FlashFlashRevolution is a 4 key game compiled of simfiles (also known just as files or maps) created by users and approved by a team of judges for release into game. A batch is simply a collection of these files over a period of time that is submitted to us for consideration. Regular batches run for a two month period at which time users may submit any files that fit within the rules for review. We will also on occasion have special batches that may run for a shorter period of time and will have specific requirements attached to them. You can find all the current batches here

For every Regular Batch Period and Special Batch a Simfile Artist has a submission cap of 5 files unless otherwise noted. Users that are not part of the Simfile Artist group have a submission cap of 2 files. If the user exceeds the submission cap, the excess submissions will be prohibited from review. Users that continuously provide improper submissions, attempt to abuse the batch system, or be disrespectful to others will have their cap reduced at the discretion of the Game Management Staff.

Judges have the right to automatically reject a file with a 0 rating if the file does not match the minimum requirements, as it is an improper submission. A proper submission at minimum consists of:

• A folder in the format <songname> (<username>). An example is Magical 8bit Tour (jimerax). This folder must contain the two files specified in the next list item below:
• It must have one .sm file with one difficulty. If your .sm file has multiple difficulties, your submission will receive a rating of 0/10.
• It must have one .mp3 file with at least a bit rate of 128kbps, stereo. If the sound quality is poor we may request a better mp3.
• Have a SM file that properly identifies the song artist and the song name. Be sure that you do not have extra text in your song name that does not belong, this includes the subtitle field. If it’s not in the title of the song, do not include it in the song name. Please also be sure to include your FFR username in the credit section.
• If your song title uses something other than alphanumeric characters you must provide a transliteration of that title. The engine currently cannot handle anything outside of alphanumeric. So for example, if you have a Japanese title you will need to get the transliteration for that title.
--- We have seen an increasing number of submissions whose .sm files are not supplying the necessary metadata (song name/song artist) for a completed submission. Please keep in mind that Unknown Artist is not an acceptable song artist, nor is a title like 64842_newgrounds_infern for the song title of a submission. Please make sure that you appropriately fill in the fields of your SM file to the best of your abilities. Incomplete metadata for your submission will result in a [0/10] rating. If the information is present but is not certain to be correct, staff will use their best judgment to ensure that the song titles and artist fields are proper.

The points above are the bare minimum requirements. In addition to the points above, a proper submission also satisfies the points listed below.

• The song artist must be created in the .sm file. If we see "Unknown Artist", we may request you to give us the song artist so we can also check for valid permission.
• If you only use a part of the mp3 for stepping, cut unstepped parts of the mp3. This will reduce the size of the level. For instance, don't use the full 4 minute mp3 of a song if you only step the first 2 minutes.
• An incomplete submission will be automatically rejected. This means that the file has large portions of empty space either at the beginning, ending, or in between the file. If there are noticeably long empty spots when the song is running with noticeable elements for no justifiable reason, it will be classified as an incomplete submission. When submitting a file to FFR you are agreeing for it to be judged “as is” so please do not submit works in progress.
• Do not include graphics or cdtitles in the submission.
• Again, multiple difficulties are NOT allowed. If you want to submit multiple difficulties for one song, submit them as separate files.
• Holds, Mines, Rolls, and Attacks are NOT allowed. If any of these are found in your submission it will receive a rating of 0/10.
• Stops are not allowed. You can use any (4th to 192nd) notes and BPM changes, but stops make DDReam unusable.
• A judge can set a 'Fixes Required' status to a file if the audio quality is harsh or poor, even if the chart itself is accepted. If no fixes are applied on the Stepartist's end in regards to said 'Fixes Required', then it may be rejected. In addition, the GM Team has the right to lower the volume if it is deemed necessary.
• Upon a file submission, the Stepartist agrees that the file can be judged as is. Regular batches are open for two months, please only submit once you are satisfied with what you're submitting. You should not be making updates until a judge has looked over your file and left notes.

*Please note that once a file is accepted it will be queued for release. If you intend on making any changes please make them within two weeks of acceptance. If you need more time for fixes please request it by contacting the batch manager.*

• Simfile judgment and game management teams are not expected to have every single artist that we have permission for memorized off of the top of their head. It is imperative that all submissions adhere to permissions as listed as in the Permissions List and Information v8 thread. Be sure to check conditions for content that you are submitting for inclusion into the game.

• Users are now expected to indicate the source of their permissions in the comment section of their submission. Users can cite the Permissions List and Information v8 thread as proof. Submissions that adhere to limited permissions should list the contingencies behind the permission for the purpose of verification by Game Management. If permission is granted by an artist/group and not accounted for in this thread, users are expected to cite their reasoning behind why the permission is valid (example: Creative Commons Licenses), and, whenever applicable, are expected to post screenshots as proof.

• If you submit content that is not covered by permissions listed in the aforementioned thread, but have a screenshot that includes correspondence between you and the artist in question, supply the screenshot inside of your simfile. This way, we can verify that a permission in question does in fact exist.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Be wary of sites whose permissions are occasionally implied. An important example: Newgrounds, a site whose permissions used to be a fully covered blanket due to its Terms of Service, which included a clause stating that all content uploaded to the site could be used non-commercially with credit, has since changed its ToS to accommodate for their various revenue sharing programs. As a result, some users who have submitted newer content have stipulated that there are no granted permissions of use -- therefore, this content cannot be used on FFR.

Usage of these songs typically falls under what are known as Creative Common Licenses.

Some websites that are responsible for holding content from large numbers of artists will have their permissions defined on the given page.

Note that it is your responsibility as the Stepartist to indicate what license is used on the site if you are relying on a Creative Commons License for a file submission.

Judges are users who review file submissions in a set and assign it a rating/status.

Primary Judges:
• gold stinger
• visD
• Gradiant
• Pizza69
• Monkeyz
• storn42
• trumaestro
• ositzxz369
• WirryWoo

Backup Judges:
• DossarLX ODI


Backup judges are judges who don't regularly judge but will come in at times as needed, or under special circumstances.

Over the years most tracking has been done within threads. However, we now have a new batch submission section located here where you can keep track of the status of your file. It will start with a status of "open" while in this state you are still able to update, once the files have been downloaded to prepare for judgment they will go to "unjudged" status and be locked from a further update until the reviewing process is complete. If your file is accepted or requires fixes, you will be able to re-submit right within that batch submission section.

*Thanks to updates in the batch submission system judges are assigned files right within the system and can leave their notes there. Once notes and a rating is assigned you will receive a site notification. You can then read the notes, comment back if necessary, and re-submit if your file meets the criteria to do so.



A judge may pass a file in a set for any of the following reasons:
• Own file.
• Had stepped their own version of the file and can’t review someone else’s without feeling biased.
• Outside comfortable difficulty range.

If the original Judge for the set encounters any of the above three scenarios, a different Judge will be assigned to those specific files.

When both judges have independently finished their notes (for sets involving two judges):

Both judges compare their file ratings and 'Fixes Required' flags before posting.

-Discuss reasoning on any 'Fixes Required' flags. Try to come to a mutually agreeable conclusion on them. If both judges can’t agree on a conclusion, the file and Fixes Required reasonings are Direct Message'd to a third judge. (Ideally a Head/Senior Judge but can be any judge) The third judge will review Fixes Required reasonings and decide whether to apply the requirement.

-If the difference between both judge ratings on a file is 2 or more points, where one judge has given a reject rating, the file is Direct Message'd to a third judge (Ideally a Head/Senior Judge but can be any judge). The third judge will give a brief judgment, reviewing the differing opinions and deciding a course of action.

When these cases are resolved, notes are posted as usual. If applicable, the third judge's notes are included as well.

The ratings assigned to a file determine whether it goes into the Queue. The Queue is a collection of files that have achieved either an Accepted status and are ready for release. A file may also receive 'Fixes Required' status or rejection status.

• Rejected: 0 - 6.5
The file is not accepted and requires much more work before it can be considered for acceptance. This cannot be re-submitted during the same batch period. The simfile author will have to wait until the next batch and submit as a new submission.

• Change Recommended: 7 - 7.5
The file is accepted but the fixes recommended by the judges are highly recommended. The file at a minimum must receive feedback from the Stepartist in the form of reading/acknowledging the judge notes before acceptance.

• Accepted: 8 - 10
The file is accepted as is, although it is still encouraged to look over any notes and take into consideration changes that may improve the file.

