Stepfile Arrow Position Randomizer

Hey everyone,

I made a small tool for all the sim file creators out there who are too lazy to place your arrows yourself. Not sure if a tool like this existed but I couldn't find one.

Now you can place arrows by following the beat inside ArrowVortex. I just mash the left arrow and use the down arrow for holds or jump. This makes for quick edits when trying to follow the beat of the song. You can run the script afterward to randomize arrow positions and test your song. I keep a backup of my sim file so I can work faster.

This saves a lot of time as it does the bulk of the work. You can make small tweaks as needed. It works with steps, hold, rolls and mines, not sure if other step types exist.

You can get it here :
https://github.com/maelperreault/stepFileArrowPositionRandomizer

Clone the repository and extract the .zip on your desktop. Run the stepFileArrowPositionRandomizer.exe to get a gist of how it works with the example sim file (Example file.sm) which contains left and down arrows only.

Here is the short documentation :

Stepfile Arrow Position Randomizer

Randomizes arrow positions in (.sm) files for all (.sm) files in program directory and sub-directorries
Backups (.bak) of (.sm) files are created in case something goes wrong
Randomization is simple for now and simply prevents too many of the same arrows in a row
Only moves existing arrows around, you need to create the arrows first

HOW TO USE
1. Use ArrowVortex to create a basic (.sm) file
2. Add steps and hold arrows following the beat of the song
3. Run the randomizer in the same directory as the file to randomize arrow positions
4. Copy the randomized ( your Stepmania Songs folder as usual

NOTES You will need to reopen file in ArrowVortex to see the changes
You might need to force a reload of the file in Stepmania to see the changes
Press CTRL+SHIFT+R in selection screen while the song is selected

WARNING
In case something goes wrong, you can always use one of the .bak files
Simply remove the .001.bak to have your .sm file once again

DO NOT RUN THIS INSIDE YOUR MAIN STEPMANIA SONGS FOLDER THIS WILL RANDOMIZE ALL YOUR SONGS
UNDOING THIS QUICKLY IS NOT SUPPORTED RIGHT NOW
I suggest you work in a folder on your desktop just in case
I suggest you keep your original (.sm) file with beats to do quick beat edits until you are done
You can simply run the randomizer again to test new patterns

Feel free to use it however you want,
Cheers !

Randomizer is built in into stepmania:

Select part of chart.


Press [A] to open Alter Menu.


Bam done.



But please don't use randomize for making stepcharts. The whole art of simmaking is about creating particular patterns that fit the music and situation, not just slamming some arrows randomly and calling it a day.

Hi Lysek,

thanks I did not know this! There seem to be some cool tools in there.

I tried the Cement Mixer both in Outfox 5.3 and in Stepmania 5.0.12 with middling results.
Outfox 5.3 seems to be buggy right and most of the time it deletes some of my arrow, my guess is they mixed some stuff up.
Stepmania 5.0.12 seem to work but seem to spam the same arrows too much, I see why you would suggest not using it.

Which version are you using though so I can test it out? It doesn't seem to be either of these.

The couple rules I set up seem to work better than the Stepmania "Cement Mixer" which does seem true random and spams the same direction too much. Basically, the randomizer tries to prevent notes from repeating twice in a row. It keeps the number of arrows used for each direction to try not to spam the same direction too much. It removes same arrow repeats which might be desirable though.

Hold sections and jumps are sometimes too hard though. The program would need to keep in consideration what foot is on what arrow to prevent too many crossovers. I know ArrowVortex keeps something similar to generate notes and provides a difficulty slider by taking that into consideration. It's a shame I couldn't just add it to ArrowVortex directly.

Try it out and tell my what you think. I think some kind of rules like these could be added to replace the Cement Mixer in Stepmania to give way better results.

The end game for randomizers would be for someone to build a small neural network based program and make it learn for patterns from existing well mapped sim files. It would probably do a better job in creating a file that appear "human". It's beyond my knowledge right now unfortunately.

I'll probably make a new version when I figure some better rules for holds though.

https://theoutline.com/post/1280/this-neural-network-has-learned-how-to-choreograph-for-ddr?zd=2&zi=e2526kc5

It's an interesting idea, having an AI be intelligent enough to automatically create stepcharts that flow well and provide a fun experience. Though I think we're still a few years out on it being convenient and consistent enough for regular use... not taking into account stepchart makers feeling bitter about being made obsolete by it.

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Thanks chewi, that looks pretty cool!

I might have to give it a look to see how well it works. The version on his site seems to only return an error right now when trying both .mp3 and .wav files. Making it work from the github seems a bit of a pain though as the implementation was meant to be server based.

I think no matter how good an AI can get at making charts that work well, there's an inherent human creativity that should still be able to bring something to the table regardless, especially with more gimmicky sorts of charts. It'd be interesting to see what sort of style an AI would have and how it would compare to the data it trains from.

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I'd be thoroughly impressed if an AI can mimick my terrible stepcharts.

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