+---------------------------------+ |DANCE DANCE REVOLUTION UNIVERSE 2| +---------------------------------+ FAQ/Guide by JesseTehSkox (Jesse Haun) crazyperson90@gmail.com Version 1.0 "Space Space Shooter goes 'dooder dooder dooder'..." +-----------------+ |TABLE OF CONTENTS| +-----------------+------------------------------------------------------------ |1. INTRODUCTION |2. DANCE DANCE REVOLUTION: THE BASICS | 2A. Learning the Basics with Game Mode | 2B. Jesse's Assorted Dancing Tips |3. FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS |4. LICENSED SONGS, PART ONE | 4A. Apache | 4B. Dorset Perception | 4C. Fire | 4D. He's The Greatest Dancer | 4E. I Know You Got Soul | 4F. Is It Any Wonder? (Tall Paul Remix) | 4G. Jungle Boogie | 4H. Love Don't Let Me Go | 4I. Rockit | 4J. Safety Dance | 4K. So Fine | 4L. Take Me Out | 4M. The Way You Move | 4N. Walk Like An Egyptian |5. LICENSED SONGS, PART TWO | 5A. Always | 5B. Anytime Soon | 5C. Don't You Love Me | 5D. Hey! | 5E. I Wish I Could Be Beautiful | 5F. Love In Motion | 5G. Not Me (Extended Mix) | 5H. Steppin' Out | 5I. Sunshine In London | 5J. The Tide |6. LICENSED SONGS, PART THREE | 6A. Anthema | 6B. Arrivals And Departures | 6C. Breathing More | 6D. Contract [Breach Mix] | 6E. Do It Right | 6F. EternuS | 6G. Get Up! Give Up! Move On! | 6H. Handle Your Business | 6I. In Different Things (USA Club Mix) | 6J. I Wanna Be Your Star (Speedy Mix) | 6K. Makes Me Cry (Drew Campbell Remix) | 6L. Moving Higher | 6M. Musika Atomika | 6N. Orange Sky | 6O. Ragganinja | 6P. Rock The Show | 6Q. Space Space Shooter (Cusimo & Co. Remix) | 6R. Summer Girl | 6S. Synergy | 6T. Tactical | 6U. Until Forever | 6V. Yoru Funk |7. NEW KONAMI ORIGINALS | 7A. Akiba Drift | 7B. Better Than Before | 7C. Breathe The Air | 7D. Contra (Medley Mix) | 7E. Elfadiciell | 7F. Emi's Song | 7G. Entry of the Gladiators (Kaz Mix) | 7H. Higher Ground | 7I. Lily Funk | 7J. Mochi Crunch | 7K. on voit la mer | 7L. Rhythm Is Rhythm | 7M. Somebody In Da House | 7N. Unborn |8. OLD KONAMI ORIGINALS | 8A. COSMIC COWGIRL | 8B. Dead End | 8C. Disabled the Flaw | 8D. Let The Beat Hit 'Em (Classic R&B Style) | 8E. MATSURI (J-SUMMER MIX) | 8F. NEMESIS | 8G. potpourri d'orange | 8H. Senses | 8I. Spin the Disc | 8J. What Is Love? |9. DOWNLOADABLE SONGS | 9A. BATTLE BREAKS | 9B. Catch it! | 9C. DYNAMITE RAVE | 9D. GRADIUSIC CYBER | 9E. Himawari | 9F. jelly kiss | 9G. Love This Feelin' (ZONK Remix) | 9H. Moment 40 | 9I. Put Your Faith In Me (Saturday Night Mix) | 9J. TOE JAM |10. POWER COURSES | 10A. Funky House Mix | 10B. Progressive Mix | 10C. Faster Harder Mix | 10D. Global Mix | 10E. Aggro Mix |11. THE NEW AND (SLIGHTLY) IMPROVED QUEST MODE! | 11A. Five Basic Types of Challenges | 11B. Song and Movie Clips, and Other Ways to Suck Less | 11C. Session Offers | 11D. Championships | 11E. Shop Inventories |12. CHALLENGE MODE |13. OTHER MODES | 13A. Party Mode | 13B. Workout Mode | 13C. Xbox Live | 13D. Training Mode | 13E. Edit Mode | 13F. Jukebox | 13G. Records | 13H. Options |14. GLITCHINESS |15. THE EXTREME HIGHS AND LOWS OF UNIVERSE 2 |16. VERSION HISTORY |17. LEGAL CRAP |18. IN CONCLUSION... +------------------------------------------------------------------------------ +---------------+ |1. INTRODUCTION| +---------------+ Welcome, everyone, to my "exciting" DDR Universe 2 FAQ! I'm still 17, I'm still a f***ing furry... nothing much has changed since I FAQed the first Universe. That was only a month ago, after all. =P FAQing, you know, can be more than a mere timewaster. Working on this, so far, has been quite therapeutic. I've had a lot on my mind lately... been pretty depressed, really. But nothing helps keep my mind off all that like writing a guide for a happy peppy dancing game! I hope this helps you all out as much as it did me, albeit in a different way... +-------------------------------------+ |2. DANCE DANCE REVOLUTION: THE BASICS| +-------------------------------------+ "How do I play DDR," you ask? Firstly, I'd like to welcome you back; what was it like living under a rock for nine years? Now, you've got a dance pad with four directions: left, down, up, and right. First, you pick a song, then its time to dance! See that line of arrows at the top of the screen? That's the "Step Zone." As the song plays, arrows will scroll up to the Step Zone in time with the music. When an arrow reaches the Step Zone, "step" on the direction that matches the arrow! When two arrows come up at once, you must press both at once, by jumping. Those long green arrows are Freeze Arrows – you have to step on these at the beginning and hold that direction down until the freeze arrow ends. It's just that simple. But with these simple controls, things can still get quite hairy. There's no way in hell a DDR beginner will survive any songs on Expert or probably even Difficult. Stick with the Beginner and Basic difficulties until you've got the hang of things. If this is your first DDR game ever, it's probably wise to start with the "Basic Edition." This teaches you the basics of how to play, has a "Lesson Mode" for additional enlightenment, and "Game Mode Light" which features only the Beginner difficulty and a shortened songlist. When you're comfortable with the game, move onto the "Master Edition!" That's where the real learning happens! Start in the regular Game Mode here. -------------------------------------- 2A. LEARNING THE BASICS WITH GAME MODE -------------------------------------- It's the standard DDR mode, and something you should definitely get acquainted with if you're a DDR newbie, before you even think about tackling anything else! Especially not that nasty nasty (but not as nasty as in the first Universe) Quest Mode... First, you're asked to select a style: 4 PANELS: Standard DDR gameplay with one dance pad per player. 8 PANELS: Each player dances on two pads at once. This is exclusively a one- player mode in the PS2 editions, but I'm fairly certain you can do this with two here. Either way, be aware that every song has different steps for this mode than "4 Panels." (Also, given my limited living space, I can't cover this mode in this FAQ currently. I apologize...) Next, we reach the "Setup Players" screen. Any additional players should hit the A button now to join in. You can use X and Y to choose your characters (there's some sexy ladies in this game, if I do say myself...) and up and down to change your difficulty level. The five fundamental difficulty levels of DDR are as follows: BEGINNER: Really easy stuff for beginners, obviously. DDR Universe doesn't give these songs step ratings, but surely they'd almost all be one-footers. If you can do this, move on to Basic posthaste; Beginner won't do much to improve you DDR skills. BASIC: The easiest "normal" difficulty, with ratings usually ranging from 2 to 5 feet. Pretty simple stuff, mostly. Steps are mostly just on the beat. DIFFICULT: Songs here generally range from 4 to 7 feet in difficulty. Steps here tend to follow the music more closely. EXPERT: Most Expert charts here range from 6 to 9 feet. This is where things get tough, as steps will either follow the song exactly, or just generally kick up the difficulty for extreme pain... or possibly both. Whee. ONI: Sort of an "alternate Expert" chart that only a few songs have. Oni charts are generally harder than a song's Expert chart, though in the case of "DYNAMITE RAVE" here, it's debatable. Now we've made it to the "Select Music" screen! Use left and right to switch songs. You can still use up and down to change difficulty here; no need to go back a screen. While picking songs, in addition to simple step ratings, you can also view a graphical representation of the song's difficulty, the "Groove Radar." This rates songs on five separate attributes: STREAM: Pretty much just the overall number of steps. VOLTAGE: The overall density of steps; how many steps are squashed into how much time. AIR: The overall number of double steps, or jumps. FREEZE: The overall number (and possibly length) of Freeze Arrows. CHAOS: The number of "chaotic" steps, either steps that aren't quarters or eighths, or steps that force you to turn as you step. Use A to confirm when you've picked the desired song and difficulty. Select "Random" if you're not sure what to pick, and what to leave that choice up to the game. Also, if you go to "ABC Order," you can change to other ways to order the songs than by the logical default order. The panel always displays what the next ordering scheme is; the game uses the Default Order by default. "ABC Order" puts the songs into different folders in alphabetical order, regardless of song type. "BPM Order" puts all the songs in order according to their maximum BPM, from fastest to slowest. And the seemingly useless "Artist Order" works similarly to ABC Order, except it goes by the artist's name instead of song title. If you hold down A when you select a song, you'll be taken to the "Arrow Options" screen first. You can tweak various aspects of gameplay, including: SPEED: The speed that the arrows scroll up the screen. Note that this only affects the speed of the arrows, not of the song itself; in essence, it just spaces arrows out more (or less) so make them easier to read. Options range from 0.5x to 8x; the default speed is, of course, 1x. BOOST: If this is on, the arrows will gradually speed up as they move toward the step zone. APPEARANCE: "Visible" is the default setting. With "Hidden" on, the arrows will vanish about halfway up the screen. "Sudden" is the opposite; arrows start out invisible and appear halfway up. "Phantom" makes the arrows only appear very briefly halfway up. "Stealth" makes the arrows completely invisible. TURN: "Off" is default. "Mirror" rotates all arrows 180 degrees. "Left" rotates them 90 degrees to the left; "Right" does the same, but in the other direction. "Shuffle" picks two random sets of arrows and reverses their position, giving a new arrangement that generally doesn't fall under any of the other options. OTHER: Again, "Off" is default. "Flat" makes all the arrows the same color, making it that much harder to tell different kinds of notes apart. "Solo" gives you different colors for the different kinds of notes. "Dark" removes the step zone from the screen. "Help" makes certain arrows glow yellow; stepping on them restores more of your dance gauge than usual. MODIFY: "Off" is default once again. "Cut" removes all non-quarter notes from the song (but really cripples your chances of a good score on higher difficulties). "LR-only" converts all steps to either left or right arrows; no steps are actually eliminated, so I don't think this affects your score. "All jump" seemingly converts every pair of steps in the song into a jump, which makes it exhausting, but also pretty dumbed-down. "All freeze" makes every step a freeze arrow. On the other end of the spectrum, "No jump" and "No freeze" completely remove those respective step types from the song, leaving only regular steps in their wake. REVERSE: Turn this on, and the arrows will scroll in "reverse," that is, from top to bottom. Think you're ready to play a song? I already explained how to play; just step on the arrows! As you step, you'll get a "step rating" for your accuracy on each arrow: PERFECT: You stepped precisely on the arrow, more or less, and got the best possible rating, in this game at least. Combo continues, dance gauge goes up, and you're awarded the maximum possible amount of points for the step. GREAT: You nearly stepped on the arrow... close enough, right? Combo still continues, the dance gauge still goes up, but you only get half the points for that step. GOOD: You missed the step by a bit. Your combo stops, and your dance gauge and score are left completely unaffected. ALMOST: You missed the step by quite a lot. Your combo stops, the dance gauge drops, and you get no points. BOO: You managed to completely miss the step somehow. Combo stops, dance gauge falls, and you're awarded no points whatsoever. Two additional ratings exist that apply exclusively to freeze arrows: OK!: You held down the freeze arrow for its entire duration, so the dance gauge goes up and you're awarded points... the normal maximum score for a normal step, apparently. NG: You stepped off the freeze arrow before it ended. This doesn't effect your combo negatively, but the dance gauge takes a hit and you don't get any points for it. The game also shows you your combo, or how many Perfects and Greats you've got in a row. Note that jumps add two to your combo in this game. If you let your dance gauge empty out, you fail the song, obviously! So try to keep it as full as you can, by getting lots of Perfects and Greats! After the song, you'll reach the evaluation screen, where you're awarded a letter grade based on your performance. I'm not currently 100% sure how DDR Universe calculates this exactly (possibly that archaic dance point system?), so if anyone knows for sure, email me! The letter grades range from AAA (only awarded for a Full Perfect Combo) clear down to E (You failed!). There's a lot of different kinds of steps that you'll come to know and love. Beginners will mostly see quarter notes, notes that are strictly on the beat, and intermediate players will get used to eighth notes, those off-colored ones right between quarters. But when you enter the dreary waters of Expert charts, you'll face some fairly unusual stuff... DOUBLE-TAPS, TRIPLE-TAPS, ETC.: A series of eighth notes on the same arrow, so named because you'll be using the same foot to tap that arrow repeatedly. They can be annoying, but there's no super-secret trick to making these easier, so you'll just have to train up your foot for extended tapping. CROSSOVERS: Steps that force you to turn your body and, quite literally, cross your legs over. A basic example is the pattern of left-down-right, where you hit the left arrow with your left foot, the down with your right, and then cross your left foot over to hit the right arrow. It can be weird at first, but it's vital to your success in the harder songs, which often feature series of crossovers that force you to turn your body 180, 270, or even a full 360 degrees. These take practice; start small, and gradually learn to make bigger turns. The hardest part is getting used to not facing the TV at all times... CHAOS: As these notes are called on the Groove Radar, any arrows that aren't pure quarters and eighths. Perhaps most basically, but not easy by any means, are sixteenth notes, which you step twice as fast as pure eighths. You'll also encounter twelfth notes (commonly referred to as "triplets"), and even such horrors as twenty-fourth and