Z-I-v Simfile Tournament of Immortals 5 [EVENT OVER]

Oni91 vs. BYE
If you're thinking about stepping Thor's Hammer next, don't.

ddrstepper vs. Pandemonium X
This match-up was just flat out unfair. Both files are AWESOME. But since I need to nitpick to make my decision; ぼうけんのしょがきえました！ had a fast spin in it that I didn't like. That's really what it boiled down to. Otherwise it was way too close to call. Ideally I'd love to see both of you make it to the next round, but that just can't happen.

tsugaru7reveng vs. SoulEdge5000
Danger is a better effort than Run&Run, but still pretty messy overall. Like Scarz said, you've got great song choice, but there's so many sloppy double-steps and random choice of rhythms that it's just not fun to play. Try to follow the music more closely, and don't forget to playtest your files so you can check for unnecessary flow-breaking doublestepping. TOXIC VIBRATION, on the other hand, was really a good file. It had a couple of iffy parts (I seem to remember what I think was supposed to be a couple of footswitches, but with so many mini-jacks in the file I just treated them as mini-jacks and I had to double-step to get through it), but the rest of it is so well done that I can deal with it for now. Actually, I'd say it's the best file I've seen from you so far, tsugaru7reveng.

Astroman129 vs. mf32892
Bring Me To Life is a good song (honestly I don't think I was able to get enough of it back in middle school ), but does it make for a good stepchart? Well... Not exactly. Considering what you had to work with, you actually did really good, but it does get old kind of quickly. Tomoe not only was a much more steppable song, its steps were also a lot of fun to play.

Loodee vs. BYE
Not sure what to put here. Next!

King_Mew vs. CLOUDIO
I can't say I was crazy about either file, but overall I do think CLOUDIO did a bit better. MATADOR was a fun song choice (of course, it's Cranky! p.s. can someone get to stepping The Five already?), but your crossovers got REALLY crazy and confusing sometimes. Not so much that I couldn't enjoy it at all, but it did get messy. Echo of Forever... I think Scarz nailed exactly how I felt. To add, I generally don't think it's a good idea to start a pad chart immediately when the song starts. Let the player have a few seconds to find the beat, then you can start.

Silverhawke vs. CuzcoBlocko
I'll leave the time signature jokes to TaroNuke. Plum was very good by the way.

Pie-kun vs. Spork!
Similarly to Bring Me To Life, Talking Body isn't the most ideal song for stepping. It's not a bad file at all, actually I think it's quite good, but it doesn't hold up against Frog Machine, at least for me personally. Tough competition, but I do have to go with Frog Machine.

Gameoson vs. BYE
Knowing DDRDAIKENKAI, he'll probably step K-Pop or Eurobeat next round. Maybe I should step either K-Pop or Eurobeat next round and have a K-Pop/Eurobeat battle with him. Or I might just do some drumstep file IDK

DDRDAIKENKAI vs. darkanine
Lucifer isn't your strongest file (I still think Hey Momma/Hit The Road Jack from Summer Contest 2014 was utterly amazing) but I'd be lying if I said it wasn't fun. I'm gonna have to come up with something REALLY good if I want to make it to Round 3, I see.

xXMokou98Xx vs. Spirit of Nightmare
Saltinka was an interesting song choice, and actually a nice break from all the pop, rock and dance that usually gets stepped. Unfortunately, I just didn't find the file all that fun. It ranges from nothing special to "OK what's with this 16th stream that I'm not so sure actually goes to anything?" (the ones near the end, I mean). Concerning Bad Girl; it's a very good file but had you been up again Pandemonium X, I would have picked his over yours. Sorry.

brunobg24 vs. hooky
I'm sorry, but I just found Chandelier to be BORING to play. There's some parts that work okay, but for the most part I was just really bored by it. It's also not helping that I absolutely despise the song, which made the already boring steps that much worse to play. YELLOW SPLASH!! was great though, I actually prefer over but they were both good charts.

TaroNuke vs. BYE
Eh... I got nothing other than bad time signature jokes, so I'll just move on.

Lisek vs. Scarz
A little more OOMPH to World's End Dancehall would have been nice. It's not bad but I definitely think it could have been a lot more fun. Point goes to Dark Fall for being wonderfully intense.

chewi vs. Cowtao
You know what gif goes here.

tamtamino vs. vincentw
If there's any one match-up that I could call completely lopsided, it would be this one. Let me start with CARS WITH THE BOOM... Okay, no offense, but I think I may actually hate this song more than Chandelier. Ignoring the song itself, the steps are okay at best, nothing special. You also had to go up against what so far is my favorite file in the entire contest, Phantom Vibrate. As if the steps themselves weren't good enough on their own, you also have a pretty damn good song and a funny music video to go along with it. I do think the warp at the very beginning was unnecessary, but everything else was solid. WOW.

