The NSM Guess-That-Melody Quiz!

[Latios212]

Just to clarify: We're supposed to avoid using music that has already been used in previous quizzes, right? Since there's one that I reallly want to add, but someone's already used it in one of their quizzes. And that makes me sadder than a sad panda.

Not at all! As long as you're not using the same exact part, I see no problem with using the same tracks.

[mastersuperfan]

If you want to keep it in, that's certainly fine. I personally don't want to do any repeats (which does become a bit problematic when I make so many big quizzes in advance), which is why I always complain about getting melodies "stolen."

(Maybe I should've kept in that selection I just posted here, since it was a pretty clever excerpt, but I always have plenty of backup tracks as replacements.)

[Dekkadeci]

You have less than 21 hours to submit your guesses to me! The deadline's still 1:00 PM MDT tomorrow, and I've only gotten guesses from 4 people so far. Don't be afraid to try, even if you've got only one song's worth of guesses!

[Dudeman]

Guys, this one's really good. Please submit answers, I like competition.

[LeviR.star]

I like competition.

You won't have a good one; I only got 4.

[InsigTurtle]

To be honest, I didn't even see the round start post. WHOooopsies

[Dekkadeci]

You have less than 2 hours to submit to this round start post,
then:

Here's my second Guess-The-Song Quiz:
[PDF] | [MIDI] | [MUS] | [MSCZ]

The MUS is readable in Finale, including Finale Notepad. The MSCZ is readable in Musescore. All other files are based on the original MSCZ, not the MUS--this explains why the PDF doesn't look like the MUS.
The MUS may display and/or play back bugged. The MSCZ, PDF, and MIDI shouldn't.

You can PM answers to me until Saturday, May 20 at 1:00 PM MDT (a.k.a. Saturday, May 20 8:00 PM forum default time). I will not count any submissions made after that time, as I'll be too busy tallying results.
Results will be posted shortly afterwards.

Some guidelines for answering, how the melodies are transcribed, and what counts as a correct answer:

• When transcribing these songs, I prioritized OSTs over high-quality rips. Keep that in mind while guessing.
• You may submit YouTube links/videos instead of game name-song name/best known use pairs.
• All tempos are approximate.
• Like last time, I will mark unambiguous songs with the right melody in the right key as correct. If your guess has the right melody in the wrong key, I will mark it as incorrect but PM back that you were close. You can freely guess again until the deadline. With that being said, the obvious choice should be the correct one for the most part.
• I may not have gotten octave voicings correct in this quiz. If you think you've got the right song but it's off by an octave or two in parts, just guess that song anyway.
• I had trouble transcribing #4, #7, the end of #9, #10, the end of #12, and #13. These melodies are less likely to be completely melodically and rhythmically accurate.
• Hint: At least one melody is found in a song in a Super Smash Bros. game, but none of them were written for Super Smash Bros.
• Hint: Exactly one melody is a remix of a piece of classical music. For that melody only, you may guess the name of the piece of classical music it's based on instead of the name of the song (or its best known use, or a YouTube video), but you must also guess which game it's from.
• Hint: #14 has its last note cut off.

[Yug_Guy]

I'm going to busy for the rest of the day, so I'm gonna go ahead and post this now:

Melody Guessing Contest
"Two's Company" - MUS - MIDI - PDF

This quiz contains 15 melodies separated into 3 difficulty levels: Mild, Hot, and Spicy. Songs in Mild and Hot are from Nintendo* franchises, while songs in Spicy aren't limited to just Nintendo, and can be from anywhere.

You guys have until 6:00 pm CST on Monday, May 22 to send me your guesses. Feel free to send multiple messages with guesses, just be sure to send any subsequent messages as replies to your original message, so I have them all in one place. Also, sorry if I don't respond to you right away: like I said, I'm gonna be busy the rest of today.

Also, protip: you might want to format your guesses like "#4", since if you use parenthesis you eventually end up with .

Otherwise, good luck!
*Okay, maybe one or two aren't explicitly Nintendo franchises, but they might as well be.

[mastersuperfan]

I CRI EVR TIM ;-;

I used six flats instead of six sharps, which you can't see because I wanted to hide the number, but it's the same one

[Dekkadeci]

Here are the answers to my latest quiz:

#1

"Menu"/"Menu Select Theme"/"Menu Theme", from Metroid Prime
Timestamp: 0:08

I decided to start this off with an easy melody to ease listeners into the quiz. This might have worked.

I also accepted the Credits Theme of Metroid Prime as correct, as it's an extension of the Menu Theme.

I reluctantly marked the Title Theme of Metroid Prime as correct because, even though there's lots of evidence that the Title Theme of Metroid Prime is a different song entirely, the topmost search result on YouTube contains that melody. I strongly suspect that video is mislabelled, but I didn't expect anyone else to do their research.

Oh yeah, this melody is in a Super Smash Bros. game.

