Dance Dance Revolution/YMMV

You mean these subjective tropes were placed in the wrong section? Can we try this again?

Tropes in question:

• Adaptation Displacement: Songs that get ported from other Bemani series suffer from this, with many fans assuming that they debuted in this game.
• And the Fandom Rejoiced: Most people's reaction to seeing Universe 3 songs (namely Aftershock, Dummy, Your Angel, Oarfish, Delta-Max and 888) songs being ported to the arcade version of X2.
  • Dance Dance Revolution II (a.k.a. Hottest Party 5 in Europe, yet again) makes up in a huge way for how much of a letdown the previous year's version was. With the return of long songs, the DDR X rating system, songs from X2 AC (and even a Replicant D-Action variant), and the death of motion control gimmicks, many felt it was quite better. Judging by its content (and the fact that it uses a theme based off it), its essentially the "US CS" version of X3 vs. 2nd Mix (i.e. some songs from the new one, on top of some songs from the previous one). However, Japan has never gotten a home version with some of these songs at all either.
• Breather Boss: Xepher in DDR SuperNOVA (This is taken up a notch in "The Last" Stellar Joint because it's the easiest boss), On The Bounce in X, and Kimono Princess and Roppongi EVOLVED in X2 are distinct examples of this.
• Complacent Gaming Syndrome: Several players will try to find the hardest song available in the mix they currently play, pass it, and then keep playing it over and over again. Some may break out of this habit by choosing new or random songs, but some don't.
  • Alternately, some players (mostly those who played earlier mixes) will try to find songs they remember (or similar) and keep playing them.
• Default Setting Syndrome: Any song that comes up first on the song select on a first stage tends to fall victim to this, especially involving typically beginners. Given how common this version is, "Graduation" on Extreme is probably the most annoying example. X2 plays with this a bit by having different defaults between regions; America got "Super Eurobeat (Gold Mix)" as default, while Japan got "more more more" as default.
  • In terms of characters Disco has been one for most of the series.
• Ear Worm: Too many to count. "Butterfly" by smile.DK is the most famous example.
• Harsher in Hindsight: It must be really awkward playing DDR X in Japan, when the announcer says "Is there an earthquake or something? 'Cause this party's a-crackin'!".
• It's Easy, So It Sucks: Bag's fixed steps on DDR X. Who wants to play that song now? Semi averted with X2: the original steps with their old timing are available as challenge steps.
• Scrappy Mechanic:
  • The BPM of the chart changing by some factor of 2, even if in reality the music's tempo didn't change, or the chart completely stopping. Charts that overuse these gimmicks are usually considered Scrappy Levels.
  • In older versions of the game (primarily any PlayStation-based versions for that matter), songs with triplets were at times harder to play than normal songs. This was not due to a player's inability to hit triplets, but rather a player's inability to hit triplets that were rounded to the nearest 64th note or so. The slower the song, the more obvious this became: "bag", "Ballad For You" and "I'll Make Love To You" are three of the slowest songs, yet are done completely in triplet style. The Windows-based engine on DDR X AC finally corrects this issue, but for those stuck with an older machine: assuming 12th notes, hit the last 12th before the quarter note just a tiny bit sooner than you would if it was a proper 12th.
  • This becomes an Ascended Glitch on X2 where "bag" gets a Challenge chart, which is just the Expert chart with an emulation of the previous glitch.
• Self-Imposed Challenge:
  • The Double mode, or using modifiers to make the game harder.
  • Don't forget performance (or freestyle) players who actually dance, do kneedrops and flips.
  • Not to mention those who try an all-great run!
  • Try it with a "battery" lifebar. No, even better, Hazard Mode!
  • Stealth + Shuffle, go!
• Sequelitis:
  • Starting with SuperNOVA. Curious how it was the first core game in the series to be released after Guitar Hero...
  • DDRMAX, the sixth main arcade release, had some questionable changes. Every repeat save for console-exclusive songs is gone (bringing the songlist from 130-something down to about 45) as well as difficulty ratings. Some of the former, as well as the latter, came back for DDRMAX2, however.
  • The new cabs designed for DDR X US version onwards. With poor pad quality and HD lag, it's no wonder DDR is losing popularity in arcades.
    • This was allegedly fixed with DDR X2's American showing, but mixed reports have come in from different players and Tropers. Some corners were still cut, making some believe that no effort was put in at all.
• So Bad It's Good: Beatmania IIDX fans, remember "GOLD RUSH"? Well, it's here, and there's not one, but TWO new versions tailored for DDR!
• "Stop Having Fun!" Guys: The safety bar on arcade machines is often the subject of many a heated debate. Some players think that barely passing a beginner song without the bar is better than beating That One Boss with a grade of AAA with the bar. Speed modifiers were once regarded as "cheating" as well; that debate has since been inherited by the Guitar Hero community.
