LeviR.star's Arrangements - [NES] Mega Man 2 ~ 2 New Sheets (w/ Crash Man Stage!)

[LeviR.star]

I'm sharing something a little different today...


492nd

[PC] Lost Caves - "Level 1"

[ZIP]

Lost Caves is a delightful little indie platformer that I followed the development of for several years. You play as a character named Michael Miner, and attempt to escape a giant cavern while collecting treasure along the way. Premise-wise, it's very similar to The Great Cave Offensive from Kirby Super Star, but the controls are more akin to Shovel Knight, with short-range melee attacks and a downward stab similar those found in Zelda II: The Adventure of Link and DuckTales. And the soundtrack is great, with some of the music even being composed by the developer himself, Adam D. Smith. It's a wonderful tribute to retro platforming games, and I had a blast playing it; you should all check it out.

Now, this sheet was started and left unfinished back in 2019, two years before the game actually released. Instead of storing it with the rest of the WIPs, I accidentally hid it away in its own private folder in the "Other Games" section, and forgot the sheet even existed. Fast forward to yesterday, when I was making a clean sweep through my arrangement collection to look for any forgotten WIPs, I rediscovered it, and realized that at least half of the work had already been done. In a funny sort of way, it was like finding some ancient artifact, just like Adam's game. So here we are now, with the finished sheet, one step closer to truly having all of my WIP arrangements done for good. And it won't be a fake-out like last time...

And with that, I've done it! At long last, my Work-In-Progess folder is empty, which, according to my New Year's Resolution, means I'm finally free to start working on new sheets.

Remember when I said a while back that my backlog was finished?

I was wrong...

Remaining Abandoned Sheets: 6

[LeviR.star]

Can I be done now?


493rd

[SNES] Kirby Super Star - "Floating Away"

[ZIP]

Figuring out this arrangement yesterday was just as difficult as it once was back in 2016, and I hate it. The parts just don't get along at all... first you've got the melody, then the nearly irreplaceable accompaniment line slapped right on top of it, and the bass line is wayyyy at the bottom, bouncing between the tonic and dominant scale degrees. It's impossible to keep all three of them in their original forms, so the best solution I could come up with was this: layer the melody with triads to fill in the harmony, bring the bass line up an octave while adding accents to each note, and then compose some material for in-between the bass notes to make up for the activity lost by ditching the accompaniment. I'm giving the performer a fair amount of leeway by allowing them to improvise whatever they want between the accented left hand notes, so it felt important to add lead sheet symbols. We're left with an arrangement that sounds fairly different than what we started with, but I'll be damned if there's that any better options out there. So enjoy, because a lot of frustration was poured into this here sheet.

Remaining Abandoned Sheets: 5

[LeviR.star]

We're getting clooooooseeeeerrrrr...


494th

[MUL] Mega Man 9 - "Thunder Tornado (Tornado Man Stage)"

[ZIP]

Ahh, Mega Man 9. I love this game so much, it's actually one of my top five games of all time, and I've got no idea why the fandom trashes it so much. That could be due the excessive use insta-death spikes in the level design, or peoples' issue with the slide and charge shot being gone (just play as Proto Man smh), but everything about the game is just so polished: the bosses are well-designed, the weapons are better in this game than in any other, and the level design is just super solid, in my opinion. And the music! Oh man, the music. Like the rest of the devs, the sound team truly understood what made classic Mega Man so special, and that's all captured in the soundtrack so well. Honestly, if we're excluding the recycled music from Mega Man 2, there's not a single track from this game I don't love, it's all just so catchy. Too bad most of it is fairly difficult to arrange...

The unfinished draft from 2016 is one of those three-stavers that I didn't take any time to consider how the pianist would perform it. But unlike the three-stavers that were eventually finished (and wiped out during my re-writing phase), this one was left to die when I started having difficulties transcribing the bass line. That, and the problematic countermelody were enough of a reason to call it quits back then. Finishing it today was not exactly a walk in the park, but I'm quite proud of the result, and I imagine this could give me the courage to try arranging more of this game's tracks. Enjoy!

Remaining Abandoned Sheets: 4

[LeviR.star]

"If Gourmet Race is so great, why isn't there a Gourmet Race 2?"

