Posts filed under 'StepMania'
It’s late at night and I’m lying in my bed, drifting towards the bliss of sleep. My thoughts are blurred and random, but through them comes the sound of music – a steady rhythm and the high-pitched vocals of the Gibb brothers. “Listen to the ground,” they tell me. “There is movement all around. There is something going down, and I can feel it. On the waves of the air, there is dancin’ out there. If it’s somethin’ we can share, we can steal it.” My mind floats around the tune, absorbing its funky beat, feeling every note and every lyric. I’m soaring high into the sky, twisting and turning with my arms outstretched. “Here I am, prayin’ for this moment to last, livin’ on the music so fine, borne on the wind, makin’ it mine.” The landscape flies past beneath me, a myriad of scintillating colours and flashing lights that sends my senses elevating further. I see arrows floating up from below me, marching forward in a summons to the music! Pointing in the four directions of the compass they approach in a steady line, advancing relentlessly towards my feet. I know what must be done… “^Night >Fever, ^Night >Fe>ver, <We know ^how to >do it… Gimme that ^Night <Fever, ^Night <Fe<ver, >We know vhow to <show it.” Suddenly I feel a jolt through my body, and with a gasp of breath I’m jerked from my dream. My foot had just twitched, trying to step on one of the arrows and waking me up. “Bloody Stepmania!” I mutter, before turning over and trying to get back to sleep.
Although I’ve obviously known about the DDR craze for years, I first found out about Stepmania last June from a friend online who liked to use it as a form of regular aerobic exercise. After a few weeks of intense dancing I’ve managed to drag myself up to the same level as he, so we had a little song-swap a few nights ago. Previously I wasn’t willing to accept any direct assistance with the game, but since I’m now more practised I figure there’s no harm in enhancing my experience with some extra songs from a trustworthy source. I also wanted to know what he thought of the songs I’d been trying, in case they were all easy as pie and I was a pansy for having any difficulty with them.
What he gave me was mostly a mix of anime and video game themes, and I had to swallow my pride and bias to dance to what were essentially J-pop songs. His choice of music was based on what he uses for an aerobic workout – with extra emphasis on the “aero” it seems. These songs involved a lot more jumping about than I’m familiar with, and that took some getting used to. But I did rather well overall, I’d like to think – got As and Bs on almost all 4 and 5-foot songs. I was significantly better at the Final Fantasy tunes that I recognised well (getting close to AA on some but not quite making the cut). My biggest surprise came today when I decided to try out the 6-foot difficulty on One Winged Angel. My first couple of attempts resulted in Cs, but I was determined that I could do better, and on my third go I pulled off an A. Further tries got me better and better, and I think with enough practice I can achieve an AA on this song.
My confidence was boosted by this, and so I decided I was ready to master other 6-foot songs, but my delusions were quickly shattered by pathetic fails in other tunes. Evidently this version of One Winged Angel is extremely easy for the 6-foot level. Still, I have some comfort from the fact that my friend considered the songs I found hard to be challenging too, and he thinks I have now managed to exceed him on skill at the game. I’m not sure I agree with that, but it’s nice to know that after a few weeks I can at least be on a similar level to someone who has been playing a lot longer. I should stress though that he uses the game purely as regular light exercise, with little interest in game ratings, whilst for me it’s all about challenge, and throughout I’ve been pushing myself to do better and better.
And better I shall get. I have asked around a bit and from what I can tell the level I’m at can be considered “decent”. But that’s not good enough for me. My next session will be centred around pushing myself into the 6-foot difficulties, and I’m determined not to stop there.
Some have said that my pad may not be good enough for the higher difficulty levels, but for now it’s holding up. However, once I showed someone a picture of my mat they came to the conclusion that it was potentially the source of all my hatred for the genre and my inability to fully enjoy the game. Not for any technical aspect to it, but due to its atrocious colour scheme – what I have previously described as “clown vomit” and “the results of a paint factory explosion”. You may find here a picture of its full glory:
http://www.geocities.com/darrenjohngrey/dancemat.jpg
For those interested in the DIY amendments I have made to improve the pad, you may observe the base of the pad thus:
http://www.geocities.com/darrenjohngrey/dancemat2.jpg
The polystyrene squares under the left and right arrows are taped on, and have worn down quite a bit through heavy usage. On the top and bottom are an old art pad and some physics magazines, giving firm support to the ever treacherous up and down arrows. Lately I’ve been doing without the latter since I find I can play well enough au natural, and my padding on the top and bottom tends to slip a bit at times.