[DIAVOLO BRACKET]
Oni-91
(none)

ぼうけんのしょがきえました！ [ddrstepper] - 1
アスカBad Girl (w/Lancaster) [Pandemonium X] - 4

TOXIC VIBRATION [tsugaru7reveng] - 4
DANGER [SoulEdge5000] - 1

Tomoe [Astroman129] - 6
Bring Me to Life [mf32892]

[FUBUKI BRACKET]
Loodee
(none)

Echo Of Forever [King_Mew] - 1
MATADOR [CLOUDIO] - 5

Plum [Sliverhawke]
(dropped out) CuzcoBlocko

Talking Body [Pie-kun] - 4
Frog Machine [Spork!] - 2

[DO BACK BURN BRACKET]
Gameoson
(none)

LUCIFER [DDRDAIKENKAI]
(dropped out) darkanine

アスカBad Girl (w/Lancaster) [xXMokou98Xx] - 4
Saltinka [Spirit of Nightmare] - 2

YELLOW SPLASH!! [brunobg24] - 2
Chandelier [hooky] - 4

[CHRONOXIA BRACKET]
TaroNuke
(none)

ワールズエンド・ダンスホール [Lisek] - 3
DARK FALL [Scarz] - 2

Baby I [chewi]
Cowtao

CARS WITH THE BOOM [tamtamino] - 4
ファントム・バイブレーション [vincentw] - 2 (HM because I like this file a lot too)

[DIAVOLO BRACKET]

ぼうけんのしょがきえました！ [ddrstepper] (Winner)
I honestly really loved this chart. It's really fun on a keyboard and I'm sure it's fun for those who are good enough to play it on pad. Alas, the most I can do is an 8 and occasionally a 9 (like Shiny World, and I think I can even do CSFILSM... or was it PARANOiA Rebirth? I'm sure it was on UM1 though). Anyway, I'm giving this an 8/10.

アスカBad Girl (w/Lancaster) [Pandemonium X]
Seems a little offsync. Otherwise, it's great. 7.5/10.
Expert: Overall, I liked it. Some of the rhythms seemed a little off however. Difficulty is fine though. 8/10.
Challenge: There was a part with a 16th stream that felt like it should have had other note types in there, like 12ths or w/e. Also, difficulty seemed a little too much for this song, but I realize there's many people who would want this. Not a bad chart though. 7/10.

---------------------------------

TOXIC VIBRATION [tsugaru7reveng] (Winner)
Okay, first off, the audio is terrible. Please try to find a better quality version next time. In order of importance, charts > audio > graphics > video imo. That said, it was a pretty good chart IMO. Kinda too hard for me, but I got an A on it my first try. I don't really see anything wrong with it, but I can't rate it higher than some others. 7/10.

DANGER [SoulEdge5000]
Video doesn't work. It might be my theme (DDR 2014 with dancer videos built-in) since idk if SM automatically reads videos, but you should always add it to the SM/SSC explicitly. That said, this was only an okay chart. I felt like the difficulty was incredibly inconsistent. I felt some doublesteps (not always bad, but check them) and some incorrect/awkward rhythms. The song is good though, and with some work this file could be really good. 5/10.

---------------------------------

Tomoe [Astroman129] (Winner)
I really loved this file. It was fun on keyboard and I think it would be really fun on pad as well. 9/10.

Bring Me to Life [mf32892]
This file was decent. I felt like there were some doublesteps (not always a bad thing), and my fingers felt like they were always facing right. I'll have to give this a 6/10.

------------------------------------------------------------------

[FUBUKI BRACKET]

Echo Of Forever [King_Mew]
For future reference, for at least DDR-type simfiles (idk about ITG-type), it's generally a bad idea to start the chart at the first measure. I'd wait until the 3rd or 5th measures. 7.5/10.
Expert: A fine simfile, aside from the issue above and many of the jump freezes being too short to even matter. I would just remove those. Otherwise, I liked it. Maybe rerate it as a 10 though. 7/10.
Challenge: It's exactly the same as the Expert chart. Well, aside from one thing: the scripted mods. Honestly, it made the
chart much more fun. TBH I would relegate these types of charts to the Edit slot in the future. Taking the above problems
into account, I'm giving this an 8/10.

