DJ Max Respect

It had been a few years since DJ Max Technika Q was released on mobile but there may be tons of things to blog about here.
Firstly, something cropped up at Pentavision that the Ex-DJ Max developers formed a new company called Nurijoy to develop Beatcraft Cyclon for the arcades and port it over to Playstation 4, Xbox One and Playstation Vita as Superbeat Xonic. The second thing was that Konami's reputation has been going from bad to a little bit worse I should say like the way they do to Beatmania IIDX ever since Beatmania IIDX Spada has been disrespectful to the visual purpose of DJing. The Club-DJ-Land is supposed to be about taking place in a nightclub with Disco Ball, tons of lights, dancefloor, non-stop music, a DJ booth and of course a counter for buying something to drink but to come up with out-of-place skins and weird-ass music defeats the purpose of club music and NOBODY AS A DJ plays that unless you're some DJ who gets other DJs and clubbers ostracized by playing that kind of weird music in your gig. Your clubbers can sense your fear of warning or contract termination for that choice and behavior of yours. Sure, the poster involving you and other DJs can have whatever visual theme of the gig as desired but it still means that the music has to be relevant in terms of genre according to the club rules if there are ones. Not to mention that the interior of the nightclub will STILL look like the nightclub so to ask for decoration of it is out of the question.
DJ Max Respect is said to be the reboot of the franchise and the classic series which refers to the DJ Max series on PC and Playstation Portable. It has tons of songs from various DJ Max games including the spinoffs like DJ Max Technika series. However, the initial songs that come with this game will be from DJ Max Portable 1 and 2 along with new songs exclusive to it. Others will be available as DLCs. BGAs of the songs from previous DJ Max games will be remastered with 1080p and 60fps. There may be rumors of choosing other UI skins than the default ones but as of this writing, the game is already released in Asia and Korea with Japanese release to follow in November. The western release has still yet to be announced.
There are other stuffs exclusive to DJ Max Respect, some of the missions from Mission Mode are making use of 10-keys as the complete maximum amount compared to 8-keys from previous DJ Max games on Playstation Portable. By adding additional bumper buttons, the game makes more potential use of the Playstation 4 controller and I can assume that even analog sticks will be used for their corresponding notes during gameplay. Auto-Fever doesn't have any effect on the score but I'm still fine with or without having to activate the Fever Mode manually. There's also the two-player battle feature similar to the one in Beatmania IIDX but the superseding thing is that the game also has the online two-player battle feature to see who can score better. This has been around in rhythm games in the arcades that have online multiplayer battle.
Like Superbeat Xonic, the Japanese release of DJ Max Respect will have additional songs taken from Arc System Works games like Guilty Gear Xrd and Guilty Gear 2: Overture under Early Purchase Bonus.
One present warning, your account and player names mustn't have DJ at the beginning or at the end UNLESS you're a real club DJ who has gotten in a gig before, whether it's a club, a festival, a bar, or even a wedding event. Mobile DJ on the other hand is a different story but the purpose is more or less the same. You're getting real club DJs ostracized that way with such account name of yours and you're vulnerable to be mocked out of their suspicions. My worse imagination is that you may be denied entry to the club/bar/pub if your account is found out like that along with your content and bio. There should be a technical trick on social media and video sharing sites that detects "DJ" in your account name and if found, it will check through DJ database to see if you've done a gig or not. But if there's no DJ contract whatsoever in your account and you keep that kind of account name in it like you continue this kind of claim and keep on posting rhythm game contents on that account, you will be suspected of being a filthy-gamer claiming to be a DJ through those games. You still can become a club-DJ in the future but only if you become genuine and mature enough and stop that filthy claim.

DJ Max Ray Update

Ver 1.04 and 1.05 have 3 song packs each and various fixes. For Ver 1.04, I may think that there's no need to backup and restore your account data just to update the game to the next version while it adds additional 3 song packs while for Ver 1.05 which may be surprising to you, you can preview play the songs similar to TapSonic on IOS before you buy them. In addition, the medal system is changed in Ver 1.05 that you can get the respective three medals depending on how well you play for the number of cleared patterns. However, to get the Rainbow medal, you may need to get the Full Combo clear for all of 9 patterns.The final update of this game of last year was Ver 1.04 and this year, we get the first one of this year which is Ver 1.05.

