User Reviews of NSCFCD#2 (2nd Sound Compendium CD for CF by Novastar)

[Novastar]

I'd love to see reviews, thoughts, what you liked, what you didn't... things you'd like to tell people about your experience using the 2nd Sound Compendium for CF... although it's only JUST been shipped--at least from the U.S. (France will take longer).

Videos... text reviews... snapshots... whatever. Although obviously videos usually tell a better story.

I think it would benefit new folks who plan to buy as well. Although it's true that most anything you want to know is on the site link:

http://thecuttingedge.s5.com/bop/nstar_cd2.html

THANKS FOR ALL YOUR SUPPORT OVER THE PAST FEW WEEKS!! It's been astonishing to me how many have purchased the 2nd CD... and continue to purchase the first one! :o I'm in the DIY saber community's debt.

Special thanks to Tim (Strydur) for allowing me to "skirt the line" on the idea of having products out there. I often wonder if it is "fair" for me to do this, but... I guess it's not exactly aiming business AWAY from him! Far from it, lol.

[sekrogue1985]

novastar you have out done yourself again. i just got my CDs today and words cannot express just how killer your work is. Yup, halloween is gonna be some saber lovin' time!

[X]

Love the new CD; it's got AMAZING new fonts. I got mine on Thursday and stayed up late that night just to get the new fonts on my saber for work the next day. My personal favorite is Rain Sizzle, with the thunder rolling in the background you'd swear it was really raining. I absolutely love the Mystery font when I figured out what the sounds were I started laughing my butt off. The guess fonts are quite impressive as well.

Nova you are a genius in saber sounds man.

If you haven't gotten Nova's CD#1 or #2 what are you waiting for? Go get them, you won't be disappointed.

[Mcich]

been meaning to post here for a while, but work and no internet made it a pain, the sounds are just fantastic, got to admit I like the Sidious font, its quite tasty :D but when it comes to my all time fav font it has got to be rain sizzle, just 100% awesome!!!!!!

[Novastar]

Thanks guys! Oh, and don't be afraid to (later on) edit your posts and go into more detail + maybe make a video or what not. I could really use the help. I'm not trying to be "overly bold", but... really, not many actual TRUE reviews exist of my CDs. Sure, we'll hear: "Love them! Thanks!"... but that's about it. :) Not saying everyone needs to review, but... it'd be great to see a few folks really go for it and point out flaws, great things, good things, and all that!

Finally... hmm... I want to (again?) apologize for EP II lightside. It was the weakest font on there (due to the hum sound)... but--I don't seem to be able to do ANYTHING with that particular pitch of hum (which is as accurate to the film as I could get)... because it doesn't "sit well" with little tiny speakers. Kind of a bummer. So... yeah--my weak sauce font is Ep II lightside, lmao!!

EP II darkside is fine though... ;)

Happy Thanksgiving, all!!!

[Obi-Dar Ke-Gnomie]

I just spent a highly enjoyable evening with your CDs. I have to say I'm impressed! They're just chock full of sabery goodness!

I put some new sound banks on Enigma. I now have Ep. IV, Mongrel, Heirloom, Nano Dues Tachi, Steel Sword, and Chainsaw. It took me a while to get everything together and configured, but it was enjoyable work, and everything works fine. No problems to report.

I watched the 250 Battle, and the Staged Combat Tutorial. Very cool. If I can find a willing and reliable partner, I'd like to work up a routine for the Toronto Fan Expo next year. (Of course, I would film it.)

One thing I liked about the 250 Battle was from an artistic/aesthetic point of view. The scenes where the camera pulled back were really cool, because you could see the reflections of the sabers on the floor. It added an interesting element to the video.

I'll have to make a video of my saber with the new fonts. They sound great!

Thanks for all your hard work!

[Novastar]

Thanks Obi-Dar... much oblige for that! :)

On another note... unfortunately a slightly negative one... ugh--I have to admit... the worst font on CD#2 is the blasted "Episode II - re-mastered" stuff...

Man. I don't really know what happened, but--the hum sounds (seems to possibly be BOTH the dark & light versions??) are really causing some distortion for the smaller speakers... and they just "don't sound right", even though I tried my best to make the hums mimic the film.

REALLY sorry for that everyone!!! :( Really. It puzzled me that these fonts got so jacked up, but... *sigh*... I guess those are the breaks. Grrr.

Made me really mad and it's upsetting to see that they didn't come out the way I'd hoped.

My recommendation is to stick with the EP II font from the CD#1 (I really ended up LOVING that font of mine, even when I initially thought I wouldn't care for it much).

Sorry for this. What a bummer.

[Mcich]

well now where to begin with this fantastic array of sound font goodness? well most probably at the start I would think.

Lightwhip: I have had a quick play around with the lightwhip font, it's pretty interesting I have to say, the work done on this font is really good considering there has never been a lightwhip used in any of the movies, the sounds are fantastic and they instantly inspire fantastic images in your mind of when Luke fights a certain sith lady in one of the legacy of the force novels, a great font if you like lightwhips.

Mysery Font: I wont say anything about the mystery font, if you want to know what it is then you will simply need to buy a CF and CD2 to find out, I will say however I had such a good laugh with it :D

Plasma Blade: I understand how much of a struggle this one was for Nova, there were not a great deal of sounds for the Covenant plasma sword in the Halo games, the actual ignition sound is there, the swings, clashes etc are not canon so for all the rabid Halo fans out there just warning you now, dont expect a 100% accurate font.