thirty-second notes! Fortunately, chaos is almost always controlled chaos; that is, they match up with something in the song, so make sure to listen, and know your songs! GALLOPS: A name given to a sequence of steps consisting of two sixteenth notes in a row, two sixteenths of nothing, two more sixteenth notes, and so on. Step these sort of like a horse galloping (hence the name!). A few songs in this game feature assorted types of pseudo-gallops, either with only a one-note break between each pair of steps, or even in triplets instead of sixteenths. --------------------------------- 2B. JESSE'S ASSORTED DANCING TIPS --------------------------------- Now you know how to play. Time to consider other important stuff. Like, uh... pads! Unfortunately, there aren't exactly a lot of choices for the 360 yet. Your best choice is the one that comes bundled with the game; do NOT get any Mad Catz crap or anything like that. Trust me. If you'd like something sturdier, sorry, you're out of luck for now unless you're up to the task of building yourself a pad... and considering my lacking technical knowledge, I can't really help you there. Sorry again. Pay attention to the beat, especially in early stages where steps tend to follow the beat exclusively. Try to step with the balls of your feet. Not your heels. It's a good habit to get into. Stepping with your heels can make your ankles hurt, something just about anyone who's played DDR has experienced. That was really my biggest problem getting into the game, but don't give up, you'll get used to it and learn to step in a more ankle-friendly way soon enough. Stay hydrated! DDR is exercise, and like any other kind of exercise, that's important. Water is good. So is fruit juice. Really, any cool beverage will do... so, like, don't go drinking a pot of hot coffee on the dancefloor. That's just stupid. Try to return your feet to the center as rarely as possible. It may seem perfectly acceptable in early songs, but as you get into the harder stuff, you'll face long streams and other rapid-fire steps that don't really give you the opportunity to return to the center. Best to get used to staying away from there now then, eh? +-----------------------------+ |3. FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS| +-----------------------------+ Q: What is Dance Dance Revolution UNIVERSE 2? A: Why, it's Konami's second foray into the world of rhythm games on the Xbox 360! Q: How many songs are there in this mix? A: 52 by default, and 18 more unlockable. I know, disappointing, that's less than the first Universe had. Meh. Add 10 more (so far, there may be more in the future) if you intend to download songs off Xbox Live. Q: What? You mean I can't use the MegaPack songs from Universe on here? A: Nope. But in Konami's defense, this is supposedly Microsoft's fault, not theirs. Q: Can you rip your own songs and play them on this game? A: Everyone always asks that when a new DDR comes out. The answer is no, and I doubt they'll ever add that feature. And if they do, believe me, you'll hear all about it... so please, for the love of all that is holy, STOP ASKING! Q: Why aren't there more "classic" DDR tunes in here? Why all this new crap? A: I personally prefer getting a whole bunch of new tunes. They're trying to differentiate themselves from traditional Japanese DDR, and I like it, if only for the sake of variety. J-pop is nice once in awhile, but not all the time! Q: Are there any ten-footers in the game? A: Only one stepchart has been given an official ten-footer rating: "GRADIUSIC CYBER" Doubles Expert. And that song's only available through downloading anyway. Sadly, singles players don't have any ten-footers whatsoever, only some fairly hard nines. Yeah, I'm just as disappointed about this as you are. Q: Quest Mode sucks! Is there any other way to unlock songs? A: Sadly, no. At least not that we know of. There might be a special unlock code, like some of the Ultramixes had, but if there is it hasn't been discovered yet. Q: Wait... where are "ON THE JAZZ" and "Balalaika, Carried with the Wind (Jondi & Spesh Mix)"? A: I know, they're in the music credits section of the manual, but not playable individually. Weird. Those two songs are only in the game as part of the Power Courses in Party Mode. Don't ask me why they didn't put them in the game so the song total at least matched Universe's, because I couldn't even fathom a reasonably logical explanation for this. Let's just say that Konami doesn't always act logically and move on... Q: What's the deal with beatmania/pop'n music/GuitarFreaks/drummania? A: These are some other popular Bemani series, and quite a few songs from those games have made the leap over to DDR. beatmania is another popular rhythm game series (popular in Japan, at least), classified as a "DJ simulator," in which you have a set of keys and a turntable to "scratch." Using those, you actually "play" a variety of songs... so if you're crap at the game, the songs sound like crap too. It's cool. pop'n music is sort of like a more cartoony version of beatmania, with big colored buttons instead of a keypad, that mainly features happy songs and tunes from popular anime. GuitarFreaks and drummania are games in which you play songs with a guitar and a set of drums, respectively. Several songs into the series, Konami got the bright idea to combine the two games, giving them identical songlists and allowing the machines to link up. And you thought Rock Band was such a totally original idea... Q: (Insert song here) was in (insert game here) first, you moron! A: That's not a question. Anyway, while I consider my knowledge of Bemani to be relatively thorough, and I checked and double-checked this stuff, I'm not perfect by any means. Correct me if you see something wrong... but please, be a little nicer than that! :D Q: Those lyrics are wrong! I can't believe you f***ed them up so badly! I hate you, I hate you to death! A: Again... not a question, genius. Well, I tried to use online lyrics sites to check for accuracy, but in some cases I either couldn't find lyrics anywhere (like with "So Fine") or the lyrics didn't seem to match up with the song (like with "Jungle Boogie"). In any case, I'm sure I made plenty of mistakes in compiling the lyrics so maybe some of you nice folks could help me out? If you've got a question for me concerning this game, go ahead and email me at crazyperson90@gmail.com! Just, you know, make sure I haven't already answered it somewhere in this guide, please. Don't be lazy. I hate laziness. +---------------------------+ |4. LICENSED SONGS, PART ONE| +---------------------------+ Ah, the first group of licenses. Universe/Ultramix veterans should know, it's where all the well-known licenses go. The bait to entice your random idiot off the street to plop down seventy bucks for the game, if you will. They've given us quite an interesting selection this time, featuring a few rather modern hits, a couple classics, a surprisingly obscure choice of psychedelic downtempo, and one of the most bizarre music videos to ever grace the series with its presence. Um... hooray? -------------------------------------- 4A. Apache – The Incredible Bongo Band -------------------------------------- BPM: 116 Length: 1:40 Genre: Funk Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 47 6 0 BASIC 3 103 8 0 DIFFICULT 5 175 10 4 EXPERT 7 257 25 16 EXPERT NOTES: Pretty much your typical Universe series seven-footer, in that it features streams that can get somewhat long, with crossovers, plus a distinctive trick. In this case, it's the occasional skip thrown in, which throws you offbeat for the next few notes. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: The brainchild of Michael Viner, The Incredible Bongo Band released two albums of instrumental funk (with bongo drums playing a prominent role, of course) in the 70's. This song is their most famous piece, released in 1973, known for its signature percussion break which has been sampled extensively... perhaps excessively. Miscellany: The original version of Apache was released in 1960 by British rock group The Shadows. This is one of the more popular of the countless covers of this song. -------------------------------- 4B. Dorset Perception – Shpongle -------------------------------- BPM: 120 Length: 1:36 Genre: Psybient Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 64 1 5 BASIC 3 110 1 4 DIFFICULT 5 168 10 7 EXPERT 7 244 17 16 EXPERT NOTES: The streams here tend to stay short, and aren't as heavy on the crossovers as a lot of songs. The main difficulty comes from the proliferation of pesudo-triplets and gallops, following the weird psychedelic rhythm here. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Shpongle is one of the more influential bands in the "psychedelic downtempo" or "psybient" scene, mostly unknown in the world of mainstream music. This is the lead track of their 2001 album, "Tales of the Inexpressible". ------------------------ 4C. Fire - Ferry Corsten ------------------------ BPM: 132 Length: 1:46 Genre: Trance Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 79 2 4 BASIC 3 164 4 3 DIFFICULT 6 232 16 10 EXPERT 7 273 12 13 EXPERT NOTES: Simple, at least compared to a lot of the tricky seven-footers they've loaded this game with. Unlike those, which employ tricks that seem to approach eight-footer territory, this one's purely short- to mid-length streams with a few crossovers thrown in for good measure. ----- Lyrics: Oh woman you make me feel Like I'm on fire Oh woman you make it real It's the only way for me Oh woman you make me feel Like I'm on fire Oh woman you make it real It's the only way for me Oh woman you make me feel Like I'm on fire Oh woman you make it real It's the only way for me Oh woman you make me feel Like I'm on fire Oh woman you make it real It's the only way for me Oh woman you make me feel Like I'm on fire Oh woman you make it real It's the only way for me ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Ferry Corsten, aka System F, is one of the pioneers of trance and one hell of a prominent remix artist who, as far as I can tell, released this song in early 2005. The vocals are sampled from the Duran Duran song "Serious", which is sung by Simon LeBon. (See? I almost had this right the first time... but thanks to Keith Young for setting me straight!) -------------------------------------------- 4D. He's The Greatest Dancer – Sister Sledge -------------------------------------------- BPM: 113 Length: 1:46 Genre: Disco/R&B Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 74 0 0 BASIC 3 120 4 9 DIFFICULT 5 203 15 3 EXPERT 7 244 17 7 EXPERT NOTES: A generic Universe 2 seven-footer if there ever was one. The streams are mostly short and simple, but they've thrown in small doses of pseudo-triplets and sixteenth clusters to make things ever-so-slightly more interesting. ----- Lyrics: Oh-what-wow He's the greatest dancer Oh-what-wow That I've ever seen Oh-what-wow He's the greatest dancer Oh-what-wow One night in a disco On the outskirts of Frisco I was cruisin' with my favorite gang The place was so boring Filled with out-of-towners touring I knew that it wasn't my thing I really wasn't caring But I felt my eyes staring At a guy who stuck out in the crowd He had the kind of body That would shame Adonis And a face that would make any man cry Oh-what-wow He's the greatest dancer Oh-what-wow That I've ever seen Oh-what-wow He's the greatest dancer Oh-what-wow Oh-what-wow He's the greatest dancer Oh-what-wow That I've ever seen Oh-what-wow He's the greatest dancer ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Sister Sledge is a disco quartet consisting of Kim Sledge, Debbie Sledge, Joni Sledge, and Kathy Sledge. And yeah, as per the group's name, they're actually sisters. Released in 1979, this was one of their most successful singles, second in the US only to their very next single, "We Are Family". ---------------------------------------------------------- 4E. I Know You Got Soul – Jason Nevins vs. Eric B. & Rakim ---------------------------------------------------------- BPM: 124 Length: 1:47 Genre: Classic Hip-Hop Remix Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 78 7 0 BASIC 4 162 3 0 DIFFICULT 6 210 8 13 EXPERT 7 294 46 1 EXPERT NOTES: Scattered among the rather typical streams here are a decent amount of gallops and "half-gallops" (as in, pairs of sixteenths not followed by another pair). Most of them tend to occur fairly randomly in the song, but as a general rule there'll always be one on every instance of "You got it!" The hardest part is right at the end, with a sixteenth cluster leading right into a final set of gallops. ----- Lyrics: Just talk about it, those that can dance and clap your hands to it... It's been a long time, I shouldn't have left you Without a strong rhyme to step to Think of how many weak shows you slept through Time's up, I'm sorry I kept you Thinking of this, you keep repeating you miss The rhymes from the microphone soloist And you sit by the radio, hands on the dial, soon As you hear it, pump up the volume Dance wit the speaker till you hear it blow Then plug in the headphone 'cause here it go, It's a four-letter word when it's heard, it's control Your body to dance (You got it!) soul Directs the tempo like a red alert Reaches your reflex, so let it work When this is playing, you can't get stuck wit The steps, so get set and I'mma still come up wit A gift to be swift, follow the leader, the rhyme will go Def wit the record that was mixed a long time ago It can be done but only I can do it For those that can dance and clap your hands to it I start to think and then I sink Into the paper like I was ink When I'm writing, I'm trapped in between the lines I escape when I finish the rhyme I got soul (soul soul soul soul soul soul soul...) Those that can dance and clap your hands to it... Those that can dance and clap your hands to it... A beat like this might tempt me To pose, show my rings and my fat gold chain Grab the mic like I'm on Soul Train But I'll wait 'cause I mastered this Let the others go first so the brothers don't miss Eric B. breaks the sticks (You got it!) Rakim will begin when you make the mix I'll experiment like a scientist You wanna rhyme, you gotta sign my list 'Cause this is how it should be done This style is identical to none Some try to make it sound like this but you're getting me So upset that I'm wet 'cause you're sweating me I drip steam like a microphone fiend Eager to MC is my theme I get hype when I hear a drumroll Rakim is on the mic and you know I got soul (Soul soul soul...) You got it! You got it! Those that can dance and clap your hands to it... ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Eric Barrier and William Griffin (aka Rakim) are a former hip-hop duo known for popularizing a more jazz-influenced style of hip-hop. Their 1987 release "I Know You Got Soul" is regarded as a classic of the genre and, according to All Music Guide, "single-handedly kicked off hip-hop's infatuation with James Brown samples". Jason Nevins is a prominent producer and remixer who released this mix, as far as I can tell, in early 2003. Miscellany: In the vaguely interesting trivia department, this song (or the original version anyway) was sampled in another DDR song, specifically from DDR Extreme 2; a snippet of Rakim's lyrics served as the titular sample of M/A/A/R/S's "Pump Up The Volume". ----------------------------------------------- 4F. Is It Any Wonder? (Tall Paul Remix) – Keane ----------------------------------------------- BPM: 129 Length: 1:40 Genre: Piano Rock Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 69 4 0 BASIC 3 198 7 48 DIFFICULT 6 242 2 36 EXPERT 7 272 1 80 EXPERT NOTES: One of the rare stepcharts in this game to not feature sixteenths in any way, shape, or form. This one sticks with streams, with a surprising number of double-taps thrown in, but the most notable thing here is the huge amount of freezes. Though streams and freezes never co-habitate, leaving things in pure quarters during the freeze sections, it's actually harder than you'd think, as they're put in positions designed to twist your legs into all sorts of uncomfortable positions. ----- Lyrics: I always thought that I knew I'd always have the right to Be living in the kingdom of the good and true and so on But now I think I was wrong And you were laughing along And now I look a fool for thinking you were on my side Is it any wonder I'm tired? Is it any wonder that I feel uptight? Is it any wonder I don't know what's right? Sometimes I get the feeling that I'm Stranded in the wrong time Where love is just a lyric in a children's rhyme, a soundbite Is it any wonder I'm tired? Is it any wonder that I feel uptight? Is it any wonder I don't know what's right? Oh these days After all the misery made Is it any wonder that I feel afraid? Is it any wonder that I feel betrayed? ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Keane is a British piano rock band consisting of Tim Rice-Oxley on piano, Tom Chaplin on vocals, and Richard Hughes on drums. "Is It Any Wonder?" was released in 2006 as the first physical single from the album "Under The Iron Sea". Miscellany: It's a song about the Iraq War, which seems an odd choice for a happy peppy dancing game but, uh, here it is. This song features its music video, which nullifies any dancing characters. ----------------------------------- 4G. Jungle Boogie – Kool & The Gang ----------------------------------- BPM: 106 Length: 1:36 Genre: Funk Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 78 0 0 BASIC 3 108 20 10 DIFFICULT 6 188 40 0 EXPERT 8 319 25 8 EXPERT NOTES: Harder than you'd expect from such a well-known song. Its slow speed allows it to get away with throwing a lot of tricky stuff at you, including fairly large sixteenth clusters which can reach up to nine notes in length and some of which include crossovers. Other than that, there's also some pseudo-triplets and gallops thrown in to follow this tune's funky rhythmage. ----- Lyrics: Get down, get down Get down, get down Get down, get down Get down, get down Get down, get down Get down, get down Get down, get down Get down, get down Jungle Boogie (Get down with the boogie!) Jungle Boogie (Get it on!) Jungle Boogie (Get down with the boogie!) Jungle Boogie (Get it on!) Jungle Boogie (Get up with the boogie!) Jungle Boogie (Get up, boogie, get down!) Jungle Boogie (Get down with the boogie!) Jungle Boogie (Come and shake it around!) Jungle Boogie (Get up, boogie, get down!) Jungle Boogie (Boogie boogie!) Jungle Boogie! (Boogie boogie!) Jungle Boogie (Ough!) Jungle Boogie (Get up, boogie, get down!) Jungle Boogie (Get the boogie!) Jungle Boogie (With the jungle!) Jungle Boogie (Get down with the boogie!) Get down, get down Get down, get down ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Kool & The Gang are a well-known American ensemble whose career spanned several phases, including R&B, disco, and more. This song, in particular, comes from their funk phase and was released as part of their 1973 album "Wild and Peaceful". --------------------------------------------------- 4H. Love Don't Let Me Go – David Guetta vs. The Egg --------------------------------------------------- BPM: 127 Length: 1:38 Genre: Electronica Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 74 3 0 BASIC 2 123 2 6 DIFFICULT 5 196 16 30 EXPERT 7 286 20 19 EXPERT NOTES: The intro is pretty much just a long series of triplet gallops. After that, things mostly settle into a pattern of short- to mid-length streams and a few pseudo-triplets, aside from one point in the middle where the song decides to throw a variety of different crap at you – a few triplets, a skip or two, that sort of thing – before settling back into its pattern of streams and pseudo-triplets. ----- Lyrics: You've got me dancin' and cryin' Rollin' and flyin' Love don't let me go You've got me drownin' in a river Cold and in fever Love don't let me go Don't let me go Don't let me go Love don't let me go Don't let me go Don't let me go Don't let me go Got me drownin' in a river And it's cold and in fever Hey... Don't let me go Don't let me go Love don't let me go Don't let me go Don't let me go Don't let me go Got me drownin' in a river And it's cold and in fever Hey-hey-hey-hey... ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: David Guetta is a popular French DJ, whose tracks tend to feature singer Chris Willis as vocalist. I'm pretty sure this is one of those tracks. The Egg is a British electronic funk band whose lineup consists of Ned Scott on keyboard, Maff Scott on drums, Ben Cullum on bass, and Matt White on lead guitar. This song is actually a mash-up, whose full title is "Love Don't Let Me Go (Walking Away)", featuring the lyrics from David's 2002 song "Love Don't Let Me Go" (by Chris Willis, of course) set to the tune of The Egg's single "Walking Away". --------------------------- 4I. Rockit – Herbie Hancock --------------------------- BPM: 111 Length: 1:40 Genre: Electronica Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 84 2 0 BASIC 3 116 10 4 DIFFICULT 6 227 22 14 EXPERT 8 341 21 27 EXPERT NOTES: Rather tricky steps made a little simpler by the fact that they follow this well-known tune rather closely. In particular, pay close attention to the keyboard, as you'll generally be stepping the melody exactly as Herbie plays it. Yes, that means that some of the freezes fall an eighth after the step before it while others are only a sixteenth later, and it's hard to tell just by looking on 1x, so paying close attention to the song is paramount. In addition, you'll always be stepping sixteenth clusters on the record scratches leading to some of the longest clusters in the game – one of them reaches a whopping twenty-four steps! Good thing it's a slow song, eh? ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Herbie Hancock is one of jazz music's most influential pianists and composers, and one of the first to embrace synthesizers and funk. This is one of his most famous solo works, released in 1983 as a single off his album "Future Shock", and was one of the first popular singles to feature scratching and other turntablist techniques. The scratching on this track was provided by Derek Showard, aka DJ Grandmixer DXT, one of the pioneers of establishing the turntable as a legitimate musical instrument. Miscellany: This song features its music video, one of the strangest I've personally ever seen, which nullifies any dancing characters. ----------------------------------- 4J. Safety Dance – Men Without Hats ----------------------------------- BPM: 102 Length: 1:36 Genre: Synthpop Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 67 1 0 BASIC 3 104 5 4 DIFFICULT 5 162 13 2 EXPERT 7 282 15 1 EXPERT NOTES: What is it with Universe 2 and its tendency to load its seven- footers with sixteenths? Once again, small sixteenth clusters and gallops rule the day, which always follow Ivan's vocals, or the synth during the vocal-free portions of the song. ----- Lyrics: We can dance if we want to We can leave your friends behind 'Cause your friends don't dance and if they don't dance Well they're no friends of mine I say we can go where we want to A place where they will never find And we can act like we come from out of this world Leave the real one far behind And we can dance (Dancez!) We can go when we want to The night is young and so am I And we can dress real neat from our hats to our feet And surprise 'em with the victory cry I say we can act if we want to If we don't nobody will And you can act real rude and totally removed And I can act like an imbecile I say we can dance, we can dance Everything's out of control We can dance, we can dance We're doing it from wall to wall We can dance, we can dance Everybody look at your hands We can dance, we can dance Everybody's takin' the chance Safety dance Oh well the safety dance Ah yes the safety dance It's the safety dance Well it's the safety dance Oh it's the safety dance Oh it's the safety dance Oh it's the safety dance ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Men Without Hats were a Montreal-based synthpop group most popular in the early- to mid-eighties, known for the deep, expressive voice of lead singer Ivan Doroschuk and an elaborate use of synthesizers. This was the group's first, and most popular, single, released in 1982. Miscellany: This song features its music video, which nullifies any dancing characters. ----------------------------- 4K. So Fine – The Freestylers ----------------------------- BPM: 118 Length: 1:55 Genre: Funky Drum and Bass Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 67 1 0 BASIC 3 158 9 16 DIFFICULT 6 239 43 4 EXPERT 8 347 43 2 EXPERT NOTES: If you can tackle these seven-footers easily enough, here's a good entry point for moving on to the next level. Why? Well, this song is basically just like most of these licensed sevens, just harder. The streams are longer and a little more complex, there's a few more sixteenth clusters in there (following the lyrics), but it's pretty much the same kind of stepchart. ----- Lyrics: Midnight, when I thought the day was coolin' down Spotlight, lookin' at the hottest girl in town Spellbound, by the way she made her body move Get down, 'cause I know I gotta catch that groove So fine, perfect and she's cold as ice So fine, I think about her all the time She said, "Are you tryin' to make a move on me?" I said, "Well you're gonna have to wait and see" Waitin', for the DJ to pull my favorite song We were on the dancefloor all night long So fine, perfect and she's cold as ice So fine, I think about her all the time ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: The Freestylers are a British electronica group, which doesn't seem to have a single cohesive lineup as far as I can tell. For a period of time during '02 and '03, they were also known as Raw As F**k. This song is from their 2006 album "Adventures in Freestyle". --------------------------------- 4L. Take Me Out – Franz Ferdinand --------------------------------- BPM: 105 Length: 1:49 Genre: Post-Punk Revival Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 65 5 0 BASIC 4 177 27 2 DIFFICULT 6 228 50 2 EXPERT 9 396 54 1 EXPERT NOTES: Surprisingly tough for such a well-known license. There's a lot of sixteenths thrown in this song, some in clusters of up to 15 notes falling on the fast-paced guitar bits, and the worst part is that virtually all the sixteenth clusters in this song contain crossovers. Ouch. ----- Lyrics: I say don't you know You say you don't know I say take me out I stay you don't show Don't move time is slow I say take me out I say you don't know You say you don't know I say take me out If I move this could die If my eyes move this could die I want you to take me out I know I won't be leaving here I know I won't be leaving here I know I won't be leaving here I know I won't be leaving here With you ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Franz Ferdinand is an indie rock band from Glasgow, Scotland consisting of Alex Kapranos, Nick McCarthy, Bob Hardy, and Paul Thomson. Their name derives from Franz Ferdinand, Archduke of Russia. This was their second single, and their breakthrough hit, released in 2004. Miscellany: This song features its music video, which nullifies any dancing characters. ------------------------------ 4M. The Way You Move – Outkast ------------------------------ BPM: 126 Length: 1:36 Genre: Hip-Hop House Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 73 4 0 BASIC 3 152 15 4 DIFFICULT 7 269 62 19 EXPERT 9 400 40 21 DIFFICULT NOTES: These honestly could've passed as the Expert steps for this one, the way it throws jumps into most of its streams. Hell, some of the streams are literally nothing but jumps! EXPERT NOTES: But instead of going with the perfectly fine seven-footer steps for Expert, they decided to come up with something a little more insane. Which is actually sort of cool. Things are hardest right at the beginning, where you're stepping fairly long and complicated sixteenth clusters along to Big Boi's rapping, which is harder than the sixteenth sections in "Take Me Out" not only because this is 21 BPM faster, but also because it follows a naturally less predictable pattern. Things mostly get simpler after that, keeping to only streams until the very end, where sixteenths rear their ugly heads again; keep in mind that one the very last line ("Can you feel the, baby can you feel the, baby can you feel the B-A-S-S, bass?"), you step everything BUT the two occurrences of the word "baby". No, I don't know why, but it's something to keep in mind. ----- Lyrics: Ready for action, nip it in the bud We never relaxin', OutKast is everlastin' Not clashin', not at all But see my – went to do a little actin' Now that's for anyone askin' Give me one, pass 'em Drip drip drop, there goes an eargasm Now you comin' out the side of your face We tappin' right into your memory banks (Thanks!) So click it or ticket, let's see your seat belt fastened Trunk rattlin', like two midgets in the back seat wrestlin' Speakerboxxx vibrate the tag Make it sound like aluminum cans in the back But I know y'all wanted that 808 Can you feel the B-A-S-S, bass But I know y'all wanted that 808 Can you feel the