Beatmania IIDX 20 Tricoro Version Blue

It was an another update of this month with more songs as part of the new mode that was released. Songs from Legend Cross were still in the game and you can select them from the normal music select screen so that there’s no need to worry about what’s going to happen to them.  This update contains additional songs and especially for new boss songs and is known as Omega Attack. Previously, you could unlock the Legend Cross songs by obtaining Astran lights and some crystals that are needed to unlock the secret boss songs. Plan 8 is the extra stage boss song and is by far even harder than the normal boss songs and the secret boss song is Thor’s Hammer which turns out to be LED remix of La Campanella and speaking of La Campanella, this isn’t the first rhythm game remix. The previous one was by Cranky and that was in DJ Max Portable 3 and Technika 2 and above. Now, in Omega Attack, you can unlock songs by clearing in-game viruses in the in-game network. Whether you clear or fail the song in whichever mode you’re in, you’re awarded the CPs. You can use the CPs to purchase the weapons for your character to clear the viruses so that you can unlock the songs. This is sort of like a social RPG way of progressing in a rhythm arcade game although you can choose to play it in the normal way. As you clear more of the viruses, you unlock more songs, new weapons and upgrade your character’s code level to earn more CPs per play. However, some tiles on the map require more hits to clear. The mode is divided into two sectors with each sector containing its boss song where the real boss fight comes in as you play the song. But then, there are some factors in unlocking the songs from the respective sectors.
Lastly for Legend Cross songs in Standard Mode, you may need to buy Devil and Angel Cards using Dellars which require of course the E-Amusement Cards with premium membership. I guess that Premium Mode may have the time limit and makes use of the Paseli. Fortunately, if you had played the Legend Cross songs during Legend Cross event, you can buy the Devil Cards which are less expensive than Angel Cards but for CS Revival songs, they are automatically unlocked the day after the last day of the event.

Maimai Plus

The word, Plus, sounds like there’s going to be an IOS port of this rhythm game but my imagination is wrong. It is actually an updated game with additional stuffs and improvements. There are more Vocaloid songs to play in addition to the originals as well as even more Extend songs. Another information is that there is some soundtrack CD called, Rave Party Tokyo or something, in which Sega took several songs for that game and to a surprise, it seems that various Touhou circles were involved in that soundtrack CD. Even Cranky, the BMS music composer was involved as well as his latest song was put in Maimai Plus. This isn’t the first time his song was in put the commercial rhythm game in the arcade. The previous game was DJ Max Portable 3 according to the Japanese Wikipedia of La Campanella.

Damn, it seemed that the mechanical problem of the card swiping part for Maimai is still there despite the update that took place yesterday when blogging this in Eastern regional time. And it’s really fascinating to me when some little kids try to bash the shit out of the buttons of whichever arcade games when they’re in attract modes. What an inaccurate rule and its factors that the vacation is left out way too long like lasting for more than five weeks for children.

DJ Max Ray Ver 1.03

Sick of stupid crashes that happen on Tap Sonic and even DJ Max Ray? Perhaps you may be angered should that happen to your device but the developers might have come up with the inaccurate workaround or something. I may suggest that you keep the app open like everyday or so without closing it entirely but I don’t know if that is the workaround or not. While I had recently reached Level 50 and above in DJ Max Technika Tune, this update is what I stumbled upon and especially the IOS version 6.01 update which fixes the issues for Iphone 5 and Ipod Touch 5th Gen. This update features additional song packs with one of them from the update being free. More gameplay videos of DJ Max Technika Tune and DJ Max Ray will be coming in on my YouTube account and videos that have Full Combo will be posted to my Nico Nico Douga account.

DJ Max Technika Tune Obtained

Oh god, I don’t know much of the songs in this one but it seems that I already knew like several of DJ Max songs so far. After completing like most parts of Project Diva F and Puyo Puyo 7, it seemed that I couldn’t wait to buy another game for Vita. My plans for buying additional Vita games were promised all along with DJ Max Technika Tune. Well, I started it off with the DJ Max songs I know of but for difficulties, I think the gameplay should take me time to get used to because the screen for the PS Vita is between the tablets and smartphone devices but I think that the Vita is quite fine enough to play this game. Also, the K-Pop music is something I’m not into but it’s the normal thing that I can also appreciate. The rear touch pad may add to the challenge but it may seem to be unnecessary to me. Better still, the tablet version of DJ Max Technika may be best suited anyway under DJ Max Technika HD which is tablet exclusive. There may be no smartphone version for me as these devices may be like too small to play in the modern way. I mean, the fingers can be the huge blockages to the screen and that’s the problem with other games in other genres on smartphone devices. Your best bet will be to do some measurement on smartphone devices and see how many horizontal rows of notes are fittable when it comes to Technika gameplay as I may predict that the number of horizontal lines on the whole screen may be a bit lower than having six horizontal row of notes available on the Vita screen. There should be seven for Vita screen if you exclude the HUD on top.

