Mega Man 4 Remade

[iYamWhatIYam]

I wouldn't call Dust Man lazy, so much as it was just missing any kind of interesting atmosphere to it. 0:14 to 0:33 sounds fine, but the intro and the outro both sound very lacking in inspiration - most notably the intro, which feels like a carbon copy of the notes being played, ignoring the tremolo in the original. The percussion and the background chords also feel somewhat out of place in the outro (and arguably, the percussion is somewhat lacking in the whole track - it just copies the original, which doesn't have the greatest percussion to begin with), as the percussion carries on playing hi-hats in between notes (which carries on the flow awkwardly while the notes try to create a tense, fragmented style), and the chords carry on playing at a constant volume, rather than adapting with the notes.

I found it a bit lazier compared to the rest of the tracks, but oh well. It doesn't really matter; it's still quite nice and better than what I can do. I still stand by my statement though.

[PaulMannIV]

Alright. I'm about to be jumped on for having the unpopular opinion, but here it goes.

RushJet1, I'm a huge fan of your Rock Man covers. From 3, 1, 2, 2 GB--all of them absolutely fantastic, each song its own unique cover and bit of remixing in there as well. You pretty much set the bar on Rock Man covers as a whole, something I wish I could be able to reach--hell, I don't even think my Wave Man cover is as good as anything in what I've mentioned. You've been one of the tracker users I've used as inspiration, up there with Danooct, psn, $RE$, etc.

With THAT being said, I was...actually disappointed with this one.

Don't get me wrong, however. There are absolutely stellar songs in the mix. The Intro Themes, Pharaoh Man, Bright Man, Skull Man ( <3 ), Dive Man--yes, I said it after dissing the song before, every battle theme, Cossack 1, and Ballade stand out to me as the kind of songs I'd hear from a legend. Unfortunately, to me, the other songs sound either a little less than what I expected--see Toad Man and Wily 1 and 2--or were just...not very good to me--see Drill Man and Ring Man as my prime examples. I'm not sure what it is, though. Was is laziness? Was is a difference in perspective as to how the songs should've been handled? I cannot say for sure, but all day yesterday, I was seriously thinking the former of the two.

Perhaps I was most disappointed in your Cossack 2 cover, as I believe the possibilities in that missed the mark pretty badly. Cossack 2 suffers from...well, if you can't tell just from looking at it, something's wrong. An entire channel. Not used. At all. Not for harmonies. Not for a solo. Not even for an echo. After the glory of Cossack 1, I was expecting something more grand like with Rock Man 1's Wily 1 to Wily 2 being even better or how Rock Man 3's Wily 1 cover to a Rock Man 3 GB cover for Wily 2. Glorious stuff.

I was also completely conflicted for Cossack 3. Having covered the song multiple times before, I was expecting something with more action, but I did like what I get...at least, the second half of it. The first half I couldn't care less, which I shouldn't feel that way.

Maybe I was expecting much more than what was given. Maybe the hype had gotten too far since I first saw your Pharaoh Man cover all that time ago. I'm not sure what else to say. I want to say I loved every note, every song, every bit like I did before, but I can't.

I'm sorry.

[MechaGrapefruit]

This is really damn good. I'd be more critical, but a lot of my thoughts are covered above. I wouldn't say I'm "disappointed" though, because even some of the relatively weaker tracks are exactly that - relatively weak - and are still fantastic tracks on whole. The only criticism I'll throw your way is that, while I like both Cossack 1 and 2, I find myself wishing that there were a more energetic version between the two of them for contrast - the original is less heavy than either.
All that said, you've done great work once again.

[Xyz]

Cossack 3 is stunning

[RushJet1]

Paulmannv: for wily/Cossack stages, I always try to have a straight cover of each theme usually and a more liberal one, usually in that order. Cossack 1 fit a longer, slower theme so usually I'd put the plain cover first and have a variation on the 2nd but it fit better to switch them. This is also why Cossack 3's first half is pretty straightforward.

Cossack 2 doesn't use the the 2nd channel- i put echo there originally but it sounded out of place. It, along with the dust man cover, are kind of casualties of the deadline I set for myself, kind of like "get a base cover done and make it interesting later" except there was no "later". Maybe I'll redo those later, but meh, probably not. I'll be smarter with MM5- each year doing these happens differently (MM1 suffered a little because each song had a 1 week deadline, MM2 suffered a bit because I had no review time for it, etc). MM3 turned out the best because I spent almost a year on it total with huge breaks between writing some of the tracks, something I couldn't really afford to do last year.

Edit: I also spent a lot of time on the vrc6 sounds on MM4, way more time than on the others, which might have taken too much time away in addition to real life junk getting in the way. Oddly I feel like ring and drill turned out pretty well, especially because I don't particularly like ring.

[PaulMannIV]

I always try to be as perfectionist as possible in many of my covers now unless I really stop caring at some point. That...makes working on ANYTHING take much longer than normal. I'd say stop using deadlines, but you have to have SOME reason to get it done, right? I suppose I should start adding deadlines for my works, as I have too many stopped projects because I never set them. Funny enough, I was actually working on a few Rock Man 5 songs recently, but unsure as to what direction I should take some of the songs.

Honestly, I didn't expect a response from you, especially considering that I see you as one of the Famitracker GODS. Glad to see you keep in touch, though ^_^

[RushJet1]

Setting deadlines can have drawbacks but can be useful. Usually for the MM remades I try to get stuff out by early December, and having a soft "deadline" like that has worked pretty well. MAGFest was a hard deadline though, and I've really not done that before. Probably shouldn't next time. What I should do for subsequent projects like this is start really early and do small amounts of work every few days at most, then when crunch time comes I have a bunch of stuff ready.

Please label all beta modules. No one is above this rule.

It's not a rule but a request.

[recme]

love the vrc6 used in these songs! especially loved the strums in drill man and the SID chip kinda sound in bright man. the music variation was also nice, like the swing used in dive man. very nice work on the ost.

[Threxx]

Please label all beta modules. No one is above this rule.

It's not a rule but a request.

why would one choose to be uncourteous