This pad cost me £5 (roughly $8), and for that price I think it’s done pretty darn well. However, those interested in serious long-term play are probably much better off investing in a foam-filled pad that won’t slip as much, whilst also being considerably less unsightly.
Positives: I’m not crap! Well, not too crap at least. I have more songs I like now, for which the step-charts are well-timed to the music and at a nice level of challenge. Having fresh songs helps take away the tedium, though obviously that only works in the short-term.
Negatives: Disturbing my sleep has got to be one of the worst things a game can do to me (asides from having a bulky cartridge stuck up an uncomfortable area – or even worse, a Superscope). Basically I went to bed thinking about how I’d like a step pattern to go to the classic Bee Gees song, and as I was drifting off my feet twitched to the steps I was imagining, waking myself up. This is simply infuriating!
Overall so far: Meh. Can’t say I’m hating it, can’t say I’m loving it. The challenge is still the only real motivation to keep playing. I’m perhaps not as negative about the genre as a whole now, and not as biased against the players either, but I do still find the concept worthy of ridicule, especially the idea of playing alone. I’d perhaps be tempted to keep playing if I knew others who played and could compete directly with them – I can certainly see an attraction there. That’s notably more of an attraction than I had 3 weeks ago.
August 24th, 2006
Over the past few days I’ve been trying to step beyond the 3-foot songs I’ve been mastering so far, and stretching my wings/feet further to the 4 and 5 foot categories. This has been an interesting challenge because it has involved getting much faster, as well as learning a few of what I call “special moves”. My own terms for some of these (since I don’t know the standard DDR slang) are half-beat triplets, forced foot-switches, and sequential diagonals. Half-beat triplets are when three steps need to be taken in the time normally taken for two. Forced foot-switching is when a holding step with one foot means you’re left to use the other foot for steps on all 3 remaining buttons (which can mean, for instance, having to use your left foot on the right button). Sequential diagonals aren’t particularly special – it means jumping on two buttons in a diagonal a few times – but on 4-foot and higher difficulties you’re expected to do this faster and more frequently, sometimes with many in a row. Maybe these don’t have terms in the DDR communities since they’re seen as being easy and standard anyway – if so I don’t care; I’ve named them now, and they’re still special to me. My precious babies…
So, progress wise I feel I’m doing well. I can get As in quite a few 4-foot songs now, though admittedly not always reliably. Since I don’t have that many songs with 4-foot available I decided to try and do some 5-foot songs too, and was quite surprised with how well I could do – a couple of As and Bs, as well as a few Cs, and most surprisingly an AA on one song. So either I’ve got some very easy 5-foot songs, or I’ve been doing some pretty fiendish 4-footers (I think possibly the latter given the trouble I had breaking into this level, though the AA 5-foot song is obviously very much simpler than others).
However, this progress has come at a price, and that price is hard work. After the first 30 minutes I spent solely doing 4-foot songs my legs felt like jelly and I had to take a rest before I could continue. I’ve gotten a bit more used to them now, but the two hour sessions I tend to do have still been very exhausting, with need of frequent breaks and breathers. And it’s not just physical exhaustion either – the concentration on timing in this game can really exhaust you mentally. By the end of the two hours I find that although I could maybe keep going physically, mentally I’m just incapacitated. I can’t concentrate on the steps enough to time anything right or prepare for different moves, and the arrows just flash by whilst I whimper pathetically. I’m going to have to give up on my habit of writing up a report right after playing – I just can’t gather my thoughts properly, let alone try to think of interesting or witty comments (that’s hard enough for me anyway). My left ankle’s also been playing up a bit. I sprained it a few months ago trying to learn to ice skate – that was an even more embarrassing and pathetic event than trying DDR (it doesn’t help when 8 year olds pick it up in seconds, whilst after an hour you’re still clutching to the barrier in mortal fear). Sometimes after heavier gaming my ankle starts aching again, but (un)fortunately this shouldn’t get in the way of continuing to play.