MATADOR [CLOUDIO] (Winner)
I really liked this. I felt like my fingers were facing left a bit too much though. Still great though. 8/10.

---------------------------------

Talking Body [Pie-kun] (Winner)
Great chart. Sync may be a little ahead. Ignoring the [IMO] misrating (should be a 7 on Expert IMO), it's really fun and very interesting. It's also really really cool. 8/10.
(quoted Britney because I don't really have much to say)

Frog Machine [Spork!]
Good chart. Some things bothered me about it though. Towards the middle, you started using freezes where they didn't make sense with the song. Also, the 16th streams seemed... off. idk. 7/10.

------------------------------------------------------------------

[DO BACK BURN BRACKET]

アスカBad Girl (w/Lancaster) [xXMokou98Xx] (Winner)
Great chart, difficulty seemed uneven though. 8/10.

Saltinka [Spirit of Nightmare]
Honestly felt like this was being hard for the sake of being hard. It's a 10 imo. I felt like the 16ths and whatever the other was were a little too much, especially for a 9. I don't really see anything wrong other than that though... 7/10.

---------------------------------

YELLOW SPLASH!! [brunobg24]:
Not much to say, it's a good file to go against. I could see either of us winning tbh. 8/10.
Expert: Pretty solid chart. 8/10.
Challenge: I also liked this, it's as good as the Expert but harder. 8/10.

------------------------------------------------------------------

[CHRONOXIA BRACKET]

ワールズエンド・ダンスホール [Lisek]
Good file. Not much else to say that's not already said below. 7.5/10.
Expert: It's good, but it felt like there were empty spots where there should have been steps. 7/10 though.
Challenge: I liked it better than Expert, but it had the same issue as Expert. 8/10.

DARK FALL [Scarz] (Winner)
Liked the chart. Can't see anything wrong with it right now. 8/10.

---------------------------------

CARS WITH THE BOOM [tamtamino] (Winner)
Loved this. Easy chart but really fun. Loved the repetition at the beginning too. 9/10.

ファントム・バイブレーション [vincentw]
While it's good, I did feel like it was somewhat awkward, especially with the warp at the beginning. 8/10.

UNCONTESTED FILES

Plum [Sliverhawke]:
Good chart, I don't have much to say. 8/10.

LUCIFER [DDRDAIKENKAI]:
Video doesn't work. To get the video to work for others, you need to have the BG change set to play [Week Title for Summer Contest / Round Number + style(s)] - Song Name.avi. So, for example, for this song, you would do [Round 1 Singles] - Lucifer.avi. This is because any file uploaded (aside from cdtitle) is renamed to match the file name. Right now, the file is set to play LuciferWide.avi in the SSC and [Round 1] - Lucifer.avi in the SM.

The simfile is good, but the short freezes annoy me. The file felt more like a 4-panel PIU chart than a DDR or ITG chart though. 8/10.

Baby I [chewi]:
YASS ARI SLAY ME! That said, I thought it was a great file. Maybe fix some doublesteps, but that's not really needed at this difficulty level. 8/10.

[DIAVOLO BRACKET]

Oni-91
(none)

ぼうけんのしょがきえました！ [ddrstepper] - thanks for not letting this go without points lol. also i appreciate the kind reviews for this <3
アスカBad Girl (w/Lancaster) [Pandemonium X] - Not gonna lie, Pandy, those charts are fire. Looking forward to see how this round plays out for us.

TOXIC VIBRATION [tsugaru7reveng] – Holy shit that was intense. Loved every moment of it. Rhythms and step patterns were excellent in my opinion. Really nice work.
DANGER [SoulEdge5000] – Not bad. Rhythm selections were pretty good and sync was good. My only problems were there were some patterns that felt very uncomfortable in terms of the position you ended up in, and there was a lack of symmetry.
WINNER: TOXIC VIBRATION [tsugaru7reveng] – Hard to top it, considering it’s one of my favorite files of the week.

Tomoe [Astroman129] – So the song is a tad repetitive, but the chart was not. You kept it interesting the entire way through, and the chart simply oozed charm. Loved it!
Bring Me to Life [mf32892] – Ok so I honestly did not know what to expect because this song actually humors me whenever I hear/think about it, but I thought the chart was solid. I will say the cut is a little long, and the choruses were stepped practically stepped the same in terms of rhythms, so it became a little predictable at that point, but other than that I thought it was great.
WINNER: Tomoe [Astroman129] – Both up you put up a great fight.