The above ratings assume there are no 'Fixes Required' flags. The Fixes Required flag is indicated by a star after the rating (e.g. 8*). A file usually receives this if there is one egregious error that must be fixed but the rest of the file is acceptable.

In the event, there are two accepted files for the same song and they are of similar difficulty, we will determine if the structure is different enough to have a v1/v2 or "another" if not the file with the higher rating will go into the queue and the other will not.

After a file has been flagged for Fixes Required, a Stepartist has four weeks to resolve any remaining notes:

- 'Fixes Required' files whose required notes have not been addressed will be considered rejected past four weeks - even if the rating is above the passing threshold.

*For Accepted files, we ask that you try to get any fixes in within two weeks as it will be queued for release. If you need more time let us know so we can push it back in the queue.*

Ratings that are 6 or above are eligible for a rating appeal if and only if they aren’t Accepted files. In the event that a Stepartist feels a review for a file is unfair, a civil response to the judge can be provided with the concerns through either a PM or discord. A file’s rating can only stay the same or be improved through this process.
• If there is disrespectful behavior from the Stepartist then the Judge has the right to reject the file.
• If there is disrespectful behavior from the Judge, the Stepartist has the right to request a different Judge.
• If after discussing with the Judge the Stepartist still feels a concern, the Stepartist can bring the review to a game manager to be reviewed by another judge. Details from the review in question must be provided with adequate explanations. No more than three Judges can be involved with a rating appeal.

Special batches run concurrently with the regular batch and have specific criteria. For files in the regular batch that meet submission criteria for the special batch, a Stepartist may request to transfer any qualifying files from the regular batch to the special batch up to that Stepartist’s submission cap. The transferred files do not count towards a Stepartist’s submission cap towards the special batch, although the transferred file still counts as a submission in the regular batch. An example is given below to illustrate this concept. The special batch must still be open for this transfer policy to be applicable.

Example:
- Stepartist has a submission cap of 5, and submits a file for July 2015. The Stepartist can submit four more files to July 2015.
- Stepartist feels like the file fits the 27-29 difficulty range, so the Stepartist makes a request to transfer the file from July 2015 to the Official Tournament Batch.
- The file is looked over for a rough difficulty estimate and if it does fit the difficulty range, it is moved to the Official Tournament Batch with an update stating it was a transfer from July 2015. The submission cap for the Stepartist in the Official Tournament Batch is still 5, although July 2015 the Stepartist can only have 4 more submissions.

Staff can go through regular batches to make all potential transfers to a special batch, ignoring a Stepartist's cap in the process. Afterward, Stepartists may no longer request transfers to that special batch, because all relevant transfers will have been made. In addition, if the staff member(s) find it necessary to also include files past the Stepartist's original submission cap, that may be done as well at the discretion of the staff running the special batch.

Please keep in mind that the rules and submission guidelines presented in this thread may change over time, and the GM staff will make an effort to reduce the number of changes. It is recommended that users check this thread periodically for any changes, and front page posts will be created when these changes occur.

As a history archive, the previous threads that described submission rules are listed below.
• Queue/Batch Discussion Thread v1
• Queue/Batch Discussion Thread v2
• Queue/Batch Discussion Thread v3

Dark World - Accepted, had some minor notes.
30.154: Missing 16th.
70.877: Missing 16th.
100.370: I get what you're going for here but the 8th jump feels very out of place when you don't step any 16ths for the other drum hits. Either change the jump into a single note or take out the last few 24ths and replace them with 16ths. (I think the latter makes more sense since the drums are pretty loud and drown out the guitar.)
119.563: This last 32nd is actually a ghost note.

Gym Training Montage - Accepted, had one minor note.
86.415: I'm a little confused, what is this jump going to? I understand 69.719 since the guitar and drum play at the same time, but here I can only hear one note.

Six Acid Strings - Not accepted, see notes.
75.191-76.091: A bit better than it was before, but still pretty uncomfortable to hit.
83.441-84.211: Still very uncomfortable to hit. I think the big issue here is that it's essentially starts off with [14][14][23][23][14][14], which is already pretty hard at 200 BPM. That in turn can also make the following jumptrill easy to screw up. Focusing less on jacking and 32nd trills would make this part more manageable.
85.091-85.541: There's a rather awkward transition between the two mini-trills, revise patterning.

Summer Colours Arch - Accepted, had one minor note.
13.386: I see one of the other judges suggested this should be stepped differently from 11.807, but personally I don't agree. The melody being played on the piano sounds identical to me. At the very least, 15.359 should be stepped different from 11.807

Check your jump placement throughout the file and just make sure that it’s entirely cleaned up and clear from start to finish. Some places to look:

• 65.127: should this be a jump? It seems like it should be compared to later sections. If not, remove the jumps that fall in this location for better layering clarity.
• 71.127: should also be a jump for the heavier synth as well
• 73.581: I’d personally move the up arrow to a right since it’s a different sound compared to what the mini-jacks are intended to accent.
• 77.809: move R to U to give that synth full attention
• 86.809: three down arrows is a pattern collision here because only two follow the synth, making this a [LUR] makes your accent stronger
• 92.740: not sure how this was missed before, but this jump should be moved to a 4th
• 95.263: same deal, move the R off to give your synth full attention!
• 97.308: missing jump?

You’re so close! Keep up the good work and this file will definitely get queue’d on the next pass.

OLD NOTES: --- green for good changes, orange for questionable changes, red for further changes requested
[6/10] Nightfall (Original Mix) {Rogue} (XelNya)
- this file, coupled with this song, has serious potential for being your best file yet
- personally, I would drop the hi-hats from being followed; this is basically any and all of the ambiguous 8th notes that you have at like 6.356, 9.628, 10.719; this does two things: a.) it gets rid of any arbitrary notes after the big synths that happen every measure or two and b.) it gives your synth 100% attention in accenting in locations like 8.810 (the 8th feels out of place despite being correct, whereas 17.538 is a more proper execution) -- your changes work! There are a few changes you could make to improve relevance even more; some examples include moving the notes at 25.446/69.030 off of R and onto something else to give the synth full attention, adding an up arrow to your jump at 27.218, etc.
- watch your pattern choices and avoid pattern collisions that cause two instruments/samples to be represented by the same arrow: 27.356 has a jump that includes the right arrow off of a synth, but there were 7 notes on the synth on the right arrow before (see 34.992 for more effective and correct pattern usage) -- this in general seems to be improved noticeably
- 36.628 to 54.083: try to either keep the repeated taps either on one arrow or one hand until the higher, shorter synths come in; this way, you get clear separation and it feels more correct
- ^ in addition to that note, make sure that you cover all of the higher synths as mini-jacks as well, as they are the same note (38.538, 40.719, etc) -- seems to be ignored, but the improvement of the structure as a whole makes this alright to deal with, honestly. You could also afford to mirror the down arrow jacks halfway through the phrase to have better distribution.
- 59.810: jump placement is incorrect for a bit here; should be jumps on 60.083, 60.356, and 60.628
- 62.810 to end: pretty much repeating the same notes as before; look out for pattern collision and improve your structure so that there is maximum clarity
- 72.083: watch your jack placement; the bass does change pitch here and breaks into multiple pitches -- this pattern really needed to be split anyway, it's quite uncomfortable
- 82.992: jumps seeem a bit out of place
- 85.719/86.265/90.083: missing jumps
- 92.810: should be 32nds
- 97.310: move to up arrow
- this file will be really memorable for players of this demographic if it gets in (it's already that way now); fix it up and solidify that structure!

Structure was cleaned up a noticeable bit. File was previously CQ’d at 7/10, but is more than able to go in now.