I’m still making what I consider to be silly newbie mistakes, like mixing the up and down arrows, and completely mis-timing certain jumps. I’m also really terrible at songs where the arrow speed is frustratingly slow, or where the speed changes dramatically at several stages in the song. But in spite of these troubles I am still pleased with how far I’ve gotten to date. I’m now doing well in songs that looked utterly impossible ten days ago. Sometimes I find myself not needing to concentrate as much on the game, and just let my feet glide over the buttons themselves. The game’s coming a lot more naturally to me now. Lyrics have been getting stuck in my head a lot, and some mornings I wake up seeing arrows and imagining steps in my mind, which is perhaps a sign I’ve been playing too much. But it’s getting me one step closer to heaven (baby), which is one step closer to you. However, Billie Jean is not my lover (she’s just a girl), and as I try to make my way to the ordinary world, I will survive, in the gay bar, gay bar. Mah-na mah-na (do do-do do).
There are frustrations though. Many of them are to do with problems revolving around the Stepmania program itself, and though I won’t let that interfere with my overall rating of the DDR genre, permit me a little rant. I was told there was an “Event Mode” whereby you wouldn’t have to play 3 stages at a time, you would just keep selecting songs endlessly (otherwise it takes you to the high score and credits screen after 3 songs and you have to go through the very poor menu system to start again). I figured this would be a popular option, and searched in all the usual places – general options, gameplay options, machine options, miscellaneous… Where did I eventually find the damned thing? “Coin Options”. Why for the love of god is there such a things as coin options?! Why is such an important gameplay feature in there? Coin options has other things in it like how many “coins” you need for a “credit”, and how many games you can have per credit (coins are “inserted” simply by pressing a button – thankfully this whole system can be turned off). There’s even a book-keeping screen so you can keep track of how many “coins” you’ve “spent”. Why, I ask? Why?! Who the hell would want to play at home pretending that they have some slot machine on their computer? Or are there weirdos that actually build a whole DDR machine in their houses with full metal pads and coin slots and everything? If so, are these people allowed to breed? What is wrong with people that they would actually choose their game at home to have all the stupid set-up quirks of an arcade game? Do they get some sadistic pleasure from this, or are they actually imagining themselves in an arcade area surrounded by adoring fans as they play? I’m reminded of my original biased conceptions from three weeks ago of what home-playing DDR fans “must” be like…
Also, the difficulty ratings are so very poorly laid out. I can understand that some 4-foot songs are like 5-foots and so forth – I can excuse some subjective ratings on that. But on top of that are the game classifications of Light, Standard and Heavy difficulty areas. It would be logical for the game to simply put all 2 and 3-foots into Light, 4 to 6-foots in Standard and 7-foot or above in Heavy, or something along those lines at least. Instead the people designing the step-charts have to choose which foot level goes into which difficulty ranking, meaning even further confusion over difficulty levels. There are 2-foot songs in Standard and 5-foot songs in Light. To confound the issue even more, although you can switch difficulty levels within the music menu, what songs are currently displayed is purely dependant on which songs fit the difficulty you’re currently showing. So if you’re in Light mode certain easy 3 or 4 foot songs won’t show up unless you switch over to Standard. This makes it a giant nuisance to navigate through the music looking for ones you’re able to play – in the end you have to try and memorise what foot ratings the songs are given on the different difficulty levels. This isn’t easy with several dozen tracks. It’s all so frustrating when it could be solved with a far simpler system!
On a final note, I went out to a danceclub last night for a friend’s birthday. The DJ was playing lot of 80s stuff, and at one point Billie Jean came on. I was pretty shocked – it’s not a song often played in clubs, but more importantly it’s the song I’ve been playing the most of by far in Stepmania, and the first 4-footer I got an A in. So after getting that A I was wondering just how good my dancing to this song would be. I didn’t have my dance mat with me unfortunately, but I tried dancing to some of the steps I remembered – doing my half-beat triplets and forced foot-switches. I avoided doing any sequential diagonal jumps, since that sort of thing might have drawn too much attention… Overall I’m sure I looked very silly, but thankfully the club was dark and the few people that knew me there were already quite intoxicated. Also, I’m guessing it’s just as silly looking as my normal dancing. I did get some compliments for my dancing that night actually, but I think it was more for effort than style.