[FUBUKI BRACKET]

Loodee
(none)

Echo Of Forever [King_Mew] – Not bad. Personally it felt a little generic for a kors k chart, but hey, it works dammit.
MATADOR [CLOUDIO] – Boy, am I a sucker for Spanish/Latino influenced songs. Anyway, there were some moments were foot placement was ambiguous, specifically after the jumps. Fortunately I was able to figure it out quickly in my head by looking at the arrows after the next step. When performed correctly, this chart is awesome and has plenty of variety. Never got bored while playing.
WINNER: MATADOR [CLOUDIO] – Honestly very close match. Quality is just about equal, but I just found CLODIO’s file was a tad more interesting.

Plum [Sliverhawke] – Cute! (that’s all I have to say really it was solid and there isn’t much critiquing I can do for this)
(dropped out) CuzcoBlocko
WINNER (by default): Plum [Sliverhawke]

Talking Body [Pie-kun] – Not sure why, but the video makes SM5 crash for me. It doesn’t seem like anyone had that problem, though. Anyway, I really liked it. It was simple, but it worked. Rhythm and step patterns were solid.
Frog Machine [Spork!] – Definitely feeling a SuperNOVA/SuperNOVA2 vibe from this. Am I the only one? Yes? Alright well anyway, I thought this was pretty good. There were moments where I felt flustered at some of the more complicated patterns, but that was only a few times. Overall, solid file.
WINNER: Talking Body [Pie-kun] – IMO, less is more. In this case, I thought both charts were equal in quality, but Pie was able to pull of that quality with a simpler approach, and I appreciate that a lot.

[DO BACK BURN BRACKET]

Gameoson
(none)

LUCIFER [DDRDAIKENKAI] – Not bad. Those freezes felt a tad uncomfortable, and those spins made me feel dizzy. Other than that, good work.
(dropped out) darkanine
WINNER (by default): LUCIFER [DDRDAIKENKAI]

アスカBad Girl (w/Lancaster) [xXMokou98Xx] – Honestly, I wish there were a few more 16ths in there because I felt like some rhythms could’ve spiced things up, but considering what you have, it was still great. I liked the step patterns a lot.
Saltinka [Spirit of Nightmare] – LOVED the song choice. The rhythm choices were pretty good, but unfortunately, step patterns fell flat. I wish there would have been more crossovers and such to have made it more interesting because it felt like a lot of stair patterns.
WINNER: アスカBad Girl (w/Lancaster) [xXMokou98Xx]: This was overall better put together as a whole. This probably would have gone to Saltinka if the step patterns varied more, though.

YELLOW SPLASH!! [brunobg24] – Challenge was significantly more interesting than Heavy, but both charts felt a little repetitive. I don’t know why but this reminds me of vintage ZIv files. I’m specifically thinking ZIv Summer Contest 2012, probably because of [Beach Party] week.
Chandelier [hooky] – Love the song, but the chart fell flat. Personally it was a lack of variety in step patterns. I specifically felt a whole lot of stairs during the chart.
WINNER: YELLOW SPLASH!! [brunobg24] - Both charts had good rhythms choices and both felt repetitive, but YELLOW SPLASH!! reigns supreme for having a wider variety of patterns in the footing.

[CHRONOXIA BRACKET]

TaroNuke
(none)

ワールズエンド・ダンスホール [Lisek] – Ah. yes. One of the first songs that led me to my Vocaloid fascination. I originally heard this last year during [Round 1 Singles] when Blinded_No_More and I faced each other. Personally, I feel like his chart led me to this with high expectations, but it didn’t reach them. I think Gameoson and hooky captured by my thoughts perfectly. I felt it could have been zestier had you not missed some opportunities for some better rhythms because there were spots where it felt like steps were missing. By no means was it bad, it was still good, I just know that you’ve put out better material, and this chart has a lot more potential, but it was not put forth IMO.
DARK FALL [Scarz] – Intense and interesting all the way through. Not much else I can say. Nice work!
WINNER: DARK FALL [Scarz] – It hurts me that I can’t give WED some love, but the quality was more present in DARK FALL.

Baby I [chewi] – Queen Ari slays all the faves.
Cowtao
WINNER (by default) - Baby I [chewi]

CARS WITH THE BOOM [tamtamino] – Lack of crossovers, but I actually didn’t mind it in this case?? I don’t know but you managed to keep it interesting without that variety of step patterns, so props for that. The song is super cute tbh.
ファントム・バイブレーション [vincentw] – Loving the energy in this chart. Also I actually really like those graphics, but that’s beside the point.
WINNER: ファントム・バイブレーション [vincentw] – This is actually kind of a hard one. Both had very interesting elements, but I’m a sucker for high energy charts.