DanceDanceRevolution X (PS2) (North America)

the problem with that is youre basing the ratings on your personal skill. this isnt 2001, PSMO isnt considered hard any more. PSMO is pretty even in terms of difficulty with maxx unlimited and paranoia respect, provided you can crossover. not knowing how to do a song doesnt mean it deserves an increased rating. also, trim needs to be rated down to 15 if it is indeed 16 like you imply. trim is no where near as hard as maxx/psmo/respect, and i think FAXXH is a 16 as well, its not as hard as that either.

and regardless of how crappy/hard for the sake of being hard PRO/FELMO/PHO are, if trigger is an 18 those are 22s. regardless of chart quality, trigger IS NOT as hard as those. even without tempo changes, PRO would just be ridiculous to pass because of the ending. without tempo changes passing trigger would be like passing any other 10(edit- old scale 10).

and yes, it is my opinion, but my opinion is fact based. based on what certain songs are rated as and how people with the ability to do them score on them. like i said, this isnt 2001, PSMO isnt considered hard. i cant AA PSMO, but i'm not going to say its under rated because i can only A it, because the ratings arent about what i'm good at its about how hard the song is. and trigger is only in that league because of its tempo changes anyway, otherwise its just another 15. its step patterns arent that rough. when the simfile is released, play it in SM with a c-mod. the difficulty will be drastically reduced. as such, once you learn those tempo changes, its difficulty is drastically reduced, just like if you can crossover PSMO's difficulty is drastically reduced.

tl;dr- youre looking at it from the perspective of what you find hard based on what you can/cant do, rather than looking at it in terms of how hard the chart actually is.

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lolwut? sure it would be a 10 if it werent for the messed up run with all of the double steps. that makes it hard 10 - 11 territory

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I would agree completely, although, since they've already started down the road of taking stops and tempo changes into account, Trigger oni would be a deserved 18 under that system. At the very least, it's more worthy of an 18 than Chaos Oni is of a 17... (although, on the plus side, it does allow me to say I can clear a 17, just like how bag or Sakura used to allow people back in the day to say they cleared a 10)

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I have to disagree with Saber Wing rmx, and Trigger.

I think Trigger should only be lowered to a 17, rather than a 16. I hate the slow part, and the ending, those are what kill me. And you stating PHO, that should also be a 17.
And Saber Wing rmx would b e about a 16 and a half, but I think they put it as a 17 so that there would be a 17, rather than putting Trigger as a 17, and Saber Wing rmx as a 16.

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IGN DDR X Review

Ouch..

I am offended by the IGN review of DDR X. I completely disagree with what they said, and some of the things were uninformed. The background is too distracting?? They ADDED an option to reduce the background. If the reviewer can't even read through what all the options do, how can anyone be assured they really cared to look at every part of the game?? It's ridiculous.

I for one think Konami did an outstanding job with X, and that's it's miles ahead of SN2 US. The graphics are definitely improved, and are more interesting to look at. Shock arrows are a new challenge. There's some great Konami originals and licenses. And the game is cheap. What more could you ask for?

This isn't DDR Extreme US, in which we got a crappy interface, almost none of the AC songs, and horrible game options. They didn't just throw DDR X together, not in the least. A review like that really makes me upset.

Does anyone really care about reviews from mainstream sites?
They wouldn't know a good DDR game unless the reviewer was an avid player, which they are almost never. The thing is, they never review from a DDR player's point of view, but from a neutral point of view.
Fair enough, it might not be popular among some people who have never touched DDR before, it's mostly for the already established fans.

It's pointless to listen to any reviews from a mainstream site on a DDR game.

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wow, thats such a slap in the face. and to think they cream themselves every time a new guitar hero comes out. same thing, different controller.

Not to mention the lack of variety in the GH music too. ...

this

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If anyone is interested, here are the BGMs ripped from the game: DDR X BGMs

Did anyone else notice that Baby-Lon's name is pronounced like the city, Babylon? I always thought it was pronounced as the word baby (bay-bee) and lon.

QFT.
Mainstream reviewers can't tell a left arrow from a right arrow. It's like listening to a blind person's views on screensavers.


I will say though, there are a lot of things in X that irritate me, same for HP 2, and which will keep me from enjoying the good songs on both games. 4.5 out of 10 for both, thanks for not trying Konami.

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Whaaa? Is that the right way to say it?

That's how the announcer says it, so I presume that's the correct way of saying his name.

I think stops should be considered in the ratings of songs. They can't be turned off in DDR, and in ITG when you use C-Mods it doesnt save your score. Learning a step pattern is part of scoring well on any song, it doesnt mean the difficulty should be lower once you can do it well right? It just seems to me that the stops make a song hard just like fast bpm or tricky rhythms. It should all be a part of the rating (imo).


Well now I feel like a retard. That's so weird.

I stopped at "Yup, Konami's still making these." I might punch the computer screen following such levels of blatant ignorance.

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Pffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffft.

I'd like to see them say "Yup, they're still making these" when the possibly-inevitable GH5 comes out.
Also, I think 1UP's review might be even worse. They didn't even realize that Party Mode didn't have online play.