B-A-S-S, bass I like the way you move I like the way you move I love the way you move I love the way, I love the way Hey baby, girl don't you stop it Come on lady, dance all around me You look so fine, look so fine Drivin' me out, out of my mind If I could I would just leave with you, baby Ooooh, 'cause you light me and excite me And you know you got me, baby I like the way you move (But I know y'all wanted that 808) I like the way you move (But I know y'all wanted that 808) I love the way you move (But I know y'all wanted that 808 (Can you feel the, baby can you feel the, baby can you feel the B-A-S-S, bass) ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: OutKast is a Grammy-winning hip-hop duo consisting of Andrι "Andrι 3000" Benjamin and Antwan "Big Boi" Patton, known for maintaining an experimental approach to their music, and widely praised for their originality and artistic content. This song was released in 2003 as the first single from Big Boi's half of their best-selling double album, "Speakerboxxx/The Love Below"; released at the same time was the first single from Andrι 3000's half of the album, the arguably better-known "Hey Ya!" Miscellany: As seen on pre-release leaked song lists and confirmed by checking the Music Credits section of the manual, this is actually the "House Mix" of this song. --------------------------------------- 4N. Walk Like An Egyptian – The Bangles --------------------------------------- BPM: 206 Length: 1:43 Genre: Pop Rock Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 2 79 6 0 BASIC 4 134 10 11 DIFFICULT 6 298 43 2 EXPERT 8 385 20 0 EXPERT NOTES: Fun Expert steps. Well, since it's such a fast song, the streams obviously stay quite short – the longest streams here are only four steps long. But things still stay interesting, with a few occurrences of "eighth note gallops" and a few fast-paced series of jumps. ----- Lyrics: The blonde waitresses take their trays They spin around and they cross the floor They've got the moves (Oh-ay-oh) You drop your drink then they bring you more All the school kids so sick of books They like the punk and the metal band When the buzzer rings (Oh-ay-oh) They're walking like an Egyptian All the kids in the marketplace say Ay-oh-ay-oh, ay-oh-ay-oh Walk like an Egyptian Slide your feet up the street bend your back Shift your arm then you pull it back Life's hard you know (Oh-ay-oh) So strike a pose on a Cadillac If you want to find all the cops They're hanging out in the donut shop They sing and dance (Oh-ay-oh) They spin the club, cruise down the block All the Japanese with their yen The party boys call the Kremlin And the Chinese know (Oh-ay-oh) They walk the line like Egyptian All the cops in the donut shop say Ay-oh-ay-oh, ay-oh-ay-oh Walk like an Egyptian... ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: The Bangles were an all-girl group, consisting of Susanna Hoffs, Debbi Peterson, Vicki Peterson, Annette Zilinskas, and Michael Steele. This is their most popular song, from their 1986 album "Different Light". Miscellany: This song features its music video, which nullifies any dancing characters. +---------------------------+ |5. LICENSED SONGS, PART TWO| +---------------------------+ This second group of licenses seems to contain songs by less well-known commercial artists that there's still a chance you might've heard of. Less pop crap, more dance music! Well... sort of... not really... ----------------------- 5A. Always – Amon Tobin ----------------------- BPM: 118 Length: 1:44 Genre: Drum and Bass Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 83 2 2 BASIC 3 140 3 4 DIFFICULT 6 218 11 4 EXPERT 7 265 21 14 EXPERT NOTES: This song likes to begin streams with a gallop, typically following the guitar here. The streams themselves, though, are not anything all that outstanding for the most part, with the exception of a longish stream about halfway through that's packed with crossovers, and a mid-length stream with triple taps thrown in shortly after. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Amon Tobin is a successful Brazilian DJ known for his creative use of sampling (as well as for having a more prolific career than a lot of the artists that get stuffed into the second group of licenses). This song is from his most recent album, "Foley Room", released in 2007. ------------------------------ 5B. Anytime Soon – Blu Mar Ten ------------------------------ BPM: 129 Length: 1:39 Genre: Electronica Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 75 2 2 BASIC 3 136 7 3 DIFFICULT 5 185 26 8 EXPERT 6 211 16 10 EXPERT NOTES: Simple enough; one of the only new six-footers in this game to actually FEEL like a six-footer! Streams are kept short and are generally nice and simple, with the exception of one or two crossovers and a single stream that begins with a double step. There's also a few offbeat steps toward the middle, but they're not really hard because it's fairly obvious what they're following in that minimalistic part of the song. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Blu Mar Ten are a UK-based drum and bass trio consisting of founding members Leo Wyndham and Chris Marigold, along with more recent addition Michael Tognarelli. ------------------------------------- 5C. Don't You Love Me – Andy Caldwell ------------------------------------- BPM: 127 Length: 1:29 Genre: House Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 70 8 1 BASIC 2 115 10 1 DIFFICULT 4 172 11 6 EXPERT 6 237 34 4 EXPERT NOTES: ...and here's one of those six-footers that DOESN'T seem like a six-footer. It starts off six-footer-like enough, but soon introduces gallops, pseudo-triplets, and even tiny sixteenth jackhammers (though not in too hard a fashion, might be a good place to practice those elements). ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Andy Caldwell is a San Francisco-based house DJ, and this song is pulled from his 2006 album, "Universal Truth". ---------------- 5D. Hey! - Tipsy ---------------- BPM: 200 Length: 1:48 Genre: Electronica Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 89 0 0 BASIC 4 174 11 0 DIFFICULT 7 314 49 8 EXPERT 8 335 41 26 DIFFICULT NOTES: Deceptively tiring. Your main nemesis here is the speed, a blazing 200 BPM. It's almost entirely free of streams, with the exception of a couple eighth-note gallops toward the end, but at this tempo that's not a guarantee of a simple routine. The wave of quarters is almost nonstop, and they're not afraid to throw jumps into the equation, either. EXPERT NOTES: Even more tiring, obviously. They've thrown streams into the mix now, which aren't that long, but they're deadly at this speed regardless. The odd thing, though, is that they've added a few freeze note sections that actually make those parts of the song almost easier here than on Difficult. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Who is Tipsy? I don't know, a Google search doesn't come up with anything worthwhile in this case so, sorry, I've got squat here. ---------------------------------------- 5E. I Wish I Could Be Beautiful – Rithma ---------------------------------------- BPM: 122 Length: 1:46 Genre: Deep House Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 67 5 0 BASIC 3 140 7 13 DIFFICULT 5 219 11 25 EXPERT 7 295 12 29 EXPERT NOTES: The first half is fairly uninteresting; just streams, albeit decent-sized ones, and a rogue pair of gallops thrown in for reasons unknown to me. This song's gimmick kicks in when we enter the second half: triplets. Not only are there sequences of twelfth notes on the series of synth hits, but there's also a brief twenty-fourth note jackhammer thrown in for fun. Yeah, twenty-fourth notes. How often do you see those? ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Rithma is Etienne Stehelin, a California-based house and trip hop DJ. This song seems to be a pretty recent license; as far as I can tell, it was released as a single in February 2007. ------------------------------ 5F. Love In Motion – Alien Six ------------------------------ BPM: 124 Length: 1:49 Genre: Electronica Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 102 3 2 BASIC 3 154 14 3 DIFFICULT 5 223 14 35 EXPERT 7 306 26 15 EXPERT NOTES: No crossovers whatsoever in the streams here, but the song makes up for a lack of difficulty in that area by making you step some streams with one foot while holding a freeze with the other, gallops and jumps in streams, plus a few odd offbeat jumps. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Alien Six is an electronic music writing and production firm consisting of Geoff Pinckney, Pete Steer, Laura Cyganik, and Pete Cresdee. ---------------------------------------- 5G. Not Me (Extended Mix) – Sarah Taylor ---------------------------------------- BPM: 140 Length: 1:37 Genre: Eurobeat Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 77 3 0 BASIC 4 118 5 3 DIFFICULT 7 258 24 14 EXPERT 8 327 35 9 DIFFICULT NOTES: This one's more akin to arcade/PS2 mix seven-footers than what they've got here in Universe 2, in that there's nothing really special about it. It's just short streams with crossovers. That's it. EXPERT NOTES: After an opening packed with three-note streams that end in jumps, the song settles into its main gimmick, gallops at the beginning or end of streams, that don't always follow a set pattern. You get two breaks from this madness, the first being a very simple series of quarters, and the second being streams that incorporate pseudo-triplets instead right at the end. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Sarah Taylor is one of those rare singers from Nashville, Tennessee that ISN'T involved in the world of crappy country music. This is her first (and only, thus far) single, released in 2007. -------------------------- 5H. Steppin' Out – Kaskade -------------------------- BPM: 128 Length: 1:43 Genre: Deep House Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 72 11 0 BASIC 3 116 11 6 DIFFICULT 5 183 14 18 EXPERT 6 214 8 28 EXPERT NOTES: Well, it's easy compared to some of the six-footers here (many of which seem more like seven-footers to me), but it's still got a few tricks up its sleeve. There's a lot of offbeat steps here, including streams that start off the beat, and a few minor freeze tricks in the first half. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Kaskade is a Chicago-based DJ and record producer and, what surprised me the most, apparently a Mormon. He's had a rather successful career thus far, compared to some of the artists in this group, and this was his first top 10 single, released in 2004. ----------------------------------------------------------- 5I. Sunshine In London – The Sunchasers feat. Victoria Pope ----------------------------------------------------------- BPM: 128 Length: 1:51 Genre: Dance Pop Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 90 0 3 BASIC 4 164 8 11 DIFFICULT 6 229 8 10 EXPERT 7 268 17 2 EXPERT NOTES: An uncharacteristically basic chart. Short streams rule the day, most of them three notes long, with an upper limit of seven. That's all there is here. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: The Sunchasers are a group hailing from New York, featuring Victoria Pope on vocals, Stanley Andrew on guitar, Chris Wilson on piano, Larry Fricke on bass, Frank Basile on drums, and backing performed by Mark Husbands. --------------------- 5J. The Tide – Noisia --------------------- BPM: 172 Length: 1:46 Genre: Breakbeats Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 112 0 2 BASIC 4 175 8 8 DIFFICULT 7 267 16 18 EXPERT 9 368 62 23 DIFFICULT NOTES: Being a fast seven-footer, the streams are obviously quite short. The longest they get is three steps. But this one challenges you in different ways – there's tons of double taps, a decent amount of pseudo- triplets, plus no shortage of offbeat steps. EXPERT NOTES: Yikes. We've got ourselves one hell of a cata here! The streams themselves are still short (albeit a little longer than on Difficult) but everything else is kicked into high gear. There's tons of jumps here, but this song's signature is no doubt the gallops. They're a real pain in the ass at 172 BPM and there's several bunches of 'em just waiting to trip you up. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: NOISIA is a Dutch electronic music trio, whose members have typically amusing Dutch names – Nik Roos, Martjin van Sonderen, and Thijs de Vlieger. This is one of their more popular releases to date, released in 2007. +-----------------------------+ |6. LICENSED SONGS, PART THREE| +-----------------------------+ Three different groups of licenses? This is madness! These artists seem to be even more obscure than those in the second group, a good number of them being unsigned artists who release primarily to the Internet. Also, the various contest winners go in this section as well. And for the first time since DDRMAX, some of the unlockable songs are actually licenses! Specifically, seven of these songs ("Anthema", "Contract [Breach Mix]", "Orange Sky", "Ragganinja", "Space Space Shooter (Cusimo & Co. Remix)", "Synergy", and "Tactical") are hidden by default and must be unlocked in Quest Mode. ---------------------- 6A. Anthema – oo39.com ---------------------- UNLOCK: Session offer in Ofa, Harowa in Quest Mode BPM: 144 Length: 1:30 Genre: Anthem Trance Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 73 1 4 BASIC 3 127 2 3 DIFFICULT 5 193 21 11 EXPERT 9 342 7 4 EXPERT NOTES: Interesting. Things start out really simple and you'll be wondering how, exactly, is this a nine-footer? The hardest it gets in the beginning is a gallop into an offbeat double-tap, repeated a few times... but soon enough, things escalate into a pretty fun challenge, with a couple sections packed with sixteenth jackhammers, and another gallop and double-tap appended to the end of the patterns from earlier in the song. Fun. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: oo39.com is apparently some sort of Japanese DDR site. (I don't speak Japanese though, so who knows?) There's several songs from them in this game, and if I remember correctly, it has to do with some contest that was held at some point. I'm not sure though... help me out, somebody, anybody! ------------------------------------ 6B. Arrivals And Departures – LINUS! ------------------------------------ BPM: 144-158 Length: 1:49 Genre: Art Rock (The song scrolls at 158 for the majority. The slowdown seems to come right at the end.) Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 69 2 2 BASIC 3 149 11 2 DIFFICULT 5 228 8 4 EXPERT 7 310 25 11 EXPERT NOTES: Pretty darn easy. Most all the streams here are only three notes long. The only tricky parts come during the guitar solo, where streams fluctuate in length a little (reaching up to – gasp – five steps) and occasionally start offbeat, plus you'll have a few triple-taps to step with one foot while holding a freeze with the other. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: LINUS is a Honolulu-based indie rock band whose lineup has the somewhat suspicious habit of not revealing their last names on their MySpace profiles – Deeniri on guitar and vocals, Nikolaus on bass, Stanley on drums, and Tim on guitar and sax. This song is off their first full-length CD, "The Construction", released in 2005, and its appearance here is apparently the band's biggest success to date, judging by the announcement's prominence on the official site. Miscellany: Stanley is, according to his MySpace, a big "Whose Line is it Anyway?" fan. That instantaneously puts this band in my favor... -------------------------------- 6C. Breathing More – Larissa Lam -------------------------------- BPM: 140 Length: 1:30 Genre: Dance Pop Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 96 10 0 BASIC 3 125 10 8 DIFFICULT 5 188 17 16 EXPERT 7 237 9 15 EXPERT NOTES: The middle is the easiest, with nothing really worse than three- note streams. The beginning and end are the more interesting parts, chock full of offbeat quarters and streams that begin offbeat, following Larissa's vocals. The streams can reach somewhat decent length toward the end, but all in all, it's not a particularly tough chart. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Larissa Lam is a former record label exec turned full-time singer/songwriter. This song is off her 2005 album, "Revolutionary". ----------------------------------------- 6D. Contract [Breach Mix] – Rupesh Cartel ----------------------------------------- UNLOCK: Cadonia regional championship in Quest Mode BPM: 138 Length: 1:32 Genre: Synthpop Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 73 9 0 BASIC 4 131 10 1 DIFFICULT 6 233 14 0 EXPERT 8 301 11 0 EXPERT NOTES: After an intro of short streams, the song kicks into is main gimmick: pseudo-triplets, and lots of 'em, which are gradually infused with gallops and jackhammers as well. It all becomes a pretty chaotic mess, especially in the middle where all this madness doesn't seem to follow any particular pattern. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Rupesh Cartel is Viktor Ginner and Daniel Gustafsson, an electronic pop duo from Stockholm, Sweden. This remix was included on the 2005 single release of the original "Contract". ---------------------------------- 6E. Do It Right – AFD feat. Ashley ---------------------------------- BPM: 126 Length: 1:32 Genre: House Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 62 9 0 BASIC 3 99 12 0 DIFFICULT 5 179 30 3 EXPERT 7 266 17 36 EXPERT NOTES: The streams here are remarkably twisty, packed with crossovers. There's an occasional jump thrown into 'em for good measure, too. Of course, the twisty streams are the only really notable thing about this tune; yeah, there's quite a few freezes but nothing really tricky done with them. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: How frustrating. A Google search yields plenty of downloads for this song but not a single *bleep*ing profile of the artist. All I know is that "Do It Right" is really their only hit so far. ---------------------- 6F. EternuS – Sanxion7 ---------------------- BPM: 140 Length: 1:34 Genre: Techno Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 69 4 0 BASIC 4 163 1 6 DIFFICULT 6 233 32 25 EXPERT 9 368 8 17 EXPERT NOTES: Unlike most DDR songs, this isn't in 4/4 time, but rather 6/8, and this really shows with the proliferation of triplets, both galloped and clustered. The hardest part is adapting to the unusual time signature, because the steps themselves aren't too hard, for a nine-footer anyway; there's plenty of catas here that are a lot harder in that respect. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: DDR SuperNOVA 2 (US PS2) About The Artist: Sanxion7 is Anthony Konzel, an independent composer and remixer who is apparently well-known within the Bemani music community. This song is one of the winners of the 2007 DDR Song Contest by BroadJam, which apparently had the interesting twist this time that the winners got to make their own stepcharts for their songs. Cool. ----------------------------------------- 6G. Get Up! Give Up! Move On! - The Divys ----------------------------------------- BPM: 144 Length: 1:42 Genre: Electro Rock Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 68 0 0 BASIC 2 132 2 0 DIFFICULT 4 236 40 4 EXPERT 6 311 24 8 EXPERT NOTES: Pretty damn hard, for a six-footer anyway. The streams can get pretty long, at 10+ notes, with the occasional jump thrown in, no less. A few sixteenths pop up here once in awhile, too. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: The Divys are a Philadelphia-based band featuring KLiffee Ritz on guitar and William Rule on vocals. They say their name derives from the "late great" Divine, of old John Waters flicks. ---------------------------------------------------- 6H. Handle Your Business – Starla Marie feat. Coco J ---------------------------------------------------- BPM: 95 Length: 1:58 Genre: Hip-Hop Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 64 0 0 BASIC 3 109 0 4 DIFFICULT 5 201 13 2 EXPERT 7 336 0 4 EXPERT NOTES: Well, it's a very slow song. One would be correct in assuming that means there's sixteenths clustered about here, but one would also be surprised by just how few there are. There's only a few parts where they're really plentiful, as they're just mostly an occasional addition to other parts of this rather long song, which is mostly just in longish streams. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Starla Marie is a San Francisco-based R&B songstress, and Coco J is apparently the male rapper here. This song is the lead track from Starla's self-titled debut album. Miscellany: This song features its music video, which nullifies any dancing characters. ----------------------------------------------- 6I. In Different Things (USA Club Mix) – ReName ----------------------------------------------- BPM: 120 Length: 1:42 Genre: Synthpop Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 55 5 4 BASIC 2 114 4 3 DIFFICULT 5 221 6 7 EXPERT 7 268 3 4 EXPERT NOTES: Like so many other seven-footers in this game, it's a mix of short streams, pseudo-triplets, and a few gallops. This might be a decent place to practice the latter two elements, as there's a section of nothing but simple offbeat quarters in the middle that gives you a chance to rest. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: All I really know about these guys is that they're a German synthpop group signed with Ultramix favourite record label A Different Drum. ------------------------------------------------------ 6J. I Wanna Be Your Star (Speedy Mix) – Melody & Mezzo ------------------------------------------------------ BPM: 175 Length: 1:42 Genre: Speed Euro Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 95 5 0 BASIC 3 148 7 9 DIFFICULT 6 336 32 9 EXPERT 8 394 80 16 EXPERT NOTES: THIS is an eight-footer? No way! Well, your biggest obstacle is the speed. (Obviously, it's the "Speedy Mix"!) You'll be stepping some short- to mid-length streams at a decent tempo, and what makes it particularly tiring is that this song has a crapload of jumps, which really like to pop up at the beginning or end of a stream. There's also a few sixteenths thrown in because... well, I don't know why, honestly. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Melody & Mezzo are a Quebec-based speedy synth/dance pop duo. This is their most recent single as of this writing, released in 2007. Miscellany: Something interesting I noticed whilst gathering info on this song: one of the duo's producers is apparently Thomas Howard Lichtenstein, a well- known Bemani vocalist. This song features a special music video created exclusively for this game, which nullifies any dancing characters. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 6K. Makes Me Cry (Drew Campbell Remix) – Binghi Ghost feat. Turbulence ---------------------------------------------------------------------- BPM: 152 Length: 1:45 Genre: Techno-Ragga Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 89 1 0 BASIC 3 166 16 20 DIFFICULT 6 255 12 10 EXPERT 8 324 45 17 EXPERT NOTES: A fairly tame eight-footer, comparably. You'll face a few gallops and pseudo-triplets, but it's mostly just streams, some with a bit of air in there. Nothing too terrible. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: The Binghi Ghost is something you don't see everyday – a white dude who sings reggae. Turbulence is the name of a surprisingly large number of reggae performers and I can't figure out exactly which one this is. Drew Campbell is, as near as I can tell, the producer and engineer for Adeline Studios, a music production firm located in Oakland, California, and apparently a frequent Binghi Ghost collaborator. --------------------------- 6L. Moving Higher – Contour --------------------------- BPM: 174 Length: 1:42 Genre: Drum and Bass Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 117 2 14 BASIC 4 140 9 7 DIFFICULT 7 319 27 4 EXPERT 9 376 50 13 DIFFICULT NOTES: The only thing that makes this series of short, basic streams that start alternately on- and off-beat worthy of seven-footerdom is the speed. There's nothing else notable about it. EXPERT NOTES: Ouch. Now you've got some crazily long streams for a song of this speed, plus a bunch of jumps. And what's worse, they combine the two a lot; about half the jumps here, I'd estimate, have an eighth leading into them. And at the end they bring back something we saw a lot in the first Universe, but not so much here, the "stream where every other step is a jump", which is absolutely hellish at this speed. Oh, and there's a couple sixteenth jackhammers tossed in just for "fun"... ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Contour is J. Lewis, a Finnish DnB DJ who released this track in 2005. --------------------------- 6M. Musika Atomika – Syrian --------------------------- BPM: 135 Length: 1:41 Genre: Electronica Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 80 1 1 BASIC 3 149 2 1 DIFFICULT 4 188 20 8 EXPERT 8 274 17 5 EXPERT NOTES: Say hello to "EternuS Lite"! This song also has a weird time signature and is loaded with triplets, but unlike "Eternus", they're in simpler patterns and are restricted only to gallops. ----- Lyrics: Musika atomika Energia bionika Musika atomika Atomika electronika Musika atomika Una voce cosmika Musika atomika Atomika automatika Musika (Now you've got to dance) Atomika (To the cybertronic beat) Bionika (The groove is amplified) Sinetika (Loud across the atmosphere) Just connect to the mechanical melody Musika atomika Energia bionika Musika atomika Atomika electronika Musika atomika Una voce cosmika Musika atomika Atomika automatika Musika (Automatic DJ) Atomika (Spinning technopop) Bionika (Artificial sounds) Sinetika (And cybernetic rock) Just connect to my electronic soul ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Syrian is an electronic music duo from Italy, consisting of Andylab and Voyager. (Methinks those aren't their real names.) They're known for their lyrical focus on futuristic themes. This song is pulled from their most recent album, 2007's "Alien Nation". ------------------------- 6N. Orange Sky – Arctures ------------------------- UNLOCK: Session offer in Bibi, Cadonia in Quest Mode BPM: 150 Length: 1:48 Genre: Progressive Trance Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 89 1 1 BASIC 4 199 17 18 DIFFICULT 6 248 21 34 EXPERT 8 331 16 14 ONI 9 439 21 21 EXPERT NOTES: Easy, compared to some of the eight-footers in the game. The streams are a little easier than you'd expect, though they do throw some gallops and a little sixteenth syncopation in to make thing interesting. ONI NOTES: Difficulty-wise, the closest thing to a real boss song Universe 2 has. They could've easily turned this into a ten, but that doesn't mean these steps are easy, oh no. Take the minor syncopation of the Expert chart and multiply it tenfold, at least. You'll be following all sorts of odd rhythms which fortunately do follow the melody quite closely, but this is still a chart that requires a few playthroughs to fully comprehend. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Arctures is an Orinda, California-based musician, and also apparently a big Bemani fan. Particularly beatmania and pop'n music. What a disappointment it must be to have his music in DDR instead... =P Miscellany: No, I don't know why they gave ORANGE Sky a PURPLE background... --------------------------------------- 6O. Ragganinja – Greg Packer & Assassin --------------------------------------- UNLOCK: Harowa regional championship in Quest Mode BPM: 174 Length: 1:32 Genre: Drum and Bass/Ragga Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 35 1 4 BASIC 2 92 0 8 DIFFICULT 3 159 30 10 EXPERT 5 228 26 11 EXPERT NOTES: A little harder than your average five-footer, if only because the considerable speed adds a bit of difficulty to the usual assortment of short streams. It's unusual for a rather fast song to be so easy but, well, there it is. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Greg Packer is one of the pioneers of the Australian dance music scene. MC Assassin is the vocalist. This song was released in 2005. ----------------------------------- 6P. Rock The Show – Future Prophecy ----------------------------------- BPM: 145 Length: 1:42 Genre: Electro Rock Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 70 3 0 BASIC 3 137 5 3 DIFFICULT 7 297 19 5 EXPERT 8 355 17 0 DIFFICULT NOTES: More of a hard six by Universe 2's standards, but whatever. Three-note streams for most of the song eventually give way to harder, longer streams toward the end, which also develop a habit of ending with a jump. A few pseudo-triplets, too. EXPERT NOTES: Basically, this plays out like a harder version of the second half of the Difficult chart right from the beginning. The streams are longer and have more crossovers now. There's also exactly three gallops, so keep your eyes peeled for those. