[SotW] Song of the Week - WEEK 124 Voting/WEEK 125 Nominating

Quote:

"This is Exceliza, I'll deploy now!"

"Roger! Good Luck!"

3 points - Dragon's Fury (Game Rip) - OMAKEBGM00 (Thunder Force II: Knights of Legend) - I'm a bit fond of the rearrangement of this track, there being 3 versions of it I've actually heard. This one has a bit more meat to it, though the arrangement from Technosoft music collection has a killer bass line. That being neither here nor there, this one grew on me a lot.

2 points - Dynamite Headdy (Game Rip) - Schumacher Fly - Wow... just, wow. A lot is done for being a Genesis/Mega Drive tune. It was a tough pick between this and Knights of Legend for 3 points.

1 point - DOUBLE DRAGON II The Revenge - Low Pursuit (Mission 2) - In the same boat as Crash here, I didn't know there was an arrangement available. I'd love to hear more of this stuff in the future.

Next Nomination:

Sorry, Darkcomet72, but this one is mine!

Album: Omega Five Soundtrack
Track: Stage 1: The glacial fortress
Artist: Hiroyuki Iwatsuki

Source: SRIN-1041: Omega Five Soundtrack - VGMdb

Uploading to SotW FTP.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by CHz

As superpumped as I am to get a nom from this, this album was released four days ago. Let's give the Iwatsuki some time to marinate and taste even better.

Fuck the album, I'd have nominated the track if there was a gamerip. It's not like Omega Five is a super popular game, and it's been out on Live for at least a while. WHILE THE IRON IS HOT, CHz! BLARGH.

Edit: On a serious note, I don't necessarily understand the point of letting the game music "simmer" when it isn't exactly an ultra popular release to begin with. Exactly who are we catering to at this point? Why does game music have to be "simmering" in the face of an "album" release. That sounds pretty backward. I doubt much of GFF, or any "gamer" for that matter, actually knew about the track until this album was released. Granted I have no actual statistics for that, so I'm reaching a bit... so I'll just ask, the game dropped January 8th, 2008; how long of a wait are we talking about here, Chz?

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by CHz

We once had a track from Katamari Damacy in SotW. This was from a game rip, before the soundtrack came out and way before the game was released in the U.S. So that's the theory behind the rule: you can't tell if this dinky little shmup no one's heard of could have a word-of-mouth popularity explosion and be Katamari friggin' Damacy.

Even if you agree that waiting is a good idea, though, it turns out to be particularly hard to nail down how long to wait. Let's just say we go with three months after the game's initial release. Who's to say three months is long enough, and everyone isn't going to know the music inside and out at the end of month four? What if the game's been out in Japan for four months, but is due out in the U.S. in another month? Is it okay now, or should we wait until after the new release? And how long after the new release? What if the game's been out for four months, but a soundtrack is coming out in the next month? That would probably increase the popularity of the music even more than a domestic release of the game would. :bigugh:

I don't really have an opinion for or against the rule, but it's how we've been doing things. We've just been able to get away with a nebulous "novelty is not obscurity" without defining an acceptable waiting period because we've never really had to deal with people nominating very recently released tracks until a bunch of them right now.

See, I'm not really tracking here as that's a gigantic tap dance around what I asked. How long am I going to be waiting? I'm going to assume all that up there just added up to "There's a rule we follow, I don't know." I'm going over the rule you're supposedly invoking... no, it's not a rule, it's a "guideline", in this case. Whatever the hell this is:

Quote:

#
# In accordance with the purpose of this whole event, the nominated song needs to have some level of obscurity. In other words, it should not come from an album/game that is widely known by VGM fans for its music. Use common sense; if the album/game it comes from has the words "Final" and "Fantasy" in its title, there's a good chance many people have heard it already. Questions on eligibility in regards to this restriction will be answered on a per-song basis by Staff, with strong aid from the general consensus here.

