[Tru]

Funky Beat

Song: High hopes for files from this group. Probably the second easiest degree of charting difficulty, so hoping to see some unique twists to help spice up and differentiate submissions.

1 - Something of a safe approach overall, and a perfectly serviceable file. I like the splashes of colour. However, I’m not sure this chart does enough to distinguish itself from other submissions. Could definitely have leaned in to the more bouncy rhythms more - felt a bit too continuous for what this song is. Increased layering felt introduced in a weird spot, would need to look closer to get more specific with why. Would probably get accepted, but more could be done.

2 - Vocal 24ths were an interesting addition that I broadly approve of. Felt at times over-layered and potentially inconsistent with its layering and pattern choices. It’s a bold chart to be sure. In judgement, would probably be listing consistency checks and smoothing out a few pattern choices.

3 - Unfortunately this chart feels unfocused. Played this twice and it’s hard to figure out what is being followed. I think(?) the layering is pretty consistent so I have to give kudos for that at least. I’d love to see more from this charter, perhaps on a song they’re more comfortable with. There are some good ideas in here but the dynamic nature of this song may have hindered them and they lost focus while planning out their chart.

4 - There are some definitely good ideas here. However, I feel that the chart went a little overboard with the density especially in the second half. While I can understand what the goal was here, I don’t think this approach works very well with this song.

5 - Felt better on the second playthrough. This will probably be a fairly popular choice in this group, as there are some decent ideas and barring the 3[34]4s the chart flows pretty nicely. I’m not personally a fan, as I think the song isn’t one that should be quite this flowy but that’s just taste. Acceptable with a few tweaks.

6 - Yesssss. I could only wish this was longer. This is exactly the file I hoped would come out of this group. Very nicely done.

7 - Pretty similar to 1 and 5, decent ideas and flows pretty nicely but I’m not a fan of this for the same reason as 5. Would probably get accepted.

GETCHA!

Song: A lot of different ways to approach this. I’m expecting a lot of vocal dumps and potentially some interesting cuts. This will require either close attention to details or some good execution or both.

1 - Kind of a neat execution, though some of the glut patterns would definitely need to get adjusted or reduced in spots. An otherwise pretty straightforward approach that I can’t really complain about.

2 - Expected this sort of chart. While I can understand the unbalanced difficulty curve and making the choruses stand out in that way, I think it’s too much in comparison to the rest of the chart. I like the idea but it needs some refinement.

3 - Felt this was way too aggressively done and ultimately I had to quit out around half way. I don’t feel this was a very good representation of the song. A decent attempt, but I feel that it was trying to do too much with the freedom offered by dump charting.

4 - Good cut and an interesting, albeit simplified, approach overall. De-emphasizing the vocals worked fairly well for how this was done, even if it might not be an ideal choice in general for this song.

5 - Similar but opposite approach to 4 where the vocals feature a bit more prominently in a somewhat simplified approach. However, the apparent lack of a cut here really hinders this chart as it lacks much of a dynamic feel to justify this length and it feels a bit tedious/repetitive to play.

6 - There are some good ideas here in a general sense. But there are a lot of questionable pattern choices that really hinder this.

7 - The intro/verse 1 was pretty decent. But the chart felt very odd to play starting at the first chorus. It’s hard to figure out what some of these jacks are for and there are some bursts within them that make this feel like too much.

Fat Lip

Song: Definitely the easiest/simplest song to create a chart out of here. Standing out will be the challenge.

1 - Pretty strong choice here. The dump approach used here worked pretty well overall and barring a few questionable patterns, I’d probably accept this in a normal batch.

2 - I like some choices here - especially the long jack to vocals used in the chorus, which was a pretty fun(ny) approach and definitely tripped me up on sightread. Layering (jump use) would need fairly substantial work to ensure consistency. Feels like a chart from a promising new stepartist, would love to see more from this person!

3 - Relatively simplified dump approach as compared to 1, and pretty decent in a broad sense. However I felt that some choices felt extremely limited when the song offered something more interesting. The best example of this is the jumptrill use here.

4 - A pretty safe/tame chart overall. Not sure what some of these white notes are for. Don’t have much to say, kind of expected to get a chart like this.

5 - Similar idea to 4 but slightly more polished.

6 - Colour work here was a good choice and is done pretty well. I like that this was still a lower difficulty overall, but I think a slightly more aggressive approach would have worked better.

Clumsy Communication

Song: I’m not sure what to expect out of this group. I’d anticipate a handful of fairly similar charts so it’ll be interesting to see how people decided to stand out from the crowd here.

1 - A very straightforward and potentially effective approach here, but the length really hinders this one. Also noted several rhythm errors and jump use consistency needs some work. This seems like a chart from a novice stepartist, and I’d like to see this person keep at it – you’ve definitely got the basics down pat and you’ll improve with more charts.

2 - I like the dump idea but I don’t think this approach was very effective. I’m not sure whether the filler jumpstream was just too slow to feel worthwhile or if it needed to lean in more on bursts. The idea could work, but not quite there imo

3 - Kind of an anticipated approach overall. Decent cut. Bursts toward the end seemed a little out of place but not overly egregious. Pretty solid.

4 - Somewhat similar to 3 but a little bit more interesting imo. Intro is weird though.

5 - Unfortunately it was difficult to determine what this chart was trying to follow at times. Sections at times felt like they were not following the music at all. There’s some cute ideas like those jump-hand-quads. Similar advice to 1, you’ll improve with more charts.

6 - Somewhat sloppy cut. I very much enjoyed the second half of this chart mostly because it’s close to how I would have approached this song. Colour notes here appear to be for sync, but I think it would have been worth sacrificing strict sync for a cohesive colour scheme (or recolorize them to closest 24th). As is, it just seems a bit odd.

7 - Felt kind of weird at times. Density doesn’t seem to follow the song all that well - noted some layering consistency concerns and some portions that just seem too empty for the song’s energy. Also some pitch relevancy concerns throughout. Pretty decent attempt but would need some polish.

8 - I enjoyed this one a fair bit. I have some concerns with hand use in particular here. Broadly I’d like to see more hands, but there is definitely a consistency issue with them either way. This is otherwise pretty solid.

Still deciding on whether I want to weigh in on any of my fellow class A submissions (if so will post those after the voting period).