OLD NOTES: --- green for good changes, orange for questionable changes, red for further changes requested
Suit Up (feat. Southpaw Swagger) {Blue Stahli} (gameboy42690)
Rating: [7/10]
- deliberately forceful structure that doesn't adhere to standard layering structure, but the accenting is point blank and very acceptable due to the style of music/reduced tempo, it feels right
- 24.800: missing guitar note, likely a single step
- 33.527: missing guitar note, also likely to be a single note
- 35.436: switch to a [13] for pitch relevance (and move the 1 to something else)
- 39.254: three 64ths into a 8th, rather than four 48ths
- 41.709: not liking these jumps; it's quite hard to hear what they're following and how they differentiate from the vocals on their own (the single taps, that is)
- 42.868: missing note for vocals
- 45.697: remove
- 46.663: I hear the first two notes, this one though...
- 48.936: these three jumps are strange with the guitar accents falling on
- 45.390: check your rhythm, should be a bit more than 16ths
- 45.697: remove this note
- 46.481: having a bit of trouble hearing what the 24ths are for here, or at least, the third note in the sequence; tough to discern
- 48.936: three jumps is a little strange with no vocals and the guitar accent falling on 49.072
- 49.481: 48ths
- 52.345: 64th blip in the vocal sampling here
- 82.072: move this over to the right arrow, listen carefully!
- 84.118: should be a 4-note 64th burst starting at 84.152
- 87.663: this feels a bit strange; care to clarify?
- 120.663: note doesn't really represent anything that is audible; the other four 64ths are fine
- 129.390: little flourish of guitar notes here
- despite the large amount of notes, many of these details are rather small and the file is understandable overall - there's a clear PR scheme and understandable sequence of anchoring in the jumps for the guitar, though some more jump clarity could be established, I think... not bad overall, though.

Slightly improved. File was already accepted in the tournament batch, but a bit more was done to it to make it more confidently queue-worthy.


OLD NOTES: --- green for good changes, orange for questionable changes, red for further changes requested
- 3.015: with all kicks designated on the right arrow, it's clear to see that 3.744, 5.225, 6.707, (etc) do not belong since they are supposed to attach to the guitar/synth (hard to tell)
- 16.348: just an fyi - there are 5 notes, but it's actually a five note 48th burst that ends on the 8th (could get a little sloppy, 32nds are acceptable at normal rate imo); if you opt into keeping the 32nds, you should tack on jumps at the end of them for layering consistency
- 32.274: why's there no note here? a kick and a hi-hat both exist here, surely that covers the scope of what you're following
- 43.014: obviously an intentional choice to leave the jumps out, but why? 8th notes earlier on cover your percussion, so having a single jump for the vocals arbitrarily at the end of the synth lead is a bit strange
- 45.607: this jump's a bit unclear
- 53.292: there is a synth note here
- 61.440: remove
- 61.533: since these kicks are going to lead into a triple that adds as a mid-phrase accent (62.274), adding jumps makes the accent a bit more powerful
- 65.144: missing note?
- 68.292: ^
- 71.996: ^
- more, etc - look accordingly (still a few unresolved in the pitch-increased chorus, but not a huge deal)
- 135.792: some 24ths here for percussion, good little transition into the final part
- despite the numerous missing notes and a few added notes, file has a decent structure

85.560: hardly a big deal, but these jacks actually should be separated by two 12th notes (so, you should have notes on beat 390, 390.67 and then 391.50 and 392.17 (second note/fourth note on a 12th and 24th respectively). Might not be necessary to fix with how fast the song runs, honestly.

Not too sure about the judgment note at 91.00, I hear a note right there and the 8th makes sense with the switch in quantize, so I personally won’t harp on that one.

All other notes resolved. This is a really good file, by the way.

PREVIOUS NOTES: green for good changes, orange for questionable changes, red for further changes requested
[9*/10] ElectroMashcore {Reizoko Cj} (gameboy42690)
- wow this was really fucking cool
- quite a good deal less difficult than the difficulty min for this batch though, but looks like we'll judge it anyways
- honestly nothing extraneous to add, I enjoyed this very much as is
- 14.23: There isn’t anything particularly bad about this, but I noticed the up jack after I got to the [14] jump.
- 55.16: This part is a short 16th run, there aren’t any 12ths.
- 75.41, 75.62: Missing 16th triplets after the jumpstream run.
- 85.75, 86.07: The vocal samples here are loud enough that they could be stepped.
- 91.00: This 8th is actually a ghost note. With the current syncing, the note should’ve been on the 64th after (91.05).
- 92.01: There should have either been a 3-note 16th jack here or a 16th triplet. One of the instruments goes to three different pitches, and the other has the same pitch so the minijack on 92.12 needs revision.
- 92.76: Why was this 8th left out?
- 97.86: Same issue as 91.00, the 8th note should really be stepped on the 64th after with the current syncing.
- Putting all the different colorings aside, I wanted to make sure the above points were addressed. This file has a solid foundation.

Rigid patterning for sure, but I’d say that the most glaring section forcing the conditional queue has been straightened out; the triples in that barrage of 12th notes at 333 BPM were (sadly) removed (I don’t share the same opinion about having to knock the difficulty down there, but ey, gotta do my job. <3). Patterning seems cleaned up a touch compared to the notes outside of the 12th note section, but I think there’s enough rigidity to keep this file interesting and super-playable for scoring.

PREVIOUS NOTES: green for good changes, orange for questionable changes, red for further changes requested
[7*/10] Nest {Cardboard Box} (lurker)
- this file's really fucking fun for the most part
- the 24th trills starting and ending on jumps are massive bootraps, I'd consider changing them to split rolls instead...but they're still doable, so fuck it I guess they're alright with me but lets see what Dossar says
- On the note of 24th trills, 20.03 is an example of how the trills should be stepped. The chiptune bursts don’t end on the 4th after, they end before. So having any 4-note 12th jacks here is wrong to begin with.
- What this file suffers from is a “layer everything” mindset. I can see the hands staying for the 222 BPM sections as this file does provide a nice opportunity for dense 16th jumpstreaming at a reasonably fast speed, although this density continuing at the 333 BPM 12th section causes a tremendous spike.
- 75.83: No hands in this section yet there were hands back in 32.63
- despite the rest of the file still being quite difficult, that middle section (78.197 - 96.197) is a MASSIVE spike and results in a pretty frustrating difficulty curve for scoring (I'm failing to SDG the file due to that section alone while AAA'ing everything else quite comfortably)
- if the rest of the file's difficulty was on par or closer to the difficulty reflected at this section, it wouldn't be a problem, but the equivalent of 250bpm 16th semi-dense handstreaming with bursts is a fuckton harder than everything else present
- I know you probably don't want to but I think you'd have to water down that section in order for this to be queued, since the rest of the file can't really be beefed up
- the 16th burst patterning here should be cleaned up a lot, many patterns (including a good handful of one hand minitrills) are forcing 8th minijacks that are ramping up the difficulty astronomically
- I'd also stick to strictly jumpstream, the hands are overkill
- For a summary of the above, removing the hands in the section from 78.197 - 96.197 would smooth out the difficulty curve for this file. It would provide for a good opportunity to contain semi-dense 250 BPM jumpstreaming as well. Note that with the current hands, they ALWAYS force an 8th minijack and an anchor so removing the hands also allows more flexibility. 84.77 is an example of how hands limit patterning here, and mixing 16ths with 12ths one handed at this speed doesn’t play well at all.
- 87.89: Snaking pattern here with the hands is a WWE-type difficulty spike that is influenced from overlayering instead of polyrhythms
- 88.84: Hidden up-arrow jack, very choppy to play here
- 91.13: Hidden up-arrow jack ending in a 16th triplet. Yuck.
- still really fun though, I hope you're able to smoothen out the difficulty curve in a way that you're happy with because I'd love to see this in FFR
- In general the hidden minijacks resulting from the overlayering issue in the 333 BPM 12th section results in very choppy patterning that needs to be revised. Overall this file’s layout looks alright, although it needs to be cleaned up to not spike up the difficulty unfairly in one section. The patterning could also be a bit better in the 222 BPM 16th sections, although that’s not as severe. Please consider more careful placement of the hands.

