2015 January/February Set 5 (Complete)

[psychoangel691]

Blue (Ashix Remix) - Eiffel 65
Bring The Madness (feat. Mayor Apeshit) - Excision & Pegboard Nerds
Cirno's Perfect Math Class - IOSYS OS
Darkroot Forest - Tom Miller
Mirror World - Exias

[HeZe]

9/10 PASS

Very good usage of 48ths making a lot of blue arrows! Nothing wrong in the steps, was enjoyable to play. CLEAR pass.

Diff 17

9/10 PASS

Very accurately placed arrows, there is absolutely nothing to correct. Well done!

Diff 30-45

9/10 PASS

Again, nothing bad to say. The file is as complete as it gets. Great!

Diff 47-51

7/10 PASS?

Good song in general.
- The polys in M2 shouldn't be there.
- M5 burst is too dense
- These triples 3,2,3 .. 2,3,2 .. 3,2,3 at M34 and M35: The sound starts before these patterns and continues after them. It feels a bit strange that you only stepped those three, and there's a large gap before you start stepping them again. But I respect your artistic freedom and won't let it affect my score, because this indeed makes the song a bit less repeatitive.
- M29 - M45 is the central part of the song with is the speediest. Still you have a lot of quite sparsely stepped sections there. You could fill this up a bit to make it more consistent.
- The end of the song is good.

Diff 27

9/10 PASS

Excellent song, great steps, nothing at all feels wrong. Good job!

Diff 12

[rushyrulz]

Blue (Ashix Remix)

Nice art file you've got there. No criticisms.

Rating: 9/10 - PASS
Suggested Difficulty: 28

Bring The Madness

Fun mid-range file. No problems that I could find.

Rating: 9/10 - PASS
Suggested Difficulty: 42

Cirno's Perfect Math Class

This would be a V2 since there is already a version of Cirno in game. It is different enough to constitute V2 status. It's a good nerfed version of what's already in-game.

Rating: 10/10 - PASS
Suggested Difficulty: 46

Darkroot Forest

Pretty much a total snoozefest without any interesting variation from start to finish that is pretty much required in a file like this. It doesn't help that the song itself is ambient background noise at best.

Rating: 5/10 - REJ
Suggested Difficulty: 22

Mirror World

Gradually got more difficult. I like this for a D1-D2 file. Nothing wrong technically.

Rating: 9/10 - PASS
Suggested Difficulty: 25

[M0nkeyz]

Blue (Ashix remix) | 5.5/10

I personally like the creative use of BPM to create a blue looking file. I would give you no flag for that, but the steps seemed really bland. The file had alot of drops and build up and you didn't step those. You mostly just stepped the bass without paying too much attention to the PR.

Bring the Madness | 6/10

In my opinion this is the kind of file you need to see on DDReamstudio to really judge it, By playing it a couple of times a few things become really evident though, and that's a wrong use of Hands and jumps. The file starts with a moderately loud sound that is immediately stepped with a Quad. after that there are alot of louder sounds that are stepped by jumps and triples. I feel that was inconsistent.

Around 700 combo I felt the file wasn't getting much variety in it's patterns and the PR could have been slightly better.

I also think that, even though the file was in sync, the bpm could have been altered to create a slightly less chaotic file(for example in the beginning where you alternate between 32nd's and 16th's)

Cirno's Perfect Math Class | 7/10

There was a slight PR problem in the beginning with the first set of jacks, I think they should have been more to the right. At around 490 combo there was a set of jacks that felt out of place, and towards the ending the PR felt backwards.

I also think u purposely omitted the 32nd(?)'s in the beginning, and im not sure why

Overall the file was pretty good, I enjoyed it.

Darkroot Forest | 5.5/10

I have pretty expensive headphones, and I had trouble hearing any sounds that the 24nd's in the beginning could represent. I felt this song could be improved by alot if you'd just stepped the main melody more often. The file right now lacks flow and variation. and it seemed to get slightly out of sync towards the ending.

Mirror World | 6.5/10

File didn't suffer from anything major, the pattern usage was not always in perfect PR, but that improved the variety alot, which is important for low level files imo.

