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buskerdog

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Everything posted by buskerdog

  1. D K ! DRUNKEN KONG ! HUH! He's the admin of the bunch You know him well He's finally back To show and tell His forum posts Can inspire in bursts If you read them You'll agree their worth! HUH!
  2. WISDOM 100 Also, not an art expert so I'm sure this is the most basic, repeated advice advice I'm about to give you since it's something I we were told during art lessons at school, but: when you draw something and do shading, imagine where the light source is in your theoretical scene. Pick one point in imaginary 3D space, and consider how light coming from that direction effects how the object your are drawing appears - and stay consistent to it once you've decided its position. Technically you can have more than one light source, but then you're adding another layer of complexity. Now, I'm a pixel artist so I suppose my context is slightly different, but it wasn't until much later that I actually started applying this principle, and I found it improved my art a lot. Another suggestion I have to make, since you seem to lament the human body so much - have you ever tried drawing non-humanoid characters? Drawing animals would be something different, and since animals being naked is normal, you might find you can focus on taking in their anatomy much more. Who knows, you may even reach a better understanding of how to draw people from drawing animals.
  3. I feel like I keep being super slow on these, and then see people's posts and realise that I'm actually not last... Feast the Night Away Hey, nice to see some Unlucky Morpheus representation! Double drunken vocal with a full on energetic opening. The mix of folk and hard rock is something I'm easily bought by, and I think that the flute brings out a traditional party feel that's very fitting for the Oni. I also like how Demystify Feast was thrown in there for some musical variety, just at the point it seemed it was about to become very simple and repetitive. The main focal point of this song, however, is clearly supposed to be the singing double act, and it's certainly a dynamic I dig. The upload quality of this video could really be better, but that's not going to effect my judgement. The arrange could have been more creative, but it has a solid instrumental, fun vocals, and rockin' energy; a song that appeals to simple pleasures. 6/10. Palace of the Earth Spirits Master Spark solves everything This is an interesting take on Heartfelt Fancy that I have interesting thoughts on. There's some nice ominous chords going on, setting a cool tone. Not the biggest fan of the main melody instrument especially right at the beginning, but things seems to even out and figure out how to blend together after a bit. What am I fan of is the weird echoey vibe noises, for lack of a better term, I love experimental ambient stuff like that. The arrange also seems increase in intensity throughout the loop, but it does so in a very subtle way that you don't really notice it happening. It also gets more of those echoey noises during the high point of the song so I dig. Strange to talk about, but kind of groovy. 6/10. Moondust It is no secret that I am a fan of the eurobeat. But despite eurobeat having been featured several times before on the remix tournament, both by me and other participants, I've never given one a 10. Why? Well, that's because for me, the golden standard for eurobeat is something like Moondust. A combination of that signature high-energy dance beat, emotional musical progression throughout the song, and meaningful lyrics make this an absolute treat. Funnily enough, this is actually a eurobeat cover of a song that is originally one of GET IN THE RING's ballads, and a song that has received numerous other covers by doujin circles. This takes the strongest parts of eurobeat and supplements it with the strengths of the original song, patching up the traditional weaknesses eurobeat has making for something truly sublime. 10/10. By the way, the other versions of this song are totally worth your time too. Maybe I'll make a post about them on musical discoveries after the tournament is over. And since everyone's been discussing about the vocalist, here's my take: I really like that this version is sung by a male because all the other versions of this song are sung by a female. It's different, and I like to hear that guys can sing the same lyrics as girls too : ) Also, it's kinda ironic that AXEL K. of all people sings this lol, since his past work is pretty much the definition of "eurobeat go brrrrr" @Shionne Imeris I know you're referring to Unlucky Morpheus, but I can only read UM as Unconnected Marketeers...
  4. Why even take Meiling? Let's be real, the only jokes anyone has to make about Meiling are so overdone they're not even worth the time anymore. Wait, was that an accidental roast in and of itself? Suika has two horns. Kasen also has two horns I mean what? Kasen totally isn't an oni. Yuugi only has one horn. Therefore, she is clearly the most inferior oni. Alright, then - Reimu Hakurei. Go ahead. See if you can actually say something original to poke fun at her, something that I haven't already seen a billion times. I dare you.