I was the only judge to reject this last time, so I’ll just work off of my notes since they’re likely what were targeted the most. It’s been quite a bit since this was submitted, so I will say this:

PR in the opening doesn’t look half bad, I’m not sure if it was changed or not, but if it wasn’t, then I was likely being a bit too harsh, because it’s visible and reasonably effective.
Jumps were limited to snares in the opening section, and it really makes your structure very clear, so that’s a big deal.
49.605: your intent in making things accurate is great - however, with the difficulty of your file overall kept in mind, that jack is extremely tight and we’ll want that removed. Sending this to conditional queue to get this fixed up. Might as well take care of anything else you’d like in here.
51.441: A few more violin notes to accent here if you want to make a nice accent coming into this section; gives you a little burst into a cymbal crash.
57.536: missing violin note for ya, so flip that [14][23][14] into a [13][24][13] and create a nice little descending blip to catch it!
70.209: didn’t say this in my previous notes before but I’ll tell you here: this part’s great \o/
128.797 to 135.002: so, in my previous notes, I mentioned not being fond of the structure but never went into detail why, apologies about that -- here’s my mindset on it: when you contrast this section, which utilizes jacks for what seems like the bass, it’s not quite as clear as to what you’re accenting compared to the next section, which very explicitly has loud and repeated notes for the melody. This also differs a bit from the section at the end of the song with the eight note long 8th note repetition, as this section actually has a few other elements going for it: the violin is modulated upward, and there’s also a lower guitar that has prominent accents. It seems somewhat clear that you’re having issues balancing the structure looking at 131.906/132.489 - two clearly different notes in pitch but using the same jump, etc.
Overall, this chart looks acceptable; simply take care of that extremely tight mini-jack (or have one of us make the change since it’s a single step change) and you’ll be good to go.

PREVIOUS NOTES: green for good changes, orange for questionable changes, red for further changes requested
[6/10] [Resubmission] Phantom of the Opera {Lindsey Stirling} (VisD)
- as much as I'd like improved pitch relevancy in the opening before the chorus melody, it's understandable to generalize because it would produce really poor patterning otherwise
- patterning could be a bit better improved for PR purposes in the chorus from 26.849 to 39.240; a few jumps seem strange given that the snare is the prominent layering point
- accent the snare flams for a little more differentiation from the rest of the structure (see: 63.243, there are others)
- detail on some of the violin rhythms could be a bit better, though it's a little hard to tell because the song sounds like it drifts against the assist tick a little bit (seems improved, but there are a few notes kinda peppered about through the chart that are a touch off, but not the biggest of deals w/ frame timing)
- not a fan of the structure, but I do understand how it works; make the overall chart's sync a bit better and take another listen at some of the finer violin rhythms and make sure they are correct; various minor misrhythms/missing notes exist throughout the chart for the melody [28.147 (not quite even intervals between 2nd/3rd note there), 65.307, 74.175 (violin starts around 74.151, and at a slightly fast interval), 103.998, etc] (still a bit unsure about the ending)
- a few jumps seem strange since you elect to follow the snare for most of the chart (34.597, 37.692, 56.278, etc? - be less ambiguous with your choices)
- still needs a little more work, I think.

Not required, but I’m certainly interested in picking your brain: what are your thoughts for putting colored accents on notes like 69.410/69.674, 71.518/71.782, etc?

Nearly all of the notes seem to have been addressed, nicely done.

PREVIOUS NOTES: green for good changes, orange for questionable changes, red for further changes requested
[8*/10] ._Pulse {YZYX} (GammaBlaster)
- minijack at 3.383s kinda irks me, change the stream patterning beforehand if you want to keep the hands
- I literally laughed out loud when I got to that minijack because that 16th is actually a ghost note.
- 6.51: This shouldn’t be forming a 12th minijack
- 4.36, 7.25: Missing notes (4.36 was not resolved, but I don’t hear anything here anyway.)
- 4.75: This isn’t a fullblown 8th handjack
- 9.56: This 16th goes to a synth run that was ignored. Please include that 16th run starting at 8.97
- 25.57: This section needs to be looked at again in terms of the jump placement. There was the right idea in a few spots that the buzzes were 3/16ths apart, although some of these jumps don’t make sense (and I assume they were meant to layer the buzzes but were misplaced). For example, 25.96 this 8th jump should have been on the 16th before for the buzz. There is of course the powerful kick as well that lands every two 4th notes, although the other jumps need to be addressed. (This is an exceptionally difficult note to resolve, because there are some buzzes that fall 1/16 before triples, and fixing those triples would break your overall structure. I personally find this part of the chart to be a bit too abstract compared to the song; it’s not immediately clear as to what the jumps are following in some cases, but I do see the point.)
- 33.60: Overkill with quads. This is arguably just jumps.
- 37.43: Buzz missing a jump again, the misplaced jumps repeat.
- 46.65: Oh man this is like a longer extension of Adventures of Lolo’s 24th triplet jump things. (du, du-du, du-du-du-du, du-du, du-du-du-du, du-du, du-du-du-du, du-du, du-du-du-du)
- 59.16, 63.38, 65.49: Change this 32nd burst so it doesn’t create the 3-note 8th jack; the pitch changes.
- 67.46: It may be a good idea to include this 4th as it is the start of the 16th run after (it has a hold period in between). (I actually agree with this note, I’m glad you made that change.)
- 69.31: While this handstream is passable, the 7-note 8th jacks are really ugly when it comes to playing them. (mmmmmmm, this handstream <33333)
- 87.29: Missing jump
- 92.37: The 8th jack should start as it’s where the bass kick starts.
- 105.28: Missing jump (not entirely sure what’s hinted at here; in fact, I don’t even like this being three 16th notes, I hear two clear 8th note jumps)
- 107.52: These hands make no sense. It would be better to step the 16th run starting on 105.67 (and keep in mind spots like 108.04 don’t actually have 16th triplets for the bass kick) (aha, I know why the triples are here, and that’s really clever usage, but almost no one is going to hear that additional layer of sound; if you’re gonna do that, you’d be better off adding triples to all of the subsequent 8th notes as well, but considering that others are not comprehending the structure, you might be better off just using jumps instead -- nice little attempt, though :P)
- 113.31: There are a LOT of up notes starting in this section. Please distribute the patterns a little more evenly so there aren’t so many anchors based on the up arrow.
- 127.02: Ending should be kept to jumps.
- wow this is a lot beefier than the SM chart (incredibly high nps despite having lots of 'break' sections)
- Yes, close to 18 TPS average.
- nice meme gamma, I think it's great

78.828, 79.001: I can hear a couple of 16ths here, but just barely. I don't think it's worth worrying over.
105.811: I'm on the fence about this 32nd burst due to the two book-ending jumps. I can hit it just fine but someone else might see it as kind of a jerk move.
- Other than those two minor things, everything's been fixed up nicely and reasonable justification was given to any notes that were ignored. Accepted.

**3.163: If you had just wanted 16ths, fine I guess, but the single 32nd at 3.116 (as opposed to a full 32nd roll) feels pretty random and should be removed.
38.434: This anchor on the left arrow isn't really going to anything. Generally you're pretty good about avoiding unnecessary anchoring, and most of the anchoring that does happen in this file fits the song fine, it's just this one that's bugging the crap out of me.
**47.162, 47.889: Missing a few 16ths here.
**73.252: Missing 16th.
- Please address any notes marked with ** for acceptance.

Belly Dance (Consistently Drinkin' Remix) [Heavy]
Belly Dance (Consistently Drinkin' Remix) [Standard]
Blaze Heatnix
Blue Army V2
Breath After Breath
Creamy Sky (NOTE: needs another fix sent, previous pending fix was reviewed)
DATA DRAIN
Dear My Sweetie
entanglement
Every Chance of Hope is Destroyed
High-Priestess
I Like Trains (Remix)
Japan Style Breakcore - 2
Lovely City
Machines
Oprah Shmup
Rivotril Isn't Working
Space Threat
Triumph
Upside Down (Bassnectar & Terravita Remix)
Waves
Welcome to Planet Urf

> DarkZtar
Blue Army V2
Creamy Sky
Machines

> hi19hi19
Breath After Breath
High-Priestess
entanglement
Blaze Heatnix
Oprah Shmup
Welcome to Planet Urf
DATA DRAIN
Dear My Sweetie
Japan Style Breakcore - 2

> MarioNintendo
Space Threat

> masterzatwork
Triumph

> Scintill
Every Chance of Hope is Destroyed

> Wayward Vagabond
I Like Trains (Remix)
Upside Down (Bassnectar & Terravita Remix)
Rivotril Isn't Working
Waves
Belly Dance (Consistently Drinkin' Remix) [Heavy]
Belly Dance (Consistently Drinkin' Remix) [Standard]
Lovely City

3 Year Anniversary Mix
Agartha
Breaka Railway
Crystalline White
Drive of Unliving Things
Glitchcraft
Horizon
i wanna fuck the moon
I'm Getting Serious!
La Tristesse Durera Toujours
Miss Jackson
My Catchy Lil Bassline
Nightfall (Original Mix)
Pear
Perihelion / Aphelion
Polis Ruin
Powerhaus
Problematic
PWRPFF RAVES
Sis Puella Magica
Six Acid Strings
Smoke Weed Everyday
Spider Dance
Starbound
The Basement Community
Tope Doge
We won't be alone
welc.moe
Yellow Smile
Your Lies
Zephyros