Gourmet Race 2:


495th

[SNES] Kirby Super Star - "Hilltop Chase"

[ZIP]

I'll bet you had no idea there was a whole other section to this song, right? I sure didn't know, that is, until I started my 2016 draft and listened past the first repeat long enough to hear it myself. What's the big idea, anyway? Most players don't even spend enough time on the second course (Corn Hall) to hear the second half of the song, so it's almost as if it was composed for nothing. It wouldn't surprise me if King Dedede reaches the finish line before the Gourmet Race reprise starts, but eh, whatever. Past me didn't try very hard to finish the sheet, but present-day me put it together in a surprisingly short amount of time. Though I have dozens of options for upcoming sheet submissions, this one would be a great companion to the on-site Gourmet Race arrangement. So stay tuned, and enjoy!

Remaining Abandoned Sheets: 3

[LeviR.star]

If context clues didn't tip you off, I'll tell you: the next Mega Man game I intend to arrange in full is Mega Man IV, also on Game Boy. It's gonna be a little while longer, though, so you'd better get comfy.

Oh, happy day!


[GB] Mega Man IV

496th

Dr. Light's Lab [ZIP]

497th

Dr. Wily Attacks [ZIP]

498th

Dr. Wily Stage Boss [ZIP]

Today, I'm proud to present my third-largest "dedicated game" project to date...

The Mega Man IV-Ever Arrangement Project


That's right, everyone! I've finally reached the end of another long-running project, and I am so relieved that it's done. For a decently long amount of time, Mega Man IV had the second-lowest sheet count in the Game Boy Mega Man section, but now it has the highest, with a total of 24 original tracks. Now it's only rivaled by Balloon Kid and Kirby's Block Ball in terms of sheet count, so you can imagine how much work I had to do. In fact, I went back and touched up over twenty of these arrangements today to make sure their quality was up to standard, and even reworked my on-site "Dr. Wily Stage" (give it a day or two and the new files will be up). If you want an idea of how much time I spent doing that today, check the spoiler tag below!

Full List of Sheets (24 Total)

Title Screen
Password
Dr. Light's Prologue
Dr. Light's Lab
Dr. Light's Lab (Unused)
Stage Select 1
Stage Start
Mega Man 4 Boss
Stage Clear
Get a Weapon
Beat
Beat (Unused)
Dr. Wily Attacks
Dr. Wily Attacks (Unused)
Dr. Wily Stage Boss
Dr. Wily Stage Boss (Unused)
Dr. Wily Stage
Dr. Wily Fanfare
Ballade
Stage Select 2
Approaching Dr. Wily
All Stages Clear
Ending
Game Over

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Like both Mega Man: Dr. Wily's Revenge and Mega Man II, there's a number of unused tracks in here; just wait 'til you see Mega Man V. That game will be an even larger project, because unlike with this one, all of the stage themes are original. Maybe someday I'll get around to arranging the tracks that were re-used in this game, but I won't be in any kind of a hurry (more on that later). Now, some statistics to put things into perspective!

First Sheet Completed: Ballade
Last Sheet Completed: Dr. Wily Stage Boss (as seen above)
Easiest Sheet to Arrange: All Stages Clear
Hardest Sheet to Arrange: Dr. Light's Prologue
Shortest Sheet: Stage Start, 0'3"
Longest Sheet: Ending, 2'19"
Favorite Sheet: Title Screen (Fun to arrange, and a bangin' track)
Least Favorite Sheet: Dr. Light's Prologue (Bleh, I don't even like this one...)
Project Duration: approximately 79 months, or about 6 1/2 years

Can't believe it was almost seven years ago when I started all of this... ew, I don't want to feel old. I'm still young, right??

... right?

If you thought I was going to get right to work on completing Mega Man V, you'd be wrong. I have a ton of touch-ups to complete, so many that, once I hit five hundred sheets, it might be months before I post another new sheet here again. I tell ya, the grind never stops, but I'd rather have it be this way than run out of time for NinSheetMusic. Here's to seven more years at NSM!

and, as always, don't forget to...

... eeeeennnnjoy!

Remaining Abandoned Sheets: 2

[LeviR.star]

You know what we've been long overdue for? A new collab!