  5. This is something that randomly popped into my head the other day when I was thinking back to the times we could still host everything on here as simple file downloads. Do Japanese fans pirate? Touhou has a larger following over there than overseas, and although it is also possible to find Touhou games legitimately in doujin shops over there, I imagine that the older generation of games must have become pretty scarce at some point. Before Touhou games came to steam, most Western fans would just pirate them. Even when they did start coming to steam, it took a very long time for any games that weren't the most recent to be added, so if you wanted something older, fans would still pirate them. And even now, there are still games in the series which are not available on steam. Despite what Reddit would tell you, piracy for the Western fanbase has definitely been a normality and even a necessity over the years. But what I want to know is if, at any point in Touhou's history, Japanese fans have had the same perspective? Has the Japanese fanbase ever pirated on the same level that western fans have a reputation for?
  6. I'm keeping it brief this time as I've been rather busy. Boho Youyoumu Area 4 A pretty upbeat chiptune arrangement which reminds me of early Sonic OST. The instruments in this are really well balanced so that nothing feels grating, but what I liked most was that this has some really cool counter melodies in it. It's a really nice listen that has plenty of deviation from the original theme while still being distinctly a Capital City of Flowers in the Sky remix. Also, I did have a listen to Ken's looped version for convenience. 7/10. Maple Dream Now this one is very interesting, it sounds not just like a chiptune remix but seems to have a lot of synthwave influence in there as well. It's much heavier sounding than the previous chiptune feature, and it also seems less conventional than what you'd usually expect of chiptune, which makes it pretty novel. I like the creative direction, it's very cool and I think it's well done, I just don't personally enjoy it as much as the other chiptune, so 6/10. MyonMyonMyonMyonMyonMyon! Myon of many indeed, this is a song I first heard 3 years ago so this is a bit of a trip down memory lane. Very chic and cute, and composed of a lot of repeating sounds that only slowly develop throughout the song, it has a vibe that I can just zone out to, which is something I like about a lot of Shibayan Records' songs. The vocals really support that, they sound so sweet and also really stick out, since they don't really match up with the background music or even the original source song. There's also just the fact that 3L has to be one of my favourite vocalists. 8/10, would myon again.
  7. I didn't want to leave you with an incomplete list, but since you've impressed me by managing to find some of the ones I didn't know, I'll tell you the other names I had happened to come across. Odibatorasu: Gigantic Castle of Vicious Sand - Odibatorasu Shantien: phase 1: The Azure Dragon's Advent phase 2: The Azure Dragon Soars to the Heavens phase 3: Storm Preceding the Verge of Death phase 4: Imperial Wrath of the Azure Dragon (idk about the website music) I didn't have the Kuarusepusu / Highlands area theme name before, but did some digging and was able to run into it quite luckily here Kuarusepusu / Highlands: Sanctuary in the Sky - Highlands Can't believe we actually managed to find all of that...
  8. Well this is odd. On your profile Ken, I don't see any of the options (like Shionne mentioned they were missing for a majority of members). On my own I see [Activity | Clubs | Steam Profile] and on Shionne's I can see [Activity | Clubs].
  9. It's been too long since my last Monster Hunter feature, since for a long time I've been wanting to mention the soundtrack of Monster Hunter Frontier - which can be described as the "dark pegasus horse" of MH games. But first, to understand that - what is Monster Hunter Frontier? Frontier was essentially an MMO version of Monster Hunter that never made it over to western audiences - emphasis on the word "was" because although it had a long run, the online service was shut down in 2019, making the game now impossible to play except through private servers. It was developed by a different team to the usual MH games and differentiates itself from mainline Monster Hunter in a lot of ways - although it essentially just started out as "online Monster Hunter with some unique monsters", there was always something a little bit "extra" about the game, even by MH standards; and being a continually supported online service there had to be something to keep people interested in the game, leading to an extreme amount of power scaling for both players and enemies over time and culminating in progressively more and more outlandish monster (and weapon) designs. Seriously, MH has always been a little OTT but Frontier is just something else. Some monsters have a lot of fans who want to see them brought over to the main series, although most fans also agree that not every monster from the game would be suitable for mainline MH. Still, there are actually two monsters in mainline MH who did originate from Frontier, however they were brought over a long time ago, and Capcom seems to ignore the existence of the game outside of this... ...until now. With the latest trailer for Sunbreak finally confirming a new monster from that game becoming canon, and confirming the fact Capcom remembers the game exists, it's reminded me that I finally ought to show some of the music from this game. The game's music is stylistically a bit different to typical Monster Hunter, which leads me to believe that not only the programming team but also the music team was different for this game. While the soundtrack is still orchestral, Frontier's tracks tend to have a more cinematic grandeur to them. This is also the point where Ken becomes very glad he doesn't list expansions separately from the base game in his end-of-year roundup, because being an MMO, Frontier has countless expansions that are probably impossible to understand unless you actually played the game. Also, I know I said I would get the track names but this a game that never left Asia and isn't even playable anymore we're talking about. Just don't even bother.