• Suspiciously Similar Song: Comparisons have been drawn between X3 vs. 2nd Mix's hidden boss song "Tohoku EVOLVED" and "MAX. (period)"; both are Darker and Edgier remixes of a previous boss song (Maxx Unlimited, and London EVOLVED) by 2MB (though, with an additional 100KB in the case of Tohoku), their charts both start immediately at the beginning of the song, both have a section played at a very high speed, and both contain an inspirational message at the end ("Thank you for playing" at the end of Period, and the "CLEARED" screen instead reading "PRAY FOR ALL" on Tohoku).
• Tastes Like Diabetes: Love♥Shine, full stop. Its remix also qualifies, and probably surpasses it in this regard too.
• That One Boss: Pick a "MAX", Trip Machine, PARANOiA, Pluto and "EVOLVED" song. Any of them.
  • "Trigger" in X, "Zero One" in Ultramix 2/Str!ke, and "Valkyrie Dimension" in the Arcade version of X2 are also good examples.
    • For "Valkyrie Dimension", it was also the True Final Boss of the arcade version of X2, which meant you initially had to jump through a large number of hoops to even get to it in the first place. Then, because it was always played on Sudden Death mode, everyone kept failing on the trills right at the end. When it was finally unlocked for normal play, cue the disappointment from fans who learned it was yet another Level 18. For many, that wasn't hard enough.
    • That disappointment soon turned to excruciating pain when they saw the Oni chart, one of the first 19's! Ouch.
  • Even worse? 888 and Mei. Each Challenge chart has over 700 steps, whereas a normal DDR boss song has about 550. And the latter is well-known as being one of the hardest Beatmania songs. Think about that for a second.
  • X3 vs. 2nd Mix brings Tohoku EVOLVED. While it is apparently a Level 17 on Expert (one level easier than VD), Sudden Death mode combined with a sudden speed-up for a few moments caught many players off guard in much the same way the ending trills of VD did.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks:
  • The song selection and other menus from Festival/Extreme/Fusion were so different from the 5thMIX "music wheel" format that the games caused a fan outcry. It was brought back starting with the next game Str!ke/Extreme 2/Max.
  • Dynamite Rave's new steps on X2 and Hottest Party 3/Music Fit. The new steps don't have the same challenge as the older ones. Even the song itself, which debuted in DDR X with the old steps, has been changed for the worse.
  • For the US console version of DDR X, Horatio got different Challenge steps with way more Shock Arrows.
  • This is the general opinion of the new Dance Dance Revolution on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Just look at their Facebook page and read the comments if you dare.
  • Many fans claim this after DDR stopped using Dancemania as its main source of licenses.
• They Copied It, So It Sucks:
  • The Shock Arrow mechanic is a variation of the mines from In The Groove, except unlike mines, they always come up in groups of four, are judged using the O.K./N.G. system, and have always been used more like a "hurdle" in charts (well, except for Horatio on X CS US. Now that was stupid).
  • DDR Play Station 3 and its "Chain Arrow" and "Groove Trigger" features seemingly rip off mechanics from Guitar Hero and the like. However, the Chain Arrow segments only add bonus points, a glass shattering effect, and forces a flat noteskin on the notes in question. Groove Trigger works like Star Power itself (bonus points for a period), except it reduces the lifebar by half.
• They Just Didn't Care: The background videos for all the new songs on Konamix and MAX USA were lifted straight from other songs in the original 4thMIX/MAX and MAX2. As a result, most of them are off by a measure. This even happens to some songs - "Healing Vision" and "Matsuri Japan" in MAX - that were already in MAX2 to begin with. Another effect of this is that some songs will have identical videos, like "Peace-Out" and "Take It To The Morning Light".
  • The music list on Wii DDR 2010's web site was apparently copied directly from the PS3 version's site without having been checked. Revival songs from the PS3 version (AFRONOVA, Flowers, TSUGARU (APPLE MIX), Sweet Sweet ♥ Magic and MAX 300) are listed on the Wii version's site but are not available in the Wii game. Likewise, songs exclusive to the Wii game are not listed on the site. Throw in a few Engrish errors here and there, and you know you're in trouble.
  • The European version of DDR II (a.k.a. Hottest Party 5) adds translations for several other languages. Somehow, the small label for the "Other Info" button on song selection in the English mode contained the German label "INFO ANDERN ^{[dead link]} ".
  • DDR X3 vs. 2nd Mix's "2nd Mix Mode" has a few embarrassing typos and bugs. For instance, Stomp to My Beat's artist is "JS1B" instead of "JS16", Kung Fu Fighting's banner does not contain the "featuring" label above "CARL DOLGLAS", and having two players on different difficulties makes them overlay on top of each other (however, the real 2nd Mix did not allow this to happen, note).
• Values Dissonance: Somehow, just in the U.K., Hottest Party 5 got a "16+" rating for "violence". By contrast, every other one got a "3+" on the scale (which, ridiculously enough, is roughly an "E" on ESRB's scale). But why? It was just a single punch in the face in the "More Than Alive" music video. It's not like we're freaking decapitating people with blades here!
• Woolseyism: In American installments, the "Boo" timing judgment got renamed to "Almost", and "Miss" to "Boo". This migrated to the Arcade on SuperNOVA (however, "Miss" was restored on X2).