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: It was hard to find info on this group, but it seems the duo is made up of Hagay and Itay Elazar, and this track comes from their 2006 album, "Body Shaker". ----------------------------------------------------------- 6Q. Space Space Shooter (Cusimo & Co. Remix) – Kick & Punch ----------------------------------------------------------- UNLOCK: Session offer in Tamommo, Capp in Quest Mode BPM: 180 Length: 1:45 Genre: Happy Hardcore Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 2 92 1 4 BASIC 4 196 8 2 DIFFICULT 6 295 27 8 EXPERT 8 439 27 24 EXPERT NOTES: This one's similar to "I Wanna Be Your Star" in that it's fast and really hard for an eight-footer. They both should probably be nines, I'd say. This has fewer jumps than that song, but the streams are harder and longer here so it's still more than challenging enough. (It's embarrassing to admit, but... this is actually one of my favourite songs in the game...) ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: I can't find much about Kick & Punch, though I know they're a happy hardcore duo who released "Space Space Shooter" as a single in 2007. Cusimo & Co. are a happy hardcore group from Quebec consisting of Dave Phaneuf, Jamie Thompson, Alessandro Iacovaccio, and Thomas Howard Lichtenstein as their vocalist. Again, he's a well-known Bemani vocalist, but ironically, all the C&C material that's hit DDR so far has been remixes of other songs, so he hasn't been involved all that much in the songs we've got. --------------------------- 6R. Summer Girl – Neverakka --------------------------- BPM: 135 Length: 1:44 Genre: Synthpop Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 61 6 0 BASIC 3 149 9 0 DIFFICULT 5 217 13 16 EXPERT 7 278 4 23 EXPERT NOTES: Just as I'm about to ask "What's so hard about offbeat quarters?" as they seemingly dominate this song, I came across the sole reason this chart gets to be a seven – streams with a sixteenth cluster thrown right into the middle. There's several of those in the second half. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Nevarakka, as it's properly spelled, is part of the Ultramix favourite "A Different Drum" label. It's mostly the work of a fellow named Philip Jidbrant. Miscellany: Perhaps you noticed while playing through this song on Expert, but there's a "freeze green" jump at the end of Measure 21. You know, that sort of putrid green that freezes are. The weird thing is, neither of the arrows are actually a freeze, yet they're still coloured as if they were. What the hell? ------------------ 6S. Synergy – C-14 ------------------ UNLOCK: Session offer in Dempasa, Ruby in Quest Mode BPM: 140 Length: 1:37 Genre: Trance Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 90 2 6 BASIC 4 154 7 11 DIFFICULT 7 255 26 3 EXPERT 8 319 16 18 DIFFICULT NOTES: I think this is more of a hard six by this game's standards, but whatever. Offbeat quarters aren't that much of a challenge, and the streams here don't get too hard. EXPERT NOTES: Universe 2 seems to really love its pseudo-triplets, as they pop up yet again in this chart. But the true challenge lies in the tricky galloping bits in the middle, though that challenge is fairly short-lived as it's only a small portion of the song. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Well, yet again, I've got nothing. Well, nothing related to the artist anyway. I've got jokes though. What's the difference between a diabolical midget and Hillary Clinton in a marathon...? ---------------------------- 6T. Tactical – Drew Campbell ---------------------------- UNLOCK: Ruby regional championship in Quest Mode BPM: 151 Length: 1:48 Genre: Techno Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 107 5 2 BASIC 3 158 4 11 DIFFICULT 6 213 22 15 EXPERT 8 321 29 12 EXPERT NOTES: The first two-thirds of this song are just insanely easy for an eight footer, but after a few freeze tricks, things get crazy right at the end, with gallops added to the equation, plus one of the longer streams you'll ever see, complete with lots of double-taps. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: See "Makes Me Cry" for what I've got on Drew Campbell. ---------------------------- 6U. Until Forever – Beatdrop ---------------------------- BPM: 142 Length: 1:32 Genre: Techno Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 84 0 0 BASIC 4 145 5 0 DIFFICULT 6 242 3 0 EXPERT 7 273 21 0 EXPERT NOTES: This stepchart was rated eight feet on SN2, though I guess it was demoted because, well, it's not any harder than most Universe 2 seven-footers, in that it's mostly in streams with just a dash of pseudo-triplets and jackhammerage. ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: DDR SuperNOVA (US PS2) About The Artist: Beatdrop is Dain C. Olsen, a rather prominent composer over at OverClocked. This is the other winner of that BroadJam song contest. ------------------------ 6V. Yoru Funk – oo39.com ------------------------ BPM: 100 Length: 1:25 Genre: Instrumental Funk Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 72 3 2 BASIC 3 99 5 4 DIFFICULT 6 185 13 4 EXPERT 8 294 33 8 EXPERT NOTES: There's a lot of things that are frustrating about this song. Most prominent for me is that it seems to scroll at about half the speed it should, given how frantic this song is. The stepchart itself has a bad case of Yellow Note Syndrome; that is, practically everything is offbeat. Your only advantage is that the really chaotic parts always follow the horns or jazz organ, so you're not completely in the dark trying to step this madness... ----- Song Type: License Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: See "Anthema" for what little I know about oo39.com. +-----------------------+ |7. NEW KONAMI ORIGINALS| +-----------------------+ Universe 2 may be one of the most license-centric DDR games yet, but that doesn't mean that ALL the songs here are licensed. Because they're not. Some of them are conscripted. >_> There's also two new songs from Togo, who seems to be quickly becoming one of the Universe series' favorite Konami Original composers. Cool. Seven of these songs ("Breathe The Air", "Elfadiciell", "Emi's Song", "Mochi Crunch", "on voit la mer", "Rhythm Is Rhythm", and "Unborn") are hidden by default and must be unlocked through the Quest Mode. --------------------------- 7A. Akiba Drift – Ko Kimura --------------------------- BPM: 132 Length: 1:45 Genre: Electronica Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 101 8 0 BASIC 2 116 12 24 DIFFICULT 5 206 40 20 EXPERT 6 305 21 16 EXPERT NOTES: Hey, look, it's one of the most gravely misrated stepcharts in DDR history! I mean, really, what kind of six-footer features sixteenth-note double-taps and crossovers? Consider this a seven, at least. Don't try this if you're just getting into Expert and can barely beat "Senses"... ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Well, I've got exactly squat. JACK SQUAT. -------------------------------------- 7B. Better Than Before – Drew Campbell -------------------------------------- BPM: 136 Length: 1:40 Genre: Electro Ballad Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 77 2 0 BASIC 4 146 8 1 DIFFICULT 6 230 14 5 EXPERT 7 279 23 4 EXPERT NOTES: After one of the easiest first halves of any stepchart in the game, things get slightly more interesting with the injection of gallops and tiny jackhammers into the mix of entirely crossover-free short streams. ----- Lyrics: I can do it better than before I can do anything I dream I don't need the skies above to help me 'Cause I've got everything I need I said I can do it better than before I can do anything I dream I don't need the skies above to help me I've got everything I need ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: See "Makes Me Cry" for what I've got on Drew Campbell. ---------------------------------------------- 7C. Breathe The Air – Bill Hamel with Spacebar ---------------------------------------------- UNLOCK: Session offer in Rab, Cadonia in Quest Mode BPM: 140 Length: 1:38 Genre: Electronica Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 87 7 2 BASIC 3 109 9 10 DIFFICULT 6 296 12 12 EXPERT 8 392 8 4 EXPERT NOTES: There's not a lot that's unique about these steps, as they're your typical eight-footer assortment of long-ass streams with crossovers and a few gallops and jackhammers, but it does this really standard stuff it does quite well. A decent challenge. ----- Lyrics: In the darkest night I can feel you there When I breathe the air In the darkest night I can feel you there When I breathe the air In the darkest night I can feel you there When I breathe the air ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Bill Hamel is a successful remix artist, having hit #1 on Billboard's Dance Charts with remixes of songs by the likes of Madonna, New Order, and Rihanna, though he also does some original work, such as this. Spacebar is an Orlando-based rock/electronica band consisting of James Rowand on vocals and bass, Arthur Hardie IV on guitar and keyboard, Brandon Coleman on drums, and... Bill Hamel on the synth. ---------------------------------- 7D. Contra (Medley Mix) – NEKOJIRA ---------------------------------- BPM: 150 Length: 1:45 Genre: Contra Medley Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 101 7 0 BASIC 3 191 11 6 DIFFICULT 6 280 21 20 EXPERT 8 382 23 24 EXPERT NOTES: Pretty tough, actually. Not at a Contra level of difficulty, of course... but it's no cakewalk either. The first half is the hardest part, thanks to gallops that pop up at pretty weird rhythms. The second half is a little simpler, but it's still packed with really long streams, so there's no break from the pain! ^_^ ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: NEKOJIRA... I've got nothin' useful on this dude. I can find his MySpace page, but it's horribly useless for factual purposes. I doubt he's really 101 years old. The only likely true fact I can take from there is that he's from Tokyo Bay, Japan. Miscellany: According to Starrodkirby86: "Through a little emulation, I got to the Sound Mode in Contra and the BPMs just rang a bell to the remix (Courtesy of Youtube there). Now I hope I get to the right order, since I probably suck at Contra's gameplay and all, but nevertheless...here we go. The first song in this medley of songs is the first stage in Contra or Area, which is the Jungle. After the first set of freeze arrows and no apparent other music (Just Sound effects, y'know?), it goes to Area 2, or known as Base01 (That is what the game called it, there must be a more specific name out there but it's probably all of the base stages, but I haven't gotten very far.). After the last set of freeze arrows, it goes to the Victory music and the song ends." Also, I'd like to point out that the background image for this song is a horse's head... for Contra? What the f*** were Konami smoking? -------------------------- 7E. Elfadiciell – oo39.com -------------------------- UNLOCK: Session offer in Bonolu, Harowa in Quest Mode BPM: 170 Length: 1:29 Genre: Techno Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 71 9 2 BASIC 2 110 13 0 DIFFICULT 4 183 28 14 EXPERT 8 297 27 15 EXPERT NOTES: Right away, this song hits you with a six-note jackhammer, at this high speed. Ouch. There's two more that are nine notes long later, too. After that, you'll be stepping really short streams interspersed with gallops for awhile before getting into some pretty intense streamage in the latter half. One particularly long stream reaches 46 notes in length, which is a lot for a song at 170 BPM. ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: See "Anthema" for what little I know about oo39.com. ---------------------------- 7F. Emi's Song – Blu Mar Ten ---------------------------- UNLOCK: Session offer in Sasube, Manarina in Quest Mode BPM: 175 Length: 1:44 Genre: Trance Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 85 2 0 BASIC 3 120 5 4 DIFFICULT 7 289 8 22 EXPERT 8 350 8 16 DIFFICULT NOTES: A few somewhat tricky streams make this a seven-footer, I guess, but just barely. Some of the fast songs that are only a six-footer on Difficult are quite a bit more difficult than this. EXPERT NOTES: This plays sort of like your typical Universe 2 seven-footer at a higher speed. It's your typical setup of streams with a sprinkling of sixteenths, but at a speed that bumps up the difficulty a bit. ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: See "Anytime Soon" for info on Blu Mar Ten. Miscellany: Presumably, "Emi" refers to the well-known DDR character of the same name... so it's a little weird that the background is a picture of scuba divers and surfers and not... you know... Emi. ---------------------------------------------------- 7G. Entry of the Gladiators (Kaz Mix) – Julius Fucik ---------------------------------------------------- BPM: 140 Length: 1:41 Genre: Military March Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 99 1 2 BASIC 3 145 1 22 DIFFICULT 6 251 14 0 EXPERT 7 300 69 0 ONI 9 466 14 0 EXPERT NOTES: Though there are some decent-sizes streams here, and a few quad- taps, most of the difficulty comes from the 69 jumps in the song. (And the immature DDRers rejoice!) They're usually alone or right at the beginning of a three-note stream, though beware, there's one of those tricky streams where every other step is a jump right at the end. ONI NOTES: Well, judging by the fact that this serves as the final stage of Challenge Mode, I guess it's sort of a de facto boss song here. It's certainly no ten-footer, to be sure, but it is one helluva hard nine. Tons of sixteenths here, following this tune's well-known melody, and they're not even jackhammers, they go all around the pad. Tough stuff. ----- Song Type: Public Domain Remix Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Julius Fucik was a noted Czech composer (with a ridiculous mustache and a name that's easy to misread...) who composed over 300 marches, polkas, and waltzes, including this one. Yeah, this is a military march. Apparently, the Czechoslovakian army consisted predominantly of clowns. ----------------------------------------------- 7H. Higher Ground – Togo Project feat. ChiyoTia ----------------------------------------------- BPM: 134 Length: 1:31 Genre: Two Step Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 66 9 0 BASIC 3 158 14 7 DIFFICULT 6 240 9 18 EXPERT 8 265 16 17 EXPERT NOTES: Pretty darn easy for an eight-footer. It's mostly all short- to mid-length streams with only a couple jackhammers. It's easier than quite a few seven-footers in this game... ----- Lyrics: Where is my place, I ask myself? I'm goin' higher ground Nothing to say, this is my way I'm gonna rock this place Na na na na na, na na na na Keep on goin' on and on No no no no no, no no no no There is no time for turnin' back And nobody can catch me now, I'm goin' higher ground This is my way so don't you ever stop me now Here we go (we go, we go, we go, we go, we go, we go, we go...) Higher ground ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Togo Project is Hiroyuki Togo, a guitarist and composer who seems to mostly work in beatmania/IIDX, but recently has started to compose brand new songs for the Universe series. Cool. ChiyoTia is a Japanese vocalist who was hired for "Fly away", from DDR SuperNOVA, and apparently Togo liked her enough to bring her in for a song of his own. "I'm going higher ground", indeed... -------------------------- 7I. Lily Funk – Konception -------------------------- BPM: 130 Length: 1:32 Genre: Techno Funk Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 74 5 0 BASIC 4 168 34 6 DIFFICULT 7 267 27 8 EXPERT 9 357 3 9 DIFFICULT NOTES: There's a lot of streams here, most three steps long, a select few quite a bit lengthier. Beware, all 27 of those jumps come either at the beginning or end of one of those short streams. There's also a few gallops in there because, well, Universe 2 seems to have a huge boner for gallops... EXPERT NOTES: The difficulty here arises from two main factors: streams in lousy, unintuitive sequences that pretty much force you to turn or else have your legs twisted into oblivion, and the usual tricky usage of sixteenths, especially in the funky rhythms that come during the record-scratchin' breakdown right at the end. ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: I can't be sure, but if I had to venture a guess, it's DJ Konception of Honolulu-based duo Kause & Konception, who previously had a song in DDR Ultramix 2 – "Altitude", to be exact. --------------------------- 7J. Mochi Crunch – NEKOJIRA --------------------------- UNLOCK: Session offer in Istar, Moldig in Quest Mode BPM: 145 Length: 1:42 Genre: Techno Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 110 0 0 BASIC 3 189 8 1 DIFFICULT 7 365 7 4 EXPERT 9 416 9 26 DIFFICULT NOTES: Lots of streams, not much else of note. It's suitably challenging for a Difficult chart, just not at all interesting. EXPERT NOTES: This, on the other hand, is VERY interesting. Lots of chaos. Lots of syncopated sixteenths, following the weird rhythms here. There's two distinct patterns you'll find them in, one that's mostly gallops with four-note clusters thrown in, and the other where gallops are thrown into streams to switch the steps between being on and offbeat. It's all pretty hard, I'd say this is one of the trickiest songs in the game. ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: See "Contra (Medley Mix)" for the only slightly more than nothing that I know about NEKOJIRA. Miscellany: This song features the same bizarre vocal samples as another NEKOJIRA song, "ZETSUBOUTEKIDA!", which appeared in DDR Ultramix 4. ------------------------------------------------------ 7K. on voit la mer – Togo Project feat. Tomoko Kataoka ------------------------------------------------------ UNLOCK: Session offer in Taka, Manarina in Quest Mode BPM: 170 Length: 1:38 Genre: Island Chill Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 79 0 4 BASIC 4 131 16 7 DIFFICULT 6 252 27 36 EXPERT 8 317 20 32 EXPERT NOTES: Nothing more than short- to mid-length streams at a decent pace in rather odd rhythms. There's air in a few of them, too, but all in all it's pretty tame as a fast eight-footer when compared to the likes of "Hey!", "I Wanna Be Your Star", "Space Space Shooter", and such, though you should still watch out for the wave of sixteenth clusterage right at the end. ----- Lyrics: (They're in some foreign language... most likely Japanese, but it looks like the title is French. Either way, I only know English and a bit of Spanish for now, so I'm amazingly useless here!) ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: See "Higher Ground" for info on Togo. Tomoko Kataoka is the vocalist for this song, but I don't know anything worthwhile about her. ------------------------------- 7L. Rhythm Is Rhythm – oo39.com ------------------------------- UNLOCK: Moldig regional championship in Quest Mode BPM: 128 Length: 1:28 Genre: Electronica Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 64 4 0 BASIC 4 170 41 4 DIFFICULT 7 257 30 12 EXPERT 8 297 53 20 DIFFICULT NOTES: Some of these streams get pretty damn complicated for a song on Difficult. There's plenty of crossovers, plus a short series of streams with freezes near the middle that pretty much forces you to turn. Pseudo- triplets also show up but, prominent as they are in this game, you should be used to them by now. EXPERT NOTES: It boggles the mind that this isn't a nine-footer. Forget the tough streams and all the air, the true difficulty comes from all the syncopated sixteenths, mostly on the vocals, so a good ear will go a long way in deciphering the mess that is this stepchart. ----- Lyrics: Rhythm is rhythm is... Rhythm is rhythm is, master moonlight (?) (Come on, freak, get out the sensation) (Body freak, generate the foundation) Rhythm is rhythm is, master moonlight (Cool, kick the nation with the groove) ('Till we rock the place when the biz gets moved) (Whatcha got to say, whatcha got to say?) Rhythm is, rhythm is... (Whatcha got to say, whatcha got to say?) Rhythm is, rhythm is... (Come on, freak, get out the sensation) (Body freak, generate the foundation) (Cool, kick the nation with the groove) ('Till we rock the place when the biz gets moved) Rhythm is, rhythm is... ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: See "Anthema" for what little I know about oo39.com. Miscellany: This song features the same vocal samples used in a much older Konami original, "think ya better D" (which, coincidentally, appeared in the first Universe)... and some samples clearly by that same crappy rapper, but which I can't for the life of my find in that song... even though I could swear I've heard them before... and thus, I feel like I'm going crazy because of a frikkin' happy peppy Japanese dancing game. Nice. --------------------------------------- 7M. Somebody In Da House – Steve Porter --------------------------------------- BPM: 130 Length: 1:45 Genre: Techno Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 75 1 0 BASIC 3 127 4 4 DIFFICULT 6 276 18 3 EXPERT 7 334 13 4 EXPERT NOTES: Steady progression in difficulty is what this is all about. When the song first starts, you'll only see three-note streams, but as the song wears on the streams get longer and jumps are added into the mix, with some sixteenths slowly added to the mix. As you near the end of the song, in fact, there's some fairly tricky sixteenth syncopation going on that seems more like what one would see in an eight-footer. ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Steve Porter is a DJ and producer whose website claims: "The next generation of electronic music producers is gaining hold and leading the charge is DJ/production phenom STEVE PORTER." Um... good for him? ----------------- 7N. Unborn – Gein ----------------- UNLOCK: National dance championship battle in Quest Mode BPM: 175 Length: 1:29 Genre: Hardcore Drum and Bass Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 76 0 0 BASIC 4 150 0 3 DIFFICULT 6 246 12 6 EXPERT 8 362 27 27 EXPERT NOTES: What's this? The final unlockable song in the game is only an eight-footer? What a disappointment! But in its defense, it's a fairly hard eight-footer, with streams that can get pretty long and a little twisty with jumps thrown into 'em too. Also watch out for the usual one-two punch of pseudo-triplets and sixteenth jackhammers. ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: Brand New! About The Artist: Gein are a Milwaukee-based drum and bass group featuring Weston B. Means (aka "The Butcher"), Adam M. Darby (aka "Abel"), and Radislov Eremija (aka "Saint"). Their stuff tends to skew in, well... a rather dark direction. This is pretty tame for them, apparently. +-----------------------+ |8. OLD KONAMI ORIGINALS| +-----------------------+ Yeah, there's a lot of new stuff in this game... but old crap is just as important! As usual, they've revived some classic Konami originals, on a seemingly random basis. Some of them we haven't seen for awhile... one of them we've seen for three mixes in a row now. Five of these songs ("Disabled The Flaw", "MATSURI (J-SUMMER MIX)", "potpourri d'orange", "Spin the Disc", and "What Is Love?") are hidden by default and must be unlocked in Quest Mode. ----------------------------------- 8A. COSMIC COWGIRL – Toshio Sakurai ----------------------------------- BPM: 145 Length: 1:38 Genre: Funk Heavy Metal Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 113 23 0 BASIC 4 202 35 58 DIFFICULT 6 294 12 14 EXPERT 8 338 41 39 EXPERT NOTES: In the beginning and end, the steps follow the song very closely, complete with small patches of gallops and a few sixteenth clusters. Things are simpler in the middle, where it's mostly streams and off-beat quarters. ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: Guitar Freaks 3rd mix / DrumMania 2nd Mix DDR Debut: DDR Ultramix 2 (Song Pack 8) About The Artist: Toshio Sakurai is a Konami Original artist who mostly composes tunes for the Guitar Freaks & DrumMania series. -------------------- 8B. Dead End – N & S -------------------- BPM: 190 Length: 1:38 Genre: Street Noise Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 2 72 15 0 BASIC 5 216 27 0 DIFFICULT 7 337 12 0 EXPERT 9 410 40 0 DIFFICULT NOTES: The streams here are entirely crossover-free; the worst you'll face is a few triple-taps. Of course, the true difficulty isn't the composition of these streams, but rather the speedy tempo at which you must step them. One really tricky part comes about a third of the way through, when there's a long wave of left arrows alternating between double-taps and pseudo- triplets. EXPERT NOTES: It's the same basic premise as the Difficult chart: mostly simple streams at a blistering pace. Still, things have been made a lot harder. Streams can now get fairly long, and there's actually the occasional crossover thrown in there. ----- Song Type: Konami Original First Appearance: DDR 3rd Mix (JP Arcade) American Appearances: DDR Konamix, DDR Ultramix 2 Artist Notes: N&S is a pseudonym of Naoki Maeda, used exclusively for this song. DDR fans should definitely know who this guy is, he's only responsible for most new Konami Originals to hit the arcade and PS2 mixes! He works under a variety of pseudonyms... a few of which you'll find on other songs in this category. ------------------------------ 8C. Disabled the Flaw – D-Crew ------------------------------ UNLOCK: Session offer in Bagania, Capp in Quest Mode BPM: 145-171 Length: 1:10 Genre: Ground Ash (As far as I can tell, this one starts out at 145 during the intro, speeding up to 171 as soon as we get into the song proper.) Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 2 84 14 0 BASIC 5 164 38 30 DIFFICULT 7 243 19 10 EXPERT 9 272 19 23 DIFFICULT NOTES: Nothing too outstanding here. Streams that stay fairly short and are, for the most part, crossover-free. The challenge mostly comes from the speed, but it's slower than "Dead End" so if you can beat that, this should be no problem at all. EXPERT NOTES: Don't let the low note count fool you, that's because it's a short song, not because of a low concentration of notes. This one has some pretty long, twisty streams at a decent pace, and some of the streams either open with a gallop or feature a few three-note sixteenth clusters in the middle, typically following the synth. ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: beatmania 6th mix DDR Debut: DDR Ultramix 2 (Song Pack 9) Artist Notes: D-Crew is Osamu Migitera, a Konami Original artist who works mostly in beatmania, pop'n music, and Guitar Freaks, though he recently composed a brand new song, "A thing called LOVE", exclusively for DDR. You might also know him as "Des-ROW". Miscellany: Yeah, this is one of the shortest songs in DDR history. ---------------------------------------------------------- 8D. Let The Beat Hit 'Em (Classic R&B Style) – Stone Bros. ---------------------------------------------------------- BPM: 102 Length: 1:27 Genre: Classic R&B Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 65 0 0 BASIC 3 133 4 0 DIFFICULT 5 172 14 0 EXPERT 6 192 32 0 EXPERT NOTES: The ideal place to practice crossovers and jumps in streams, I'd say. There's plenty of that kind of thing here, yet it's at a slow enough pace that it's not too hard. ----- Lyrics: Turn me on Let's see who's better If you wanna play a tune I wanna groove with you So turn me on Hey yo, I'm like this so watch the moves that I make How I take over the floor, throw the grooves that I shake I'm number one, how'd you figure that I'm losing my place If you're the joker, player, than who's the ace Hey yo, it's me, the player to beat, I'm playing for keeps I got some special moves so homey don't sleep You learn and I teach controllin' the game You can brag all you want but you kids don't be rollin' the same ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: DDR Extra Mix (JP PS1) American Appearances: DDR Konamix, DDRMAX, DDR Ultramix About The Artist: Stone Bros. is another Naoki pseudonym, used mostly for bad rap songs like this. Miscellany: The original version of "Let the beat hit 'em!" appears in DDR Disney Mix, and DDRMAX also features a "Beatmania II Version". ------------------------------------- 8E. MATSURI (J-SUMMER MIX) – RE-VENGE ------------------------------------- UNLOCK: Manarina regional championship in Quest Mode BPM: 180 Length: 1:33 Genre: Ethno Dance Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 2 107 5 0 BASIC 4 213 5 24 DIFFICULT 5 291 24 16 EXPERT 7 345 23 39 EXPERT NOTES: Bizarre. Just... bizarre. This one alternates between triplet gallops and eighth notes seemingly arbitrarily. Weird steps like those should have been an eight-footer, definitely. Jumps that pop up in streams toward the middle only serve to complicate things even further. ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: Dance ManiaX 2nd Mix DDR Debut: DDR Ultramix (Song Pack 4) American Appearances: DDR SuperNOVA About The Artist: RE-VENGE is yet another Naoki pseudonym, used for various "ethnic" songs such as this. Miscellany: This song received new Expert steps in the Japan-only PS2 release DDR Festival, because the original Ultramix steps sucked, and so they had since become the standard steps for that song... except they're not used here. We're back to the crappy Ultramix steps. I don't know why. ------------------------ 8F. NEMESIS – D.J. SETUP ------------------------ BPM: 164 Length: 2:07 Genre: Techno Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 102 4 0 BASIC 4 205 4 91 DIFFICULT 6 309 13 48 EXPERT 7 335 52 75 EXPERT NOTES: What the hell were they smoking when they decided this was a seven-footer? It most certainly isn't! The first half is especially hard, as it's packed with tons of gallops and sixteenth clusters. Oh, and one of those clusters opens with a jump. Yikes. That's the kind of thing that would be hard even for a nine-footer! The second half is considerably easier, settling down to only gallops and freeze-packed streams. ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: beatmania IIDX 6th Style DDR Debut: DDR Ultramix (Song Pack 3) About The Artist: DJ SETUP is Takayuki Ishikawa, more commonly known as dj TAKA. One of the most popular Bemani musicians, perhaps even moreso than Naoki, Taka has historically primarily composed for the IIDX series, though he has also shown up in other series, including pop'n music, and recently he even composed a brand new song, "Freeway Shuffle", exclusively for DDR; sure, we've previously gotten some of his stuff as crossovers, but that one's all ours! Miscellany: This was one of the first songs in DDR history to be over two minutes long. -------------------------------------- 8G. potpourri d'orange – Orange Lounge -------------------------------------- UNLOCK: Session offer in Apia, Moldig in Quest Mode BPM: 169-175 Length: 1:34 Genre: French Bossa (Though it's a really minor tempo change and isn't probably even worth finding, I'd say it's a safe bet that it changes as we segue from "MONDO STREET" into "MOBO*MOGA".) Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 84 2 3 BASIC 3 154 4 10 DIFFICULT 5 197 8 43 EXPERT 8 283 19 35 EXPERT NOTES: The worst that the majority of this song gets is streams of varying lengths, mostly short, occasionally ending in a double step. But on the various drumrolls throughout the song, you'll end up stepping sixteenths; this is at its worst right at the end, where the rather complicated drum patterns have a good chance of throwing you off. ----- Lyrics: ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: GuitarFreaks 8th Mix / DrumMania 8th Mix DDR Debut: DDR Ultramix 3 About The Artist: Orange Lounge is Tomosuke Funaki, a Bemani musician with the distinction of having worked in the most different Bemani series of any Konami Original artist. His work covers a wide variety of genres; Orange Lounge is a pseudonym used exclusively for his collaborations with Shizue Tokui in the "French Bossa" genre. ------------------- 8H. Senses – JT.1UP ------------------- BPM: 120 Length: 1:43 Genre: Trance Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 65 1 2 BASIC 3 125 1 0 DIFFICULT 4 151 13 20 EXPERT 6 200 25 14 EXPERT NOTES: Easy, even for a six footer. Lots of little three-note mini- streams throughout, all of them extremely easy. The only parts that are even remotely tough are the string of six consecutive quarter jumps about two- thirds of the way through, and the nine-note stream that closes out the chart, and even those are nice and simple. Definitely should've been a five, IMO. It's even easier than "Ragganinja". ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: DDR Ultramix 4 American Appearances: DDR Universe About The Artist: All I know about this guy is that he was apparently an employee of Konami of Hawaii. That's all I've got. Miscellany: No, I don't know why they had to revive this for the second game in a row. ----------------------------- 8I. Spin the Disc – good-cool ----------------------------- UNLOCK: Capp regional championship in Quest Mode BPM: 130 Length: 1:32 Genre: House Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 69 5 0 BASIC 2 70 5 15 DIFFICULT 5 191 17 4 EXPERT 8 292 9 13 EXPERT NOTES: This was an easy enough eight-footer anyway, and it only seems easier next to a lot of these insane Universe-series eight-footers-that- should-probably-be-rated-nine. Sixteenths are surprisingly rare and follow the music well, so all that's really worrying here is the considerable length of the two streams near the end – the first one's 72 steps, and the second is 65. ----- Lyrics: Someday, somehow, somewhere We're gonna have magic in the air Someday, somehow, somewhere We're gonna have magic in the a-a-a-air ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: beatmania IIDX 5th Style DDR Debut: DDRMAX: DDR 7th Mix (JP Arcade) American Appearances: DDRMAX, DDRMAX2, DDR Universe 3 (Song Pack 13) About The Artist: good-cool is Tatsuya Furukawa, a Bemani artist specializing in R&B and house. ---------------------------- 8J. What Is Love? - TOMOSUKE ---------------------------- UNLOCK: Session offer in Recon, Ruby in Quest Mode BPM: 130 Length: 1:24 Genre: House Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 83 6 0 BASIC 3 127 7 0 DIFFICULT 5 171 21 0 EXPERT 6 229 29 0 EXPERT STEPS: Nice and easy. Very easy, in fact. There are absolutely no crossovers in the streams here, not even in that fairly longish one in the middle. No jumps in streams... yeah, THIS is a six footer. Not "Akiba Drift"... >_> ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: beatmania 7th Mix DDR Debut: DDR Ultramix (Song Pack 4) About The Artist: See "potpourri d'orange" for info on Tomosuke Funaki. +---------------------+ |9. DOWNLOADABLE SONGS| +---------------------+ The theme of the downloadable content this time, based on the first ten songs (of course, that's assuming that there's even gonna be more songs... there might not be) seems to be reviving old material from the Ultramixes. That's right, nothing new here. Not even new Oni charts for any of these old songs. ----------------------------- 9A. BATTLE BREAKS – DJ TAKAWO ----[DL01]------------------- BPM: 112 Length: 1:46 Genre: V.R.D.J. Skills Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 79 7 0 BASIC 3 161 7 38 DIFFICULT 5 186 7 70 EXPERT 7 239 18 75 EXPERT NOTES: Like so many other early Ultramix song pack debuts, this one's a slow mess packed with a truly excessive amount of freezes. Aside from the freeze trickery, the rather odd steps tend to follow the lyrics, whacked out as they may be, or the various other odd noises throughout this song. Weird. ----- Lyrics: Baddest DJ on two turntables Word up! Baddest DJ on two turntables Baddest D-DJ Baddest, D, J, two turntables Say turn it up! Lemme hear you say Say turn it up! Say turn it up! Say turn it up! Baddest baddest, D, J Hey Hey Hey, hey, hey, hey Baddest DJ Baddest DJ Baddest, DJ, J, on, on two turntables Thank you, thank you... ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: beatmania Append 5th Mix (JP PS1) DDR Debut: DDR Ultramix (Song Pack 3) About The Artist: DJ TAKAWO is a Bemani artist who has done quite a few obscure Konami original tunes, but I can't seem to find any real info on him. ----------------------------- 9B. Catch it! - TOTAL SCIENCE ----[DL02]------------------- BPM: 173 Length: 1:26 Genre: Drum and Bass Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 109 14 0 BASIC 3 177 24 4 DIFFICULT 6 211 46 21 EXPERT 8 311 30 16 EXPERT NOTES: These steps follow this rather hectic tune pretty closely, though there's only a hint of sixteenths (in pseudo-triplets, gallops, and three-note jackhammers), as the steps mostly stick to tricky fast-paced streams with crossovers. ----- Song Type: Conscripted Song Bemani Debut: beatmania 6th Mix DDR Debut: DDR Ultramix 2 About The Artist: Total Science is Jason "Quiff" Greenlaugh and Paul "Spinback" Smith, who formed their group in 1987 and have become somewhat well-known in the UK DnB scene. Konami commissioned them, and several other British groups, to compose songs for beatmania 6th Mix, which was themed around the UK underground music scene, thus setting the precedent for the Ultramixes' and Universes' modern-day use of conscripted tunes. ------------------------- 9C. DYNAMITE RAVE – NAOKI ----[DL03]--------------- BPM: 150 Length: 1:35 Genre: Speed Rave Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 101 31 0 BASIC 5 188 53 0 DIFFICULT 7 269 38 0 EXPERT 9 398 19 0 ONI 9 362 42 7 DIFFICULT NOTES: It's a tame seven-footer, but a seven-footer nonetheless. Quite a few short streams about here, but what puts it over the six-footer level are all the jumps. Granted, there's not as many as on Basic, but they're used much more maliciously, sometimes popping up in streams... sometimes they'll even string three jumps together in a stream! EXPERT NOTES: Ah, here's a classic cata. And it's still challenging in this day and age, too. It's a textbook example of what makes a good nine-footer: long streams, jumps in some of the shorter ones, sixteenth clusters, and some chaos in the beginning, as gallops in the streams switch you off- and on-beat, which can be tricky. By the way, watch out, the first step of one of the sixteenth clusters in this song is a jump... ONI NOTES: Fairly similar to the Expert steps; it seems less like a whole new Oni chart and more like a reinterpretation of the Expert steps, with less chaos (the whole beginning part that switched from on- to off-beat and back again has been completely replaced with one big long stream) but more voltage and air. Which one's harder is a matter of personal taste, really. ----- Lyrics: One, two, three, four Dynamite Rave Come on everybody (Go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go) And get on the floor, yeah Techno, rave It's time to make a stand And pave the way Some might say Let it go Stay with the flow Stay on beat Move your feet On concrete Or on the dance floor You want more then I'll give you more If it's too hardcore Let me know I'll stop the show Then bring it back To be exact At twelve o'clock Rock the spot It's too damn hot They told me so Dynamite Rave It's on the down low Use your inner glow To make a move Show and prove The man with the lisp Sounds so crisp When you can see me On TV On the radio Hear me blow I don't wanna give up We're gonna have a party Have a really great time Yeah yeah! Just feel the heat Listen to the music and feel that beat C'mon, get up, c'mon, c'mon Let me hear ya, let me hear ya Jump, jump Do your thing This be the bomb Try to sing Narrator king Spread your wings Make your head ring To this song All night long Jack your body To this party Feel the pain When you strain Don't refrain Please don't stop Until you drop I don't wanna give up We're gonna have a party Have a really great time Yeah yeah! Just feel the heat Listen to the music and feel that beat, yeah! ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: DDR 3rd Mix (JP Arcade) American Appearances: DDR USA, DDR Konamix, DDR Ultramix (SP 3), DDR Extreme 2 About The Artist: See "Dead End" for info on Naoki Maeda, the man of a million pseudonyms. Miscellany: The "Down Bird SOTA Mix" of this song is in DDRMAX, the "super euro version" is in SuperNOVA, and the "B4 ZA BEAT MIX" challenge remix is in Extreme 2. A long version of this song was playable exclusively in DDR 5th Mix, which has yet to appear on an American version and probably never will, since Long Versions are a thing of the past, unless they edit it down, "HOT LIMIT" style... -------------------------- 9D. GRADIUSIC CYBER – TAKA ----[DL04]---------------- BPM: 140-165 Length: 1:43 Genre: Digi-Rock (I have no idea where this tempo change occurs; historically, this song scrolled at a steady 160 BPM, so either they changed that for no apparent reason, or it displays the wrong BPM... though the more I play this, I do sense a slight slowdown right at the end...) Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 1 105 3 0 BASIC 7 235 5 0 DIFFICULT 8 298 23 0 EXPERT 9 334 54 0 BASIC NOTES: A seven-footer on Basic? Seems weird, but bear in mind that this was the closest thing that Club Mix had to a boss song; it's not much different than, say, FAXX's Basic chart being rated nine feet. This has some pretty tough parts, including streams with crossovers and a couple sixteenth- note double-taps, and some mind-numbingly simple parts; Club Mix was notoriously awful at balancing its stepcharts like that... DIFFICULT NOTES: Quite a bit harder than on Basic. There's tons of double-taps, especially in the beginning, and watch out for a long stream filled to the brim with crossovers about halfway through. The sixteenth-note double-taps are held over from the Basic chart, so watch for those too. EXPERT NOTES: One of the oldest nine-footers in existence, it's pretty middle- of-the-road by modern standards. There's some fairly long streams with crossovers, and quite a few jumps that manage to find their way into streams. There's even a stream near the beginning whose second half is nothing but air! The sixteenth double-taps have been turned into more mundane gallops, which are also a somewhat common sight here. Watch out for the tricky pattern of sixteenths right at the end! ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: beatmania IIDX DDR Debut: DDR Club Mix About The Artist: See "NEMESIS" for into on the ever-popular DJ TAKA. Miscellany: This song heavily samples sound effects from the classic shooter "Gradius", hence the name. This is actually the "Another" version of the song; the original, which has the same steps as this but sounds different, hasn't appeared on a US mix yet, though the "AMD G5 MIX" can be found in DDRMAX. This song's Doubles Expert chart is currently the only ten-footer in this game. Just like with the Contra remix, this song features an animal head (in this case, some dog with huge-ass teeth) instead of, you know, something even remotely related to the game in question. ------------------------------- 9E. Himawari – Riyu from BeForU ----[DL05]--------------------- BPM: 185 Length: 1:43 Genre: J-Happy Hardcore Diff - Steps - Jumps - Freezes BEGINNER 2 120 8 0 BASIC 2 156 15 8 DIFFICULT 5 276 15 9 EXPERT 7 370 51 2 EXPERT NOTES: This song really comes across to me as "BREAK DOWN Lite", both musically and stepchart-wise. Whereas "BREAK DOWN" features long, tricky streams at high speed, the streams here are shorter and simpler. There are a few original parts here, such as when the steps go offbeat, and a brief series of triplets, though. ----- Lyrics: (They're in Japanese, and I don't speak Japanese, so I'm no help here...) ----- Song Type: Konami Original Bemani Debut: GuitarFreaks 10th Mix/DrumMania 9th Mix DDR Debut: DDR Ultramix 3 About The Artist: BeForU are a J-Pop group created and produced by Naoki Maeda, hence their heavy presence in DDR. Their lineup has shifted over the years, but Riyu Kosaka has been one of the ever-presents, also releasing some solo work (such as this song) on the side. ---------------------------------------- 9F. jelly kiss – Togo Project feat. Sana ----[DL06]-------------