XenoSound

I’m a fair bit late to uploading this here, but here is my arrangement of “Bubbly Clouds” from Kirby, along with some original artwork.

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Disclaimer:  Not sure how much it affects my opinion, but I have the Nintendo Switch version, and probably had only completed a handful of shrines, so I’m not sure how my thoughts may reflect any final opinions.

Also, there will be no spoilers in this, at least not until the end when I’ll include a warning

Overall, I have to say:  I absolutely love this game!  Never before had I been so captivated by an open world game, and it has been a while since I’ve loved a Zelda game this much on my first play through (Skyward Sword took a while to grow on me).  Never have I felt lost, overwhelmed, or like I had nothing important to do in the game, and yet at any given time there is so much to do, which hasn’t quite been the case with games like Skyrim or Xenoblade X.

Story: I feel like I am yet to put a dent in the content of the game, especially when it comes to the story.   All I can say about it really so far is that it looks like it will be a great one with a fair bit of depth, but the fact that it is an “open world” game has me skeptical.  But I have faith in it, it is Zelda after all.

Characters: Once again, I hadn’t gotten myself far enough to say many specifics on the main characters of the game, but the few characters I have gotten to know are undeniably Zelda characters, and that is with no doubt a good thing!  I’m glad with all the drastic changes Nintendo made with this title, they are not getting rid of the quirky characters we all love.

Gameplay: Arguably the most important thing in any game, the gameplay of BOTW is great!  Like I touched on in the summery, I am yet to feel bored, which is quite a feat for a game of this genre.  My only hope is that it manages to stay that way for the many, many hours I will be playing it.

My only real complaints of the game so far are relating to the gameplay.  For one, the frame rate is less than ideal at times.  I haven’t noticed it being an issue much after the beginning of the game, which may be because it gets better, or I have just gotten used to it.  I’m hoping it is the former.  Also, I wish inventory was a bit bigger at the start of the game, I hate having to shuffle my weapons around as much as I do, but I understand why it is that way.

Music and Visuals:  By far the visuals of this game are the most impressive I’ve seen on the switch... wait a second... 

Jokes aside, the game looks great, from the grass blowing in the wind, to the great landscapes stretching as far as the eye can see.  Only complaints really are the pop in you get with some objects, but since my eyes are mostly focused on the the distance, I’ll forgive the sacrifice that needed to be made for the game to run (almost) smoothly.

And the music is cool.  I’m yet to sit down to listen to the OST, ‘cause spoilers and all, but  I love the piano ambiance and the jazzy voicings when you gain a Spirit Orb.  Oh yeah, and the song that plays when a Guardian sees you is terrifying.  (quite comparable to the silent realm in Skyward Sword)

MINOR SPOILERISH STUFF AHEAD

I mostly wanted to use this section to talk about how terrified I was during the first blood moon.  I’ve heard about it from NPC’s, but when I saw the blood red color of the moon, I was shocked.  I thought that was it.  “Hey look, a red moon, i guess the enemies have respawned,” but NOPE, the whole sky needs to turn red as a haunting cutscene plays.  Zelda games just have a thing for scary moons, I guess.

Also, it looks like Ganon may very well be a formidable rival once again, so I’m looking forward to what ever may happen with the main story.

I’m also super happy to see the return of Gorons, Zoras, Rito, and Gerudo.  I’ve only actually seen Zoras so far, but I’m eager to see the rest.

So as you could probably tell, uploads have been much less frequent lately, and I am falling very short of the weekly schedule I had set back when I started my channel.  And I honestly wish I had some kind of solution where I could be able to have a consistent upload schedule, but at this point it looks like it will be near impossible, at least for the time being.

Recently I tried to push to get a few songs done ahead of time, so I could have a buffer of videos to put out during particularly busy weeks, but even that was very exhausting to try and fit in with school and extracurriculars, and to be honest none of the songs I worked on met my standards for quality of songs I put out.

When starting my YouTube channel, it was a goal of mine to be sure that every one of my videos was an improvement over the last, in one way or another, and with only a few exceptions, I believe I had achieved that.  However, I can say this is becoming increasingly harder to achieve, and considering what I know I am capable of, the last few uploads of mine have been disappointing.  That’s not to say my piano medleys have been bad per se, but when compared to my covers of “KK Crusin’” and “Midna’s Lament,” there is much more to be desired, which I cannot consistently deliver within a weekly schedule.

In summary, for now, and for at least the next few months, I will be switching to an irregular schedule of uploading whenever I finish a song.  This will ensure the quality of uploads will be better than before, and will allow me to do things I haven't had time to do before, like collabs and recording with real acoustic (particularly percussion) instruments, instead of digitally produced sounds and samples.  And trust me, I have quite a few great things planned for my channel!

This is my take at an 8-bit version of the theme Hooked from Splatoon!

Here is my chiptune arrangement of the theme from one of my very favorite cartoons, We Bare Bears.