DDR to PIU difficulty comparisons

[L.]

how does DDR's difficulty steps compare to PIU's difficulties. I'm making the switch to practice for WF2005 and I need to know.

Also, how do you become a rep for the US @ PIU's World Festival 2005?
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[cj iwakura]

Pump: Normal / Hard / Crazy

Hard is about equal to Heavy. The toughest Hard charts are easily what would be called nine footers on DDR, and Dignity might even pass for a 10 by their standards.

Crazy goes well beyond those boundaries. ITG categorizes it fairly well, but it's still not quite definable on the same scale.

Basically, Hard charts are usually all eighth note charts(and some even have 16ths), and Crazies break out the 16th note runs on a constant basis. (Some even have 24ths/32nds.)

The toughest song three mixes back surpassed PSMO, so they're well beyond the boundaries DDR set.
Again, In The Groove is very, very close(might even surpass it in some cases, since Pump never goes above 230 BPM), but Pump were the originators.

As for being a supporter, you need to contact KingAlexander/Crimsonforte with information on your region and why you think you should be a supporter.
Contact info

Bear in mind, Andamiro is out to get Pump noticed in the US, so they're most interested in what you can do to help generate interest, primarily by organizing tournaments/communities and things of the like.

You also might want to make sure your state doesn't already have a supporter, but some can have more than one if the size of the region calls for it.
Hope that helps.

Oh, and if you mean attending as an actual competitor.. well, good luck. Only two slots are open in both technical and freestyle. And the best players in the US are really, really good.
Those who go'll be decided in a forthcoming nationwide tournament, likely happening this June/July. (South Carolina's tentative, but it's still open to debate.)
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[cj iwakura]

[/doublepost]

[Baka of the Orochi]

Wait, and you're in Chicago?

WTF?

Where the hell are you playing?
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[L.]

actually I play DDR but I want to make a temp. switch to Pump for WF2005. What's Nightmare like? LoM? MaxxU? *gulp* PSMO?

there's a pump machine about 2.5 mi. away... closest to my house.
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[.hack//*cough*]

[L.]

how about stepcharts?
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[cj iwakura]

You can get a LOT of stepcharts here:
http://pumpitup.completelyfreehosting.com

And the toughest nightmares can't even be compared to PSMO Doubles. To be more specific, the song I mentioned that surpassed PSMO back in the day was Get The Party Started: it had a maximum combo that was literally one step higher than PSMO's, and it was 18 seconds shorter. (It was basically constant 16th notes at 138 BPM, with psychotic freezes and 8th note jumps intermingled at random intervals.)
The toughest killers to beat for Nightmare are Canon-D, Dignity, Final Audition Episode 1, Bee, and X-Treme Vook Of The War Another Step.
(XTVotW is also 2:48 long.)
For Canon-D, expect constant 16ths at 160. Dignity is near-constant 8ths with lots of 16th spurts at 195 BPM, and triple freeze steps with lots of triples mixed during the later segments. (Also has the death run to end them all, a QZQSECE7175939 run across the pad going to one side, then back.) Final Audition Episode I is basically a chain of 10-comboing 16th runs, with two second intervals, one after the other, at 190 BPM. Bee is like Canon-D, just with more breaks and less insane flow to the runs(same BPM). X-Treme Vook Of The War is technically the worst of them all, but only because of the length: it also goes from 186/70/140/210 BPM. LOTS of 16ths in the beginning(with 8th note jump drills mixed in), constant 8th jumps during the 140 part(you get a freeze break at the 70 BPM part), and the 210 part is a mixture of insane jumps, 16th spurts, and all-out 16th note drills.
If you want to master nightmare, that's the very least of the expectations required of a player.. so you would need to do a lot of practicing to consider attempting a World Festival run, to say the very least.
Not to dissuade your hopes, but realistically, it'll take an insane amount of skill to get far in the nationals, much less the worldwide tournament.
If you're serious about trying, start from Normal/Hard/Freestyle charts and work your way up. Jumping straight into Crazy and Nightmare, and being inexperienced at five/ten panel gameplay, is a very bad idea.
(To give an example, I've seen an Pandemonium-level ITGer fail a level 4 normal song.)
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[CStarFlare]

[L.]

those stepcharts suck. can I find anything I CAN READ?
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[cj iwakura]

If you can't read those, you're out of luck. That's the best you're going to get; those are from the definitive stepchart sites like Project Rebirth and such. You'll just have to make do, because they're the only kind in existence.
I sure don't see how they 'suck', either.
Using the 2x option should help with the CZ/NM charts if you're having a hard time reading them.
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[Baka of the Orochi]

If you want some tips for playing, since you're in Chicago, check out Dennis' Place For Games. That's the ONLY place in Chicago with good players (as in, people that can pass Slam CZ without the bar or without stage break, or some ridiculous NMs). Some of the regulars are complete dickheads if you don't seem friendly, but some can be real helpful if you get on their good side.

Unfortunately, they also won't play Exceed unless they see someone else playing.
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[Syncopation]

^^ The stepcharts "suck" because when they are compared to DDR or even ITG step charts, there is no indication of the beat subdivision indicated by the step position. (And ITG stepcharts at the Expert level tend to look like DDR's Bag at 1x or far worse as far as arrows crammed together within a single beat... at least before generating the step charts with a speed mod greater than 1x.)

But, I also realize that Pump It Up uses a "flat" arrow system, where the step directions are color-coded but not the beat subdivision. So, what I mean by beat subdivision for the PIU step charts would be horizontal bars separating beats 1, 2, 3, and 4 for each measure. Just look at any DDR stepchart to see what I mean, even if the arrows aren't color coded themselves.

However, beyond that, I'm more than happy that they still exist in some form, because they will still help me learn more Hard songs and maybe I'll progress into the low-level Crazy songs a bit faster. For example, I've been stuck not being able to get certain steps on Starian (even after I saw somone else play the spins, I'm just not seeing them when I read that song's arrows), but since I know that song is mostly quarter and eighth notes, I can now learn the step directions off the step chart... and be well prepared for trying that quad-step at the end.

[Rancidfish]

[Syncopation]

^ You're probably extremely good at reading 1x, even with stepcharts.

I just know I was looking at Anubis and Euphoria stepcharts (as just two examples). At 1x, I couldn't figure out what the rhythms were. I had to go to 4x just to actually see those faster-than-sixteenths rhythms (16th triplets and 32nds in Anubis and 32nds in Euphoria) spaced out enough to understand what they were.

But, going back to the Pump step charts, I guess I could always download one, and then add my own gridlines as necessary. As for the Starian one I downloaded--since the song is mostly quarters and eighths... now I finally understand how the crossovers and spins are supposed to work in that song.

[Rancidfish]

[Ickorus]

[Edible Bondage Tape]

[Pop'n Usagi!]

RAW wasn't intended to be cleared, it was intended to be watched more than anything. like an interactive ending credits/thankyou message.
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[quote:8b1ee61c71="rampage in oct '04"]
I'm sure if it was sold for profit, Konami would clamp down on it (I'm sure it's a matter of time before they clamp down on ITG).[/quote]

[Edible Bondage Tape]