Drive of Unliving Things [8/10]
19.658 & 21.782: I’m still really not crazy about either of these bits even after revisiting the file. Can’t say it’s really worth conditional queuing though; the latter leans more towards personal preference anyway.
28.154: What I actually getting at here in my previous notes was that the first 32nd should have been nudged down by one 192nd and the second 32nd should be nudged up by one 192nd (I probably should have clarified, sorry about that). Either way, as I said before this was a super trivial note and likely wouldn’t matter due to FFR’s frame-based timing.
61.604: I think rather than this second hand also being a [234] hand, you could change this to a [123] hand since the synth is a lower pitch here than at 61.703.
- Layering has been cleaned up quite a bit! Accepted.

i wanna fuck the moon [9/10]
22.545: This is very clever! I love how the white notes for the more dominant sound are perfectly pitch relevant, and at the same time the 8th notes for the background are also perfectly pitch relevant. (Admittedly, I didn’t even catch what was going on in the background when I first reviewed this, I just heard ascending notes and saw descending 8ths.)
55.697: I prefered the original patterning for the last few notes, but there’s really nothing bad here.
- All of the fine-tuning you’ve done clearly shows. This is really solid! Really quite a shame it isn't longer though. Accepted.

My Catchy Lil Bassline [7.5/10]
25.658: Missing a single 16th note for the hi-hat.
- Other than that, everything looks okay. It’s not a groundbreaking file by any means but it’s acceptable. Accepted.

Nightfall (Original Mix) [8*/10]
**36.764: I really like having these three-note jacks in the file, but what I don’t like is how you’re completely fixated on having every single jack on the down arrow from here all the way to 53.400. It’s super repetitive, for one thing. (I don’t think the difference in the jump placement and the last few 16ths each measure does enough to add variety.) Secondly, the synth begins steadily increasing in pitch about halfway through this sequence, so starting at 45.355 you could actually begin scaling the jacks from left to right to reflect the increase in pitch. I would do this in groups of three jacks; first three jacks on left, second three jacks on down, etc.
81.627: This jack shouldn’t actually be anchored to the 16th jump. It actually should be anchored to the 8th jump following the jack. (So in other words the pattern should look more like [14][23]11[14]1[13])
114.900: Missed an 8th note at the very end of the file.
- Other than the aforementioned repetition issue, everything plays really well! The only thing that I think really needs to be addressed is the repetition. 36.764 to 45.355 can stay the same since it’s technically correct, but after 45.355 there’s no reason to keep spamming the down jacks. Conditional Queue.
**Notes marked with ** must be addressed in order to be accepted.

Pear [7.5/10]
6.299: Having a 4-3-1-3-4 pattern here implies that the music from 2.141 is an exact repeat. It isn’t. Pitch relevancy still needs to be fixed.
37.581, 41.752, etc.: These sets of five 8th jumps still aren’t quite as pitch relevant as they could be but it’s at least consistently structured now.
- Good improvements otherwise. 6.299 should probably be fixed, but it’s really such an easy thing to fix that it’s not worth conditional queuing over it. Accepted.

Powerhaus [8/10]
26.890: The one-handed pattern is kind of a jerk move. You’d probably be able to treat this as a jumpjack and get perfects consistently though, so I don’t mind it that much.
74.890: Feels a little on the empty side with only 8th notes here. Then again, it’s way better than the mess of 48ths you used to have.
96.533-107.247:It’s very difficult to hear what a lot of these jacks are going to unless I slow the song down. It's technically correct otherwise.
- This file plays so much better without the 48ths! Accepted.

PWRPFF RAVES [8/10]
33.707: I really don’t understand why you removed the jump here, or for that matter why there aren’t jumps at 28.252, 31.889, etc. (I really should have caught this in my previous review since this was a problem then as well, I kind of feel like an ass now.)
89.434, 92.343, etc.: These mini-jacks are somewhat uncomfortable to hit due to how they’re sandwiched in between a hand a [23] jump.
- Good fixes overall. Not conditional queuing this since 33.707 is a fairly quick and easy fix, but please look into it. Accepted.

Sis Puella Magica [8/10]
- The link you provided was broken. It’s okay though, I still managed to find the sheet music you were trying to link to. Really smart decision to link me to the sheet music, by the way, it really helped to have that while I was re-reviewing this file.
- Honestly you weren’t much of an ass in your response so don’t worry about that. :P
45.769: I’m confused as to why you changed this to a single note. There’s clearly two different piano notes being played at this point and the sheet music verifies that.
49.103: Now that I’m looking at the sheet music, this hand seems especially off now compared to everything else. I mean, technically it’s correct since there’s a three-note chord here, but there’s other notes just like this that are only stepped with jumps and not hands. You’ll either need to step hands for all of those chords or leave them as jumps and reserve hands for 82.158 onward.
81.158: By the way, the heavy layering is completely justified now that I’ve seen the sheet music.
87.443: Sometimes due to the heavy layering, you accidentally end up with some long anchors like this one on the left arrow. It’s not a big deal, especially at only 108 BPM, it’s just something I find very mildly annoying and this is probably a really trivial note.
93.551: Shouldn’t this be a hand, too?
127.864: There shouldn’t be any mini-jacks during the jumpstream, since the piano doesn’t ever play the same note twice in a row. (136.611 is excusable due to the hands, and the jumpgluts are fine too.)
- Having the sheet music in front of me justified most of what I originally complained about. Despite this being a relatively wordy review for pending fixes, most of what I pointed out is minor and very easily fixable. Accepted.

We Won’t Be Alone (feat. Laura Brehm) [7.5/10]
- Metadata in the .sm is still incorrect, but the folder is named correctly at least.
90.078-111.335: I can hear some 16ths in the background that I didn’t notice the first time around. (They usually occur around the 8th mini-jacks.) Since what you have now is pretty repetitive, you could add in these 16ths to add a little bit of extra flavor.
125.735: If you want to keep stepping the guitar in addition to the vocals, that’s fine, but you need to follow through and continue to step the guitar. This is the only time you ever step the guitar between vocals, despite the fact that the guitar continues all the way until the end of the song.
- 125.735 is the only real issue, but it’s also an easy fix. Everything else plays well, although like I said earlier it’s pretty repetitive. Accepted.

Zephyros [8.5/10]
0.588: Kind of confused why you decided not to step a note here.
19.088: Missing 32nds between the 8th jump and 4th hand. Then again, having 32nds between the jump and hand would be total ass to play so I totally get why you decided not to step the 32nds.
- Solidly charted! My only real complaint is some of the 32nd bursts that lead into hands (11.254 for example). They’re technically correct, but they’re very difficult to hit consistently at this speed and I didn’t think they were that fun. But they fit, so I’m not gonna tell you to change it. Accepted.

[8/10] I'm Getting Serious! {Furries in a Blender} (YoshL)

> means the point in question was addressed.
>>> is responses from me.
== is responses from the stepartist.

> 11.953s - can't tell if this is going to the laughing or the fading out synth, either way it's not synced well with anything
==fixed this==
> 21.792s - jump [?], the rest of the 4th jumps seem to be following the background bass synth, this one is hard to follow
==the jump is because the kick drum and melody coincide there (Actually missed the one at 27.277)
> 32.6s - the descending triplets are well used here, but at this point the pitch changes yet you keep 421 as the main pattern (when you could use 321). you could literally go 432 432, 431 431, 421 421, 321 321 repeat & add on jumps for this part and it would fit perfectly
==i changed these to 431, 432, 421, 321 because of the way the chords are (given their inversions and the actual harmonic distance between the pitches fits better)
> 45.792s, etc - watch the minijacks after jumps, there are 2 free columns to put the note so you don't force it to be a minijack--not that it's an issue of difficulty, but of better pr & flow of the stream, unless the note repeats
==done
> 60.65: Up arrows leading into the 16th minijack with the hand should be separated. Specifically, 60.82 doesn’t go with the synth and should be moved.
==i think you're talking about the up arrow that's before the minijack, and not the minijack itself (fixed)
> 70.85, 73.59, 76.34, 79.08: Missing jump (synth and bass kick)
==i'm only layering in snares and crashes
> 80.334s - the main melody follows a pattern of xxx_xx_xx_xx_xx_ (where x is a note and _ is an empty 16th space), rather than constant 16ths, and you have no note here which marks that, but then the rest of the stream is continuous, better would either be to make the whole thing continuous and ignore the actual pattern of the melody, or to follow it completely & not have a continuous jumpstream
==the arp is continuous, so it might sound like the rhythm is as such, but there's still the lower note in the arp that exist. I cut some of them out that were the least audible
> Also the dense hand/jumpstream at the end with the minijacks wasn’t a good addition to the file, toning the minijack usage down there would be better.
==aye, they're split jumps instead now


[8*/10] Creamy Sky {BTB} (DarkZtar)

>>> is responses from me.

