Quarl AIM 2022 Review
Composition/Structure (0-10), Production (0-10), Emotion (0-10), Relevance to Artwork (0-10)
ChromaCee, Girl With A Knife: 9,10,8,10

Thank you for providing some relative data in the author's comments. Since one of the key elements of the contest is "inspiration," providing key data only helps an artist's cause via communicating conceptual ideas not easily conveyed to the listeners via the music. I'm taking everything into account for fairness and too many users didn't write much or in one or two cases, anything at all. Judging for "inspiration" is often subjective but having a manifesto helps direct attention. The image itself isn't terribly inspiring but recording percussion with knives suited the character well, I wouldn't have notice that without your statements. That squishy climax sample at 2:59 implies a viscous stab wound. You did a really good job with very simple elements. The production was very well done, creative, and fun. The reason I mentioned that the image isn't very inspiring is because someone less familiar with Nene might not understand the character well enough to connect the knives.

She literally begs Pico to kill her in the original Pico's school. How she became a reoccurring Newgrounds character after dying in the 90's always confused me a little but she's a fun if incredibly flawed character known for over-reacting. I kind of identify with her manic energy a little bit, I often emotionally crash much as she does.

With the popularity of KawaiiSprite's music in FnF, I'm surprised you didn't use some pitched up female vocals or vocoder. This would have been a good character to include a voice actor or some other form of reference to Nene. The knives aren't enough, imo. She is after all very human and the track could use a little more of her humanity. The track is dark and moody but Nene is a tragic character that FEELS immensely. You could have toyed with my emotions a little bit more with manic orchestral breakdowns or melodic switch ups. This affected both the "composition/Structure" and my "emotion" scores. Even though I think there is more you could have done with this you still made an otherwise wonderful character theme. I'm nitpicking the lack of diversity only to be fair to the other contestants. Not many competitors tried to make theme music for characters. The first half of the judging process involving the other 92 contestants felt like mostly chiptune music with pixel art, diverging from that is sometimes refreshing. 37/40 is still an awesome score.

In any case, I'm happy to have come across this, have a wonderful day Cee. I hate having to nitpick little things like I did for your track but you are far from the only person I've apologized to while writing up my reviews. Judging contests is emotionally draining but at least I'm better aware of the community and I was happy to come across a name I recognized. The late submissions to the contest seem to have a higher ratio of users that I recognize and compared to the users that submitted material on day one or day two, these later tracks feel a little more authentic and inspired. You made good work bae <3

I love the idea of incorporating knife sounds that you recorded and using them in many different ways. Utilizing the kitchen knife as a sample throughout the piece is a creative and resourceful way of drawing inspiration from the art.

For an art piece that portrays a sinister but silly character, I feel like this entry leaned more into the silly aspect, especially given the bouncy nature of the composition. For a piece based off a particular character, I feel like there was a missed opportunity to give this character more sense of a personality that is being held back by the repetition of the piece.

Although I like the concept of using knife samples in the piece, I wasn't a huge fan of the execution and having the rhythm of the knife sample at 1:40 hitting the same emphasis on the beat that the rest of the piece had done beforehand made the whole piece fall flat for me. With such a prominent and distinct sound becoming the forefront, I think there was more opportunity to explore some variation in rhythm and pitch that would have helped transition to the buildup splat at 2:59 more effectively.

Full disclosure - while I'm aware that this is based off an FnF character, I have little to no familiarity with this game and didn't really see how this piece reflects the conniving expression given off by the character in the art.

Greate job!