The biggest problem I had with the file was that the jump usage was pretty random. Sometimes the bass was singles and other times it was jumps, then you started to use jumps for the main melody, which in my opinion would have been better combined(So a jump when the main melody and the bass collided)

[MarioNintendo]

My score: 1-0-0-0
The blue gimmick is a seller. I think the file could have ended sooner (dragged near the end), but this might also be because I am not used to playing easy files anymore. Either way, accepted!
8.5/10 pass

My score: 2-0-0-1
I was entertained. (I'd be willing to bet that samurai is the one who stepped this) I felt there was a missing jump between m42 and m45 (sorry if this is imprecise, it's the best I can do), but this is the only bad thing I could find. Terrific chart.
9.5/10 pass

My score: 7-0-0-0
Wow this was way lighter than I expected. Like, damn. But anyway, lol
While I was a tad disappointed about the actual lightness of the layering (I believe it could use a bit more jumps without upping the difficulty significantly), I was still impressed how consistent within itself the difficulty was. As it stands, this is a nice stream-ish file to play on rates, as far as I am concerned.
One nitpick: maybe I am wrong, but as far as I know, the ministream at m56 should end sooner (i.e. there's a lot of ghost notes here). Maybe I'm just wrong, but that's how it felt!
7.5/10 pass

My score: 2-0-0-0
Trippy song choice... The 8ths at m27 and m67 (if I recall correctly) are offsync and should be 12ths. That's all I really have to say here.
7.5/10 pass

My score: AAA \o/
Neat! Very sweet beginner file. I dig it.
8.5/10 pass

[VisD]

Blue (Ashix Remix) - 7.5/10
Good easy file. I love gimmickry to add some spice to a file and the blue coloring does just that. Some more focus could be put on lining up repeated voice clips as jacks, and cutting back on jacks that don't go to repeated voice clips, just similar-sounding words

Bring The Madness - 10/10
This is spectacular. Like Rat Twist but easier. Nice colors, heavy layering, ending slowdown. A perfect easier file.

Cirno's Perfect Math Class - 3.5/10
- The beginning is underlayered relative to the rest of the file
- Holy PR 67-70
- The 16ths to the lyrics in the next section feel off, like there's ghost notes and missing notes here and there
- My biggest issue with the file: the difficult part is concentrated in the one area where you have the two staircases in quick succession, and these are far harder than anything else in the file. I know it's very subjective as to whether a gigantic spike is "justified", but this doesn't do it for me - the whole thing is so gentle in layering and all, and the nasty patterns here don't fit
- The layering to the bass on the 4ths is incredibly inconsistent

The file overall has the groove of the song right, but you make many stepping choices I just can't agree with.

Darkroot Forest - 5/10

- Things completely fall apart at notes 200-400, when the layering goes all wonky. A lot is omitted, for no good reason, making this section quite inconsistent
- A bunch of ghost notes and omitted ones, most notably at the beginning

Not your fault, but the song just doesn't lend itself to a good file, anyway. It's all so mellow, with very little variation, making it quite dull

Mirror World - 7.5/10
I have a feeling some of the 16ths in the two main sections shouldn't exist (or, conversely, that there should be even more 16ths) - you step the percussion not 100% consistently.

Otherwise, this is a great beginner's file. Lovely song.

[DossarLX ODI]

DarkZtar will be taking the primary judge task for January/February 2015 Set 5.

[DossarLX ODI]

DarkZtar finished the primary judge task for January 2015 Set 5. The notes can be seen below; this thread is being moved over to Completed Sets and the results/notes will be updated in the January/February 2015 thread.

[7.5/10] Blue (Ashix Remix) {Eiffel 65} (wv)
Really not a lot to comment on, chart structure is very simple and deliberate. Pr could be better in places and i would have liked to see more usage of 8th jacks and common note columns to indicate vocal pr better in the choruses. Otherwise chart is fine.

[8/10] Bring The Madness (feat. Mayor Apeshit) - Excision & Pegboard Nerds (gameboy42690)
-46.960 don’t hear anything that would make this 16th a jump
-50.581 missing 8th
-61.960 the anchor here should only be the last 3 notes, the previous 8ths all change pitch.
-63.857 remove this 8th
-64.891 another anchor that is longer than it should be
-68.684 interesting that you chose to completely ignore the vocals here since they’ve been the clear focus throughout the rest of the file.
-72.995 same thing as 61.960
-74.891 remove this 8th
-80.409 ghost 8th
-84.547 kinda the same thing as the other long anchors, but this one kinda seems more like the same pitch? Still would recommend changing it to something like 4443322 since the long anchor feels kind of out of place.
-103.340 really should include the grace notes to the background synth in this section since you included them in the outro section after.
Overall well done, solid thumbs up, please break up the long anchors though.