499th

[WiiU] NES Remix - "Title Screen"

[ZIP]

That's right, everyone, today I'm proud to present one of two brand new collabs I've been working on! This one was put together with the help of XiaoMigros, who worked with me to condense the dense texture of this song into a piano arrangement. There's a lot of NES-era sound effects in this track, very few of which we could afford to include, but aside from that, this turned out extremely well, and I'm super happy with what we came up with. I'm also glad that it wasn't left to die unfinished.

The NES Remix series of games features a bunch of customized mission from NES games (challenging you to clear a course in a set amount of time, defeat an enemy in a certain way, etc.) It also has these special "remix" stages that combine elements from different games for a truly unique experience. I never owned a Wii U, but I did have Ultimate NES Remix on my 3DS; I was disappointed to learn that you can't play the games by themselves, but that didn't stop me from having a decent amount of fun with it. If this sounds like a good time to you, go out and buy either NES Remix Pack for Wii U or Ultimate NES Remix for 3DS, because unfortunately, the eShop closure means that the first two games in the series are now inaccessible, matey.

I have good news and bad news! The good news is that my next sheet, a collab with Zeila, the Big 500th, is just about complete, and I will be uploading it to my PA very soon. The bad news is that I recently rediscovered that the unfinished version of this sheet actually contained material from two different tracks, meaning that my Abandoned Sheets countdown just got bumped up by one. Looks like we won't be quite finished with all the WIPs for this milestone, which is a bit of a downer for me, but at least I remembered this, right? They'll both be finished soon enough. Enjoy!

Remaining Abandoned Sheets: 2

[XiaoMigros]

It was fun working with you, and I'm happy with the resut! Congrats in advance on this special milestone..

[LeviR.star]

It was fun working with you, and I'm happy with the resut! Congrats in advance on this special milestone..

Thank you, Xiao! It's much appreciated, I enjoyed working with you, too.


Told ya I had something big planned!

Behold, my most ambitious sheet ever (arranged with the invaluable help of Zeila):


500th

[3DS] Kirby: Planet Robobot - "VS. Star Dream"

[ZIP]

Make no mistake, this is a MASSIVE arrangement compared to my normal output! Clocking in at five and half minutes worth of playback, and with seven full pages of sheet music, I've never gotten remotely close to arranging a track this long. And I certainly wouldn't have been able to do it alone, either, because Zeila played an incredible role in helping to put this sheet together. The left hand part was all her work, and she also helped shape up what I had written in the right hand, as well as adjust both hands to make sure they work together. We're so pleased with the outcome that we're submitting it today! Personally, I cannot understate how excited I was to get this finished... it's come a long way, that's for sure.

And yes, we've finally hit the Big 500! I did some quick math and determined that I've produced roughly an average one sheet every five days since August of 2016. Of course, this number is a lot less impressive when you consider how many of these sheets, well, fail to hold up, but eh, I'll take what I can get. The spreadsheet I made a few months ago will be the key to getting all the shabbier-looking sheets touched-up in due time. Hard to believe my sheet-making journey started here:

Where has the time gone?

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Tomorrow, I'll be fulfilling my old promise to finish every last WIP by posting a companion sheet to this one! No, it's not from Planet Robobot, but it is closely related, and I will be sure to submit it next month. Thank you for reading, and here's to another 500 sheets! God help us all...

Enjoy!
Remaining Abandoned Sheets: 1

[Zeila]

Yay, it was nice working with you ^.^

Also, I really admire that you put in the effort towards finishing every WIP (to be completed soon^TM). Congratulations once again on completing 500 sheets!!

[LeviR.star]

Yay, it was nice working with you ^.^

Also, I really admire that you put in the effort towards finishing every WIP (to be completed soon^TM). Congratulations once again on completing 500 sheets!!

It was a great privilege to collab with you as well.

Thank you Zeila!! You were there to congratulate me when I mistakenly claimed the WIPs were done, but now I'm positive they're all complete! Thank you for your kind words.