  10. Unhuman Variations This started out as chiptune with some non-chiptine subtly hidden in there, but before long it turned out that actually this piece was not intending to be subtle about its instrumental diversity at all. The unique mixture of instruments makes for something very novel, and the piece has this rising intensity throughout it, yet somehow manages to keep everything coherent. I wish it did deviate from the original tune a bit more, there is that one section with the piano where things feel a little more remixed which I very much appreciated, that moment was entertaining, although it only lasted a short time. For 6 minutes, I felt there could have been more going on in there... uh, melody-wise I mean, not instrumentally. Still, colour me impressed. 6/10, loved the novelty of the sound in this one but wished that the original theme was implemented in a more creative way. Youmu at the End A rather intense orchestral arrangement. We got a foreboding build up, we got drums, and... that's about it. It has Youmu's stage theme, her boss theme, and the PCB credits theme, but despite that it feels like I'm listening to the same thing the whole way through, and it's all incredible linear in terms of being directly based on those original songs. The most interesting part was probably the transition from the first theme to the second. The transition of second to third wasn't so good. For 7 minutes and 3 source songs, it just feels like nothing changes in the whole song. Normally I really like orchestral but this needed more. 4/10. The Illness Approaching You - Edelritter Remix This has a good opening but things get way too hectic later on. The vocals are beautiful and it's got a very climactic feel to it, but starting at 2 minutes it just becomes way too rough on the ears, honestly I don't get the appeal. Well at least it ends eventually, and from 3.15 onwards is actually fantastic, but the part before it is egregious and that makes this very hard to rate overall... 6/10, honestly I'd like to give it higher but I just can't with that bit from the middle.
  11. My perception is that the hate for anime has nothing to do with the artstyle and everything to do with over-the-top voice acting, ridiculous stories and odd manner of speaking (even for Japanese people, anime characters do not talk normally). At least that's always been the way I've seen it, as me and my friends have made "anime bad" jokes in jest before. And I mean it makes sense, because those characteristics are very easy to parody and ridicule, with how unique they are to anything else. That, and anime fans who try to embody those characteristics way too seriously, I mean just look at the "I have the power of god AND anime on my side!" meme, the thing that makes it funny has nothing to do with how the characters from said medium are drawn and everything to do with some kid trying way too hard to act like an anime character. The thing that makes anime hated is not the art form itself but the tropes associated with it, particularly shonen anime. Since shonen is an especially popular genre of anime outside of Japan, most people who aren't knowledgeable of anime are going to assume that all anime has tropes like what shonen has. A lot of stigma surrounding anime can also come from the association with hentai, since many anime (including you guessed it, shonen) do have a lot of sexualisation, but it all depends on the type of show. For every anime with risqué character designs and innuendos there are just as many where the tone of the story would make such a thing incomprehensible. For the record, I'm not much of an anime watcher. Do I hate anime? Well given what I've just written and what forum I'm even writing this on, no obviously I don't. But all that being said... I have heard of some animes before that made me go "who wrote this??? The only thing this seems good for is laughing at how absurd it is". Not an expert on the anime industry, but I do wonder if it might be oversaturated with a certain amount of crap content? But at the same time people who don't care for anime aren't going to hear about that, so it's probably not relevant to the conversation. So in summary: -People don't like OTT -It can be horny, and people like to exaggerate that and immediately draw a parallel to hentai -There's also just the general overlap with geek and nerd culture. Just because video games are borderline mainstream now doesn't mean other forms of geek culture are also accepted by everyone People who dislike Japanese pop culture in general are probably just people who use anime as their basis for all of their assumptions about Japan.
  12. smh citations needed was not expecting the image aligned to the right like an actual wiki page and the table of contents with decimal points, that's when I realised the effort put into this.
  13. Oh hey I know that artist, I'm in a discord with them. Yes, every drawing from them I know involves talking about marriage, even if it's not 2hu. No, they don't do it for horny reasons, just want to feel loved (apparently). I found it a bit strange at first but by now I've seen it so much that I find the recurring trope quite amusing.
