#ontamarama beat

[onta-maestro]

www... god i love my main characters

[vincentspork]

So, last night I downloaded a bunch of DS rhythm games - mostly ones that had previously fallen under my radar. The issue with the DS' library in particular is that there was just. A lot of shovelware unceremoniously dumped onto it, so while there are a lot of worthwhile games on it a wide range of genres, finding actually, like….y'know…good stuff takes considerable digging. Thankfully, I like digging in the ground for tubers I mean good games

One of the titles I downloaded - and one that I posted about a little bit last night - was Monster Band (released as Music Monstars in Europe). It's an Elite Beat Agents-like, in that you have to hit shrinking targets in time to the music. While the gameplay itself isn't really a whole lot to write home about, the graphics are simple and fun (reminding me more than a little of Gabrielle's Ghostly Groove on the 3DS), and the licensed soundtrack, as stated previously, is fucking bananas. If it had been in production a few years later it would have one hundred percent had an endearingly shitty MIDI of Shakira's Loba in its roster.

Something about this game made it feel like a DSiWare title - it's short, it's simple, but it's so so weird. I think it's definitely worth checking out, if for nothing else than the pure novelty of some of the choice choons in it. It also includes a tool to let you mess around with the digital instruments that the game itself uses for its soundtrack, so that's pretty neat - I'm sure someone more musically-inclined than I could get a lot of use from that; I personally just smashed out the riff of Megalovania on the organ preset and called it a day.

Strangely, Europe got a pretty tonally-appropriate cover, while America got box art that was no doubt intended to confuse parents who kept getting harangued by their kids about the newest Rock Band game:

The other game I tested out…is…something called Dance: It's Your Stage! Apparently this was a multi-platform release, and while the Wii/PS3/XB3 versions are DDR clones (with the WORST arrow layouts I've ever seen in a game of its ilk. Yippee!!!!!!!!), the DS version is…also an Elite Beat Agents clone, except where Music Monstars was a lesser EBA clone for its lack of variety in its gameplay, this is a lesser EBA clone because it's simply not very good in any capacity, specifically not offering any of the feedback that EBA showcases.

Elite Beat Agents' marble mechanic, where you roll a ball from one marker to another at a consistent tempo so it "lands" in time with the music is by no means my favorite part of the game, but it does work in that game. Each note also plays a sound to let you know that you've hit it on time, but Dance: It's Your Stage has none of this auditory signaling, the marble mechanic confusingly never plays back at a speed that seems to fit the track (which is notable for how often it crops up in the charts), and….ough, the soundtrack.

I kind of knew instinctively that it was royalty-free music. There's nothing wrong with stock music - it's something that a human, somewhere, made. It's admirable. Royalty-free music, by design, however, is kind of made to slot in into the background without calling attention to itself, so it's an extremely odd choice for a rhythm game - none of the tracks are enough to really grab you, and all of the music is around the same middling BPM, so it's hard to convince yourself that there's really anything in the way of diversity in the audio.

Oh wait hold up. Live update while I'm typing this: this game was apparently a tie-in to a reality show that got cancelled after one season for low ratings. That makes sense. Uhh, I dunno, play Ontamarama instead of this. Ontamarama unironically rules.

[onta-maestro]

icons

taken from the official ontamarama website