Board 8 > [VGMC] ROUND 4 -- Inno&Empti vs Mt Vesuvius, Machine Passage vs Douwa Kairou

(+) Yeah! (+)

Welcome to today's topic for Video Game Music Contest 13, a tournament of the best tracks from games, as decided upon by you, the voters.

Links:
Bracket - http://www.bracketmaker.com/tlist.cfm?tid=471679
Contest info - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/17rEeB1_oYWgryWzIxOaZXw2a381gKGnMegjHCG_2OTQ
Discussion and results thread - https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/77672812
Bracket playlist - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLW9O9mntH1RF28glW72G6s_5M1e4kcSxR

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Rules:

- Listen to both of the songs. Links have conveniently been provided for both songs. Even if Song A is your favorite of all-time and Song B is from a series you hate... Listen. To. Both. (If I have suspicions your vote is not based on a fair and impartial preference, it will be disqualified.)
- Obvious contest rules apply (no alts, one vote per person, no rallying, etc.).
- Please make your voting options clear, rather than burying them in text.
- Each set of matches lasts 24 hours, even if the new one isnt up by then.
- Always vote on the versions of the song provided, not versions from different sources.
- If you know ahead of time that you're not going to be around and you want to vote in advance, post your choices in the discussion/bracket topic.
- Please do NOT post tallies/score updates in the middle of the match, as this has a tendency to directly influence matches.
- You don't have to vote in all the matches, but it'd be cool if you did!

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Match 1:

Baldr Heart - Innocence and Emptiness

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TnnPq4AxPU" data-time="

DuckTales Remastered - Mount Vesuvius

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9rMfPjn1n0" data-time="

Match 2:

Kirby Air Ride - Machine Passage

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0-TRGMg9R8" data-time="

GITADORA OverDrive - Douwa Kairou

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HOrlz6yxLqU" data-time="

Match 3:

Demon Truck - Dead Neon Hell City

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aptaoGaE13k" data-time="

Atelier Escha & Logy - Sky of Twilight

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDa-vYgd1P8" data-time="

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Easy vote form:
Innocence and Emptiness / Mount Vesuvius
Machine Passage / Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City / Sky of Twilight

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Song lyric trivia: Here-here-here, here we go! They're finally here, p

Innocence & Emptiness
Machine Passage
DEMON TRUCK

DEMON TRUCK go vrum

DK
DONKEY KONG
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Baldr Heart - Innocence and Emptiness
GITADORA OverDrive - Douwa Kairou
Atelier Escha & Logy - Sky of Twilight
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Innocence and Nothingness
Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City

match 2 is perfect and i want the winner in A finals. staying flipped on DNHC over Sky of Twilight I still want both to move on so bad but here we are I will be sad either way

Mount Vesuvius
Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City
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Mount Vesuvius
Machine Passage
Dead Neon Hell City

Mount Vesuvius
Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City

Innocence and Emptiness
Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City

It's finally here! The retirement round!

Match 1 is crazy good, really gets my coconut gun firing in spurts
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Innocence and Emptiness
Douwa Kairou
Sky of Twilight
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Mount Vesuvius
Machine Passage
Dead Neon Hell City

DuckTales Remastered - Mount Vesuvius
GITADORA OverDrive - Douwa Kairou
Atelier Escha & Logy - Sky of Twilight
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DuckTales Remastered - Mount Vesuvius
GITADORA OverDrive - Douwa Kairou
Atelier Escha & Logy - Sky of Twilight

too many matches
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Innocence and Emptiness
Machine Passage
Dead Neon Hell City

Mount
Machine
City
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Baldr Heart - Innocence and Emptiness - it's a tough call. I like this one more overall (it's grown on me), and I REALLY like the harmonies at around 4:20, but Mount Vesuvius at 0:46 - 0:56 (plus when it plays again later) is ridiculously awesome.

GITADORA OverDrive - Douwa Kairou - I don't know what it is about Beatmania, but there's just so much amazing stuff from some of those games. I really like those piano patterns, and it just keeps pumping out awesome harmonies. My favorite of the four today. I have to give a nod to the novelty of Machine Passage, though.

Atelier Escha & Logy - Sky of Twilight - the highight of Dead Neon is definitely at 1:38. I love how the first phrase there ends on minor, then the second phrase ends on the same chord, but major.. Still gotta favor the Atelier track, though. Pretty much keeps me engaged the entire time.

Overall good music today worthy of the retirement round. In the poll I voted today's second match as the best one in Bracket A. (some of the other matches there also have amazing music, but only one of the two is amazing, IMO)
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Mount Vesuvius
Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City

I changed my stance on the third match. DEMON TRUCK is too powerful
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DuckTales Remastered - Mount Vesuvius
Kirby Air Ride - Machine Passage
DEMON TRUCK - Dead Neon Hell City
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Baldr Heart - Innocence and Emptiness
GITADORA OverDrive - Douwa Kairou
Atelier Escha & Logy - Sky of Twilight

MATCH 1

To be honest, this is a pretty underwhelming retirement match for me. I'm not particularly excited about either song in this match retiring. This is a very easy decision, though. Innocence and Emptiness has that portion with the last 3 minutes of the song that I actually like quite a bit. Mount Vesuvius, on the other hand, just doesn't really do much for me. I will say, though, that I think I'm starting to like Mount Vesuvius more. Funny how it took all this time for that to happen. I still don't like it enough to beat Innocence and Emptiness, though.

