[Mirby]

Here we are again, at the start of a new year. However, just as at the start of every year, there are quite a few uncertainties about what may come in the following 365 days. Sometimes it is comforting to look back at the year that just wrapped up and see all the various things that happened. As I have done for the previous two years, I now present to you 2012: The Year In ReView.

The year started off with a bang as C-jeff released Preschtale, a prog-rock masterpiece consisting of seven parts and even featuring some guitarwork by Danimal Cannon. OverClocked ReMix also posted "The Unbroken," a Cave Story remix; containing vocals and combining synthetic and orchestral stylings, it was quite the unique mix from Nutritious. Both of these were on the first too! As for the rest of January... The long-awaited Unsung Heroes was finally released on the 24th. Consisting of remixes from underremixed games, there were plenty of gems on the album that made it a must-have.

In February, Ben Landis released his Adventures in Pixels album, combining both a comic with chiptune accompaniment. On the 3rd, housethegrate returned to OCR with a Zelda II mix entitled, "Heroes Fall." Consisting of three guitars (one steel-string, one nylon-string, and one electric), the arrangement represents a trio much like the Triforce of Zelda's lore. February 22nd brought The Music of Retro City Rampage, featuring the works of virt, Norrin Radd, and Freaky DNA. February 28th marked the premiere of Touhou Tuesday on Arecibo Radio, hosted by OverCoat and occasionally TrueStar as well! The show takes a look at things in regards to the Touhou arrangement scene, and quickly developed quite the following.

Jake Kaufman had another masterpiece not long afterwards, when FX4 released at the start of March. Though it was the fourth entry in the FX saga, this was the first to be made entirely in Famitracker. As a result, with a bit of time, effort, and the right technology, all of FX4 could be played on actual NES hardware. March 9th brought the release of ella guro's dys4ia soundtrack, which is just as great as the game it plays in. A few days after that (March 13th to be precise), an Earthbound tribute album using the soundfont from the original game was released. Entitled I Miss You - EarthBound 2012, multiple artists combined their talents to show their love for the classic. The day afterwards, OCR released the gargantuan Mega Man X: Maverick Rising. Consisting of 5 discs and 62 tracks, the album took on songs from the entire Mega Man X series (and a track from Mega Man Zero 4). The day after that, Shnabubula released NES Jams. Taking chiptune mastery as seen on his Game Genie album and combining it with live piano, the album took on various songs from NES games and continued the narrative started with Game Genie.

April brought the transformation of OverClocked ReMix into VocalClocked ReMix, featuring such classics as "Katy Perry vs. Suikoden," "Quad City DJs vs. TMNT 4 Turtles in Time," and "...Tetris Play You." Granted, it was all part of the annual April Fool's joke, but the last one actually did become posted in the end. ThaSauce had a brief partnership with OverClocked ReMix, adopting OCR's standards and releasing a Cityville/Farmville arrangement album. However, things quickly soured due to the intervention of a certain bearded individual and the partnership broke off. As a result, ThaSauce partnered with VGMix and released the VGMix Archive, a move that stretched past the April Fool's shenanigans and aims to centralize all the various VGMix tracks in one location.

The rest of April also brought some great stuff. April 2nd brought Diddy Kong Racing: Bootleg Circuit, an EP by Benjamin Briggs and one of the first GameChops releases. The 4th brought zircon's Unearthed, a collection of various songs from within the zircon archives of the five years previous, and the 5th brought SOUNDSHOCK 2: FM FUNK TERRROR!!, a phenomenal collection of FM mastery. The first Crash Bandicoot remixes to be posted on OCR also came on the 5th, both thanks to Rexy. OCR released Pilotwings: Take Flight on the 25th, a short EP by halc that comprised the original game's soundtrack, plus two tracks by Insert Rupee: one from Pilotwings 64 and another from Pilotwings Resort.

May 3rd brought the phenomenal tracer, by coda. Telling the tale of four members of a lost space shuttle, the album takes the listener on an adventure across a strange blue planet as told by the tracer modules left in each escape pod. May 19th kicked off the start of SNESology; the Genesis/Mega Drive scene has long had people interested in the sounds and system therein (take April's SOUNDSHOCK 2, for example) but the SNES has never really had that same type of deal despite having some great tunes and sounds of its own. SNESology aims to remedy that, and already has to some extent, thanks to Shnabubula who founded the site. The 29th marked the release of Starbound, by Shnabubula. Just as with all his works, this one is a phenomenal addition to anyone's library. The end of the month marked an exclusive listen to the then-unreleased Rokko Chan Arrange album on Noise Channel Radio; due to the unfinished nature of the album, the show had no archive.

June brought the fantastic Where Good Marbles Go To Die, headed by Stemage and featuring a different guest artist on each of the album's seven tracks. June 14th brought Inverse Phase's Pretty Eight Machine, a dedication to the Nine Inch Nails album Pretty Hate Machine; as such, it reimagines the album on eight different 8-bit systems, ranging from standard fare such as Game Boy and NES to more exotic systems such as the Sega Master System and Atari 800. halc's Pixel Perfect Complete released on the 15th, ending the Pixel Perfect saga by collecting the tracks from the LP and EP and adding in some arrangements and new entries. On June 18th, OCR released Final Fantasy: Random Encounter, a metal take on the original Final Fantasy's soundtrack. "My Innermost Apocalypse" was added to The Binding of Isaac in an update on June 21; the song features guitar by FamilyJules7x, who was approached by Danny B about it after Jules did some Super Meat Boy and Binding of Isaac guitar covers on his YouTube channel. The 23rd brought the posting of VocalClocked ReMix's "...Tetris Play You" arrangement, which was great anyways. The final day of the month brought the first part of the long-awaited Mega Man 3 album by The Megas, entitled History Repeating: Blue. It's quite evident that the group has improved immensely compared to Get Equipped just on the first track, and it leaves the listener eagerly awaiting History Repeating: Red.