Rain Sizzle: well what can I say here, this font is by far the cream of the crop, if ever a sound font were to stand out ahead of the pack this is the one, the swings are just delightful, the clashes are fantastic, and the idle hum is just in a league of its own, you can hear thunder rumbling in the background, hear the rain hitting the ground and sizzling on the blade, even when you power the saber down the thunder and rain continue for a little after the blade has turned off, it is simply a beautiful piece of work, everyone with a CF should have this on their saber!

Resblade: personally I prefer this one over the nano deus tachi, and I am a HUGE Deus Ex fan, so for me to say that then this font must have something good about it, that being that it is the first time we have heard what a Vibroblade would sound like, not even in the knights of the old republic games did they put any good detail in the sounds for the Vibroblades, all they did was give them a generic sound like they were a normal sword, Nova has taken a great step by creating the effect of what a Vibroblade SHOULD sound like, the swings are interesting and the idle hum is good, but what I really love about it is the clashes, ohhh yes the clashes, they are just so great to hear, another good sound that all CF owners should toy around with atleast once.

Episode II Remastered: well Nova beat me to it by saying this font is the weak one of the batch, the Lightside idle hum sounds a tad like a plane coming in to land, dont get me wrong the swings and clashes are superb, but just something about that idle hum keeps nagging on me, I have tested out the Darkside version once and it was pretty good, not a great stand out font like Rain Sizzle though, but it is unfair to compare any font to that amazing piece of work, the EPII fonts are alright, but the original EPII font on CD1 was superb enough.

Episode III Obi-Ani: well the font most of us have been waiting on for a LONG time finally comes to our sabers, the fantastic swings, the amazing clashes and lockups and the addition of 2 other powerons and 3 poweroffs, one of which I love so much, the Anakin Alt 2, the one that has a small echo at the end of the deactivation, the blaster sounds are good, some of them are a bit longer than some people may like, but personally this font is fantastic, it makes you want to re-enact the whole final fight between Anakin and Obi-Wan.

Episode III Sidious: there is only really one thing that lets this font down for me, the deactivation, it sounds a tad out of place personally, but that is the only bad thing I can say about this font, the rest of it is tremendous, there is a choice of 3 ignition sounds, the idle hum is really evil sounding, the swings are just so damn good and the clashes are just 100% right! there are no blaster sounds, instead you get to hear that mad scream Sidious does, I had to chuckle the first few times because it was so unexpected, but one of my favourite things is the force sound, it is the sound for when Sidious and Mace both swing out and shatter the massive window in Sidious office, the sounds of the glass tinkling away just really made this font stand out to me.

Episode IV Remastered: how can you make the original EpIV font better? ask Nova, he has made it feel more movie like, the hum, swings, clashes, everything is just so good now, and that is saying something, the EpIV font on CD1 was and still is one of my favourites out there, I did notice however that the hum is a little lower pitched than the swings etc. you can hear the hum in the swing background at a higher and slightly faster pitch, but that is about all that there is that I noticed.

Episode V Remastered: remastering this font to me was like watching the re-release of ESB in the cinema when Lucas decided to touch them up back in the 90's, a rollercoaster ride of fun and awe, and this font brought back all those childhood memories for me, the swings most of all, just so perfect for the carbonite duel, they sound just so fantastic, the clashes are all 100% accurate as is the blade lockup, the only thing for me that was a tad annoying is the carbonite chamber sound instead of a force power, but hey when you measure it up to how great this font is then you can quite happily let it slip, not only that but this time round we get Boba Fett's blaster taking shots at us! ahhh Nova you spoil us!

TFU Starkiller: now this is a good font to play around with, the ignition is great, the powerdown is superb, and the swings are just what we all love, movie accurate sounds, I didn't like that 3 of the blaster sounds were force powers like force bomb, lightning etc. but its easily fixed by just using the blaster sound twice and the alt blaster sound twice, there you go it is sorted, the force power however stands out, it is the sound of the saber being thrown, and it kinda messes with you, it sounds like the saber is spinning round you, really cool effect and a fantastic step into the realm of the force unleashed.

Thrasher: now I can't really comment on this one as I have not tried it out myself, just got to wait for someone else to give it a try ;)

[Novastar]

Plasma Blade: ...the swings, clashes etc are not canon so for all the rabid Halo fans out there just warning you now, dont expect a 100% accurate font.Yeah, sorry for that... as far as I was able to tell--the swing sounds were just "wooshes" in the games. Sounded weak to me for something like a "PLASMA" sword, lol. Additionally, I didn't find any "clash" sounds either (except you hitting an object that blows up or gets cut)... and, yup, I wanted to at LEAST try not copying everything on this outright.


Episode IV Remastered: ...I did notice however that the hum is a little lower pitched than the swings etc. you can hear the hum in the swing background at a higher and slightly faster pitch, but that is about all that there is that I noticed.This was done on purpose, as... if you listen to the film closely enough--when Ben and Vader meet--the sounds do precisely this! :)

Certainly I would tell anyone using this font to remove most any/all pitch shifting though, as it would ruin the "film accurate" effect.

THANKS THOUGH FOR THAT!! I think your comments are dead-on for the mostpart. Especially with EP II re-mastered (I'm gonna get flack for this font for years to come, lol)... it's really too bad it didn't work out the way I'd hoped. The "screen accurate hum" for that one eludes me. Recycling older ones is nice and all... but I tried hard to get it to work. Grrrr, FAIL. :D hehhehehe

And... oh poop, I guess I didn't include an alternate powerOFF for the Sidious font. Bugger me!! I guess Sith happens though... lol.