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Initial Impressions


ParoXyzm
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Right - so I picked up the DDR bundle at ebgames for around $40CAD. Minus the price of the pad, I would expect the actual game to be around $30CAD.

 

Having said that, I would say as a first impression that this game would be worth no more than what it is. It costed me 1600 MS points to get any decent music onto this game, what with its horrible English set list. While many songs are unlockable, it just becomes a hassle to actually get them. Call me a weeaboo or whatever the hell you want, but I don't think core ddr enthusiasts really want to play songs like Jason Mraz's I'm Yours. I can understand the difficulty associated with slower BPM songs, but this is just plain ridiculous. If I can barely get through the song without puncturing my ears out, then I know something is most definitely wrong.

 

As for the actual game play, the interface is cleaned up a bit and the background can be dimmed down to reduce distractions. Even so, whenever a arrow gets "danced", it "explodes" leaving a trail of sparkly and annoying stars in your face. Combine this with the annoying-as-hell bonus counter in the middle of the screen, it really is quite frustrating to see what notes are coming up. To make it even worse, you have this stupid thing called Chaining where all the arrows become gray to symbolize the fact they are "bonus" notes. As a player who aims for all perfects, being unable to determine the type of note (1/4, 1/8, etc.) is extremely bothersome. You sometimes can't even tell whether the notes are double notes or if they are just single notes that are really close to each other (ie. 2 1/8 notes).

 

Game mode wise, I can't stand club mode. This would be a result of the fact you cannot choose which songs you get. You would have to play the shitlist of English songs before you get them into your club and can then select your own set lists. Combined with the fact that you start at beginner difficulty (it changes throughout the song), it just becomes a mind-numbingly tedious game mode.

 

Achievement-wise, the game is much easier to get GS in compared to the Universe series. "Goods" are now included in combos and getting AAA is extremely easy now.

 

Groove trigger is similar to Guitar Hero's star power mode were you have to activate it. When you are playing Expert or Challenge though it is quite annoying having to slide your foot to trigger it. As well, it seems I trigger it by accident whenever I play normally, so it doesn't really bother me at all.

 

Ultimately this game is better than the Universe series mainly because you have decent DLC (albeit expensive) but definitely nowhere as good as the PS2 classic DDR games. All of the above was written in perspective of a core DDR player who grew up playing on the Japanese import cabinets at the arcade. If you are a casual DDR player and/or enjoy today's horribly auto-tuned music, you might enjoy this game.

 

Normally I would not rant nearly as much about disappointing games, but I just felt like I needed to let off some steam. It is all my personal feelings so if you disagree that is fine. I would also be appreciative to hear what others thing about this game.

Edited by ParoXyzm
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Some of the licensed songs aren't bad. Read: SOME. Yes, most of them are pretty terrible for this game, but I happen to enjoy Rio and So Fine myself. Not to mention, some of the starting Konami Originals like In The Zone and Magic Parade are pretty good. Once you start unlocking stuff, Top The Charts and Until The End are pretty sweet songs.

 

Yeah, the interface is pretty lousy and Chaining is a stupid addition to the already piss-easy scoring, even without making it difficult to discern the arrows' timing. On the plus side, the background videos don't cause to framerate to fall through the floor like they did on the Universe series. Not to mention, some of them look pretty good, like say, those cute geishas in the background of Flowers.

 

Yes, Club Mode is terrible. What's even worse (that I'm surprised you didn't mention) was how it automatically throws mods at you at random and they get worse as your songs increase in level. This would be bad enough, but it seems like Konami doesn't have a good idea what mods are harder than others. At Lv.3, they throw Sudden and Dark at you, which isn't too bad, but at Lv.2, they displace the position of one random arrow in the Step Zone, which is practically an instant-kill if you're playing above a certain difficulty.

 

I remember thinking the DLC was expensive too, but I was reminded that DLC for the Universe series was priced at an average of 100 MS points per song as opposed to 80 points per song for this version. Still pricey, but I might consider getting a couple of the songpacks after I completely wipe out Club Mode.

