[Wiosna]

I do want to give my input on what FFR's identity is to me and how dumps would affect that from a stepper's perspective as well. My post is awfully long so I'll just spoiler it into pieces. Given my experience across multiple 4K VSRGs, I ultimately feel that people saying that FFR's identity being a safe haven for "high-quality non-dumps" is selling FFR as a game really short and that there are many different things that FFR brings from other 4K VSRGs. Moderators can move this into a separate thread because it's an awful lot of text that could be its own discussion.

A small background: While I made my first FFR account about 12 years ago and was active in this community from 2010-2015, I was never in touch with the stepping community until about late 2019 to early 2020. Most of my reputation (from 2015 to today) as a stepper came from my presence and contributions in other communities -- primarily osu!mania and, to a smaller extent, Etterna/StepMania -- so I do consider myself to be an initial "outsider" or non-native in the FFR stepping community.

When I rejoined the FFR community with the intent of sending files, there were multiple things that stood out to me from VSRGs. I can summarise them into three main factors: a lack of hold mechanic, a different playing meta, and existing drastically different stepping philosophies from other rhythm games.

1. Lack of hold mechanic

I think the main aspect of FFR stepping that stood out to me was the lack of a hold mechanic. The degree to which more contemporary Etterna files and osu!mania maps use holds (even with the latter having release timing) is really substantial and I don't think FFR steppers, whether it'd be for visual emphasis or to add another layer of mechanical challenge into the chart. I don't think insular FFR steppers realise just how heavily holds are being used outside of their circle -- the lack of holds is in itself a distinctive part of FFR's identity. And I know many players from osu!mania actually consider this a plus, too.

And I consider the lack of holds to be a constraint that breeds a lot of creativity as well. When I was transitioning from EO/o!m to FFR, a lot of my files had many holds, and just removing the holds made those files feel naked or incomplete. Using colour theory can bring you so far because, frankly, holds and white notes are not the same thing. And with fewer and fewer players using snap colours in gameplay (because more players from other games are coming to FFR), even colour theory would be lost in translation over time. Going through FFR files and understanding the constraints of the game's mechanics forced me to reshape the way I convey a song to players. I nowadays focus far more on pattern "flow", how patterns feel to play kinaesthetically (what kind of strain does this pattern cause? how much? etc.), and how to emphasise musical motifs through kinaesthetic means.

I attribute this paradigm shift in my stepping greatly to the constraints put onto FFR files and how I can work around them. While most of my output isn't made for FFR specifically, I still shaped my approach around this constraint on FFR, and I'm more than grateful for FFR inadvertently giving me a new lens for how to approach stepping. It's also for this reason that I would never want a hold mechanic for FFR and why I really empathise with hi19 when he alluded to (reasonable) stepping constraints breeding creativity. It's the main thing that really makes it stand out from other rhythm games, in my opinion, and its consequences on the stepping meta have been beautiful to see.

2. Different gameplay meta

For me, the general "meta" of playing any game is extremely important when submitting content to any community-based game. FFR, in particular, lends itself to a completionist meta despite having a skill rating system in-game. FFR has a limited (albeit large) pool of files, and the most commonly accepted goal on an individual file is reasonably achievable -- a AAA grade. Even the skill rating system is based more on high SDGs, which are, in the grand scheme of things, close to a perfect score. There is a rate function and people use it, but the primary way of playing FFR is through achieving a (near-)perfect score on 1.0x and only that. The average rank system and AAA/FC/TP bars also facilitate this.

This is something that also distinguishes FFR from other VSRGs. There is no clear end goal for Etterna charts. Got a AAA on 1.0? Try it on 1.1+ for some percentage, maybe a AA. Or maybe go for a score with much better accuracy -- but what percentage? 100% scores are virtually unachievable now. Not to mention the MSD system compels players to attain 91-97% Wife3 scores instead, far from a AAA. While osu!mania does have a curated (Ranked) section of the game that forces people to play on 1.0x rate, the ranked section is not taken very seriously. The gameplay meta as well focuses on attaining 96%-98% scores (very far from AAAs) rather than near-perfect scores (SS-ranks). FFR having a much clearer score range to attain scores primarily on 1.0 leads to forming manifestly different playing habits and some interesting questions for FFR steppers as well.