Positives: Still improving my skill at this. Y’know, that’s been about the only positive there’s been to the genre so far. Oh yeah, and my mat doesn’t stink as much any more (even though I probably do – so sweaty!)
Negatives: Frustration with Stepmania itself aside, and ignoring the current pain in my ankle, the biggest negative has to be with how this game creeps into you when you play it too much. I’ve generally been doing 2 hours every two or three days, with extra hour sessions when I get the chance. Any game played this often will get into your dreams and subconscious thoughts, and it’s not particularly nice. For people playing this game every day it must simply be a part of their life, always somewhere in the back recesses of their mind, and that’s pretty freaky from my perspective…
Overall so far: This game still hasn’t gripped me, and I still don’t see the general appeal behind the genre. It is no longer an interesting peculiarity and is more and more becoming hard work. I’m toiling at it purely for the aim of achieving better scores. Could someone point out where the fun is?
August 20th, 2006
…Worries for another day
Let the music play
Down in Fraggle Rock!
Okay, so I promised a more fun update, with the plan being to get drunk and play Stepmania with a friend who will make sure I enjoy it. Unfortunately that’s been postponed, but it should hopefully happen shortly. In its place here are some lyrics from the old theme song for Captain Planet:
‘We’re the Planeteers,
You can be one too,
Cause saving our planet is the thing to do!
Looting and polluting
Is not the way,
Hear what Captain Planet has to say:
“The power is yours!”’
Can you imagine that show airing these days? 5 teenagers of different racial backgrounds hold rings for each element (the fifth element being Heart!), combining their powers to stop pollution and save the planet from the evil corporations and scientists! Maybe that was totally gnarly when we were kids, but these days Bush would accuse it of being hippies trying to brainwash our children. Terrorist hippies!
Also somewhat disturbing was finding the theme tune to Alvin and the Chipmunks. The lines go something along the ling of “So get set to have some fun, We’ll bring you action… and satisfaction… We’re the chipmunks, Coming on stronger than ever before!” As I was dancing to this, hearing that high-pitched chipmunk voice sing about coming on stronger and giving me satisfaction, I was extremely creeped out. Didn’t stop me getting an A though…
But anyway, enough of such tomfoolery! Back to the game itself, which has gripped and excited me so intensely that I’ve taken a whole six days to bother shoving out another article about it. To be honest there’s not a great amount to report. This game is really starting to bore me a fair amount now. I’ve usually been playing 30-60 minutes a day, and gradually trying to improve myself. I’ve gone through all my 3-foot songs and gotten A rankings in the vast majority. I managed to impress myself by trying out a 3-foot song I’ve never heard of before and cranking out an AA grade first go!
But 4-foot songs are still an uphill struggle. Today, after going through all the harder 3-foot songs, I gave 4-foot Billie Jean another few tries. First attempt – fail. Second attempt, struggling, but for once I actually managed a D! That’s the first time I’ve been happy with a D outside of cup sizes! After that I felt on a roll, I went another time and was doing amazingly well. I got the health meter up to full, stringing along a very good combo, and was hoping for an A when I started screwing up near the end – resulted in a C overall. After that I was just too tired to do well (I’d been dancing for a good 2 hours straight) so I gave up.
But tomorrow is another day… I am determined to get into the 4-foot songs and do better. I’m also still perplexed by the grade rankings you get at the end. An AA seems only possible if you never miss a single beat. An A only seems possible if you get your bar to full, whilst a B is if it’s nearly full. C and D are obviously lower down the line (which is actually rare to get – either you have the song covered well and you get an A or B, or you totally cock up and fail). However, there seems to be some other factor here since sometimes you get a B if your bar is full, and sometimes an A if it’s not quite full. I’m guessing it must be the number of perfect steps, or how high a combo you can get.