Should also note that Creamy Sky is also still sitting in the conditional queue with bmah stating a note needs to be added at 66.04, but I'm simply not hearing it and that is the only comment preventing the file from being added to the accepted queue.
>>> The 8th note is there and it's the same element that is being stepped as 8ths in this section. It is just a lower pitch. There are technically some missing 16th triplets here, although leaving them out looked intentional -- although the 8th note is definitely missing when taking into account how this part is stepped.


[7.5/10] Six Acid Strings {The Flashbulb} (DarkZtar)

> means the point in question was addressed.
>>> is responses from me.

> 9.455: This is a bass kick separate from the synth, there shouldn’t be a 32nd minijack on the left note here.
> 11.780: This 16th is separate from the bass kick on the 32nd after. There shouldn’t be a minijack here.
In fact, I think the above two problems about minijacks for two different sounds occurs throughout this beginning section.
> 21.435, 21.885, 22.185: Ghost 16th notes.
> 23.916: Interesting color note theory!
> 30.830: What’s going on here is a 3-note down 16th jack, with a [12] on the 3rd note. The 64th burst that comes after should be mirrored.
> 37.595: Missing 32nd note.
> 51.335: There's actually 24ths (or roughly that at least) playing here. This should actually be three notes just before the jump instead of a 16th(ish) minijack.
> 56.232: Ghost 16th.
> 56.532: Missing 16th.
> 62.311, 63.511, 64.711, 65.911: What are these 4th jumps going to? If it's for the synth, there needs to be 16th jumps at 62.761 and 63.061 (repeat for each synth). Although personally I'd remove the four jumps and keep the ones from 67.111 onward; that way you get some nice progression once the jumps for the cymbal kick in.
> 75.231: This section is very messy; revise patterning (it may be a good idea to remove the jumps in these 32nds)
> 75.831: The bursts here are erratically stepped and there’s also a hidden up jack that makes it worse. The 64th burst starts on the 16th at 75.906 and goes to the 8th, and the 48th burst is cut short. This part needs revising.
> 81.661: Missing 8th.
> 82.336: Missing 16th.
> 83.461-84.361: The 32 trills and 16th mini jumpjacks make this part brutal! I'd like to see this part toned down a bit.
> 85.036: The transition into the left-handed 32nds is pretty rough, especially when the player is already trying to recover from the previous bit.
> To the above point, please change the one handed 200 BPM 32nd trills. Also, what are the jumps at 84.906 and 85.056 for? >>> It may be to accent the 16th kicks here, although it might be a better idea to remove those jumps as it's just that element.
After 90 seconds into the file, the overlap of the color sounds and all the buzzes are interfering to the point where the color theory actually becomes more detrimental – especially when it comes to the 64th bursts.
> 95.891-105.487: Why all the missing 16ths? A handful of them are step, but most are ignored, and I can't find any real consistency in when they're stepped and when they're not.
107.585: Oh boy. It becomes problematic when other fast elements interfere with the colors you use for certain sounds (the 48th jumps are a recurring structure, and then in this section there are 48ths right next to them).
109.248: This burst ends early. The drum actually plays all the way to 109.398 (although it's rather faint by that point). >>> There's one more 32nd that can be put in here. The 3 note up-jack is a bit problematic in this section.
> 112.321: Missing 16th.
> 115.079-124.674: Again, there's a lot of random 16ths that are omitted for no clear reason. >>> 123.28 is a ghost 16th note
There comes a point where color theory detracts from the original contribution to the file. Considering this is a technical file with other color notes when the burst sections come into play, they interfere with the colors.

Glitchcraft

Cleaned up the uncomfortable trill + additional note sections in the last third of the file. Fixed errors mentioned in the notes.
-The file now somehow has an incorrect offset? -0.054 should be used instead of -0.020
-The major glitch sections in last third of file are still difficult to hit, but it's cleaned up a lot better with this fix. Pretty sure this is good to go as soon as the .sm offset is shifted

=================================================

Starbound

fixed the misrhythms in the intro, touched up on several of the other minor suggestions such as changing the fast jacks to mini trills. Changed bpm in intro fixed the misrhythms and both specified sections with minijacks that were changed to minitrills play much smoother. Good to go

=================================================

The Basement Community

I forgot that I had to document each of my changes so I unfortunately do not have specifics with some edits, but I agreed with and have made all of the fixes listed specifically in Gradiant's post. I've made some fixes to the layering, primarily ensuring hands go to each cymbal crash, and also making jump usage more consistent. (There was also a random missing note to a drum, for whatever reason--that's fixed as well)
-Guitar bend issue at 49.750s is still there
-Only other thing is the outro when I mentioned the jumps you had for the guitar weren't warranted, you removed all of them. However, jumps still could've been used for snare hits, so singles for all guitar notes and then jumps when snare hits. It plays fine currently though, just a little suggestion

-The major issue I had with original judge was the jump/hand layering which is fine now. Good to go

Red = my comments/reponses
welc.moe

I tried my best to enhance the file based on the notes from judgement. The bulk of the fixes are found in the first 1/3 of the file in the 32nd patterns. I just found it hard to find more life in the file, given the overall difficulty of the stepfile. (ie. not constant 32nd streams to accentuate every swoop). I hope this is a noticeable improvement however!

Good work on cleaning up the 32nds, some instances of 2 note 32nd grace notes are still kind of suspect (e.g 22.154, but overall not a big deal, file overall has improved a lot.

=================================================

Tope Doge

Fixed all judgement notes I agreed with (the first note about a missing 16th note left me scratching my head). I tried my darnest to fix the layering from my original file, Maxo (the artist) just loves to switch between layering schemes every other measure, but I tried to unify the file as best I could.

The layering issues mostly were in issue where you had incomplete/confusing layering transitions. A dynamic layering scheme definitely works, but what you had in the prior version was rather sloppy, this version is much cleaner.
Missing 48th flams at 36.730, 47.104, 78.225, 78.786, 79.347
Ending still needs to be fixed, step the pulsing synth beginning on the 45th at 145.328 and delete the last 4th on 146.449.
Fix those and this is ready, rest of the file looks good.

=================================================

Spider Dance

[8*/10] Spider Dance {Toby Fox} (Silvuh)
Had to reprocess the mp3 to get a stable bitrate so my timings might vary slightly from yours
-17.396 16th should be a jump
-21.570 ^same thing (I think this error repeats more times)
-32.546 16ths continue here through 33.198
-33.329 16th jump feels kinda weird since it's only used in this instance at the end of a layering section and the snares aren't layered in the next section either
-33.459 section beginning here the layering gets confusing. With the layering you start out with to the bass synth I'd assume 35.285 would also be a jump, but then there are a lot of other jumps left out, and many jumps such as 37.894 and 38.416 that don't make sense. And then it gets weirder cause you revert back the the prior section layering scheme at 41.025. I抎 recommend just sticking with the prior layering scheme that you had going on since the main synth still has the same prominence in this section, but either way the layering consistency in this section needs to be fixed.
-41.546 previous instance of this was a jumpjack and here it is a single jack, should probably make both the same one way or the other (though I抎 advise a single jack)
-41.807 section here it appears that you revert back to layering the main synth but there a lot of jumps missing such as 42.068, 42.590 etc. This feels very deliberate but I can't help but question why it is done, layering the main synth as you were previously is super clear and easy to understand, and this layering scheme with several sections deliberately left more bare is quite confusing, especially considering that the background is running straight 16ths too so I can't see any justifiable reason for the layering drops.
-50.134 color theory section is pretty cool, I抣l give you that.
Rest of the file looks good, cool callback to the intro layering scheme progression at the end of the file.
-Really urge you to clarify/fix some of the layering choices in the middle sections cause other than that the file's really good.
---
17.37s: There's no strong melody note here, so I didn't jump these 16ths
Understandable
32.37-32.89s: I left the 16ths out on purpose so the three jumps would feel more emphasized
33.15s: changed snare jumps to singles
36.28s: Instead of adding jumps, I removed the one bass 8th jump here. I didn't want to jump 36.81, 37.33s to keep 37.59-39.68s distinct, so I decided to just not jump the bass on the 8ths.
Hmm, makes the section feel rather bare compared to what it could be but it works fine.
40.20s: Changed pattern to make this a minijack to the bass
41.76-50.09s: The reason I stepped this section lighter than 16.72-33.41 was because it has the same cleaner main synth sound that's been playing since 33.41s, where the layering decreases, so it feels right to me to keep the layering lower.