  14. Lunatic Vengeance I'm not on the best terms with Rolling Contact's music, but I thought that this remix incorporated Pure Furies fairly well. As usual I'm not a fan of so much voice samples, but I like the sections that are more so just focused on the tune of Pure Furies. I genuinely think there's a lot of interesting instrumentation in this and although I said I don't like samples it's also not the worst use of them I've ever heard. The part in the middle, about 2:20, is probably the highlight for me. It could be better, but I've heard much more disappointing songs before. 5/10. Myon Rag Fever A simple but effective combination of instruments that create quite a character. Cute, bouncy rhythm curtesy of piano and c o w b e l l. The guitar is tuned quite oddly and sounds quite similar to something in the original Mystic Temple, it contrasts a lot with the instruments around it and makes an effective lead instrument. The best part is when it slows down and then is followed by the main melody picking up the pace again for an exciting finale; all the changes in speed in this and the quirky rhythms make for a very endearing song! Too bad it's only 2 minutes, but then again, maybe that's what gives it it's charm? The definition of "short but sweet", have a 7/10. Nostalgic Blood of the East ~ Old World This struck me as very ghostly sounding, yet upbeat. It's kind of reminiscent of something from Ghostly Field Club, isn't it? I like the changes of rhythm made to the main melody, and the percussion is pretty funky too. Combined with the instrumentation it makes for something energetic, yet otherworldly. I can tell this is game OST, and while I can't speak about the nature of the game in question, this reminds me a bit of the soundtracks from the Mario and Luigi RPG games. Unfortunately the only problem with it is that the music loop is a bit rough. I rather like this, have a respectable 6/10.
  15. Need even more awesome music to listen to in the middle of Remix Tournament? Well no worries, because I have a handful of things I just gotta share... why do I always suddenly have stuff a bunch I things I want to post when there's a remix tournament on??
  16. First thing I got to say is damn we have a lot of participants this time. Alright, I'm ready! The Young Descendant of Tepes Already opening with a banger, I'm loving the driving power in this, and is that a bit of whimsicalness I can hear subtly in the background? At first I thought it was a flute, but now I'm pretty sure it's a piano. Between the power guitar, the groovy beep-boop organ and a hint of calmer instruments, I'm reminded a lot of Fight On from FF7, and that's certainly not a bad thing (seriously, does this not sound a bit it in places?). The break and change of tone at 1 minute is unexpected, but nice. The first time they switched the tone like that I thought it was good, but later on, is sort of just feels like the chords changed to something they weren't exactly going for? But you know it still sounds good. Oh, by the way it may have taken me way to long to notice it was Remilia's stage theme and not her boss theme lol, but it's a plus to hear her stage theme arranged for once. Random sidenote: the bats look so happy. 7/10 Mugen no guradeishon RANDOM STACK VOCALS GO!! Obligatory Stack feature is obligatory. Well... yep, this is Stack alright. The arrangement of Immemorial Marketeers is pretty banging, I particularly like that break bit at 2.20, very experimental sounds at that point, followed by Stack almost becoming an opera singer lol. I also like Stack's more melodic singing during the lower energy sections, gotta slow down and appreciate calm Stack a bit. Overall not the most creative Akatsuki Records song I've ever heard although there were some sections I liked quite a lot. Pretty gooood, I'll go with 6/10. Cinnamon, Cinnamon!! It's time to S W I N G ! Straight from the beginning, the bass in this is top tier. I also like that slightly gritty filter her voice is going through at the beginning, sounds cool but doesn't overstay its welcome. And speaking of the vocalist, damn the way she rolls her R's! Suddenly J-ASMR, sure why not. I really like that background Xylophone(? assumed), it sets a sort of playful but confident tone, and then of course you've got that trumpet for added force on the main chorus, goes really well with the singing and helps create this kind of sassy attitude in the song. I will say that this is one of those songs where I can't really hear the original inspiration, but hey at least there's that one sections which is obviously Wonderful Heaven. Anyway, this is certified groovy and has lots of personality. 8/10. Only the first round and I'm already having a lot of fun reading everyone else's comments. Am I the last to rate this round? Ah, I think we're still waiting for Von's ratings (no pressure). Heh, reminds me of the time there was a posting spree in a thread with several people online at once. I've only ever seen that once. (It was in musical discoveries, of course)
  17. For me, the final boss of WBaWC. Idk if "emotional" is really the right word but I love that right before the final boss fight you realise that you've been manipulated by the beast spirits the entire time and start to question whether you're even on the good side anymore. And then after fight... nothing is cleared up. And that's fantastic. You're just left sitting there wondering "did I just do something horribly wrong? Which side is even the good side? Are there any good sides?" Anyway, now off to go fight a horse I guess I also love the final boss fight of AoCF because satisfying Yukari big brain plays. And I guess Shion finally getting her moment to not just be an underling to her sister is cool.