3 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#2

"Sullied Grace"/"Dirty & Beauty"/"Queen Sectonia 1", from Kirby: Triple Deluxe, used as Queen Sectonia's first final boss theme (and Queen Sectonia DX's only boss theme)
Timestamp: 1:12

I also accepted Sectonia Clone's boss theme--"Faded & Flower"/"Faded Flower" from Kirby: Planet Robobot--as correct, as it slices out all of the original's intro except this melody.

I picked this melody because it is highly repetitive. The first 2 bars are repeated 3 more times in that excerpt. If you didn't get the song from the opening 2 bars, chances are that you didn't get this song entirely. Luckily, even though the melody only starts playing more than a minute into the original song, it marks a pretty noticeable tempo and texture change...(By the way, I tried to evenly distribute such highly repetitive melodies throughout the quiz.)

2 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#3

"Mechanical Rhythm", from Xenoblade Chronicles, used as the regular battle theme while in Mechonis
Timestamp: 0:38

Given that this song is relatively famous, I purposefully picked this melody to both use the anthemic F minor portion and dodge all versions of the opening riff (thus why its 8 bars start with 2 bars in D minor).

Also, this melody is in a Super Smash Bros. game.

5 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#4

"The Decadent Dandy (King Knight Battle)", from Shovel Knight, used as King Knight's boss theme
Timestamp: 0:05

This is one of the less popularly arranged Shovel Knight songs, so I picked an excerpt from close to the beginning of the song. I don't really wanna transcribe the intro...besides, it's hard to extract the melody of this piece from the .nsf. The last bar of my melody is particularly deceptive...

5 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#5

"Great Grey Wolf Sif", from Dark Souls, used as Sif's boss theme
Timestamp: 0:00

This is the only melody in this quiz that I transcribed pretty much cold, without listening to it several times beforehand. So I figured I'd better transcribe the very start, as I didn't have a clue which sections of the song would be the most iconic. It's a bit ambiguous to me which melodic line is higher-volume in parts.

Fun fact: I first heard of this song from a FamilyJules Dark Souls medley. This combined with Dark Souls's music being somewhat played in orchestras and the several remixes of Sif's theme on YouTube convinced me that this song was not obscure. So I guessed that at least one person would get this song right. Alas...

Yes, we have Dark Souls music on www.ninsheetmusic.org. I don't think I'm the only one here to have heard of Dark Souls's OST.

0 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#6

"Theme of the Cheetahmen"/"Cheetahmen Theme"/"Game 52: Action Gamemaster", from Action 52
Timestamp: 0:00

This melody and #7 were meant to be a pair, and if one of them were stolen, I would need to replace them both with another pair of similar-sounding melodies from different games. The first melody in the pair would always be the less popular one to possibly bamboozle listeners.

Note that the main theme of Cheetahmen II is practically the same song.

This Cheetahmen stuff apparently became a meme as recently as 2007, complete with an album of Cheetahmen music remixes being published then.

I later found out that this is a highly repetitive melody, as it also repeats its first 2 bars 3 more times in its 8 bars. Thus, I dragged the paired melodies far away from #2 so you wouldn't notice that highly repetitive melodies are a sub-theme of this quiz.

Yes, this song is on www.ninsheetmusic.org.

This is one of the 2 obscure songs that I predicted nobody would guess correctly. Somehow, I was proven wrong.

2 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#7

"Pursuit ~ Cornered"/"Cornered", from Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, used when submitting the last piece of evidence in a trial
Timestamp: 0:00

This melody and #6 were meant to be a pair, and if one of them were stolen, I would need to replace them both with another pair of similar-sounding melodies from different games. The second melody in the pair would always be the more popular one to ensure that people would realize that they were led astray.

In this case, this melody is really popular, and given how obscure #6 is, I trusted that this would ensure that nobody would guess this melody's song for #6. Luckily for me, that worked.

5 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#8

"Garden Boogie", from Dance Dance Revolution Mario Mix
Timestamp: 0:30

I thought I'd throw in a VGM remix of a piece of classical music into one of my quizzes. That remix would have to sound distinctively different from the original in order for me to use it. Luckily, this song fit the bill.

This song is a remix of Georges Bizet's so-called Carmen Overture (in reality, the Prelude to Act I of that opera).

This is one of the 2 obscure songs that I predicted nobody would guess correctly. Somehow, I was proven wrong.

1 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#9

"Fighting to the End", from Bravely Default, used as the regular boss theme
Timestamp: 0:57

I like Bravely Default's OST in general, and this is one of my favourite songs from that game (don't worry, I like "That Person's Name Is" at least slightly more). I find this melody's riff to be pretty distinctive, if rather angular for Revo/Sound Horizon/Linked Horizon.

Given how well-received Bravely Default and its OST were, I thought at least one person would get this song correct. At least that came true for this song...

You can be particularly evil and transcribe part of the solos in the second loop of this song (2:02 and later) in your next quiz.