Justifications are reasonable, fixes applied cover what was needed, this is good to go.
=================================================

Breaka Railway

@20.691: Added 32nds to follow the noise channel.
@23.219-34.759: Layered 16th notes and jacks to follow the background synth.
@36.683: Tweaked this entire section for pitch relevancy and more comfortable trills.
This in particular improved the section a ton, good job.
@47.985: Changed jumps with nasty patterns into a simple roll.
@63.135: Here (and onwards) I converted all jumprolls into more ~expressive~ jumprolls.
~expressive~ +1
@68.787: Fixed the layering scheme here by removing jumps to barely audible 16th notes.
I still feel some of the 32nds go to such quiet noises that you might want to remove them but they aren't going to make me hold the file from acceptance.


I also fixed ALL missing notes and other suggestions outlined in my review. Below are included the judge notes by DakrZtar:

[7/10] Breaka Railway {Tilde} (PrawnSkunk)
-12.755 you had a 16th jack at 10.711 going to the background synth that should be present here as well.
-20.811 seems like a pretty conscious decision to leave out these 16ths but adding them in would make the file more interesting.
-32.234 the focus on this section is entirely melody, but you have sporadic instances of stepping the background synth when the melody isnt present, make it consistent by either dropping the background synth notes completely or filling them in everywhere else and layering the whole section.
-44.378 this jump feels very out of place considering you havent layered any of the 32nd streams when similar sounds are present, suddenly having a jump after the hardest spike of notes feels very jarring.
-49.669 again the jumps feel weird cause you抮e suddenly layering the background synth (on top of being forced to drop several of the jumps in order to leave room for the melody 32nds)
-62.294 these instances should technically be jacks, would make this section more interesting. (consider adding jacks to other instances of the background synth)
-63.376 again where you want to up the layering but im assuming you left out the jump on the 16th to avoid a large difficulty spike. Normally certain generalizations to avoid difficulty spikes is ok, but when you only have 3 jumps you're working with and you get forced into leaving out 1 of them the idea feels very incomplete. Either put the 16th in and force players to deal with the difficulty spike, or go with the generalization that leave out the 32nds in favor of highlighting the increase in layering. Also happens at 64.338, etc.
-67.164 i don't hear this 32nd
-68.787 layering in this whole section is inconsistent. You seem to be accenting a certain sound here, but when it is present at 70.711, 73.115, 73.365, you don't emphasize it.
The layering generalizations/inconsistencies are what hurt this file the most. Otherwise this is a pretty nice broken stream oriented chiptune file.

Red = my responses
A little bit last minute i've fixed some of the issues in LED-G that put it into the conditional queue. The changes are:
4.707: Is now a jack (10.871 is the same)
The jack usage here is still slightly inconsistent, there are a couple times where you acknowledge the 2 consecutive sets of jacks as appropriate, but other times you have one jack set followed by other patterns. Not really a huge issue and I'm not requiring you fix this, but you should be aware it might feel a bit weird to play. (ex starting with the j ump at 3.457 should play like [24]233 instead of the [24]322 you have now)

17.983 and all other instances: Jump has been removed, however a jack is still in its place.
Acceptable change, the jack matches the sort of illusion of a stutter the synth gives.


36.222: A note is now here to match the vocals
38.656: Pattern has changed from a trill to something else (44.630 is the same)
39.367: Burst patterned adjusted so the last note doesn't lead into a jack (51.505 is the same)
This plays so much better now, gj.

42.164 and all other instances: PR for the jumps has been adjusted accordingly.
42.544: Jack adjusted to the left hand side.
I'm assuming you meant right since the jack is on 4, either way it works now.

52.216: Jumps have been removed from the backing synth until later on for consistency.

71.924 missing an 8th

78.958: Hands here are now jumps aside from the last one in this pattern
mmmmmm You really should have hands on the crashes to make it consistent. tbh after playing it through a few times, you could put the hands in and just make the player eat a pretty hefty difficulty spike.
Either way though make it consistent, having hands on only a few ending crashes feels a bit odd.

84.269: Pattern no-longer contains a three note jack
96.796: Ending jack adjusted accordingly, now a two note jack.
Ehhhh, the ending pattern kinda just sticks out like a sore thumb (the [23][12] thing) now compared to your patterning leading up to it (with the alternating jump patterns). I guess I can see your intention of calling back to the jack motif in the intro but I'd personally just have it follow the patterns youve been doing in this section.


The only thing you absolutely need to fix is the hand consistency in the section around 78.958, I'll go ahead and recommend you add hands in to the rest of the crashes.
Edit: looking at my prior notes I told you to tone it down, oops. Well either way works, just make it consistent

3 Year Mix (Razor & Xiz) - Accepted
- Special case in which the stepartist gave permission to have the judge make the changes according to the review given.
34.791: Single note changed to jump.
47.330: Single note changed to jump.
51.725: Deleted ghost 32nd note. The forced mini-jack is gone too.
52.604: Extended 16th jackhammer by one note.
52.955: White note switched to a normal blue note.
57.526: Same as above (yellow note this time)
64.440: Added missing 4th note.
65.612: Added missing 32nd burst.
67.370-69.245: Added missing 16ths for the snare hits.
70.065: Changed to a 24th trill.
76.100 & 77.799: Added additional notes for drum.
80.846: 32nds changed to 24ths.
82.643 (basically the entire Toothless Hawkins bit): Fixed all the 24th swing.
96.667: Deleted ghost 16th.
99.479: Changed jump to single note, deleted a few ghost notes.
99.74: Jump changed to single note.
101.823: Added 16th note.
105.339: Deleted ghost 32nds.
106.432: Added 48th grace note.
113.542: Changed 12th note to 16th jack.
121.745: Added 16th mini-jack.
144.421: Okay, guitar solos are admittedly a weak point of mine, but I did my best to try and make it somewhat accurate. I think it's kind of messy but Dossar made no mention of additional fixes for this part so whatever. *shrug*
168.150: Fixed the polyrhythm. It's straight 24ths now.
169.602 & 175.796: Fixed the grace notes going to the guitar wailing. There's only two grace notes now instead of three, and the second grace note actually occurs at the right time.
170.279: Added missing notes.
171.118: Tweaked the patterning here a bit. Just adding in the missing 12th didn't really flow well.

Miss Jackson (Xiz) - Accepted
- Special case in which the stepartist gave permission to have the judge make the changes according to the review given.
30.046: Added in a 32nd burst. Same thing at 47.607.
34.436: Added a 16th here for the bass kick.
- I chose to leave in a couple of jumps that were stepped to the guitar plucking. Even though the main focus of the layering is the bass kick, I think the plucks add a bit of variety. It would be too impractical to try and jump all of the plucks though, so it's only done twice.
41.753: Changed 16th jump to a single note. A jump technically works since there's a bass kick here, but none of the other 32nd bursts begin with a jump so it just seems out of place.
46.326: Left arrow should have also been white to correspond with the vocals. Fixed.
49.070: Added a 16th jump for the bass kick (again at 54.924)
- Naturally I had to adjust a few patterns for the sake of flow, otherwise I tried to leave all the patterns as close to the original submission as possible.
66.082: PR on the jumps got a little messed up (second AY is definitely not a different pitch from the first)
72.313 etc.: There was this odd recurring issue of leaving out an 8th note during the chorus and I couldn't really figure out why it was omitted or why nobody brought it up in the review (in retrospect it's pretty easy to tell I was a new judge just by looking at some of my notes from that set, lol). These 8ths have all been filled in.
72.496 etc.: Turned these bass kicks into 16th jumps. I don't think everyone's going to be a fan of the anchoring but at the very least it stays consistent with the "Miss Jackson" jacks and how the bass kicks were being layered earlier.
81.643: Added a jump for the drum here as well. I don't think it's what I personally would have done had this been my file, but Xiz did it later on so I'm just trying to stay consistent with his work.
84.752: I guess technically these bass kicks should be stepped as jumps as well, but the trouble here is that they conflict with the jumps to "whoa-o-o-o-oah" so I'm just leaving these as single notes.
- From this point on the fixes are a repeat of earlier. The bridge was completely untouched.

