Z-I-v Summer Contest 2018

Ladies and gentlemen, Week 9 is OVER!

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Was informed that Flow didn't have a ZIP and that is fixed now.

WEEK 8 RESULTS!

Taking 1st Place with 58 Points is... Peek-A-Boo, by DDRDAIKENKAI & Gameoson! But really, is anybody surprised that DDRDAIKENKAI has won another round ZIv Academy?
Taking 2nd Place with 54 Points is... AIMAI mind, by Daffa212162 & vincentw!
Taking 3rd Place with 45 Points is... Sunset Drive (Summer FestaMix), by 5l1n65h07 & dj VERTICAI! ...Unfortunately, 5l1n65h07 forgot to vote, so I guess only dj VERTICAI gets points out of this one. Sorry about that.

Check out the full (and hopefully final) results here

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And now, we wait for Daffa to announce the final theme of the regulation rounds.

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Thus was uploaded a couple days ago, just giving a brief description.

I've been wanting to step this for awhile now. This was submitted to [Chordophones] by DDRDAIKENKAI back in SC15, I believe.

I spent a lot of time on the sync, because it wasnt up to my standards, hopefully it's acceptable.

There's a chart in , please ignore it, unless you want to play the chart I used to sync the song. (Some of it is just 4th notes)

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Step a song that the first letter of the title of the song starts with a vowel letter.

Rules:
- The first letter of the title must start with a vowel letter (the vowels letter are: a, i, u, e, o)
- If the titles aren't in Latin character, the title get romanized and the rules still apply.



Question, clarification, or complain because the week theme are too lame? Just shoot them to this thread or PM me!

Honestly, I wanna go to sleep right now since its getting late now~

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Has it been 10 weeks?

Sorry if I haven't been able to post the last two leaderboards, so here's three at once. From top to bottom, these are the leaderboards for Weeks 8, 7, and 6.


- Congrats to all winners, and DDRDAIKENKAI for snatching VIP!
- djVERTICAI is now a definite qualifier, congratulations!

Thanks for using Agadoo as an example, Daffa!
I have the PERFECT song for this week and I'm determined that this will be my best file yet as my chances of being a VIP this year are slim ;w;

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Oh boy. Last week. And with 6 points on the leaderboard (so far. also thanks to those who voted for Kick Drums & Red Wine). Wonder how much will I need to get enough for the VIP Room. Well, let's find out that if I end up getting a hat trick 0 points get enough to make it in.


I was wondering how long before a LOOΠΔ song shows up in the contest (or on this site). Well, might as well be the first to do so.

I honestly don't know how I'm going to tag the artist for a LOOΠΔ song.
ViVi of LOOΠΔ?
LOOΠΔ ViVi?
...just LOOΠΔ?

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OMG!

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It ain't ROTTERDAM METRO but I couldn't fit that song in any of these past weeks so here's another track from PARALLEL HARDCORE 4.

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Started the SC with some Cannon Ballers with The Chase, might as well end the normal section with some Cannon Ballers as well.

A 20th anniversary remix of a beatmania classic. Since this is a classic tune with a modern twist, I decided to make the chart very old school like by adding no holds and making it a little jumpy. Also had to name the file "OD*20" since ZIv doesn't like you naming your file with "/s" in them. If you have any issues with the file not working because of file name, let me know and I'll fix it asap.

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Lots to cover, so bear with me! We'll start by talking about the submission.

First of all, curse you @K-Step cuz I was literally planning to step EILY as soon as the theme was announced LOL. In any case, I was wondering the same as you and wanted to see some LOOΠΔ submissions, so while I did want to step EILY, Egoist was a fun choice as well.

As for the simfile itself, it is one of my personal favorite submissions of mine. Maybe I'm biased because I fucking love LOOΠΔ, but I really do love this submission. On a superficial level, I really love the graphics I made for this (banner and background), and the MV cut includes my favorite scenes from the MV (which is frickin gorgeous AS ALL LOOΠΔ MVS ARE DAMMIT). For the charts, specifically , I just think I struck a really nice balance of simplicity and technicality, especially during the chorus. See, Egoist is one of those songs that despite how mellow it is, the production is so damn good, it makes you want to dance. I wanted to create a chart that complimented that sentiment, giving the player lighter sections to appreciate the production as well as Olivia Hye's vocals, and a relatively rhythm heavy chorus section to give the player the opportunity to jive to the emphatic lyrics and production of the chorus. Honestly, if I find the time, I might make an LRC file for this because this song is worth it.

All that said, while I really love what I'm presenting, the reason I'm submitting this now and not for VIP Room is because I don't think this will perform well contest-wise and would do me no good in the VIP Room. The biggest reason for that is the difficulty of this submission. While I have rated at an 8, that is based mostly on the most difficult stream of the of the chart, which is right before the chorus and only lasts 5 beats. Overall, you could definitely call this a medium-hard 7. Besides the one heavy stream, there are only 4 crossovers and one jump at the very end. The difficulty comes mostly from the density of the rhythm selections, and at 92 BPM, I would barely call a 16th stream difficult. Meanwhile, almost all of the files that have won so far have at least one chart with a 9-foot rating. The only winning file that breaks that pattern is Ian's NewAige file, which has rated at an 8. Granted, Ian's file is also a BEMANI song and those generally do well anyway, but that's neither here nor there. Throwing out more numbers, 24 files have placed 1-3rd (before DQ's): two have 7s as their hardest chart, and four have 8s. Again, of those 6 files, only one of those, with an 8, has won its respective week.

I guess what I'm trying to say here is I keep seeing a lot of the same old, same old when it comes to these contests nowadays, and it's kinda disappointing and tiring. Playing through files has become more an more of a drag because I feel like I'm playing the same charts over and over again. That's why as of late, my votes have been almost dependent on song choice, and its frustrating to have to divvy up 15 points when I feel like no one is offering something new.

While I have my gripes with the VIP Room format, what I do like about it is if you qualify early enough, you have the liberty to experiment with your files; step a genre you haven't stepped in a while or ever, stepping difficulties you're not used to, integrating patterns that are rare to your stepping style. If it flops, it doesn't matter in the end because you're already qualified for the VIP room. In the weeks that I've participated, I really haven't seen much of that, and even though we've reached the end of the road of the themed weeks, I hope that we see a shift in what we see worthy of submitting or voting for.

OK, that's all I've got right now. I've been meaning to have a meaningful dialogue about this for a while, so I'd love to hear other people's thoughts on the matter. Also, sorry if I came across as a pretentious snob in any of that, it's just something that's been on my mind for a while.

Final notes:

- My file for The Gangnam Avenue has been updated with graphics. I also removed the Edit file from the .SM since, again, it was the exact same as , if not it was an early draft that didn't belong there anyway. Do with that what you will.

- I will probably stream [Deja Vu] reviews either tomorrow around noon (CST) or Saturday afternoon. Either way, I'll post before I go live if you care to join.

- S T A N L O O Π Δ

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I’m leaving for vacation tomorrow so I’ll keep this brief: I liked the song and made a cut a while back, never got around to finishing it, then found it in my folder and noticed it fit the theme so I said what the heck and did it. is pretty easy for a 10 (more like a mid-14 X-scale) but idk I just like round numbers? I guess? I’ve never been good at ratings anyway.

((And yes, this is the second week in a row I’ve stepped something space related. Sue me.))

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shoutouts to all the 6-8s out there, you're doing wonderful, keep it up 👍

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