 

The game is okay, but not great. Personally, I think the Universe series was better than this game. I am, however, thankful that Konami had the good sense to sell the bundle brand new for only $40. And yes, I've been playing since the days of 3rd Mix and have several of the JP games imported.

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Ah, about the Club Mode trick mods, I don't think I got far enough into it (i gave up after Jason Mraz came on) to have weird mods thrown at me. I don't really understand how they judge how well you're doing because I was on a perfect combo into the third song then all of a sudden they dropped my difficulty down to beginner (on Jason Mraz) making the arrows literally "crawl" up the screen...

 

I will probably give the game another try to 1k it but until I unlock the Konami Originals, I will not be having very much fun ... All in all the game itself ended up being $60 (the price of a normal new release) which includes all the DLC I purchased. So I suppose considering that, I don't feel as cheated.

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Yes, Club Mode is terrible. What's even worse (that I'm surprised you didn't mention) was how it automatically throws mods at you at random and they get worse as your songs increase in level. This would be bad enough, but it seems like Konami doesn't have a good idea what mods are harder than others. At Lv.3, they throw Sudden and Dark at you, which isn't too bad, but at Lv.2, they displace the position of one random arrow in the Step Zone, which is practically an instant-kill if you're playing above a certain difficulty.

Amen to this! Having that one arrow displaced, at Trick Lv.2, is often enough to kill you right away. Especially if you've recently used a groove trigger, meaning your bar is only around half-full. This leaves you with almost zero room for error. None of the other tricks case me any grief, and the earlier ones actually make gameplay substantially easier (like high speed scrolling and note step color.) I'm just waiting for them to throw stealth at me, once I unlock the highest trick level.

 

I actually love a lot of the licensed songs, including the host of classic 60s-90s tracks they threw in there. There are some fantastic Konami originals as well, and many more become available down the line (as all 20 unlocks are Konami tracks.) Besides, this game has Ever Snow - one of my couple favorite DDR songs of all-time. It's a cover by Terra, not the original Komatsu Yoma version, but in a way that's actually even better. It's a great cover, an extended mix, and something fresh.

 

The only problem I have with Club Mode is how long it's going to take to max out the bar for every song. It seems you'll have to play a song at least 20 times to max it out, and there's 50 songs in the game. That's would be 1000 songs played by itself, if not for the fact that the songs you play are randomized. I tend to see the same half-dozen songs over and over again, whereas none of the boss songs have even shown up once for me.

 

Getting DLC would also be sort of a double-edged sword. It would add some variety to Club Mode, using some of our favorite Konami originals from yesteryear. But at the same time, it would add more potential songs to the pool. In that, Club Mode would take even longer to complete. It already looks like that mode could take a three-digit number of hours to clear as-is. -_-;;

 

Then again, if they released two BeForU DLC packs, I'd purchase them on day one. They inserted a good many of those songs into the newest arcade cabinet, X2, so there's definitely interest in using them somehow.

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The only problem I have with Club Mode is how long it's going to take to max out the bar for every song. It seems you'll have to play a song at least 20 times to max it out, and there's 50 songs in the game. That's would be 1000 songs played by itself, if not for the fact that the songs you play are randomized. I tend to see the same half-dozen songs over and over again, whereas none of the boss songs have even shown up once for me.

 

I'm not sure if this counts, but once you play it once you can play it in your club. I have yet to confirm whether or not playing them there furthers the song bar. If it does, you can max them that way.

 

Getting DLC would also be sort of a double-edged sword. It would add some variety to Club Mode, using some of our favorite Konami originals from yesteryear. But at the same time, it would add more potential songs to the pool. In that, Club Mode would take even longer to complete. It already looks like that mode could take a three-digit number of hours to clear as-is. -_-;;

 

Then again, if they released two BeForU DLC packs, I'd purchase them on day one. They inserted a good many of those songs into the newest arcade cabinet, X2, so there's definitely interest in using them somehow.

 

If only, if only. If they released BeForU along with more Terra and Xepher, I'd be a happy man.

