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Topic: Official remix addon 3: The Ur-Quan Hierarchy (Read 33310 times)
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FalconMWC
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Excellent Job, so far I have only listened to the Umagh remix and it is great!
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« Last Edit: July 02, 2004, 06:25:07 pm by FalconMWC »
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RDH_An-R-Kist
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jeeze, I'm amazed no one's complained about how the thrddash sounds like music from star control 3.
After listening to them all, all I can say is, I like them all.
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Chrispy
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Vlik Dweller
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Lots more distortion
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Megagun
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Moo
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The Thraddash one is great.. It really fits them. You know. They were willing to cut off their own limbs.. So.. 
Mycon one is great, too. Reminds me of this song from Dune II....
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Smaug
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I love YaBB 1G - SP1!
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UQM-Precursors Remix Review
OK, I’m a little late to the whole Precurosors’ Remix thing. So, I downloaded all 3 remix sets and got to listening. And now, I’m telling you what I think. Before I get to my thoughts, I would like to say the following on my feelings on remixing in general.
Nine times out of 10, when somebody dedides to remix a piece of music, they do it poorly. At least, poorly to my tastes. If I enjoy a piece of music, I don’t like listening to music that sounds vaguely familiar, but lacks the basic essence of why the original piece works. Nowhere is this more common than videogame music. Most remixers tend to think that they know far more about how to evoke emotion and feelings than experienced composers, and they therefore start to interject their own, usually crappy, ideas into that music. This leads, almost inexorably, to disaster.
I find the best remixes are the ones where the the listener has a profound respect for the melody and ideas that the original composition was attempting to get across. In short, the best remixes are the ones that stick pretty close to the source material. I despise, with all of my being, attempts to re-genre a piece (turn a classical piece into a jazz piece); doing this is like defecating on a piece of music to me.
If this is the case, what’s the point of a remix? Simple: a remix can add to a piece, and it can use better instruments/samples. Take the 3DO remixes for UQM, for example. The battle music, in particular. Much cleaner samples than the .mod originals, and the occassional added intensity here and there. Better quality, and enhances the original. Overall: superior to the original.
There are a few cases where melodic reinterpretation is good, however. The 3DO version of the QuasiSpace music is an excellent example. The original clearly had an intent, but it wasn’t quite getting the job done. The 3DO version was exceptional; it took some of the melodic elements and made them fulfill their role. In this case, the original piece was lacking in something that the remix added.
Basically, what I’m trying to say is that I don’t tend to take too well to massive reinterpretations of music simply for the purpose of stroking the remixer’s ego. If you’re going to severly alter a piece of music, it had better need it. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
Which brings me to the reviewing portion of this post:
Set 1: Super Melee!
I’m not going through all the ditties.
* The Battle of the Sa-Matra
Hands down, the best music in SC2 for me was the fighting music. Even after a 30+minute Mycon battle, it never got old.
This thing, with its silly Star Trek-like sound effects, doesn’t deserve to have any affiliation with that masterpiece. This is nothing short of a musical atrocity. It may keep the melody, but the presentation kills any of the power this piece may have had.
* Outfit the Vindicator
See, I knew you guys could do something worthwhile. Stick to a good melody, add better/cleaner instruments, and all is good.
* Shipyard: Rough Repair
Surprisingly good. Granted, the original didn’t do anything for me, so any alteration is fine with me.
* Starbase
Taking a 37 second piece and turning it into a 5:51 second piece usually doesn’t bode well for any semblence of the melody. So, basically, this turned into somebody’s ego-fest. Somebody got to make up their own little melody and had some StarControl music bolted on.
That’s nice and all, but that doesn’t make it a remix. It makes it somebody’s composition with some stolen music added on. Not only that, it isn’t a great composition on its own merrits.
* Exploration
Once again, turning a short piece into a long piece. The last one was at least a little energetic. This piece doesn’t make me think about wandering the planets in a star system; it just puts me to sleep. It’s just that boring.
* Commander – Corridor Nine
This was a fine piece of music, at one time. Then, somebody who clearly thought that they knew more than the original composer, got their hands on it and ruined it. Not quite to the level of Battle of the Sa-Matra, but still pretty bad. This piece has none of the flavor of the original, and only a scant piece of the original melody remains.
* Orbit 1 – To Mine the Heavens
Another fantastic original composition. You could (and would) hear this piece for hours over a playing of the game. And it never got old.
