Why is it so hard to use edit mode in DDR MAX?

I finally got the game (it's so much fun) and I decided to finally add in the newer steps that songs in the game were given (cutie chaser, brilliant 2u, stompin to my beat, etc...)

BUT THIS EDIT MODE IS SO CONFUSING. It seems like everything is off by one. I tried to copy the oni/other steps for the songs from stepmania, but they're always off in the actual game.

Is there anything I could do to make editing (well adding) steps much easier?

There's your problem, not all simfiles will match up with the first measure of an official step chart, so you need to figure out which measures in SM and DDR MAX are the start of the steps to the music.

Not only that but, there's an extra line in stepmania in between main lines (4- then 3 smaller lines 5) instead there's only two in DDR MAX so i don't know where to start.

EDIT: It seems this is only in Cutie Chaser, and not any other song.

And trying to find the synch area takes so much time Especially when they have triples

For some reason, Cutie Chaser's edit data is in 3/4 time, which is the time signature for the song. Cutie Chaser is the only one that does this as Saber Wing goes between 3/4 and 5/4, but the Edit Data is shown as 4/4. Shoot me a PM when you try again so that I can help you out.

Edit: finished typing out the information to Shubox. Hopefully, the information below is as clear as possible. If you get stuck or get confused on something feel free to ask. If I don't give an immediate answer, you can always open up a blank edit and tinker around!

First to get the important stuff out of the way:

5.1.1. D-
Starts in measure 3 in DDRMAX and measure 5 in stepmania

celebrate D-
Starts in measure 3 in DDRMAX and measure 3 in stepmania

Cutie Chaser D-
Starts in measure 3 in DDRMAX and measure 4 in stepmania

AM-3P S- and D-
Starts in measure 3 in DDRMAX and measure 3 in stepmania

BRILLIANT 2U (Orchestra Groove) S- and D-
Starts in measure 3 in DDRMAX and measure 3 in stepmania

CANDY S- and D-
Starts in measure 5 in DDRMAX and measure 5 in stepmania

Ecstasy S- and D-
Starts in measure 5 in DDRMAX and measure 5 in stepmania

Secret Rendez-vous S- and D-
Starts in measure 5 in DDRMAX and measure 5 in stepmania

Stomp To My Beat S- and D-
Starts in measure 3 in DDRMAX and measure 3 in stepmania

You can move the cursor up and down with the directional buttons or with the analog stick. You can use the R1 button to scroll faster when using the directional buttons.

You see the red triangles on the cursor? Pressing the L1 button will switch it to blue. Press it again and it'll switch to yellow. That's how you access the 4th, 8th and 16th notes.

When highlighting the measures, press the select button to access the Green notes. Switch Triplets to On and you're good to go! Note that while that feature is on, you can only use the green notes. You have to turn it off to go back to the other notes.

If you're having problems reading the notes as you insert them, you can use the right analog stick to zoom in and out by moving up or down.

To insert freeze arrows, all you do is hold down the button and move the cursor up/down.

Here's something to make things easier when putting in the edits from stepmania: to prevent any confusion, start placing the arrows in the same measure, regardless if it starts there or not. When you're done putting the steps in, play the song on stepmania to see where the first note starts in the song. Then play the the song in the PS2 to see how much you need to move the whole thing. It's usually either a measure early or a measure late. In some cases though, you might have to adjust it by six measures!

Don't know how to Copy and Paste? Press the L2 button. That will put down a marker. When you press start to play test the chart, the song will start from where you put the marker. Press L2 again in another area and you set the ending point when play-testing. If you need to move the whole edit to so that it goes with the song, place one marker at the first step and place the other marker on the last step of the song. Pressing R2 will open up the menu to copy and paste. Select copy and the window will close signifying that the selected area has been copied. To remove the whole chart to fix it, you'll have to place the markers again to Cut it. After putting the two markers down, open the menu with R2 and select Cut to remove the selected steps. With the above information on where the song starts in DDRMAX, move the cursor to the measure number, open up the same menu with the R2 and select Paste.

Ta-da!! You just finished putting the Oni charts!. Make sure to save often if this is your first time putting steps in as you might end up making a mistake. Wouldn't want to start all over from the beginning now do we?

On the left, you'll see a whole bunch of buttons. Move the cursor to that area, and you should see two memory card icons. The top one is to Save/Load an edit and the second one is to Quick Save. Since you're putting new steps in, you'll only have access to the top memory card. Select it, pick a spot to put the edit in, give it a name and you're done!! Since you saved the edit onto the memory card, you can now use the Quick Save feature when editing that specific edit.

Every thing else on the menus can be explored when you get curious. Feel free to ask about one of the icons if you get stuck!

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