I’ve messed around with the settings a bit and managed to turn the stupid menu timer off (who the hell would want that on?) though I still can’t find a way to disable the way it forces you into a 3-stage mode of play. Interestingly I found an option to turn off the “Marvellous” rating for your steps. I can only assume this means that in terms of points Marvellous is exactly the same as Perfect – it’s only something added on for display. Looking at the post-song statistics I can sort of see why – on the songs I’m good at over 50% of my steps are Marvellous, with a further 25-30% Perfect. Without that extra high rating I’d simply be seeing the same Perfect score all the time. I figure there must be some damn amazing grade for getting the highest rating on every step – something I’ll have to experiment with some time on an easy song. But I really can’t see what the heck is the difference between Great and Marvellous – that split-second variation just really ain’t obvious.
The alterations I made to my pad are getting a little worn – the polystyrene on the left and right buttons has developed a groove in the middle making the buttons a little less responsive at times. I’ll have to look at reworking these with harder materials. Still a few slipping problems too, but not enough to interfere with play – the mat just needs a little adjustment in between stages sometimes. It will be interesting in future to see just how different the proper arcade machines are to my pathetic little patched up cheapo dance mat…
Positives: Well, I guess I’m still improving, albeit very slowly… I don’t feel like a complete pillock playing any more – just bored really.
Negatives: Forget embarrassment or shame, this game is just turning out really really dull. The initial joy from something new has quickly worn off and I’m left really struggling to want to play.
Overall so far: The thing I’ve never understood, and that I understand even less now, is that there are people who play this regularly, on a daily basis sometimes. There are forums with tens of thousands of users dedicated to Stepmania. Why? Just why…? To keep this up I’m going to have to try and add a bit of spice…
August 14th, 2006
As I type I’m still sweating from my last session of Stepmania. The game doesn’t exhaust you or put you out of breath (at least not at the difficulty levels I’m on) but it certainly can cause you to perspire – or glow if you’re a woman. The heat doesn’t help obviously, nor does wearing clothes. I’m not yet desperate enough to dance around naked on my own – but if the heat gets worse I may have to consider my options…
At the start of this challenge I was determined that I wouldn’t rely on others for advice, and I’d let the game speak for itself. Well, I can’t exactly help it if people starting giving hints in the comments here, so I have learned a few things recently. Like I can stand on buttons whenever I don’t have to hit them. I would have figured this out eventually I’m sure, but knowing it now has given a very major boost to my performance. Before I was having a lot of balance problems because I was trying to keep my feet in the little gap between the buttons, and there really wasn’t enough space at all. I’m much more comfortable now that I know how to play a bit more properly…
I’m trying to learn more about the game mechanics and the scoring system, but it’s not exactly crystal clear. You get marked on your timing with each move – depending on the timing of your step you get rated as Miss, Poor, Okay, Good, Great, Perfect or Marvellous. “Perfect” sounds like it should be the best, but “Marvellous” uses flashier text so I must assume that it’s better. You have a health bar that starts at 50%, and Misses or Poors cause it to go down, whilst better ratings make it go up. If it drops to zero you lose, and I assume the ending position of the bar affects your overall score. The three highest move rankings can count as part of a combo, so one of the challenges of the game seems to be to try and string together the longest sequences of well-timed moves to get a high combo. At the end of each song, assuming you didn’t fail it, you get a score from E to some high number of As – the best I’ve gotten was AA on one song, and I’m guessing to do better I’d have to get Marvellous or Perfect on each and every step.
I did some amendments to my mat to try and fix the troubles I was having with it slipping, and with my inability to tell where the heck the buttons where. I taped some squares of polystyrene and cardboard to the bottom under where the arrows buttons are, so I can now feel bumps under them with my feet to know I’m stepping in the right place. This extra padding on the bottom also handily doesn’t slip as much, which all helps to improve my performance. Okay, so it looks a bit silly, but since my mat already looks like the results of a paint factory explosion I’m not too fussed.