This is a relatively faithful reproduction of the original. It’s good, but it adds a few too many sound-effects to be truly great.
Overall: Highly disappointed with volume 1. They unabashedly brutalized some of the best music in the game. Jouni Airaksinen has committed a crime and should be punished severly.
Set 2: Neutral Aliens, Don't Shoot!
* Welcome to Falayalaralfali
I don’t believe it. This is a massive departure from the original; I can’t recognise any of the original melody in it. And yet, it works. It works very well. Much like the 3DO remix of the QuasiSpace music, you could slide this into the game and (except for the quality difference in terms of samples) it’d work just fine in place of the original
That’s probably the highest compliment I can pay any remix that is a departure from the original.
* Through the Angles of Space
I’m still ambivalent on this one. The initial sound was terrible; not at all the feeling one should have on entering Q-Space. It’s just too heavy. However, the rest is very good. Much less of a departure than that of the 3DO remix. In the end, however, the beginning, to me, is what makes it inferior to the 3DO version.
* Property of the Crimson Corporation
Because it’s going to come up quite a bit, later on, I’m going to say this here: I don’t like it when a remix doodles around for the first 12 measures or so with its own little melody, then jumps into the initial bars of the actual song. If you’re going to follow the original, do it. If not, then don’t. But don’t do it half-way.
That being said, this piece is except from that rule because of one thing: the cry just before it hits the familiar Druuge music. We all know what that’s from: someone feeding the furnace. This goes a long way into connecting with the Druuge. Not that the rest is bad; indeed, it is quite good, despite some of the liberties taken with the melody a bit later. But the beginning really sets the mode.
Also, btw, this is an excellent example of the right way to deviate from the original. The Druuge music is typicfied by this relentless, headlong marching beat. It drives the Druuge music as the Crimson Corporation drives their culture. Though this piece plays with that beat, it never falls away entirely, and remains the core of the piece, despite the melodic interventions.
* Hyperspace – Across the Galaxy
3 in a row. You guys were going so well. Maybe it’s because I didn’t really care for those three pieces in their original form.
Now, go you fart this turd out. This is an atrocity on the level of Battle of the Sa-Matra. This has none of the adventureous feel of the original. It is way too light. The original melody was perfect for long-range space travel. This is nothing by comparison.
Riku Nuottajärvi, apparently, composed the original and this atrocity. Clearly, his skills have deteriorated, or he was extraordinarily lucky the first time out. Or he just didn’t know what to do with perfection, and spewed out this thing.
* Melnorme – Turning Purple
A quick comment on the original. I didn’t like it too much. I like parts of it, but I never really felt that it worked for the Melnorme.
The remix doesn’t improve the piece. It does some more stuff with the melody, but it doesn’t actually make the music any more appropriate for the Melnorme.
* Orbit II – Around the Rainbow Worlds
Technically, this is a remix of a 3DO piece; the original didn’t differentiate between the orbital music. I still think Orbit I sounds the best, the 3DO Remix version being the best version of it.
Apparently, this music is used for Rainbow Worlds. It is nicer than the 3DO music, more mysterious, but it is too human (FYI: exotic human instruments doesn’t make it alien) to be for a world where the Precursors once walked (even if they used it as a garbage dump). It doesn’t fit it’s place in the game, but it’s not a bad piece of music.
* Orbit III – Planet Red Alert
One of the better 3DO orbital pieces.
A 1:31 minute piece stretched into 5:31 minutes. If you take something good, and force it to last longer, it doesn’t make it better. In this case, they took something good, put a bunch of crappy filler, took out most of the “melodic” components of the original, and made it last for 5+ minutes. Doesn’t work. Sorry, please try again.
* Sylandro Home – Floating Gas Bags
Very well done. See, if you stick to the melody, you can make something very nice. It uses some dead space as part of remixing (a common remixing technique where the melody drops out), but it works pretty well in this piece.
* Slylandro Probe – We Come in Peace!
OK, I know it’s part of the original melody and all, but we seriously don’t need to hear “We come in peace” every 5 seconds. These are not words that are going to create a nice melody.
Oddly, I was listening to the original, and I realized that the only sample it uses, outside of the occasional drum beat, is that one line, at different frequencies.
This just means that both of them are crappy (I never cared for the original). Though I have to say that the fact that I only now realized this means that those words can apparently form a melody of some kind when modulated appropriately. Not a good one, though.
* Safe Haven – Spathi-home theme
I honestly can’t say why I like this piece. It does that annoying intro thing before getting to the melody. It is, at least, well integrated in this case.
