Submissions General Questions, Comments, etc

[nayuki]

Your transcriptions sound terrific and I'm not noticing any inaccuracies when listening (comparing them to my memory lol). But while you can do a bunch of things with transcriptions, our site is tailored specifically for piano arrangements. In that regard, some of the source material has been altered or omitted for the sake of playability. Keep in mind the limitations of a solo pianist - hands can only stretch so far and move so fast. That's why you'll see many sheets differ from the exact sound you find in the game - they're written for the pianist, making them playable while maintaining as much of the notes and "feel" of the original as possible.

That said, mistakes do happen, so if you notice anything you think is an error, like an incorrect rhythm or pitch, please do let us know! We strive for accuracy at the same time as keeping sheets playable.

And I think your site is absolutely fantastic. There's a ton of cool stuff on there! (As a math/CS guy I really like it...)

Thanks for your response and Tobbeh99's as well. Glad to hear that you're enjoying the math/CS content. I always love meeting new people in my field!

You're right about the NSM arrangements being piano-oriented. After browsing a couple of PDFs, I caught on that they are all structured around a bass and treble staff, which probably meant it is intended to be played by a solo pianist.

Some of the sheet music posted on NSM are quite faithful to the Game Boy original but appear hard to play because one hand is doing two non-chorded melodies. (I am not a pianist unfortunately and can't judge accurately.) Examples under the "Pokémon Red Version & Pokémon Blue Version" heading include "Battle! (Gym Leader Battle)", "Cycling", "Road to Fuchsia City: Leaving Lavender Town", "Rocket Game Corner". These existing examples seem to violate the human playability guideline in favor of cold accuracy.

Now I don't know if this is helpful, but here are a few minor inaccuracies I found in the NSM published scores:

• Pokémon Red Version & Pokémon Blue Version: Battle! (Gym Leader Battle): Repeat at the wrong position
• Pokémon Red Version & Pokémon Blue Version: Cycling: Bars 9 and 17 in the left hand
• Pokémon Red Version & Pokémon Blue Version: Pallet Town Theme: Bars 15 and 16 in the bass staff
• Pokémon Red Version & Pokémon Blue Version: Rocket Hideout: Bars 29 to 32 have several pitches off
• Pokémon Gold Version & Pokémon Silver Version: Cherrygrove City: Bars 2 and 3 in the bass staff

(And thanks to cross-checking with NSM, I caught a critical flaw in my RGBY Route 1 music.)

As for entire channels being missing (i.e. having only 2 out of 3 melodic channels):

• Pokémon Red Version & Pokémon Blue Version: Pewter City (a.k.a. Viridian City)
• Pokémon Red Version & Pokémon Blue Version: Rocket Hideout
• Pokémon Gold Version & Pokémon Silver Version: New Bark Town
• Pokémon Gold Version & Pokémon Silver Version: Goldenrod City: The third hand is pretty hard to play though, but it's what makes the song fun

On the whole, the collection of music at NinSheetMusic is simply amazing. It's not something I can hope to match with my own efforts, even in the limited context of one or two games. As far as I can see, the Pokémon RGBY and GSC collections here have pretty much all the musical tracks that you can ask for. Plus, the accuracy is clearly above the average level of transcriptions posted online (e.g. YouTube, other sites - can name examples). Thanks again for this wonderful resource!

[Tobbeh99]

As for "Pewter Town". I actually arranged it for the project, but it was rejected (I'm assuming) and edited or something by someone else (or mine was accepted but edited by someone else). Anyways, I think it was because of the Left Hand being very "cluttery" and difficult and uncomfortable to play. As you can see in the images in the spoiler.

Spoiler

[close]

On the whole, the collection of music at NinSheetMusic is simply amazing. It's not something I can hope to match with my own efforts, even in the limited context of one or two games. As far as I can see, the Pokémon RGBY and GSC collections here have pretty much all the musical tracks that you can ask for. Plus, the accuracy is clearly above the average level of transcriptions posted online (e.g. YouTube, other sites - can name examples). Thanks again for this wonderful resource!

Y, it is a community-driven site, filled with free VGM sheet music. Being an arranger myself, I got to say that it is really impressive. Also nobody expects you to match it (the entire site) if you're interested in arranging, so you shouldn't feel discouraged if you want to. 

[Latios212]

Haha this will be fun to talk about. Having reviewed all of the sheets from Red/Blue/Yellow/Gold/Silver/Crystal I can address all these issues. Though I only have time to speak to a few of them right now, here goes: (The rest will come later like maybe tomorrow or something.)

