courtesy of Generic:
http://www.2xtreme.net/zero-g/generictabs/
BTW, If you want to hear the rest of the Generic songs ... they're not up because they're looking for webspace. Hint hint, nudge nudge.
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