So, with these developments today’s practise gave me much improved results. On a new 2-foot song I downloaded I didn’t miss a beat on my first try, and got a rank of AA. On almost all of my 3-foot songs I now have A or B rankings. The song I’m best at by far is still Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean”, on which I can easily string up combos of over 100 on both 2 and 3 foot modes. I’m not sure if my skill at this song is due to me knowing it well, it having a strong bass beat, or perhaps me having some as yet undiscovered magic paedo powers.
But regardless of my great progress with 3-foot songs, doing well on the 4-foot difficulty level seems as elusive as a DDR fan in a conversation. I can barely last half a minute in Billie Jean before my health bar drops to zero. Other songs have bewildered and dismayed me ever more. I still have some difficulty with certain areas of the 3-foot songs – such as whenever the arrows change speed, or when I have to press two arrows at once that aren’t opposite each other (left + down for instance). Hopefully with all of this practise shall make perfect, but a part of me worries that these early advances have just been me getting to grips with how to play, and at some point soon I’ll hit a wall where improvement will become far harder and require tedious amounts of practise.
I’ve downloaded a lot more songs, though it does seem to be generally hard to find tracks I like. Still, I’ve got around 120 songs now and there are a fair few I love in there, though most of it I haven’t tried yet. Some of the most fun stuff is the different TV themes, like Fraggle Rock and Captain Planet. I downloaded a number of DDR mixes, but I simply don’t recognise the vast majority of the songs, and trying to dance to them always turns out to be futile. If I don’t know how the music goes my timing is all out. I’m hoping at some point to get the DDRExtreme 80s Mix, which looks like it’ll offer me a lot of fun.
Now I’m slightly ashamed to admit this, but I’ll be open about it – I did catch myself smiling when playing this today, and whenever I got an A on 3-foot difficulty Billie Jean I jumped in the air and shouted “yes!” I am beginning to enjoy this, especially the challenge of improving myself. I need to give this time to develop more, and see if when improvement comes slower I’m still enjoying myself, but at the moment I can say I’m having fun.
I do still feel shame though. I’ve kept this whole thing a dirty secret from my housemates – I’ll let them think what they want about the thumping noises and the loud music. The few friends I’ve told that aren’t into video games have given me weird looks, and when I stress that it’s only for a web-site they look at me weirder. It’s not that I really care what they think of me, but there is a part of me that’s looking at myself and thinking exactly the same way. I’m dancing at home, on my own, sober. The idea that someone would willingly choose to do this on a regular basis is still disturbing. But it’s only been half a week’s play so far, and perhaps there is more that this game has to offer that will keep me hooked. For now the absurdity will continue, and I’ll just blame it on the boogie…
Positives: “The power is yours!” I loved Captain Planet as a kid. Now as a grown-up (physically at least) I can appreciate how awfully and wonderfully cheesy it was. Being able to dance to stuff like this is fantastic, and is by far the best highlight of this game. Part of my desire to improve is stemmed from the fact that I have more songs I want to dance to that can only be played on higher difficulties.
Negatives: This game is very poor for beginners. The step files mixed by fans tend to be aimed at very high, sometimes stupendous, difficulty levels. They are also sometimes mis-labelled, badly rated for difficulty, and even poorly timed to the song. Trying to get the most out of this game requires a *lot* of effort and searching around.
Overall so far: There is promise and there is despair, but for once the two seem to be on a more even level. The game is opening up, and as I more properly get into it now I will be in a better position to judge it highly or harshly.
Sorry if the updates haven’t been of much interest to date as I get to grips with this thing, but I can promise that my next session should provide a more interesting report. For I shall not be alone, and I do not intend to stay sober…
August 8th, 2006
I’m pathetic. I’m useless and worthless and utterly wretched. I have the reflexes of a zombie sloth and the balance of a giraffe on ice skates. My co-ordination is awful, my timing is completely out and I have all the skill and grace of, well, me. In short I really really suck at this game…
But before we discuss that properly, let’s have a look at Stepmania itself. Stepmania has been out for about 5 years now, and is currently on version 3.9, with v4.0 currently going through the test release stage. It’s a very professionally put together program with excellent graphics and interface, and a huge range of customisation options. For those interested in extreme RSI you can play on your keyboard, but the real experience of the game comes from getting your own dance mat, such as the many available for the Playstation series. The Stepmania web-site very handily gives helpful advice on which pads and converters work best, and I was pleased to see a picture of my own PS controller converter on its recommended list.