501st

[SNES] Kirby Super Star - "Heart of Nova"

[ZIP]

I've wanted to arrange this track for a long time now, but never truly got around to it. See, if you remember from a couple days ago, this is the sheet that I found inside the unfinished "VS. Star Dream" arrangement; there wasn't much to it, as expected:

One bar is good enough

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[close]

... I don't recall in great detail why I chose to start one sheet inside another. It may have been that I misremembered the Star Dream's first phase theme quoting "Heart of Nova" (it does in Star Dream Soul OS's last phase, but not this one), or it simply could've been that I was too lazy to start a new file, because even younger me knew that I wasn't going to finish it right then. And if the latter is the case, who could blame me? This one's kind of difficult to translate to piano, especially with the part that starts at m. 28, where the augmented arpeggios start rising microtonally, and the weird percussion feature that I never knew know how to incorporate. Yesterday, I decided that some high-register tone clusters were in order, figured out how to make some using the custom line tool (thanks, Static!) and BAM! The sheet I once thought was impossible is now possible. or probable at best

So now, I believe we're truly done with every last WIP. Those that have since been done by other arrangers or repurposed for compilations have been rendered obsolete, and now reside in the "Never-to-be-Finished Folder" that you can find in my OP. Somewhere down the line I may think of a sheet that I arranged on my family's computer before 2014 (files that are undoubtedly lost forever) but at the moment, I'll be shifting my focus towards touching-up older sheets until I'm satisfied. I'll give you all semi-regular updates on my progress with that, but like I mentioned earlier, individual touch-ups won't be getting their own PA posts. Thank you for tuning in, and enjoy!

And in case you're wondering, yes, I have plenty of ideas for new sheets

[TheZeldaPianist275]

Congrats on both 500 and wrapping on the WIPs Levi.  Job well done

[LeviR.star]

Congrats on both 500 and wrapping on the WIPs Levi.  Job well done

Many thanks, ZeldaPianist! I appreciate your support in me working towards finishing the project

Anywho

I'm back, bitches, and just in time for the holidays


On the first day of Sheet-Mas, my true love gave to me...


1st/502nd

[SMS] Wonder Boy III: The Dragon's Trap - "The Monster's Lair"

[ZIP]

Ok, let's get this out of the way: yes, it's been a while since my last sheet. Especially considering how many I was posting between April and June, back when I was aiming to finish off my backlog of sheets. Around a week after sheet #501 was posted, I got hired at my current job as a music store salesperson. And since moving states in order to start that job, I've spent my time doing mostly three things: finishing my Hydlide Resurgence project, and working through my gaming backlog (I'm using the term "working" very loosely here), and spending time with my new cat, Chucky. Though I know there's so many sheet touch-ups I could've been working on during all those months, think of it as a long-term break. Besides, I had all that time to brainstorm sheet ideas for the 12 Days of Sheet-Mas! So let's begin:

I've gushed about the music of Wonder Boy III before, but man, is it worth gushing about. I'm not gonna lie, most music on the Sega Master System and Game Gear sounds pretty ear-piercing to me, not quite in a Mega Man II on the Game Boy sort of way though. It probably seems this way because the range of sound on the NES dips much lower, and I'm all too biased towards that system (c'mon, I wrote an album for it!). But there are exceptions to this, and Westone's third entry in the Wonder Boy series (no, not that one, more on that later) is a worthy qualifier. In fact, with my limited exposure to the Master System library, I'd venture to declare this soundtrack one of the best on the system. The music is catchy, there's plenty of variety throughout, and the range rarely gets too high up for my liking. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: go listen to the remake's album on Bandcamp! Not only does it have all the fantastic arrangements included in the game, but it also has over 50 bonus tracks, bringing it up to 89 in total to commemorate "one of the best games that came out in 1989". Naturally, once I listened to this music, it led me to playing the game, and I loved it so much I played it multiple times. So please, go check it out!

... oh yeah, and that comment from earlier about this being the third game in the series? There's another "third game" of the series, they're both direct sequels to Wonder Boy: Monster Land. Way to make it so confusing for us, Westone

Before I sign off for tonight, I'd like to bring one thing to your attention: for my 12 Days of Sheet-Mas series this year, no console or franchise will be arranged for twice. I'm doing this to introduce a little more variety to my PA. Expect some interesting stuff to come! Enjoy!!

I've missed being able to say this: enjoy!

[LeviR.star]

On the second day of Sheet-Mas, my true love gave to me...