MATCH 2

This match is better for me in comparison to match 1. I do like Machine Passage, but I don't think it's "retired song" good, so I'm also not super excited about the possibility of it retiring. Douwa Kairou, though, is a pretty good song that I'm perfectly okay with seeing it retire. Also a very easy decision.

Sky of Twilight > Douwa Kairou > Dead Neon Hell City > Machine Passage = Innocence and Emptiness > Mount Vesuvius

Hmm, this writeup feels a bit harsher than they usually are. Well, despite my lack of excitement for the possible retirement of some of these songs, I don't have any strong dislike for any of them! My apologies to the people that really like any of the songs in question if I was too harsh.

Innocence and Emptiness
Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City

Innocence and Emptiness
Machine Passage
Dead Neon Hell City

Mount Vesuvius (#11 vs. #22)
Machine Passage (#12 vs. #16)
Dead Neon Hell City (#04 vs. #28)

I felt like ranking the 33 remaining tracks, largely from memory, so now I may include numbers to go with my votes good job. Who knows if my indecisive mind will agree with these rankings by the time we finish round 4
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Baldr Heart - Innocence and Emptiness
GITADORA OverDrive - Douwa Kairou
Atelier Escha & Logy - Sky of Twilight

I&E and Exsphere are still the best remaining songs
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Mount Vesuvius
Machine Passage
Dead Neon Hell City
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Mount Vesuvius
Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City

Innocence and Emptiness
Douwa Kairou
Sky of Twilight
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Rankings from here on out are out of 33 (not 32 due to tiebreaker, will drop to 32 after today).

5. Baldr Heart - Innocence and Emptiness (9.5) (over Snake Eater, TIGAR)

vs.

16. DuckTales Remastered - Mount Vesuvius (7) (over In Circles, Ethereal Dance)

Still loving Innocence and Emptiness, maybe even more than last round. I'm a sucker for songs that build gradually over time and escalate their intensity, and this song does it so well, building until it reaches that final section, where everything explodes. Love love love this song.

Mount Vesuvius is bouncy bouncy new Duck song. I've said it before but the main notes are a little too wobbly/annoying. I still like the song a good deal and I voted for it twice over decent competition, but against I&E there's simply no contest.

and

27. Kirby Air Ride - Machine Passage (4) (for Who Am I?, over Recollections)

vs.

30. GITADORA OverDrive - Douwa Kairou (3) (for Howling of the Birds, over Your Contract Has Expired))

Oy. This match. I'll say that Machine Passage has grown on me a little since the contest started, but it still feels like it doesn't quite belong here - I'd much rather have Who Am I? It's an interesting ride at least, and it keeps me guessing even though I've heard it a few times already. But I completely lose interest in it after the loop.

Douwa Kairou is not my thing due almost entirely to the loud guitar. It's not as abrasive to me today as it's been in the past, and I'm able to hear the melody more clearly than normally. But that guitar is just so overbearing. Nothing turns me off to a song faster (hi Sky of Twilight).

and and

11. Demon Truck - Dead Neon Hell City (7.5) (over Galaxy of Friendship, for Dark Man Stage)

vs.

33. Atelier Escha & Logy - Sky of Twilight (0.5) (for Intersection: Me vs. You)

Hell City Dead Neon still holds up across the past few rounds. That grungy "wet" synth is what sustains the song and gives it such unique flavor. zircon really does a great job at all levels here - the bass, the melody, the flow. Really neat track.

Sky of Twilight...I don't know about this song. It's got that awful guitar that drags it down a lot, but there are admittedly parts of it I do kind of enjoy - if I rerated, it almost certainly wouldn't get a literal 0.5 (for comparison's sake, that would give it bottom ranking under all 174 songs nominated for my ranking topic). Honestly if it didn't have that guitar it would be much higher - there is some stuff to like. It still wouldn't be above a 5 because it feels too much like "stereotypical Itou Kanako," but do I hate it like I did upon first listen? Not really. I'd probably rank Where the Sky Ended and Distorted Happiness (both of which are fortunately eliminated) under this. But it's still not enough to beat City Neon Dead Hell.

