ZIv Simfile Tournament of Immortals

While I greatly appreciate the in depth reviews NIQ9, I strongly disagree that double steps shouldn't be in a simfile and that a chart should follow a song rhythmically to a T in a contest. The way I see it, if a file keeps me coming back to it over and over and over, despite rhythm, flow, difficulty, etc, then I'll choose it because it's fun to play.

Definitely. That catchyness factor means a lot, and double-steps can provide emphasis.



So many surprisingly catchy songs... 5 votes is not enough!

5: Matador
4: New Castle Legions
3: Sayaendou (ONE PIECE Movie 7 Theme)
2: Aegis
1: Shamaaninainen

My runners-up... =/
Programmed World -SF_Infected Mix-
No Crime

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It's not that I have a problem with all double-steps no matter what. It's when they lead you to a pattern awkwardly. If you crossover something you're supposed to double-step, you could be in the wrong place for the next pattern and then it's just not fun. THAT is what I have a problem with. If you still insist on having a double-step, guide the player with a freeze arrow or a mine. Fun is subjective. I play files because they're fun too. Will I still play Matador? Yes. Do I think it could have been better? Absolutely. When looking at simfiles in a competition, the craft of the simfile is important. Anyone can throw a bunch of random steps together in a good, catchy song. Song choice is important, yes, but you also have to take a look at the steps themselves, look at the positives and the negatives of the patterns used and see where the step artist could improve. When it comes to rhythm, leaving rhythms out is ok if you're going for an easier simfile. Adding rhythms that are not in the music is not ok. Also, misplacing rhythms is not ok. If you disagree, then that is your stance on how simfiles should be made, and I respect that. As for my ratings, I stand by them.

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Oh I'm not disagreeing with your ratings, it's your notion that in a simfile contest there should be:

This is a simfile competition. There should be no double-steps.
A step artist should never copy and paste the same pattern for a different section.

I'm not saying music choice is a major factor, but look at, oh, say, So Deep. That pattern repeats over and over for most of the song and only changes it slightly for each measure, yet it is regarded as one of the best charts in dance game history.

Healing Vision Angelic Mix, while it can be done without double stepping, is mostly double stepped and it is also a highly regarded step chart by many.

By your logic, Colors Challenge would be a terrible chart as it adds 16th notes where you cannot hear them. In fact, Remember You should be regarded as one of the best charts of all time considering that if follows the beat and it flows well, but the song is painfully slow and easy.

You are definitely entitled to your opinion as everyone is, but what I saw was "I really like song A but because it doesn't follow the rules of simfile making, I will choose simfile B because it follows the rules perfectly but might not be as fun." The point of a simfile contest is to get a collection of fun simfiles together that others may play, not to make the best simfile that fits into a certain preconceived mold.

I like Remember You... =<

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Man, now I feel dumb for giving points to the 5 songs I had the most fun playing :{

There are reasons why some songs are more or less fun than others, but any reasons that are worth noting should be evident in gameplay, not while looking at the simfile in an editor.

I think Matador is so popular because it's a great song, and it feels like it was taken from a DDR game. It has all the perceived faults and characteristics that you find in most official DDR / ITG songs. You could make the same complaints about Cartoon Heroes. Did you play that for the first time and honestly just say "That was good, but the steps could have been better"?

Wrong.

My 5 picks are based on how fun they were on pad. If I didn't find it fun in my first playthrough, I didn't even consider it for the top 5. A simfile that has good flow and follows the music isn't automatically unfun.

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Of course, they can be, I just think it should be a matter of playing songs and identifying which ones are the fun songs, rather than identifying whether specific "good things" and "bad things" happen during the song.

I guess it's the difference between playing simfiles for fun, and playing simfiles to be a critic? I'm glad I can do the former.

edit : Well, your logic in judging was pretty much the same as the way I did it, so I guess we misunderstood each other somewhere over the last page ^^;

I could careless of the ratings or even the fact that my chart is even part of the discussion. What I read was "Matador is really fun with a few issues" then I read "Enchanted Fairy Garden is is #1 because how close it follows the music, variance, and step flow". That only bothers me because you went against your initial gut instinct of "this is really fun it should get #1!" and instead subjected yourself to a checklist of what the simfiles should and should not follow and chose a chart that you initially didn't want to give the #1 spot. It's like someone who reads a book and finds the story on the whole to be really, really good but gives it a bad review because it's geared towards 8th grade reading levels.