I can't say I agree with the logic in this case, at all. Omega Five is an X-Box Live Arcade shooter that appeals to people who can appreciate how esoteric it is, that or people who just wanted the Gamerscore. Katamari Damacy was a PS2 game that exploded in popularity because the PS2 is actually a medium with a user base that actually wanted it from the get go. Personally, I don't really think it takes clairvoyance to see that the Omega Five Soundtrack is where most people are going to probably gain an appreciation for the game's music. However, my appreciation is from actually hearing it in game.

That said, I don't know what to do with that giant block of text, CHz. I'm gonna sit here, with no clearly defined time and one day someone's gonna decide that "Oh hey, it'd be cool to nominate this because it sounds cool off the album I just downloaded" while I'm sitting here right now thinking "I wanted to nominate this the day I heard it while playing the damned game." Just, I really want some kind of answer regarding how long of a wait I'm looking at. Or at least confirm to me that all that up there is the equivalent of "I don't know how long you're waiting, there's rules."

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by CHz

If you would like a guarantee that this track will not be nominated by anyone until you do after the next lunar eclipse or whatever waiting period is agreed upon, assuming one is imposed on your track, I can provide one.

That would be great!

Drakken/orion:

As far as your collective reasoning is concerned, if there were a clearly defined rule regarding what just happened to some of us, I'm pretty sure we would have gone to the massive amounts of untapped VGM out there for potential nominations. Unfortunately, in the case of myself, I liked The Glacial Fortress since I heard it in January. I mean, surasshu brings up something that is good in theory, but guess what? I know Omega Five isn't going to be a gigantic cult explosion. It doesn't take a genius to see that.

There will not be a massive outcry for the music from Omega Five, much less the game, because it isn't anything like what Katamari Damacy is. It's a shooter, esoteric. Katamari was a fairly fun game that was extremely addictive and not overly complicated to play. Again, I realize "obscurity" is a touchy subject, taken on a case by case basis, but I find that the bulk of you who enjoy oversimplifying only increases some of the frustration regarding our attempts to participate.

Guess what? I would love to nominate something else, but I heard "X" song first. As we're seeing right now, "obscurity" is very much a game of semantics as far as this contest is concerned. In the case of Sonic CD, that game's music precedes it. It has a clearly defined reputation, yet I see that its status as "obscure" is being viewed in a light that just might get it into this contest. I disagree that it's obscure, I also disagree that Castlevania's music is obscure, but this VGM scene we deal in is very much a niche market. That said, I don't see very many people trying to fight the rules, we're just asking for guidance. I could do without the peanut gallery. I appreciate CHz's patience and helpfulness in this regard.

I'll have to come up with another nomination, but I'm glad to know my issue is being addressed.

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Respectfully... Waiting period, Dhsu? You mean the one that CHz just established as not being clearly defined or even in the rules? The very rules I referenced when I made the nomination, Dhsu? People would find the music on their own, sure... but I find that I have very little reason to believe that many of us find VGM from places other than albums or gamerips. I smelled opportunity, I took it. The instant this started being a contest was when the very idea of it being purely "about the music" went right out the window.

I was speaking idiomatically.

The tracks are competing, but the nominators are the persons recommending them, chief.

I'd argue on Drakengard 2... but my point goes back to when CHz made mention that the album for Omega Five was just released and we should give it time, whereas I felt it was more important that we go based off when the video game actually hits. Since that's the point of origin, barring any musical arrangements/remixes. I feel that VGM enthusiasm seems to often forget the very reason the music exists in the first place: the video game itself. I don't care where people find the music, just that we could make some kind of concession to original tracks if there's no gamerip. I could see us waiting on albums like the Darius Remix, which has absolutely no original music from any of the games in question, but if I had to wait to nominate an original track from Darius based off when the Remix album dropped, I'd be somewhat puzzled.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

We can't clearly define "obscurity" here, yet "natural progression" comes up? OK, then.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by Kaleb.G

I don't understand what you're trying to say.

Then I guess we're in similar boats. I do not understand how someone can define "natural progression" when the very term used to justify the existence of an event is never clearly stated. In that case, what would be natural progression for obscurity? Waiting for "non-success" to kick in?

How ya doing, buddy?

I'll pass if it's all the same. My loss? Awesome!

Jam it back in, in the dark.