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Exactly the same thing I was thinking. They also complain about the background obscuring the arrows - I guess they don't know that the option menu exists or they didn't bother to check if there were any new options in there.

The reviewer also took the game too seriously. Case in point:

You know what? I'll take your word for it. PSM is a 16 provided you can crossover.

As for Trigger's bpm changes:

200-400-200-100-200-400-100-200-400-6 Stops-200-400-200-400-100-200. That's 12 BPM changes. Less than FAXX and PR. It might be more sudden than FAXX or PR but it's not what makes the song hard. The thing is, I have been looking at how hard the chart is. In fact, I'm going to do dissect the chart and you can tell me what's easy, what's hard and how you would get past it.

1st 200-400 section: Starts off with jumps and reversed step-jumps (I don't know what to call it other than that), leading to an awkward jump-step-jacks-step-freeze jump. The latter looks similar to the last few notes of FAXX without the freeze arrows.

200-100-200 section: You have streams of arrows starting with a jump and ending with a jump. The 100 section has 16th note staircases and transitions to quick jumps at 200 bpm

1st 400 section: Several triplets close together and 5 note trills ending with quick jumps and a sudden decrease in BPM after the last trill.

100 section: Freeze arrows with various arrows to tap out and a few jumps. Then this awkward section starting off with 16th gallops turning into 32nd gallops with a few jumps sprinkled in for fun.

1st 200 section: A straight stream of 8th note twisting crossovers and freeze jacks ending with a freeze hold.

400 stop section: Very quick freeze arrow step-jumps comparable to FELM . Then a part where you hit a freeze jump and tap out several quarter notes. 8th note jackhammer streams ending with a freeze and the holds during the stop.

2nd 200-400 section: Guess what? More freeze jacks at 200 BPM. Ends with 3 8th note LR jumps and that familiar jump-step-jack-step-freeze jump.

2nd 200 section: Straight 8th stream filled with longer crossovers and staircases.

2nd 400 section: Looks like a simpler version of the first 400 section with freeze arrows. It isn't. Double-stepping galore with the freezes. If you crossover at the wrong moment or drop a freeze in order to use both feet, you might end up doing the 5 note 8th cluster backwards. Another set of freeze arrow tap holds leading to a staircase. Oh yeah, there's a long 8th stream. Then there's the FAXX ending (8th note step-step-jump) done 3 times ending with a twisting crossovers (or hipbreakers as I like to call them) and the FAXX thing again.

Ending: 16th note staircases or candles or whatever they're called at 200 bpm.

Trigger loves its jacks, fast jumps, 8th note step-jumps and crossovers. It might be easier at first glance but it's draining. You'll be dropping many freeze arrows here in order to use both feet but that might be bad considering that you'll have to double step a bit to get back into line with the crossovers.

Now let's compare this to 17 footer charts. Remember, my opinion on the charts. You can disagree.

There are... 4.

FAXX
NGO
CHAOS
Saber Wing (AI Headshot Remix)

FAXX ? Similar but you called it a 16. Eh. The step-jumps, jacks, and more dramatic BPM changes makes it more difficult than FAXX .

NGO ... Not sure whether to call it a 17 or yell for a rating change. Anyway, Trigger has the same elements. The majority of the step-jumps and crossovers are slower but then again, there are the parts that roll by at a blazing 400 bpm.

CHAOS ? Yeah... no. Awkward double-stepping and the nasty ending stream might make it a 17 but it's mostly the stops that make it a "first-time 17 footer." It doesn't compare.

Saber Wing (AI Headshot Remix) ? I'd say the BPM changes, 8th note streams at 316, and double-stepping make this a 17 but it doesn't really compare. It seems to be a blending of the various MAX-style streams and BPM changes and that doesn't make it as hard as Trigger .

Only NGO and Trigger seem like a real fight in the 17 foot category, mainly because of the step-jumps but Trigger has those same elements at a faster speed.

What about the 18 footers?

FELM , PH , PR beat out Trigger , that much I believe. Then there are HDV , FAXX , DEGRS. Trigger is harder than FAXX if you can handle stream but not jumps. HDVO's main bite is the ending stream. DEGRS is mostly triplets and insane double stepping with jumps and crazy jacks to boot. It can play ball with those 3 but not the others.

There IS a valid reason why Konami calls it an 18. I haven't seen other people calling out any serious rating mistakes other than those from people who have incredible skill and stamina saying that various boss songs shouldn't be called this or that. Maybe they wanted to fill the 18 spot with something so when they release that OMGWTFBBQ 19 footer chart, Trigger Oni would suddenly feel like an 18. Besides, the only 18's come from SN/SN2. If there's an 18 that's slightly less crappy than the big 3, it's going to seem easier.

tl;dr version: Trigger isn't about the ending only. Crossovers, jacks, fast jumps, awkward freeze arrows and dramatic BPM changes can kill also. Trigger Oni only compares with NGOO in my opinion and is similar to the lesser 18 foot charts in difficulty. Maybe FELMO, PRO, and PHO aren't 18 footers but borderline 19's? We just don't have a chart to compare yet.

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