2nd/503rd

[ARCADE] Puzzle Bobble - "Let's Go to Pao Pao Island!"

[ZIP]

I might catch some heat for saying this, but I can't stand the main theme of Bubble Bobble; something about the repetition, aimlessness and awkward syncopation of the melody really doesn't sit well with my ears. And it's really, really well-known, and while I could see that, it's the type of earworm that would drive me insane. If I were ever to remix it, I'd certainly be met with a lot of opposition for taking some artistic liberties with the rhythms, so I'll hold off on that until I'm experienced enough to do it justice (and feel confident in doing so).

That said, the main theme of Puzzle Bobble, a spin-off of the main series, is such a bop! The first time I heard it, not sure when, I was instantly hooked, and couldn't get the melody out of my head but wasn't even mad about it. I'm glad I finally found a good excuse to arrange it, so now I have the chance to tell you about it. It's weird to me how closely Taito clings to this franchise, even with how popular it was in its heyday, but this adorable little tune is ridiculously catchy and I hope you take the time to listen to it. Enjoy!

[LeviR.star]

On the third day of Sheet-Mas, my true love gave to me...


3rd/504th

[PSX] Pac-Man World - "Ghost Island"

[ZIP]

Believe it or not, Pac-Man World is actually a really fun game! At least, I thought it was. I'm pretty sure the first time I had learned about it was through a Nitro Rad review on YouTube, and while I thought it looked cool, had no real interest in emulating it. Not too long after, however, a remake for modern platforms was announced, and I was convinced that I had to try it. Now, granted, you might be thinking, "a 3D platformer spinoff of a maze game from 1980? No thanks" and I'd totally understand where you're coming from. But having played the remake, I'm here to say it's held up remarkably well! Granted, there were a small handful of problems I had with it, but the level design is good, the bosses are clever, and well, Pac-Man himself is just really fun to control. I've heard the sequel is even better, so if the success of Re-Pac meant anything to Namco, I might be in for a treat.

The music of this game is really creative. The composer, Todd Dennis, takes music from the arcade games and spins it in so many interesting ways that I'm fascinated beyond belief. It's not like some other soundtracks where the main motif gets irritating after a while (looking at you, Super Mario Land 2), no, instead it's consistently catchy and a joy to listen to. I'd say that the single most mind-blowing part is in King Galaxian's boss theme, where the scaling arpeggios at the beginning recall the "game start" fanfare from Galaxian, before moving on to the more well-known game start theme from Galaga, its direct sequel. That Galaxian "sound" or whatever it is barely even qualifies as music, and yet he made it work! Props to him, hearing these classic melodies all over again put a smile on my face.

So go try Pac-Man World Re-Pac! Even if you don't enjoy the platforming, I'll bet you'll at least like the music. Enjoy!

[LeviR.star]

On the fourth day of Sheet-Mas, my true love gave to me...


4th/505th

[GB] Taiyou no Yuusha Fighbird GB - "Stage 4"

[ZIP]

Bit of an obscure pick, even for me, no? At first glance, you'd think so, but the reason I arranged this was not just to bring an old, mostly forgotten game to light. The real reason is that the game's soundtrack was composed by Kenji Yamazaki, who is best known for Mega Man II on the Game Boy (albeit not for the best of reasons, but we've been over that many times). Now, between arranging all of its music for piano, as well as making FamiTracker remixes so that it sounds like Mega Man 2 and 3, I've spent a lot of time focused on this game. But back in May, it was brought to my attention on the FamiTracker discord that this composer's entire discography is documented on VGMPF, and that some of his musical cues heard in Mega Man II can be heard in his other works. Let me explain...

First, the composer heard this:

... leading him to write this:

... as well as the stage 4 track from Taiyou no Yuusha Fighbird GB. I even made a MM3-styled cover of the MMII "Get a Weapon" theme a while back to illustrate the obvious influence this melody had on Yamazaki. This rhythm is heard multiple times throughout II and Fighbird on the Famicom, which he also worked on. Someday, I might finish a VRC6 cover of "Stage 4" but for now I'm putting that WIP on the back burner. Unlike the other games of this year's 12 Days of Sheet-Mas, I would not necessarily recommend this one, but I hope you found these comparisons as interesting as I did—enjoy!