With matador, I placed it lower because it wasn't as fun as it could have been. It had fun portions, and I wanted to make it #1 because of the song choice, but it wasn't the best simfile in the round. I really liked the ending, but the earlier portions of the simfile just didn't have the same effect on me.
When there is ambiguity in the steps, that's a turnoff for me. I don't find patterns like that fun. It all goes back to fun, and i have a different view of what fun is than the rest of you. I found Pie's chart to be the most fun overall. The thing with Karaoke charts though, is they basically "step themselves". Pie's chart is still really good and the most fun out of the group, It's just the patterns in the music are too obvious. That's not Pie's fault though. He still did a really good job with the crossovers and step patterns overall.

When I play a simfile, I play for fun. If it wasn't fun, I wouldn't play it, would I? I just think you have to take at least a slightly critical approach when it comes to simfile tournaments. I did not think M.A.D. was fun. Even without the errors I mentioned, it would not have made my top 5 anyway. I would rank it #6. I find it less fun because some of the steps are just too awkward to be fun, so that puts it even lower on my list.

But yeah, this discussion is ridiculous. Let me have my opinions on what makes a fun chart, and you can have yours. Please stop assuming I was purely critical in deciding things. You do not know my thought process.

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Forget how fun it could have been and look up on how fun it was as it is when you played it.
It's all subjective.

yes.

Either way, I still like the other two more than Matador anyway

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That's all you needed to say in the first place.
It's not like we were going to bite your head off.

I believe XKCD said it best. This is how I view doublestepping.


I'll figure out my top 5 eventually. I'll pick the 5 that have 0 doublesteps and 0 musically inappropriate jumps, because that's what I consider fun.

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NIQ9,

If you have the time, would you do me the favor of a critique on the D- for Flux?

Playing OpenITG, WITH BAR on a Futuremax FitPRO and a theme I made myself.
Mostly playing only the hardest difficulties, but occasionally play a few others.
If I have fun on the highest difficulty, I'll want to see more. I'll also want to see more if the highest difficulty VIOLATES me.
(So I don't rate a song unfairly if I can't pass it)

Fun may be subjective and all, but INCOMING LONG POST

Programmed world - I just don't see how that 9 is supposed to be a 9 rofl
Somewhat entertaining though.

Flux 10 was fun. GOOD fun. lots of nice crossing, but also some easily identifiable doublestep (that isn't too much of a problem, I just noticed it)
also the lyrics kept breaking/not appearing (might be my theme, someone else check for it)
Flux heavy! Wow technical crossover with holds! At a reasonable speed too! I enjoy. Though I don't understand what the FUCK is going on with those 16ths at the end of holds near the end. Dropped the hold to hit a few, doublestepped to hit a few, then they turned into crossovers and I started thinking "so wait, so I SHOULDN'T have been doublestepping them?"
I'm probably not good enough at the game to deal with this properly. This is like the 9 with my lowest passing score of the whole tournament. I missed like 10 lol

@ Flux - I don't like the song in general

Shamaaninainen has a broken banner in the SM (my theme picks up on this and hitches - the .sm is pointed at the wrong file, something about "deck the hallcore" or someshit. PRESENTATION/CHECKING POINTS MINUSMINUS!)

The doublestep (near the end) in Artificial man actually caused me to way off 2 as I stumbled rofl

Sayaendou is the only song with an edit chart that blank steps'd on openITG. I don't know what causes blank steps, but considering the other edit charts in this tournament didn't have that problem, it'll cost you presentation points...
The non edit 9 was fun, but the steps didn't seem to flow as well as some of the other charts in the tournament.

After bullshitting my way through the steppy jumpy ding dongs section of Cry of Aether 12, all I have to say is HORKY BORKY HORKY NONG BONG WANG DANG
Enjoyable stream though. I DID pass it, just felt like crying after all those jumps ;-;
The hands in the 9, lol waut, I'm sure it plays better on a pad that isn't mine, but I dunno, something about that felt un-9-like.
It's not like it makes it a 10 or anything, I guess I'm just not used to seeing hands used in a chart tons like this.
COUGH mawaru 2 cough
Also, minor, but I didn't like the song very much, the guitar sounded way too... midi.

