Akyut's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Visha OST]

Some pretty phenomenal texturing, Tennon : )

Thanks for sharing!

Tennon responds:

Thank you!

[Smeave - Thundersong (NGUAC 2023 Knockout Round)]

E(b)m best key! My first thoughts went to HK with 'dirtmouth', probably my favorite piece from that whole soundtrack (outside of Grimm Troupe stuff) and that's awesome!

Really enjoyed this submission, especially where you took it heading into 3:00 and beyond. The stretch from 0:44-1:40 is beautifully written, and this really held my attention the whole way through.

Very well done <3 Thank you for sharing!

Fox4567 responds:

Thank you for your kind words!

[Odyssey of Echoes - MsFluent]

Seconding octopus' comments on the dance perc/cinema feel combo, is a really cool combination. Sort of reminds me of Age of War, and that's a really nostalgic feeling for me.

Congrats on getting this done in time, am enjoying watching the competition so far : )

MsFluent responds:

Glad you liked it <3

[Decayed Men]

Very very cool chords on display, and the grace notes added to the right hand of your keys sounds great in context.

For added variation, why not write some minor edits into the pattern for your pad/lead? When approaching 4 minutes, it will be more difficult to hold the attention of your average listener. I think there's a good opportunity at 2:32 when that strong melody returns. Experiment, and have fun with it.

Would also be great to hear some more significant changes in the overall volume of this track, would aid in dynamic and really sell the more instrument-full sections when they all come in full-strength. I can see some minor variations, but no visual tells that define separate sections of the song, or 'events on the timeline'.

Well-done, and thank you for sharing : )

TOUGHSHARK4 responds:

Thank you so much!

[Lost]

Love the wideness of your stereo field, but not having a central element to focus on that's in your face takes some of the impact away from this track.

Experiment with some upward compression on your bass, 3:1 or 4:1 ratio is where I'd start (and then adjust to your taste from there.)
This should move the sound up in the field, volume-wise and spatially, from the bottom middle to... middle-middle. ha.

Ideally, this will leave your side image nice and wide (would definitely Mid/Side the synths further to remove a little of the extra frequencies right in the center of your field.)
Usually you'll want to keep your sub in mono. It's fine to have width on a mid-bass, and a combination of these both will give a sense of space to the low end while leaving the sub down center.

Very nice work on this,
thank you for sharing! hope this helps.

NGC5194 responds:

Thank you for the feedback! I'll keep this in mind for whatever I come up with next.

[MEMORIES OF US]

Beautiful. The only nitpick I can offer is regarding the strings, a little bit of post processing to bring out the depth of the room/stage (maybe some verb, slight cuts to high end EQ?).

Seriously. Nitpick. The progression is haunting in the best way, like the ghost of an old friend come to visit.

Thank you for sharing <3

reethepeethe responds:

Sorry for reading this only now, but thank you! I'll work more on that, but thank you! If you're interested in hearing more of my works, you can find me on many listening platforms, where I have tons of more songs to listen too! - RE3ZE

[The Echos of Muras]

Cool stuff, am really drawn to music by storytelling (especially instrumental) so would be great to hear more about 'Muras'. Ever record any of your campaigns for later review/inspiration seeking?

ToddlerPuncher responds:

We don’t usually record our sessions but we do have a designated note taker. The note taker is one of the players and one of us DMs take our own notes (We have two DMs) That usually helps us DMs keep track of what the players know for story events. I usually make the music specifically for the campaign but I felt like I wanted to share it with the rest of the world in some way too (even if nobody else will have the proper context.)

[Toby Fox - Spider Dance (SEVEN LIVES' "Genre? Never Heard of Her" Remix)]

Drums that come in at around 0:23 have some incredible presence to them. Nice and full!

Transition at 1:17 took me by surprise, but is a good change in rhythm. I especially like the new rapid-fire element introduced a little later, some very cool sound design. I think the kick could use a little more low end/body to it, just a small nitpick.

From 4:00 on, was too busy headbanging to write anything else.

Awesome combination of sounds/genres, thanks for sharing something you put almost fifty hours into. Was a ride!

sevenlivesmusic responds:

thanks for the feedback!