[Dhsu]

Or "doujin," for those in the know. :P This is probably the third time I've revived this thread, and I'm not sure why I keep doing it. I guess I feel some sort of duty to keep newcomers informed of stuff outside our borders. It's also my hope that someone from Japan gets a remix posted on OCR someday. The rest of this thread is cross-posted from the GamingForce Forums.

The Japanese VGM arrangement community is significantly different from the American one in that artists don't submit their works to central sites like OverClocked ReMix, VGMix, or Dwelling of Duels. Instead, everyone has their own site and provides their own hosting, although occasionally members of the community will come together and contribute to group projects known as "events." Due to the nature of the doujin music community, finding sites on your own is fairly cumbersome, especially if you don't understand Japanese. And even then, it takes time to separate the good from the mediocre and plain bad. Therefore, the purpose of this thread is to share and discuss your discoveries and recommendations.

If you've never even heard of any of this until now, that's fine. A few people have taken it upon themselves to highlight/catalog these sites. Here are links to some of their sites, along with a couple others to get you started. Keep in mind that most of the MP3s are packaged in LZH format, so you'll need software such as WinRAR that can extract that type of file. Also, Excite's translator should help get around the language barrier.

Lists and threads
[Remix/Arrange] VGM Sites - A good list of both Japanese and English VGM arrangement sites. Great place to start.
niki's finds - A doujin-sharing thread by another GamingForce member.
TheShizz doujin thread - Good list with links and downloads from various doujin sites.
2chan OCR/VGMix thread - If we talk about their remixes on our message boards, it makes sense for them to talk about our remixes on theirs. ;)
Video Game Music Covers YouTube group - Started by 778 of GNGB. Kind of like the OCR YouTube group, but for VGM in general. Lots of great vids.

Blogs
Arrange Stream - The site that started it all for me. Currently on indefinite hiatus.
Noctilucence - A cool VGM arrangement review blog.
Disaster - A daily log of the latest doujin site updates. Probably the closest thing you'll find to a Japanese OverClocked ReMix. ;)
Good Nintentions Gone Bad - An interesting blog devoted to VG arrangements and...porn?
Nitouhei's Blog - Another good arrangement blog. Fairly regularly updated. If you're a remixer, try putting your name in the search box and see what comes up.

Database/Search sites
- A blog run by several members of the doujin music community. Also keeps track of sites like OCReMix and VGMix.
- An amazing searchable catalog of literally hundreds of doujin sites, even including American ones.
- Probably the biggest existing database of doujin sites currently.
- Another search site, with handy drop-down boxes for various categories.
Otokei Doujin Database - Pretty self-explanatory.

Some of my personal favorite artists
YAMAGEN
MintJam
CROW'SCLAW
preludio
S.S.H.
Hellion Sounds
ViViX (and Serenade)
AD794
Magical Trick Society
Azu Piano
Zephyr Cradle
(Rock and heavy metal stuff is pretty popular if you didn't notice :P )