It just all somehow seems to work. It fits together well, and it sounds very Spathi-ish.
* Talking Pet – Didn’t You Mean to Ask About Flowers?
Here’s a piece of music where I can’t fault them for sticking with the melody: there isn’t one. It’s a nice sounding piece, though I’m not sure how much it fits the Talking Pet. His original “music” was so sedate as to not be noticeable. Maybe that was intensional.
Overall: What they did to the Hyperspace music is unforgivable. Riku must be stopped before he destroys another of his fine original compositions. Otherwise, overall pretty decent.
Set 3: The Ur-Quan Hierarchy
* Cleansing Required
OK, Riku Nuottajärvi, repeat after me, “The Kohr-Ah should not have a beat. I should not be able to swing to Kohr-Ah music. My head should not, at any point during their music, wish to bob up and down. Dan Nicholson knew what he was doing, and is a better composer than I am.”
* All Evil
Shockingly good. Notice how it takes few liberties with the original melody. It flows just like the original.
Riku is definitely hit-or-miss. This was a hit.
* Rebirth
Once upon a time Riku made a great piece of music for the Mycon. It was soft, subtle, and a bit weird. It worked for the Mycon. At no time could it be classified as rollicking, swinging, or energetic. Much like the Mycon.
Riku clearly doesn’t trust his original ideas. This piece is not Mycon music, even though it occassionally touches on Mycon melodies (and poorly, at that). It does something even worse than breaking from the melody: it changes it somewhat. I would rather that you dump the melody entirely than to have half of the melodic line and half of something he just made up.
Not good at all. Definitely not Mycon.
* Orbit IV – Cold Tectonics
Didn’t care for the original. Don’t care for this.
* Orbit V – Extraterrestrial Lifeforms
See directly above.
* Culture 19
Yes, indeed. This is the good stuff. Few liberties taken with the melody, everything sounds like it fits together. Very good.
* Genetic Modification
I don’t care for the sound sample they used for the melodic line (the kind of reverse sound doesn’t work here), but overall very nice.
* Ultra-Gross
This is quite nice, despite the rather scratchy guitar they give the melodic line to. It sticks to the melody for the most part, and sounds very nice with it. When it plays with the melody, it does so intelligently.
* Now and Forever
If this weren’t the Ur-Quan music, I might forgive this. If it had ignored the original melody and did it’s own thing, I might forgive this. But it is, and it didn’t, so I can’t.
This music strips the Ur-Quan of all menace, might, and strength. What was once a relentless piece (that looped so very naturally) that threatened to crush the listener, has become a mild evil that just sits there looking evil. This music took the strong, forceful melody of the original and subdued it, not beneath a crushing wave of bass, but they just made it softer. Ur-Quan are not soft and subdued. They do not lie, they do not decieve. They are the followers of the Path of Now and Forever. You will submit or be destroyed. There is no alternative.
This music actually detracts from the enjoyment of the original melody.
Overall: Some nice pices. The systematic deconstruction of the Ur-Quan and Mycon music, however, is unforgivable.
Overall remix set: Some very nice standout pieces. However, every one of my favorite pieces was trashed, mutilated, perverted, or destroyed in the process of making those standout pieces.
I live in fear of what they will do to such masterpieces as the Chmmr and Yehat music. Could we convince them to just stick with the original on those, or not remix them at all? I don’t think I could stand to hear how they destroy them.
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jabbrwock
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I love YaBB 1G - SP1!
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Here's my take on the new Ur-Quan theme.
I love it. I want it in the game.
I do not want it to be the Ur-Quan Hierarchy's primary musical theme.
The new Ur-Quan theme is creepy. The Ur-Quan are not creepy. They are intimidating, ruthless, and way more advanced than you. That makes them scary. It does not make them creepy. The original martial theme, all 30 seconds of it, fit the Hierarchy perfectly. It was a perfect expression of the indomitable will of of the Ur-Quan to subjugate the entire universe to their will.
The new theme would actually fit the Kohr-Ah quite well. They *ARE* creepy, and the similar melody with a completely different atmosphere would highlight their similar origins and their now very different cultural goals.
Is there a way I can shift the new theme to the Kohr-Ah and keep the Ur-Quan's old theme for the Ur-Quan? I used to actually leave my PC in an Ur-Quan conversation to hear that music in the background when I was reading a book, and I can see myself doing much the same with the new theme - although since it's conveniently packaged in a seperate file, I can just keep it in my music folder and play it with WinAmp.