The tendency to think of FFR as more of a completionist game makes me think about the potential "value" of each file that I submit would bring. What would make my submission, if it were to get accepted, stand out from the other files that are already present in-game? In other words, is my file redundant? This means more to me than in osu!mania, where curation happens much more frequently and there is negligible incentive to play through everything ranked. So I end up having to be more cognizant about what I send by thinking about what would be a valuable submission to FFR. I can always submit a chart I think is good and enjoyable, of course, but I think finding a way to make my files stand out in some way is just as important from the pack if not more. There are also other things like how steppers can get away with more technical accuracy (e.g. using a 48th gallop + 16th rather than a 32nd burst) because the established goal for FFR is a AAA (which isn't awfully tight) rather than a quad or really good accuracy, but this is a smaller thing but still a factor nonetheless.

The fact that charts are primarily played on 1.0 also affects the value of certain charts -- specifically ones in which its auxiliary appeal lies in how useful it is for improving specific skills (e.g. jumpstream ability, stream ability, chordjack ability, etc.). This is a pretty big deal because some charts that would be played and enjoyed very heavily on osu!mania and Etterna may not have anywhere the same degree of appeal on FFR.

A quick example would be my Sharpnel JS files in my Sharpnel Instrumentality Project pack made last year; they average about 300 scores on Etterna and get about 4,000 plays on average on osu!mania despite not being Ranked or Loved (both ways of curating maps), both of which are extremely high values for their respective games given their circumstances. These high playcounts are primarily because of how osu!mania/Etterna are played and the presence of rates. It wouldn't have anywhere as much appeal on FFR, even if FFR does have a rate mechanic, because it's just not the main way people play FFR. It's also for these aforementioned reasons that I regret submitting too many of my Sharpnel files to FFR (Moonearth and Shind Bad specifically), but it's too late for that now. But these are factors that I feel I should consider when it comes to "stepping for FFR", and these factors definitely constitute part of FFR's identity to me.

3. Existing stepping meta and philosophies in the community

The existing stepping meta is, to me, an identity in itself. I think there has already been a lot of discussion about just technically focused FFR's catalogue is -- so I won't pry into it further. But the existing catalogue does give some ideas on how to approach stepping and the type of music that can be stepped for FFR. But in addition to the existing catalogue, the catalogue is still expanding. There are so many people producing enjoyable files of this nature (Pizza, M0nkeyz, Deamerai, DarkZtar, Tru, etc.), most of them still active is a genuinely great thing for both FFR and VSRGs in general imo. Would the inclusion of dumps make them tilt towards a different style? Perhaps, but based on my observations of how communities and charters grow, their origins/roots will still shine through even if they go through some gradual changes.

Another thing about the stepping meta that I feel is overlooked is just the existing philosophy of additive layering that is much much less prevalent in 4K VSRGs today -- layering through the quantity of sounds happening at a specific time rather than the textures or qualities of sounds. I believe bmah is making a thread about this very soon so I won't go too deeply into this, but from my experience, understanding stepping from this perspective was extremely eye-opening for me.

And the existence of multiple ways of even something as fundamental as layering is important -- any layering approach that isn't in vogue that's still logical and appropriate will compel both charters and players to turn their heads and think about what's exactly going on in the chart. Most charters (even dump charters) do make an attempt to make sure that the chart communicates the details present in a song of course, but I think there's an additional flavour necessary to get players to focus more intimately on the song's details. And I have deep respect for many people in the FFR community who try to subvert players' expectations of how charts should go in one way or another. FFR files often having this less popular approach to layering today is both fascinating and educational to me. I do think that additive layering has been getting neglected a little bit by some judges based on what I've seen, but that's an issue less with having dumps in-game and more of a failing on the judges' side.