Dance mats can vary in quality, from the basic plastic ones that tend to come with any Playstation dance game you buy, to far more expensive metal framed mats that more closely resemble what you’d find in the arcades. Being the scrooge that I am I went for the cheapest option, finding a £5 plastic mat in Virgin. It looks like clown vomit and smells like poison, but I figured it would suit my purposes. These mats actually seem to be quite rare here – it looks like the only way to get a half-decent one is to order online.
Stepmania is compatible with a range of song files, including .mp3 and .ogg, as long as they have an accompanying .sm file to give the program instructions like what moves you should be making at what times. Each song can also optionally include backgrounds and banners, including the ability to display video backgrounds. You can use the program to make your own .sm files for your own songs, and there is a huge range of thousands of these put together by fans of the genre, which can be downloaded from numerous web-sites dedicated to the game. From what I’ve seen I’ve been very impressed by the effort put in to make these. However, I do have to wonder just how many hours of their lives people have put into this sort of thing…
Installation of Stepmania is extremely quick and simple – choose your directory and it’s done, pretty much. Step packs (.zip files containing the necessary songs with their .sm files and backgrounds) are easy enough to find, and can simply be unzipped into the Songs folder. .smzip files are available for certain packs, which when run will nicely put everything in the right place for you – no thought required! Packs are available of all the different mixes from the various DDR-style games, as well as a horde of songs fans have made steps to themselves. These mostly consist of modern American dance tunes, video game and anime themes, and a number of J-Pop or J-Rock songs. A few songs are hosted on the Stepmania web-site itself, which also has links to many other sites more dedicated to downloading step files. The best of these tend to require registration. There are a number of strong torrents going which offer the Stepmania program bundled with a number of DDR packs – something I wish I’d gone for in the first place.
Stepmania is set up to emulate DDR in a variety of ways. From what I can tell you choose difficulty levels and songs much like in the arcade games. By default set-up you have to press the Insert Coin button to have credits to play, and you have three lives which you can lose by dancing poorly. You have to pass several “stages”, for which you get rated and put on a high score list. After this the game then resets to the title screen and you can start again. I turned off many of these options when first playing, seeing them as being rather pointless emulation of something I’ve never touched.
To be honest I found the number of options available to be extremely overwhelming. From what I can see there’s little or no documentation to the majority of it, and it’s mostly quite incomprehensible to someone new like me. Some of the defaults seem ridiculous for if you want to just play the game instead of pretending to be in an arcade. This game really seems designed specifically for major DDR fans. For whatever reason they didn’t design it for sad losers that decide to play it just as a challenge for some dumb web-site. That’s such a terrible oversight, don’t you think?
I searched for songs that I might like, or at least recognise, and downloaded a number of game tunes, as well as some old 80s pop songs and TV themes. I was also pleased to find some classical music pieces, and I downloaded them gladly, knowing I’d like the music and thinking they’d be really easy. So, after getting things set up, and switching the options to how I figured I’d like them, I got started. I chose the Beginner difficulty level (the lowest of 8 modes) and figured I’d begin with Chopin’s Etude in C minor since it was classed as 1-foot difficulty.
It was then that I realised two terrible things. Firstly, some of the people making these step files are too lazy to bother putting the right difficulty level on. Secondly, classical music is not suited to this game. For each and every note a step appeared – a mass invasion of arrows flooded my screen, flowing upwards like a river from a burst dam. I tried in vain to keep up with the entourage, but as the screen began flashing DANGER! I collapsed whimpering, utterly defeated as Chopin’s soft piano strokes washed over me and the game rated me “FAILED”.
Further attempts at “1-foot difficulty” pieces produced similar results – I’m guessing it’s the default rating if the person mixing the step file hasn’t specified a difficulty level. So I decided to move on to songs that had been specifically rated 2 or 3 foot difficulty. I started with the FF1 battle theme, a nice spunky little tune that I figured I could really groove down to (see, I’m starting to pick up the dance language now – ain’t that totally funking, dude?) After a try at this I realised what a clumsy, stupid oaf I was.