For some reason those last 3 freezes in M.A.D. 9 made the whole chart seem better (?)
Good chart, I just liked some of the others more.

A - Due to the song choice, I almost flat out refused to play this.
...In playing it, why is the simfile named "A"? It's Starstruck :/
WHY ARE THERE STEPS DURING THE FADEOUT.
The steps don't match the music because the bpm is wrong... I smell ctrl+R
The bpm is wrong, the steps are boring, etc. Rank F MINUSMINUS!

[morals: get the right bpm - this should be a given!
don't put steps during a fadeout - just... don't
I don't know if you did, but don't use ctrl+R EVER when charting, unless you want to catch a specific sound effect
the chart just comes out... clusterfucky and rhythmically random, especially if you have the wrong bpm]

NOTE that all the charts are good! (except one) I liked them all! (except one) I just liked some more than others! (except one, which I hated) Don't feel offended if I didn't write good things about the chart lol. Also don't take offense at that last sentence for whatever reason people might, etc.

Ratings:

1st - Matador (LOL Cranky, but otherwise nice cross, yeah there are doublesteps but the speed wasn't high enough that they subtracted fun from the chart [I don't mind doublestepping up to about 210bpm 8ths])
2rd - New Castle Legions (song choice won it for me, as well as having well balanced and properly rated steps)
3nd - Flux
4st - Cradle (I can't quite put my finger on it, but it's just FUN)
5yp- THE ENCHANTED FAIRY GARDEN (WTF IS THIS SONG I LOVE IT also not a single doublestep. Song made me laugh.)

Sadly, the enchanted fairy garden nudged Shamaaninainen after much delibaration.

6fw - Shamaaninainen (11 - lol hands, but not rofl overly taxing hands like Cry of Aether's 9.
Shamaaninainen 9 - might qualify as a 10, not sure.

7ng - Fury (I love the song so much! I also like your stream a lot. But that 16th step step jump at the start left a bad taste in my mouth for the rest of the song)

25th - "A"

Do people like long descriptive/meaningless reviews? I forget lol
Also I'm not saying I'm the best at anything. I gotta give my opinions on these charts as part of the tournament, amirite?
"A" is not going to learn from all positivity!

That said, y'all should flame the hell out of my chart too.

EDIT: Added morals to the lady gaga chart review

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I liked Aegis when I played through it. The presentation is great, all the gimmicks are well done, and the steps follow the song perfectly until near the end, when it turns into a bunch of really, really hard, not very fun streams :{

From the left-right-right-left-right-left-right 16th note streams (bar 51), it stops being fun. If everything after that had been more in line with the first 50 bars, it probably would have been in my top 3.

Haha, thanks Tyma.

Hmm, I seem to have killed fun with unnecessary stream again. Darn.

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The name problem with starstruck is #TITLETRANSLIT, I just checked.
Lol, the CDTITLE is "DDR X2". People need to check their SMs.

*Says the guy who forgot to fix the song preview clip on his simfile*

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I thought that part was ok there.

Protip to guy who composed Cry of Aether: there are good free drum and guitar plug-ins that work with FL Studio. Use them, because FL Slayer is NOT NICE.

1st - The Enchanted Fairy Garden
2nd - MATADOR
3rd - Artificial Man
4th - WISDOM
5th - M.A.D.

Scores: yell at me if they're wrong)

MATADOR: 44 pts
New Castle Legions: 27 pts
The Enchanted Fairy Garden: 26 pts
Sayaendou (ONE PIECE Movie 7 Theme): 17 pts
M.A.D.: 16 pts
Flux: 15 pts
Na Dushe Perepoloh: 10 pts
Aegis: 5 pts
Cry of Aether: 4 pts
Shamaaninainen: 4 pts
Artificial Man: 4 pts
WISDOM: 4 pts
Programmed World -SF_ Infected Mix-: 2 pts
Cradle: 2 pts
Black Butterfly (The Maid and the Pocketwatch of Blood remix): 1 pt

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