Then there’s a DJ Max Technika clone on IOS called Rhythmix. It may be suited on the Ipad but on the smartphone, the rows of notes are like squeezed even though the number of horizontal rows is like already six just like the Technika Tune. The serious downside though is that the clone is put on hold due to being caught red-handed and sued by Pentavision for ripping off the on-going DJ Max Technika series. But what it does offer exclusively in terms of gameplay is the freaking flick notes. *Clone flattened by a huge falling object* That’s a fag for not having major differences when it comes to inspirations for your work.

DJ Max Ray for IOS

What, NO WAY! Why it is like Tap Sonic all over again? Hadn’t Pentavision learnt the lawful mistake from last time in which their previous DJ MAX games are already ripping off the Beatmania series? But come on, there are already other games similar to Tap Sonic on IOS and I don’t know if this one will crash on me as well.

Thankfully, this one is free just like Tap Sonic but the packs are not just like Jubeat Plus on IOS where music packs will have to be purchased as DLCs. If you probably expect the Technika like game where it is kind of legal enough on the IOS, well, you should think again because how the hell can the Technika like game be fit onto the smaller IOS devices? At least, the PS Vita is quite fittable enough for DJ Max Technika game but on the smaller IOS device, it may be too small to be frank. Just two horizontal rows of notes for top and bottom parts and it can be a boring result. However on the Ipad, a TECHNIKA LIKE GAME CAN BE FITTABLE! So all I can say is, the tablet users will be disappointed with this game. Even if this game is on Android, well, the disappointment is still there.

So what’s new in DJ Max Ray? Well, you can customize the skin of the gameplay interface, notes and other stuffs. Common features in the gameplay like speed, fade-in, fade-out, mirror and other stuffs are back from Tap Sonic but this time, things have been improved here. Another new thing is even more new songs exclusively to this game and HOW ABOUT THE EDIT MODE FOR DJ Max Technika Tune so that you can put in the custom songs, custom notecharts and that will save your ass from using those clones on the PC? I believe that the Fever scoring is also in Tap Sonic in addition to the previous DJ Max games including Technika series.

So do you probably need this when you already have Tap Sonic? Well, this is an arcade way of sequelizing the previous game like there will be additional features, additional songs and other changes to the game and the gameplay.

DJ Max Mobile for IOS

There are previous versions of DJ Max Mobile series released for Korean cellphones and this year, there will be the upcoming IOS version. What kind of gameplay will this be and will this be released in Korea first this fall? Right now on YouTube, there is only the teaser trailer video and it doesn’t give us whatever details unfortunately.

Now, there is already a game on IOS by Neowiz Internet called TapSonic which contains DJ Max series songs which are ridiculously difficult depending on the songs and the K-Pop songs in which I may appreciate of normally. For this year’s update of the game, you’re able to play a different song everyday for free tree times so the next day you play the game, you’re given another different song and each song as part of some event will be given three attempts. It may increase some kind of replayability. Unfortunately, the feature as part of the update that allows you to increase the music points by completing three stages and then tweeting for example to get the points is gone. Interestingly enough for westerners, there may be western songs as well in TapSonic.

So for DJ Max Mobile for IOS, I may guess that the gameplay will be based on the original DJ Max series, DJ Max Technika series or both but we’ll get to find out more after this article.

DJ Max Technika Tune for Playstation Vita

Will DJ Max games be the next ones for me to play? So far, I know like a little amount of songs so playing those will not be easy and the gameplay is assumed to be tough. Thankfully, there’s DJ Max Technika series which may have simplified the gameplay and I believe that there’s going to be the Playstation Vita version. So, speaking of Playstation Vita release, the gameplay can work with the touch screen controls and it is the only consumer release. The original arcade version is in HD widescreen resolution and the arcade cabinet has two monitors which display duplicated screen. One is for gameplay and the other monitor is for the people to watch which may be unique to see someone playing. What a show off but the cabinet can be damn expensive like that.

DJ Max Technika Tune for Playstation Vita will be released in Summer this year.