I figured downloading stuff based on my interests had been a mistake, so I went and found a generic pack of songs that had recently been put together, figuring that it would be better for a beginner. I tried some slow songs, and began to get a bit more used to the pad and controlling the game. However, I was still crap. My co-ordination was pretty awful – I often found I was missing the buttons entirely, or was accidentally standing on the buttons in between steps. My timing was absolutely atrocious – I was usually stepping far too early (when I was even stepping in the right direction). Worst of all was my speed, and my ability to switch quickly between different directions.
Feeling dismayed I decided to go back and at least try some songs I recognised. I tried out “Another One Bites The Dust” and “Billie Jean”, and suddenly found I was doing a lot better. Billie Jean especially was very easy to dance to – the step times match the rhythm of the song so perfectly, and the beats in the song are loud and clear. It seems my problem with the more generic pack of songs I don’t know was that I was trying to follow the arrows on screen, which I’m basically crap at. When I can listen to the song itself for the timing and just watch the screen for the directions I suddenly do a lot better. I practised more and more, and tried out a few more songs too, and found myself improving my co-ordination a bit. Eventually on “Billie Jean” I was stringing combos in the 30s, and I managed to get my rating in it up to a B – I was pretty pleased considered how bad I’d been an hour earlier. On “Another One Bites The Dust” I managed a D.
Some problems though – this pad sucks. It slips around a lot, and during one song it managed to turn round a whole 90 degrees. When my co-ordination is already bad this makes it far worse. Also, I have a lot of trouble telling where the buttons are, and keep stepping on them accidentally, or missing them when I aim for them. This is especially a nuisance with the down arrow, which is out of my field of vision. I can’t keep looking down to see where to step whilst following the screen, and I can’t feel where I am with my feet. So, I figure some DIY work with styrofoam and masking tape may do the trick, whilst also making it slip less (hopefully). If that doesn’t work, and this becomes too much of a bother, I’ll look into buying a better pad online. I can’t let my cheapness get in the way of a fair review of this game. Also, I want to get good enough to dance to the Captain Planet theme…
Many people have commented on my disbelief that this game is any good for exercise. Well, in spite of numerous testimonials, I’m still an unbeliever. I’m going to have to see for myself how much good it really does. I’ll admit though, after my 90 mins or so of playing I was fairly sweaty, and I did need a couple of drinks of water throughout play. At higher difficulty levels it seems obvious this would be more taxing to play. Still, at 75 kilos I don’t see this as being able to do me much good. Obviously my full judgement on this can’t come for another while.
Positives: I feel I’ve advanced quickly. I haven’t had any advice or instruction from others, but still managed to pick up how to play quickly enough and get a decent grade fairly early on. Hopefully this will keep up.
Negatives: I feel silly. This whole game just still feels so pathetic. I’m just glad no one’s watching… I’ll take some webcam pictures to laugh at myself at some point, but I can’t promise to show them.
Overall so far: Stepmania is a very good program, I really can’t fault it. The only problems I have with it are from my own preferences and lack of knowledge or experience of the genre. Being able to choose your own songs is great, especially since you can find some rare and weird stuff that you could never dance to in a club. I can’t really say I’ve enjoyed myself, but I’m certainly willing to carry on. The challenge to improve my scores is compelling. But would I be willing to continue if it wasn’t part of this project? I’m not so sure I’d bother…
To come in future: Obviously I’m going to get more songs – I’ve received some helpful advice on the best web-sites to register with for downloading step files. If I can find some Bee Gees I’ll be very happy. I’ll keep practicing and improving my skills, and hopefully be able to advance up the difficulty scales in due course. When I’ve had enough experience I will try the proper arcade machines and give my opinions on them. I’ve also got to try this as a drunken party game some time (a couple of friends have already expressed an interest), and possibly even give some of the break-dancing style songs a shot. I’m not getting my hopes/fears up for that for a while though… Maybe after a while I can see how hard it is to create my own step files. There seems to be quite a bit of flexibility to this game, so I’ll be trying to get the most out of it in the coming weeks.
August 7th, 2006
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