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I'm just happy that after FOUR tries, Konami was finally able to make a functional DDR game for the Xbox 360. The frame rates lagged terribly in all 3 Universe games and timing was a crapshoot with the constant screen lag the games suffered from. Now I can AAA songs on command (with controller, my days of playing on foot are over).

 

My main complaints are:

-The song unlocking process SUCKS and is a complete waste of time.

-Club mode is boring and too easy if you are good at the game.

-Konami wasted time making ridiculous Challenge charts when they could've invested time making 4 panel charts that were actually worth playing more than once.

-Why don't the achievements stack?

-Day 1 DLC? Yeah, right. I wouldn't buy it if it was 3 months DLC but still, that's just outrageous. There's no reason those songs can't be on disc and I won't promote Konami's selfish antics.

-Too much licensed music and really shitty licensed music at that.

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I'm not sure if this counts, but once you play it once you can play it in your club. I have yet to confirm whether or not playing them there furthers the song bar. If it does, you can max them that way.

I wish, because then the final achievement would actually be fair. Sadly, playing the songs in Your Club is only for fun. You make absolutely zero song bar progress when playing them in there. You must play them in Other Clubs for the bars to raise. Not only that, but the three boss songs can only show up after the 10th song in a course. Unlike the rest of the songs in the game, you can't just hope to get them right off the bat.

 

This means that, once you get down to only needing to max the boss songs, you'll be constantly playing 20 song courses where the first ten songs are an absolute waste (and just filler on the path to even potentially getting boss songs to show up.) After the other 48 achievements being a cakewalk, particularly for a DDR veteran, it was kind of a slap to the face when I realized the final achievement in the game takes potentially 50-100 hours by itself.

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After reading ShinUkyo's post it makes me want to cry. If what you said is true (and I don't doubt it) then this game is never going to get a 1k from me. Like you, if I actually felt like investing the time (I might this weekend) to get close to 1k, spending more time on a DDR game with songs I HATE than I would with an RPG makes no sense.

 

I suppose I can try... Maybe the songs will grow on me... Then again I could always mute the TV and just listen to something else while dancing... Rofl.

 

Also is there a way to start the songs on a difficulty other than beginner? I nearly fall asleep playing club mode trying to increase the difficulty via Tricks to the point where I can actually ... you know... move my feet?

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I personally think this title is a breath of fresh air to the DDR series. Having played for nearly 10 years I consider myself a "core" player and I am fairly pleased with the setlist. The dlc price is no problem seeing as when i played in the Ultramix series (as Take It Away, incase anyone played then :l) the dlc was 5 dollars a pack and at the time i was itching to buy my next pack. The interface is seriously the cleanest one out and the most eye appealing since Extreme US in my oppinion. It took no time at all to make Groove Triggers and chains a part of my routine because there are plenty of songs that help in getting practice using that.

 

The only real negetive thing i can think about in this game is challenge mode. trying to read that is terrible.

 

All in all i think this game is completely rad :)

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Also is there a way to start the songs on a difficulty other than beginner? I nearly fall asleep playing club mode trying to increase the difficulty via Tricks to the point where I can actually ... you know... move my feet?

 

Doesn't look like it. I've gotten most of my songs to at least Lv.3, and I've never started on anything but Beginner, and only once has the game been courteous enough to boost me up to Expert during the first song.

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Doesn't look like it. I've gotten most of my songs to at least Lv.3, and I've never started on anything but Beginner, and only once has the game been courteous enough to boost me up to Expert during the first song.

 

Im starting to think that It's kind of a 30/70 on the luck and skill factor on getting Expert at the start. It looks easier when I get songs with higher difficulties at the start (like 2's on beginner and 3's or 4's on basic) and full Perfect them from the get go. The only reason i say that is because at any point you can drop your groove meter to get lower difficulties. I also seem to get a definite boss song at stage 20 when I have the dlc for the long versions of 3 songs. It tends to play those 3 and then 1 of the 3 boss songs. And seeing as the first 3 long songs are infact long it gives me plenty of time to destroy my groove meter so i can play my boss songs at all difficulties.

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