[edit] Is the beat that people are complaining about the one that sounds like somebody sharpening a knife? That's a big part of the reason the piece seems to fit the Kohr-Ah more than the Ur-Quan - that creepy psycho ambience of somebody sharpening the knife they're going to kill you with behind the whole piece.
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« Last Edit: July 03, 2004, 11:48:04 am by jabbrwock »
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meep-eep
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Just some friendly criticism to Smaug's posting:
Tastes differ. In fact, if you read the reviews of the other people, you may notice that yours differs a lot from most people's. That doesn't make your taste bad. I think the remixers deserve more courtesy than what you're giving them. So you don't like all of them. Then use the old tracks instead for those.
This isn't a replacement project.
Often when people dislike a remix, it's because of nostalgic attachment to the original. But some of the tracks that don't stick to original music are good tracks in their own right, in my opinion.
Other tracks, you really have to hear in the game itself to fully appreciate. The Ur-Quan remix is one of those, and the space and orbit music are also in this category.
I personally, like you, think that the best remixes are the ones that stay close to the original (except for the few original tracks that weren't much to start with).
Especially Mark Vera's music tries to do this, and very well in my opinion.
Riku's motivations for so drastically changing the HyperSpace music was that there were already plenty of faithful remixes around. I personally don't like the result, but there are enough people that do.
Unlike you, most people prefer the original QuasiSpace .mod music to the 3DO version, which is completely different. You compare the remixed version to the 3DO music, which have as much in common as the .mod version had to the 3DO version. However, it has a lot in common to the .mod version.
The .mod QuasiSpace was one of my favourites, and a part of its strength was its simplicity. Mark's remix is complex, but in my opinion, it is the best track the remix project has produced to date, even though it deviates a lot from the original.
Overal, I get the impression you didn't give these remixes a real chance. Try playing the game with these remix packs. Once you get over the idea that they're not the original, you may get to like them.
Now to jabbrwock:
You can change the tracks that are used in the game.
In the future this will be possible with in-game settings, for now, you'll need to mess a bit with the files.
The same structure that is used in the .zip file, can be used unpacked, in the content dir. Unpacked files always override the packed files.
So to your specific question, to keep the original Ur-Quan theme and replace the Kohr-Ah theme with the new Ur-Quan theme, you could create a directory "comm" in the content dir, where you create a dir "blackur" where you put the Ur-Quan music from the .zip file, and give it the name "blackur.ogg", and get the original Ur-Quan theme and put it in the "urquan" dir in the comm dir.
Alternatively, you could make a new .zip file from the remix pack .zip file, removing blackur.ogg, and renaming urquan.ogg to blackur.ogg and put it in the blackur dir.
If you do this however, be sure to turn off compression when you pack the new .zip file; .ogg files can hardly be compressed at all, but it saves a lot of cpu time in the game if no decompression has to take place. You may hear stuttering otherwise.
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“When Juffo-Wup is complete
when at last there is no Void, no Non
when the Creators return
then we can finally rest.”
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Tiberian
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Did anyone else notice that the new Ur-Quan song is very much like the boss-musics in Resident Evil games? I'm not saying that it's a bad thing.
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« Last Edit: July 03, 2004, 04:24:46 pm by Tiberian »
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Mark Vera
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Me?You mean me,personally? How nice of you to ask!
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Also something to Smaug's posting.
All orbits except the fits Orbit I, are original songs. Not remixes of 3DO versions or the mod version. The Star Control has been only an inspiration to start with.
Also I think you didn't notice, that Command Corridor Nine was originally composed and remixed by Riku himself.
To note about Riku's work something he has said, is that he usually tends to bend the song into remix and not into cover-remix. Especially with song he made originally.
The battle in pack I wasn't originally to be remix (but turned out quite similar). There's one remix Mortal Melee which was made as a remix. But I doubt you like it, as it got all those "silly star trek sounds"
You're waiting for Yehat, be my guest and tell me what you like in it before I rape it for you.  Chmmr remix is awesome, just wait till you hear it.
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TiLT
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To boldly go where no Spathi has dared go before
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Smaug, I'll have to start out this post by giving you a tip:
It's obvious that you spent a lot of time and thought on your post above, and I respect that. It's refreshing to see someone so critical of our work, and I'm surprised it took 3 remix packs before someone did it. However, you ruin the entirety of your post by presenting it in a trollish way. By this, I mean that you use personal attacks as a way to get your point through. This does not work. You'll most likely receive several troll posts back thanks to this, although my post won't be one of them.