As for entire channels being missing (i.e. having only 2 out of 3 melodic channels):

• Pokémon Red Version & Pokémon Blue Version: Pewter City (a.k.a. Viridian City)
• Pokémon Red Version & Pokémon Blue Version: Rocket Hideout
• Pokémon Gold Version & Pokémon Silver Version: New Bark Town
• Pokémon Gold Version & Pokémon Silver Version: Goldenrod City: The third hand is pretty hard to play though, but it's what makes the song fun

~Pewter City: As Tobbeh showed above the left hand gets kind of messy if we go the transcription route. A lot of clashes and near misses between the two layers in that range - you get a bunch of small (major/minor second) intervals which don't really sound good. In the original the two LH voices are played using different soundfonts and volumes so there isn't any noticeable conflicting between the voices. But when playing for piano it's a considerable increase in difficulty without much reward. So the more prominent voice was chosen for this one.
~Rocket Hideout: [Intro reference] This part is a little ridiculous lol. Constant 16th note dyads is something I'm pretty sure no one wants to do. Sounds a bit emptier without that other layer, but... way more approachable. If you were going for m. 29-32, that's again because of constantly conflicting/overlapping voices.
~New Bark Town: [Intro reference] Here, the middle layer isn't quite near the melody or the bass part - juggling it between hands to include it in the sheet would result in large intervals in the RH and more complicated rhythms in the LH. Ultimately I decided to go with a route that would make it easier to play, and specifically better articulate the rhythms. You'll see the bassline I created for this sheet is a combination of the bassline and the middle layer. Hopefully you'll agree this is a lot easier to play without much of a loss when listening. (Most of the middle voice is just an octave away from other existing notes anyway.)
~Goldenrod City: [Full transcription] Yeah, measures 9-16 are definitely playable but... just speculating, most people wouldn't (be able to) put in the time and effort to pull it off as well as this guy did. We don't cater to a specific type of pianist around here, but keeping things relatively accessible is always looked upon favorably. Another thing I would like to point out is that this is not my sheet, and the arranger chose to omit the voice as such. You'll encounter some sheets that might seem easier than they should be and some sheets that might seem harder than they should be, and that is because leeway is granted for the arranger's own style and preferences. Different people weigh accessibility and inclusion of voices in different ways, and I highly respect arrangers` decisions to include or exclude certain voices. This isn't to say "you're wrong", far from it, I'm just explaining why these sheets are as they are!

Oh yeah feel free to add my on Skype lol I'm typing a lot here and these are only a few that you mentioned

[ilegi]

Hello talented arrangers...

In TES4 Oblivion, is the piece Auriel's Ascension the same tune as what is posted here as "Title Screen"? I've found some seemingly good sheets for it by emailing a guy on Youtube.

[Zunawe]

We can't post his arrangements unless he submits them himself. We have an errors thread if the title of the piece is wrong.

[Trainer Ave]

can unused or unreleased tracks be submitted to the site? Im specifically asking because i would like to submit the beginning deminsion music that was supposed to be used in the gen 4 arceus event.

[Altissimo]

I dunno, why not look for unused tracks on the site and find out

[Olimar12345]

The answer is yes. Off the top of my head, we have beta music, trailer themes, and unused tracks sprinkled in on the main site.

[Trainer Ave]

thank you

[Yug_Guy]

Here's a peculiar quandary I've run into: What do I do when the in-game version of a song is different than the one that plays on the official soundtrack?

Just to give you some idea of what I mean: The in-game version of a song has sections A & B which loop over and over indefinitely, but the version on the soundtrack includes A & B and an additional C section before looping back to the beginning.

Normally I'd just shrug it off and choose one or the other, but I'm arranging multiple songs on this soundtrack, and some I'd rather use the in-game version, and some I'd rather use the official soundtrack version. I'd like to use either one or the other for all arrangements for consistency's sake. Thoughts?

[Dudeman]

That's a good question. Similar situations that come to my mind are Shadow of the Colossus (which features intros/endings to pieces which aren't played in-game) and Undertale (where the key of the piece is sometimes different than the key in the OST). Just thinking back to Undertale, I think the general rule for the project was to arrange what was on the OST and that's why we dropped the "Genocide" arrangements, so if it was me, I'd say arrange what's in the soundtrack. But that's just my two cents.

[Maelstrom]

Go on a case by case basis. I'm on mobile so I'm to lazy to give YouTube links, but Serpent Eating the Ground has an ending that isn't in the game, but it doesn't add anything to the song except making it impossible to play. That one is a good example of one to leave out

[Olimar12345]

^that could also have been included. Like he said, case by case basis.

[Yug_Guy]

Go on a case by case basis. I'm on mobile so I'm to lazy to give YouTube links, but Serpent Eating the Ground has an ending that isn't in the game, but it doesn't add anything to the song except making it impossible to play. That one is a good example of one to leave out

^that could also have been included. Like he said, case by case basis.

Alright, thanks for the advice. For this song in particular, I personally like the extended OST version, so I'll probably end up including it in the final arrangement.

[SkyriderRhythmic]

I use Musescore, and it doesn't have the option for exporting .mus files. Is it okay if I just have a .mxl or .xml file? Or will someone be able to convert it?