  18. It is here. (Wow, is this actually the eighth tournament?) Since we've done so many of these now and there are a lot of new folk here, I actually suggest adding a new clause to the rules; that you can't submit a song that was featured in a past remix tournament. Ken's got a playlist of more or less all the past RT entries, but for anyone new here, I'm not saying you have to check it, I'm just saying that Ken might tell you to pick another song if you've accidentally submitted one that was already featured. The reason I suggest this rule is because for many of us the point of the remix tournament is to discover new music, so it would be counter-intuitive to have a song that was already featured show up again, and for those of us that have commented on it before it would be pretty pointless to just repeat ourselves. Now with that out of the way, this time I already planned what songs I wanted to submit. I'm going all out with my submission this time!
  19. IMO the print works can be pretty good; when they're slice-of-life comedy style is when they are at their best. It's cool to be able to see Gensokyo and its inhabitants through a more normal lens when there is no incident going on. I'm reading the three fairies manga series at the moment and while the first of those (Eastern and Little Nature Deity) wasn't that interesting, the second one (Strange and Bright Nature Deity) was a lot better, and I've heard many people say that the three fairies series as a whole is a really good Touhou manga so I'm looking forward to reading the rest of them! Forbidden Scrollery, while slightly more serious, also has the same sort of slice-of-life feel and I really enjoyed that manga, maybe the fact I could actually physically read them made me enjoy it more but, with the exception of the last volume (unfortunately the ending was a huge anti-climax), I do think its a great Touhou manga (damnit Kosuzu is just too entertaining, the fact I forgot to put print work characters on my last Touhou sorter list was a missed opportunity). Wild and Horned Hermit, for me personally, flopped because it was a lot of just being boring or being confusing... I don't remember anything particularly funny happening... As for Silent Sinner in Blue, it was a quite a long time ago I read it but I seem to remember liking it. It was one of the first print works I read, so maybe if I went back to it I could see whether or not I actually think it's that good compared to other Touhou mangas I've now read.
  20. I've already given my take on this whole debacle in that other thread where the video was mentioned before, but reading this has made me think that maybe it's about time I really took that whole "Touhou game analysis" idea I had seriously... unfortunately, I still don't think I would have the time or motivation to do that. But perhaps I should start thinking about it as more than just an 'interesting idea that I'll never bother with'. Perhaps people would not only find it interesting, but also helpful, to have someone offer a comparison of games' quality at more than just a surface level look. Regarding the WaHH manga, gonna be real with you I can barely remember a thing that happened in WaHH, I didn't really like that manga as a whole lol. Don't most people consider AoCF to be the best of the flying fighters? I agree that the flying fighters aren't on the level of their predecessors but in terms of both singleplayer and multiplayer content, AoCF is the most polished and least gimmicky "floater" which people generally like it for. In fact, the game is completely devoid of gimmicks since this game's unique mechanic actually works as an expansion of the game's systems rather than a system that conflicts or overbears on the core gameplay, making AoCF the most straightforward, plain-and-fair fighting game since IaMP, something even Hisoutensoku can't claim to be. Sure, if you wanted you could still argue that character switching is a gimmick, but it's nothing close to the level of SWR/Soku's weather and card decks, HM's loadouts, and ULiL's... however you describe what happens in that game. Ken talking about how much he likes Ten Desires music was not a take I was expecting to read today.
  21. just bring back last word mechanic from Touhou 8 pls I generally prefer Touhou games where the mechanics are more "pure" and less gimmicky, so I like things like the classic era games and DDC and still enjoy games like WBaWC and UM that have gimmicks, but am glad for the fact that each gimmick is only for one game. That being said, if I must come up with something new... Maybe a skill tree system? Similar to UM's cards except instead of purchasing random cards with the currency you collect, you use it to open pre-determined bonuses in the skill tree. Most would be small bonuses that just give you a slight advantage in certain areas so you can tailor to your playstyle, but if you get right to the upper levels of the skill tree there could also be some crazier effects that can completely change how you play. And different characters would get their own skill trees, to make them distinct. Another idea is just a good ol' charge shot (bound to a different button so you can still rapid fire, looking at you PoFV) Hmmm you know what I like my ideas, maybe I should steal them
  22. I've got some interesting fan trivia for you guys today. This MIDI arrange is believed to be the first recorded Touhou music fanwork. (I highly recommend reading the video description).
  23. how could you forget to bring up the most egregious, horrifying misconception of them all?
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