1 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#10

"Guardian Deities Battle"/"Battle! (Tapu)", from Pokemon Sun and Pokemon Moon, used as the battle theme against the Tapu legendaries
Timestamp: 0:11

This is one of my favourite songs from Pokemon Sun and Pokemon Moon, and given how angular it is, I thought it would be fairly hard to get. So I picked an excerpt from near the beginning of the piece. And it was hell to transcribe, and it's hell to read. But, apparently, it wasn't hell to recognize...

4 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#11

"Death by Glamour", from Undertale, used as Mettaton EX's boss theme
Timestamp: 1:04

I picked this melody to have a fair chance of tricking you into picking the wrong song. I marked "Metal Crusher" (still from Undertale, used as Mettaton's boss theme) as incorrect, as it contains a similar melody in the wrong key. Somehow, nobody fell for it. Maybe it's because this song is arguably the more famous of the two...

5 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#12

"Circuit"/"Raceways"/"3 Raceways & Wario Stadium", from Mario Kart 64, used as the theme for Luigi Raceway, Mario Raceway, Royal Raceway, and Wario Stadium
Timestamp: 0:04

This was the last of the highly repetitive melodies. Unlike the other two, it only repeats its first 2 bars two more times instead of three. The 7th bar is the same as the first one, though.

I have a habit of singing the drum roll in the last bar, which is why I took the trouble to attempt to transcribe it.

4 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#13

"The Greatest Warrior in the Galaxy"/"The Strongest Warrior in the Galaxy"/"The Strongest Knight in the Galaxy", from Kirby Super Star Ultra, used as Galacta Knight's boss theme
Timestamp: 0:27

Unlucky #13 is a melody so fast that its notes blur together, likely ensuring that any transcriptions of it are hard to trust. If I weren't restricted to using only songs from video games that share a series with at least one song in www.ninsheetmusic.org for this quiz, I would easily have picked another song instead for that role. Every time I listen to this song with better headphones, I'm reminded how rhythmically inaccurate I likely am...

...especially since, if you were observant, you may have noticed that I ripped this melody straight from my current transcription of this song and corrected the octave voicing. No fixing the accidentals this time...

I marked both versions of Galacta Knight's theme in later games, "Warrior from Another World" from Kirby's Return to Dream Land and "The Greatest Time Travelling Warrior in the Galaxy" from Kirby: Planet Robobot, as incorrect because they modify this melody.

Based on all other arrangements of this song I've heard, nobody else has ever arranged or transcribed 0:43-0:49 correctly, despite several attempts being published. Maybe stay away from excerpts like that in future quizzes...

4 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#14

"Knight of the Wind", from Sonic and the Black Knight, used as the "main theme" (including the credits)
Timestamp: 0:17

Yup, this song has lyrics. I couldn't bear to keep transcribing after the 8th bar, which is why I cut it off instead of extending the note into a 9th bar. I like listening to the instrumental version, but it doesn't have the vocal melody anywhere, so I suspect it's a karaoke backing track...

Oh yeah, this melody is in a Super Smash Bros. game.

1 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

#15

"To Zanarkand"/"Zanarkand", from Final Fantasy X, used as the opening theme
Timestamp: 0:25

I ended my quiz with an easy song to reward you for listening this far. It's also one of the only slow songs in this quiz.

...Well, at least I thought it would be easy based on how many rearrangements of this I've listened to and how disparate their arrangers are. This was partially a test to see how famous I could expect Final Fantasy music to be in this forum.

Fun fact: My cousin played this piece at his sister's (my other cousin's) wedding.

3 out of 6 people got this correct.

[close]

Winner

And the winner is...Dudeman, with 12 melodies correct!

If you care, the rest of the rankings are below:

Rankings

• Dudeman: 12 melodies
• mastersuperfan: 9 melodies
• Maelstrom: 8 melodies
• Yug_Guy: 7 melodies
• Latios212: 5 melodies
• LeviR.star: 4 melodies

[close]

[close]

[Maelstrom]

3rd by one augh

[LeviR.star]

*hides face*

[Dudeman]

You know, it's honestly both surprising and worrying how often I see some variation of the phrases "I assumed people would know this, but they didn't" or "I assumed people wouldn't know this, but they did" in those explanations. Your VGM library must be incredibly different from the rest of us.

And out of curiosity, what melody did you think we'd think 11 was? Anybody who didn't immediately think that was Death By Glamour would be out of their mind.

[LeviR.star]

You know, it's honestly both surprising and worrying how often I see some variation of the phrases "I assumed people would know this, but they didn't" or "I assumed people wouldn't know this, but they did" in those explanations. Your VGM library must be incredibly different from the rest of us.

And out of curiosity, what melody did you think we'd think 11 was? Anybody who didn't immediately think that was Death By Glamour would be out of their mind.

I didn't even recognize Death By Glamour, which is weird, because I was just listening to the OST a week ago.

[Dudeman]

Well, I meant those who recognized the melody. If you recognized it, I can't think of what else besides DBG you'd think of.