STsung

KONAMI is organizing a DDR Championship in the USA. There are seven Qualifier tournaments all over the states to which you can register. Up to 160 players are allowed to enter a qualifier tournament but only top 16 players will make it to Round 2. The players can choose their own speed mod, difficulty on a song that is chosen randomly (there is a set songlist for each round though).

If you win you are then allowed to participate in the US Championships taking place the 5th of December in Las Vegas, Nevada. 8 players will compete in the finals (one of the players will be a wildcard - randomly chosen from the second place winners). Only four players will make it to Round 2.

So well this is the US Championship…how will European Championship look like?

Few days ago new GFDM game was at test location in Japan and we have news about the game. Unlike last time were it was more about new songs and difficulties this time there’s something “revolutionary”.

So here it goes:

Guitar Freaks XG and Drummania XG are the new titles for the upcoming series (not V something thus)

The arcade machines use a wide LCD monitor (looks the same as the DDRX one)

Radar Chart is removed (I don’t get it why because that’s how I was picking songs to play *sniff*)

Difficulties aren’t 1 to 99 anymore but rather one digit followed by two decimals. Thus 1.00 is the easiest and 9.99 should be the most difficult one.

It also seems that in order to clear a song your bar needs to be above a certain percentage like in IIDX, PNM etc

There are 5 buttons instead of 3 on the neck of the guitar

BSC and ADV use only 4 buttons, EXT uses all of them

Long notes have been added

When wailing (that can be done either up and down horizontally) there’s a vibration (can be turned off)

There are huge speakers next to each cabinet side!

Left cymbal, hi-hat pedal and floor tom have been added so the line looks like => left cymbal, hi-hat, hi-hat pedal, snare, high tom, bass, low tom, floor tom and right cymbal.

Machine now features a stage platform with support frames around the machine which means that you are kind of “inside” and not in the open.

In game you’ve got most of the screen showing the column in which the notes scroll. Under the target line you can see all the drums and cymbals depicted. It takes quite a lot of space and is actually quite needed as there are new things for you to catch up. (left cymbal, 2 hi-hats, 2 toms)
In the back you’ve got some real drums showing (animated). On the left side you’ve got stuff like difficulty and such. On the right side you see your combo in HUGE digits.
All this is done in 3d “high tech” version.
The songwheel reminds me of PIU NX style. You scroll to left or right and it shows the song/album cover
The judgements are WAY TOO flashy.

We did not need to wait for long till Jubeat’s test location. The first test location started today at Round 1 - Sanomiya . This one will end tomorrow at midnight.

Next test locations will be held at Round 1 - Yokohama Station West Exit and Entertainment Square Pasuka. At both locations Jubeat will be present from 17th of March till 22nd of March.

Jubeat Ripples theme looks like “Soappy Bubbles everywhere”. Different blue colors are the main color + orange. There is a new Touch marker. It’s not the Green/Purple one from the previous game. This one shows the perfect timing with a “cloud” turning from white to orange color. The super high-tech feel is gone…

Most of the songs on Jubeat Ripples are licenses. Few are covers and KONAMI Originals.

Songlist

AREA 51 by 96 (KONAMI original)
Russian Snowy Dance by Mutsuhiko Izumi (KONAMI original)
愛 NEED by キマグレン
今 by ET-KING
にんげんっていいな by ガガガDX
バカサバイバー by ウルフルズ
Musical Messenger by 九州男
労働 CALLING by 怒髪天
ロボットハニー by Aira Mitsuki
情熱大陸 (cover)

Today the official arcade release of PNM17 THE MOVIE is released.

Everyone was wondering if KONAMI comes up with conversion kits for DDRX. And well the good news is that they will be released on 28th January 09. Cool isn’t it?

The special site was open on 10th of December and everyone awaits the release of the Japanese DDRX arcade machine.
Wonder how it looks like when new cabinets are being made?

We got a new TV, which is pretty nice Samsung HDTV. So I tried playing some DJ Troopers on it. The problem was that I was getting all goods with few greats (40). So I wanted to compare AC data vs PS2 data on the TV.

I found out this…
Happy Sky AC

-huge video lag (if played according to the rhythm the notes disappear on the targets, not the case of plasma TVs)
-no audio problem (can sync to audio thus^_^)
-clear image (looks so nice)

Happy Sky CS

-huge video lag (bleeee)
-some kind of weird audio problem (ehm IT’S OFFFFFFFF, can’t sync with it at all)
-pretty blurry image (does not look nice at all-_-)
-desaturated colors (I would be fine with this playing gold^_^ maybe it would render it playable)
-ghost notes at higher speed (erm…sucks)
-actually the fact that HS CS has such a f*cked up timing made it almost playable on this setup o_O

note: as you can see AC data is on P1 and PS2 on P2.

Two days ago Jubeat staff posted on their blog that a jubeat online update will take place during mid-december. Four new songs will be added to the game. Each song comes from a different “living” bemani game.

From IIDX - SigSig by kors k.
From DDR - TRUE♥LOVE by jun feat. Schanita
From PNM - 凛として咲く花の如く by 紅色リトマス
From GFDM - Slang by Kozo Nakamura

…almost. Few more days and Beatmania IIDX 16 Empress will be released (19th November).

Starting today Japanese people can try out the new Guitar Freaks and Drummania game. The test ends on 16th of November.