The two factors about the existing stepping meta on FFR will obviously affect the palate of FFR players too. Because of this combination of gameplay meta and existing catalogue, I found that the typical FFR veteran's palate is quite different from the average strong osu!mania/Etterna player. There will naturally be charts with cross-community appeal (I've seen a lot of people on both FFR and osu!mania really like Writing on the Walls), but a chart like jh05013's The Lady Is A Trump (that is quite liked by multiple D7 players and some D6 players based on a quick survey I did), I'm not sure will have the same appeal for osu!mania players around the same skill level. Trying to figure out what exactly makes players from a community really like something is one of the most interesting things to me as a stepper, and having various different communities to appeal to is naturally great, because I want to be the best stepper that I can be.

Some closing thoughts:

All of this is obviously just my perspective, and I don't expect every stepper from multiple different rhythm games to share the same sentiments -- my goal here isn't to tell people that everyone will think that FFR has an established identity. But to me, as someone who has been wandering through one rhythm game after another for at least 12 years, FFR has a very clear identity, even if it isn't necessarily felt as if it did. With the presence of dumps in the game, I'm not quite sure how much FFR's identity will change from my perspective. The first factor is obviously unaffected by the inclusion of dumps (you don't need holds for dumps), and I don't expect dumps to change how the game is being played either, so the second factor is unchanged too.

Maybe the third factor will change quite a bit. I understand hi19's concern (?) of allowing dumps in-game stilting creativity in one way. I find that the most joy that I get from playing through files is less from playing through good files, but from discovering a file that breaks conventional moulds of a good file that is still enjoyable and communicates the details of the song well. It's not that good files don't have merit, of course, but it's something that motivates me further as a stepper to keep going because it's an affirmation that there is still stuff out there to explore.

Dumps from the FFR community, while will likely have some unique edge to them, will probably come off as less unique than some of the more cutting-edge charts that FFR has to offer. I think that's a very fair concern and I think the strongest defence for not having dumps in-game. A counterargument is that the use of ghost notes in themselves I think can lead to alternative avenues of creativity that maybe FFR regulars can exploit too. It's something that I'd like to see in the future, but I'm not quite optimistic about it. I think FFR will lose some of its unique identity through accepting dumps, but I don't expect it to be something that would cause FFR to be Just Another VSRG In The Abyss of 4-Column Keysmash Simulators.

The concern of the inclusion of dumps leading to people making charts that are awfully overemphasised even to a calm song is also fair, and I don't think internal consistency and musical relevance are sufficient factors to mitigate this, based on my experiences in the back-end of the osu!mania ranked section. A quick example would be Ideal Ratio [Oni] but with 48th bursts/64th bursts rather than the 32nds-40ths that it has now. Still logically consistent and musically relevant, but a much less enjoyable experience for most players because the exaggerated rhythms feel much more exaggerated than the average wubstep chart. I've volunteered as a bit of a consultant for the dump batch to see if there's anything that can be done in that respect, but striking a balance between artistic expression and egregious overexaggeration is very difficult, especially with FFR treading into unmapped territory. In this sense I think a lack of trust in judges is very valid.

I'm also speaking from solely an artistic perspective. I think there are valid concerns about how more casual players (or just <D5 players) aren't being accommodated for (or rather, D6++ players are being accommodated for disproportionately more than those players through the acceptance of dumps and dump batches), and that the easy batch is likely insufficient given the prevalence of lower-level players and that there hasn't been any progress in fostering among many steppers a need to provide content for newer players. But I don't think axing the dump batch or not allowing dumps would resolve much -- the issue at hand is symptomatic of a much larger concern at hand.

All in all, I just find the concern of FFR's identity being challenged and potentially homogenised to be valid, but I think the concern is excessive. There are way more things that make FFR stand out than just a catalogue of non-dumps. The very first reason at least, the lack of a hold mechanic, is something that stood out to me as a player and stepper much more than a lack of dumps. And it's something that the FFR community has worked around and developed theories for over at least two decades. And the completionist meta, manifestly different score goal from other VSRGs, existing catalogue of files and philosophies that are so different from other VSRGs, and a different audience are all factors that differentiate FFR from its contemporaries like Etterna and osu!mania. Having dumps won't change those as much as I think they would, especially with tight control and (hopefully) a critical lens as to what kind of dumps FFR would like to accept in the future.

I don't expect anyone to read this in full, but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. Since people are talking about FFR not having an identity, I feel that it's worth sharing how I feel about its stepping community and how different it is from other rhythm games I've been in.