[4/10] Cirno's Perfect Math Class {IOSYS OS} (takumi000)
-9.947 this 3 note anchor should be on 4, same pitch as the last note of the previous ascending sequence.
-14.747 4 notes of backwards pr is super awkward
-16.804 pr here in general needs improvement
-24.347 there are a lot of dropped 16ths here, which is problematic considering they are the same synth that you are acknowledging with the 16ths at 24.947.
^This happens many many many times and is the most glaring issue so far
-25.632 more missing 16ths.
^also happens many times
-at this point gonna say that amount of dropped/inconsistent 16ths warrants a no-pass, I’ll finish reviewing the file though.
-56.404 missing jump
-56.575 16ths here actually start earlier (as early as the 8th of the previous measure if you want to acknowledge all of them. I’d actually recommend you just drop the acknowledgement of the 16th here though since you’ve taken a very simplistic/light approach towards the song.
-57.947 should be a single note
-61.375, 61.718 what are these jumps here for?
-62.061, 62.232 missing jumps
-noticing more sections where pr isn’t that great, should probably look over the pr throughout the whole file and touch up the spots where there are noticeably long instances of awkward/backwards pr
-66.689 missing jump
-72.861 not a ghost note, but this 4th shouldn’t be here since it’s not part of your layering scheme
-74.918, 75.261 missing jumps ← without these your layering scheme is essentially two split half measures and feels really really weird.
-76.975 generalization here is fine but these 16th patterns should be going in the same direction.
-78.347 this 16th run should end here.
-86.404 break up this anchor, the vocals are different pitches
-88.804, 89.147 these 8ths only go to the background hihats which you weren’t acknowledging before, even if you were to keep them and fill the rest of the hihats in these shouldn’t be the same as the previous note to distinguish the 8th jacks from when you deliberately use them for pr purposes.
-91.204 3 note 8th jack to 3 different pitches
-98.232 fill the 16ths in here since you generalized the sweeps as 16ths previously
-outro has same errors as the intro
Lots of missing notes and pr is pretty questionable throughout the file. This is suitable as an easier v2 if it gets fixed up though.

[4/10] Darkroot Forest {Tom Miller} (PrawnSkunk)
-13.708 missing jump
-16.388 missing jump
-19.069 missing jump
-21.750 missing jump
-24.430 missing jump
-27.111 missing jump
-29.791 missing jump
-32.474 i think you get the idea
-49.225 this 8th should be on the 12th before it
-59.724 ok so I played through this whole section with the active drums, and I get what you’re trying to do with the drops in layering to focus on the melody when it’s there, but the lack of acknowledgement for the drums when they are so prominent just feels very off.
^lack of layering in this section is also kinda weird since this is the most active part of the song
-115.271 missing jump
-133.138 missing jump
-137.605 the 2 12ths here and the 4th after it should be jumps
-147.611 syncing here is way off
-153.371 missing notes to the synth in here, they’re pretty quiet though
-the ending of the song being offsync really kills the file unfortunately. The focus on individual elements throughout the song is good, but the layering errors also drags the file down a lot. Some of the focus choices aren’t particularly great, even if they are aimed at producing an easier file.

[5/10] Mirror World {Exias} (Silvuh)
Had to reprocess the mp3 to get a stable bitrate, my timings might differ from yours
-5.373 the first pattern of consecutive 4th notes is kinda ambiguous, but these 3 4ths are definitely the same pitch.
-29.040 missing jump
-28.207 highlighting only the last hihat in each drum phrase is clearly deliberate, but I feel like highlighting such a small snippet of a musical element is confusing at best, this only gets worse as other elements are tacked on later in the file.
-33.373 missing jump - at this point this seems deliberate too but these really should be jumps, they go to the same percussions as the previous jumps
-49.540 alright i’m just gonna put this out here, additive layering to subtle 16th overlaps is just… ugh it’s just so not necessary in a file of this difficulty and just makes understanding the file complicated even from a stepartist point of view.
-46.207 filling in the 16ths gradually as the file progresses honestly isn’t really working for me, the layering ends up feeling incomplete/unfocused. Either acknowledge them all or drop the 16ths you currently have.
-58.873 ghost 16th
-60.207 same comment as 49.540
-96.207 ghost 16th
-72.040 there are many harp sounds that you omitted in this section which again seems deliberate, but why would you highlight them for the 16th run at 68.707 (at the highest density part relative to the rest of the music) and then ignore them everywhere else when the density matches the music well. The 16ths feel out of place just as much as the lack of the rest of the harp notes makes the section feel empty.
-92.707 same comments from the prev section since this section repeats
Alright, pretty much everything in this file is done very deliberately, my problem with the file is that there are a lot of obscure layering interactions/omissions that are needlessly confusing, especially considering this is an easy file. Ultimately I feel like the approach to this file isn’t great considering the audience the file is geared for: the omitted notes to the hihats just make the file feel unfocused/empty, and many of the quieter sections just feel completely bare, especially when are active elements that were previously acknowledged are omitted.
Feel free to appeal this rating though, other judges are likely to have a different opinion.