Votes:
Innocence and Emptiness
Machine Passage
Dead Neon Hell City

Innocence and Emptiness
Douwa Kairou
Sky of Twilight
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Innocence and Nothingness
Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City



Switching vote on the rematch, just not feeling Sky of Twilight today.
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Innocence and Emptiness
Douwa Kairou
-

Innocence and Emptiness
Machine Passage
Dead Neon Hell City

Baldr Heart - Innocence and Emptiness
GITADORA OverDrive - Douwa Kairou

Demon Truck - Dead Neon Hell City

first match is one of the best retirement matches in VGMC history and I hate everything about it
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Mount Vesuvius
Douwa Kairou
Sky of Twilight
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...Really? Yeah, I usually do the "rankings" thing as a check on myself, but with a tiebreaker in the mix, there's no way I'm listening to nearly 7.5 minutes of Innoncence and Emptiness to decide how it stacks up against songs from Bracket D when I knew pretty much from the moment I first heard it in Round 2 that I wouldn't be voting for Mt. Vesuvius...hopefully ever. Pretty sure that out of the eight things that could've possibly retired in this spot after Round 1 was done, Mt. Vesuvius was a clean #8. Sad thing is, Innocence and Emptiness just might be #7! It gets good eventually, but starts much too slow, not to mention this was seemingly a fairly strong region. Innocence & Emptiness isn't a bad choice, but I'm pretty sure that if Mt. Vesuvius had lost in either of the previous two rounds, I wouldn't be voting for it.

This still isn't Frozen Hillside. :( But it's still a pretty good KAR track. That said, this isn't a tough match, either. Or is it? Douwa Kairou started out so promising, but turned into a bunch of noise. It's amazing that a song that short can do that; Douwa Kairou as a whole is shorter than the amount of time it takes for I&E to really get going.

Dead Neon Hell City is still just so generic.

Votes:
Innocence and Emptiness
Machine Passage
Sky of Twilight

Rankings:

Sky of Twilight > Innocence and Emptiness > Dead Neon Hell City > Machine Passage > Douwa Kairou > Mt. Vesuvius
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Baldr Heart - Innocence and Emptiness
GITADORA OverDrive - Douwa Kairou
Atelier Escha & Logy - Sky of Twilight
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Mount Vesuvius
Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City

Mount Vesuvius
Douwa Kairou
Sky of Twilight

I want to scrap the first two matches and start over. Good practice VGMC guys, time for the real thing now.
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Sceptilesolar posted...

Mount Vesuvius
Douwa Kairou
Sky of Twilight

I want to scrap the first two matches and start over. Good practice VGMC guys, time for the real thing now.

Good practice vote Sceptile, time for the real thing now.
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Vesuvius
Douwa Kairou
Sky of Twilight

Mt Vesuvius
Douwa Kairou
Sky of Twilight

Vesuvius > Douwa Kairou > Sky of Twilight > Dead Neon Hell City > Machine Passage > Innocence and Emptiness

laaaaaaaaaaate
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Innocence and Emptiness
Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City

Was-I-expecting-too-much-from-today's-matches? day.

Match 1:

I'm still not sure why I keep forgetting what I&E sounds like. Maybe it is kind of forgettable after all; but... to be fair, I don't quite remember today's songs too well; even worse, for some reason, 4 rounds in and I still can't recognize most songs by name, and I don't know why; I don't remember that happening last contest, and unironically the songs I look forward most are the ones that appeared last contest.

Back to the song itself, it's pretty strange how there were sounds at the beginning I didn't even notice at all until now (namely the deep-sounding drums in the background). After a little over 2 minutes..."Oh, there it is" -- everything onwards sounded pretty familiar and good. But... "Round 4 good"? I'm not so convinced. Same thing goes for Mt. Vesuvius; it's not "R4 good", but I guess it's what this quarter of rhe bracket offers. I can't remember Mt. Vesuvius's its exact placement in the bracket, but either it had an easy placement, a not-so-fair win, or a mix of both. Honestly, I'd go with the last possibility, and I said "not-so-good" instead of "unfair" on purpose since I don't remember a blatant "what the heck" result from this area of the bracket.

Anyway, I&E wins because of its catchier execution despite the first two minutes holding it back quite a bit.

Match 2:

Machine Passage is pretty solid, but the question still rises: Retirement-level good? I don't think so. We have another weird case here: I looked at Douwa Kairou, didn't recognize it, and 4 rounds in, it was like I was listening to a brand new song! A pretty good song at that, as well. If there's one song right here that deserves the "retirement" badge, it's this one.

Tiebreaker:

For a moment, I entered the topic and was like: "Hey, we did have 2 matches a day! Hooray! ...Wait. 3 matches a day?! Oh, it's just the past tie, lol". This is the one and only tiebreaker in the whole contest I couldn't remember in terms of which song I picked, so I had to look at my past write-ups from two days ago and rested assured that even if I skipped the match today, this is a clear choice.

The only thing that's going to complicate things is the actual rankings, so I think I'll pass from them today.
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Innocence and Emptiness
Machine Passage
Sky of Twilight
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Mount Vesuvius
Douwa Kairou
Dead Neon Hell City
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Innocence and Emptiness
Machine Passage
Sky of Twilight

edit: Oh look, I voted opposite Jona....AGAIN.
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Innocence and Emptiness
Douwa Kairou
Sky of Twilight