Nightfall (Original Mix) (XelNya) - 8.5/10 - Accepted
- Honestly I didn't even really notice any [14] spam. Besides, I'd rather have [14] spam than down arrow spam. ;)
- Fixes approved!

Problematic - Accepted
- Special case in which the stepartist gave permission to have the judge make the changes according to the review given.
12.807: PR was backwacks, this has been corrected. Same at 24.101.
29.483: Added a 16th note for the high-frequency synth. Even though you can argue that Xiz only intended to follow the vocals and drum, it just feels weird leaving out one fairly prominent synth note.
31.204: Deleted a ghost 32nd note.
- A lot of these 32nd bursts contained ghost notes. These have all been addressed.
33.542: Changed to a 16th note.
46.953: Added a 16th note for the drum.
53.394: Changed the patterning here to be way less repetitive.
59.747: Xiz seemed pretty back and forth on whether to step the snare drum with hands or jumps. I went ahead and made all of them hands.
90.100: Fixed the timing on this burst.
94.865: Changed to an 8th jump for the bass kick.
101.394: Changed the staircase pattern to a 4-3-2-1 roll (which fits the song way better and isn't such a difficulty spike).
114.276: Added missing 18th jump for the bass kick.

[8/10] Welcome to My Kastle
- 23.87, 31.55, 39.23, 46.91: These should be changed to be consistent with what's mentioned at 131.40
- 146.51: Missing offsetted note

[8/10] Rainbow Archiver
- 112.07: Missing 32nd [RESOLVED - very quiet note]

[7/10] Hesperides
- Offset to change to 0.480
- 163.61: This part is stepped awkwardly. It may be a good idea to get rid of this 32nd note, or just have the 5-note 32nd burst with the 12th at 163.55 removed. [RESOLVED - goofed this one, I meant 163.45 but upon looking again this isn't a problem]
**- 170.55: The incomplete 32nd bursts here are misleading. The jumps should be removed to account for stepping the full 5-note bursts. [UNRESOLVED - 170.77 and 170.81 should be stepped as 32nd notes, 170.89 is a ghost 32nd. The patterning is also a bit tight in the anchors here]
**- 183.97: Missing 16th for bass kick
**- 189.82, 190.13: Missing 16ths for bass kick before 32nd burst (these can be patterned properly as well) [UNRESOLVED - The 16ths were added, but there are nasty anchors here on the down arrow]
**- 206.55: Missing jump [UNRESOLVED]
**- Please cover items marked with ** for acceptance.

[7.5/10] Your Lies
- 118.70, 121.45: Missing 8th note
- 166.37, 169.13, 171.89, 174.64, 177.06: Missing 16ths
- 201.11: Could add a jump here
- 213.26: Should be the 48th before (see 207.72)

[8/10] Smoke Weed Everyday {Rasmus Hedegaard} (Xiz)
- This was a special case as the changes were made by the judge by request.
- Offset changed to -0.133, and BPM changed to 100.08 (from 100.00)
- 9.868 etc.: Ghost note. This same exact 16th ghost note appears every time the lyrics "smoke weed everyday" come up. (Occasionally there's actually a synth being played between "weed" and "everyday", and in those cases you're okay. Other times there's nothing being played and you're left with a ghost note.) Pitch relevancy could also use some fixing up around here. "Smoke" is a higher note than "weed", so a pattern like 4-3 would make a lot more sense than the current 2-4 pattern. [RESOLVED]
- 10.768 etc.: The two chopped vocals this mini-jack is going to doesn't make that much sense as a mini-jack, since the two syllables here are two completely different syllables and pitches instead of a repetition of the same syllable with the same pitch (such as "smo-o-o-o-oke" where you stepped the 5-note long jacks). [RESOLVED - not minijacks anymore)
- 57.394: I'd change this 2-4-[13] pattern to something like 1-2-[34], in order to better distinguish what's being played in the song here is completely different from what's being played at 57.734. (Notice the inflection on "up" compared to the next few lyrics; it sounds very different from what comes immediately after but the steps don't really reflect that). [RESOLVED]
- 104.211: The vocals here are an exact repetition of what was played from 26.550-29.548, but here you stepped a mini-jack that you didn’t step the first time around. Like the mini-jacks I pointed out earlier, this mini-jack doesn’t really fit (same reason as before) so I would get rid of the mini-jack. [RESOLVED - not a minijack anymore]

[7*/10] Alone {Marshmello} (VisD)
-25.302 there should be an 8th jack here for pr and consistency (you did it earlier to match the synth)
-**37.769 File was great, and then this happened. Pls fix the vocal syncing.
Ehhh, the last 3 notes that you have sound accurate,
but the 16th really sounds like it should be on the 32nd note before it (a 32nd earlier)
-52.771 just condense this into an 8th jump, the 48th grace just feels out of place in this section.
-70.300 4th should be a jump
-71.568 not sure why you swapped to putting jump to the synths when you could have stuck with putting jumps to the vocals. This transition would have been much cleaner, and you would have more to work with in this drumroll buildup.
-**74.946 alright the whole “I’ll use three 32nds to acknowledge the cymbal burst that actually persists through the majority of the beat” does not work at all. Just make the jumps white or something (and consider removing the rest of the white notes since they’re just to abnormally high or low pitches)
-**101.992 last note is a ghost note
-File’s honestly pretty good aside from that odd 32nd section.
** = stuff that must be fixed
Rest of the stuff I wanted fixed is all good now, I hate to hold a file from acceptance because of 1 note but that vocal rhythm still sounds a bit off.

[7*/10] Credits {Frums} (VisD)
-**18.110 polyrhythms suddenly start here when you didn’t have them in the two instances prior? (probably easier to just fill in the polys for the 2 prior instances)
-28.669 keep the consistent 8ths going, it matches the kind of droning on and on that the background synth provides (fill in this 4th)
-31.183 ^ same comment, but fill in the 8th
-39.395 same thing as 28.669
-40.903 missing a jump here to the kick
-41.909 like I mentioned in the earlier review, should fill in the 8th here to kind of keep the droning of the background synth going.
-42.076 this should be a single note, while the white note at 42.412 should be a jump
-42.998 missing 16th in here that you should fill in
-**55.799 check the jumps around this measure, either the sync drifts or you have the 16ths misaligned.
-**63.760 also this 16th jump seems inconsistent with each repetition, double check the section for this.
Other than the things mentioned file seems fine.
Rest of the file looks great now, fix that one section in the middle of the song around 40s in and this is good to go.

[8*/10] Light of the Seven (Ghost in the Machine Cover) {Ramin Djawadi} (VisD)
I can't believe I didn't catch this in the original review,
but there are 8th piano notes running from 35.578 to 37.578 that you should fill in (making 36.578 and 37.078 jumps.)
-**46.580 there’s a faint higher note here which I’m assuming follows what you put a jump to in the earlier instance of this pattern. Make it consistent, either add the 4th here, or remove the 4th earlier. I’d recommend adding the jump here.
-**55.580 should be a single note
-**66.581 add a jump here to follow the descending high pitch melody.
-74.081 remove placeholder
Short and simple, well done overall. Song’s pretty too. Fix the couple things noted.
Fill in the 8ths mentioned (I'm sorry for not catching them earlier) and this is good to go, rest of the stuff was fixed as asked.

Arctaic
Csikos Post TPRMX remix
Dragonic Conjuring
Human World - Wandering Soul
Illusions of Magic
Ruins

Acid Rain
Balloon Fight
lolharp5000 v2
Rape Castle
The Day The Sun Exploded

Before Cynthia
Lavender Town [Fairytale Remix]
Rainspark
Teatime
The Last 8 Bars

Finixe
Make Me Real
Nhelv
Quietus Ray
Story x Teller