I realize that you were posting reviews of our remixes, and reviews are never wrong (They are the opinion of the reviewer after all, and opinions can differ a lot). However, some statements in your post are indeed faulty and can be pointed out, which I will now do:
"Most remixers tend to think that they know far more about how to evoke emotion and feelings than experienced composers, and they therefore start to interject their own, usually crappy, ideas into that music. This leads, almost inexorably, to disaster."
This was a pretty interesting statement, since you turned the entire situation completely on its head. Did you know that the original Star Control 2 music came about through a competition between amateur mod-trackers who for the most part had no idea what their music was going to be used for? The remix team, me included, can be considered experienced composers. We have all composed music for at least 10 years. The original composers were not. You could ask Riku if you wanted to. He's one of the original composers from way back then, and is one of the remixers now. In fact, Riku was hands down the best composer from the original game, in my opinion. With a few exceptions, his were the only tracks which showed real musical talent, harmony and planning.
"If this is the case, what's the point of a remix? Simple: a remix can add to a piece, and it can use better instruments/samples."
What you're describing is a remake, not a remix. One of my personal goals as a remixer for this project is to take a good long look at each song I'm assigned, and determine if it REALLY fits my idea of a situation or race. If it does, then I'll try to stick to the original. If it doesn't (which has turned out to be far mor likely so far) then I'll pick up a few elements from the original and make the remix into something I feel fits better than the original. My Arilou remix is a perfect example of this. If it's remakes of the originals you want, I'm afraid you'll have to look elsewhere than this REMIX project. Remakes simply aren't our goal.
"The 3DO version of the QuasiSpace music is an excellent example. The original clearly had an intent, but it wasn't quite getting the job done. The 3DO version was exceptional; it took some of the melodic elements and made them fulfill their role. In this case, the original piece was lacking in something that the remix added."
Interesting. I think that's the first time I've ever heard anyone say the 3DO Quasispace was better than the MOD Quasispace. Says a lot about opinions, don't you think?
"* Starbase
Taking a 37 second piece and turning it into a 5:51 second piece usually doesn't bode well for any semblence of the melody. So, basically, this turned into somebody's ego-fest. Somebody got to make up their own little melody and had some StarControl music bolted on."
Yup, you could say this was VOiD's and my personal ego-fest for this remix project. We wanted to start out the remixes with a bang, with something we could call a personal masterpiece. That, and we got seriously inspired by looking at the starbase rotating above a slave-shielded Earth. Telling an inspired musician to show restraint is like Indiana Jones stopping, turning around, and telling the rolling boulder to stop.
"* Commander - Corridor Nine
This was a fine piece of music, at one time. Then, somebody who clearly thought that they knew more than the original composer, got their hands on it and ruined it. Not quite to the level of Battle of the Sa-Matra, but still pretty bad. This piece has none of the flavor of the original, and only a scant piece of the original melody remains."
I'd say it's a pretty safe bet that the someone who composed this remix knew more than the original composer. It's a safe bet because he's the same composer, and unless he's somehow turned senile lately without me noticing, he should know a lot more after all these years.
"Jouni Airaksinen has committed a crime and should be punished severly."
I'll make sure to give him a good talking to.
"Overall remix set: Some very nice standout pieces. However, every one of my favorite pieces was trashed, mutilated, perverted, or destroyed in the process of making those standout pieces."
Ah yes, here comes the crux of the problem: Nostalgia. We are very aware that the nostalgia in the Star Control 2 community can be absurdly strong in some cases, which is why I take your criticism with a huge grain of salt. That doesn't mean there can't be constructive and reasonable criticism. In fact, we've had plenty of those from other posters in several threads around here. But sometimes the nostalgia comes into the way of reason, and that's when I decide to apply the proverbial grain of salt.
"I live in fear of what they will do to such masterpieces as the Chmmr and Yehat music. Could we convince them to just stick with the original on those, or not remix them at all? I don't think I could stand to hear how they destroy them."
My final advice to you is to delete our remixes from your HD, remove us from your bookmarks (if you've bookmarked us), and never download any of our upcoming music. I think your memories of Star Control 2 will be better off like that. As you've clearly shown, the remixing project isn't for everyone.
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« Last Edit: July 03, 2004, 06:02:16 pm by TiLT »
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Deep Jiffa Owns j00!