Pump It Up Zero at arcades now

Vince Mestas · Trick Member Joined: 07 Nov 2005

Zero just got me into Pump. Never thought about the game before I saw someone play it at the arcade. Zero is awsome.
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Tsuri · Posted: Thu Mar 16, 2006 9:30 pm Post subject:

Syncopation · Trick Member Joined: 03 Feb 2003

Keep in mind that a lot of those games that don't use "vivid" arrow color schemes *do* use gridlines and/or measure barlines to assist in judging the spacing.

Now, it may still be hard to judge triplet spacing; however, it is still relatively straightforward to judge quarter, eighth, sixteenth, and--in some cases--32nd notes. So, the difficulty becomes seeing all the columns all at once and hitting the notes correctly, but for any single column, the interface still makes some effort to denote a time value even without using colored noteskins.

In contrast, I still find Pump It Up at 1x is cramped, cluttered, and in some cases (Exceed and beyond) the overlapping of the same steps makes it hard to distinguish between two or more notes and a long arrow. Speed of x2 or x3 eliminates the usability issue with the interface altogether. As long as speed mods remain in Pump It Up, I'll use them. If they ever remove speed mods, I'll stop playing Pump It Up.

Also, it's not just Pump It Up. Same goes for DDR, 1.5x or 2x for me, Solo arrows when available in a given mix. I didn't even bother with songs such as Orion 78 until the later mixes because I wasn't going to waste money trying to figure out cluttered arrows.

Rationale: a "fair" challenge in the game is making the rhythms hard to do in time (due to irregular rhythms, song tempo, and so on), but also making them fully readable with an interface that doesn't break down using excessive overlapping. Otherwise, I won't waste my money trying to read clutter just for the sake of obscuring otherwise straightforward rhythm patterns (which is one of the reasons I won't purchase any game that doesn't use vivid noteskins or gridlines to denote rhythms).

.hack//*cough* · Posted: Sun Mar 19, 2006 5:25 pm Post subject:

Well, the D&B's in Houston, TX, has now upgraded to Zero, and I played it over the weekend.

Finally, Andamiro gets it right as far as telling you how to select songs, how to pick, how to speed mod, etc. And the new Easy Station has a tutorial for all the n00bs out there who've never played Pump. Not to mention most of the Easy Station charts are ridiculously easy.

As for Arcade, FINALLY if you're playing with someone else, you can each play on different difficulties. One of my BIGGEST gripes with Pump has finally been corrected. Why it took Andamiro 10-something odd mixes to figure that out is beyond me, but it's all good now.

Only thing I didn't like: it's too easy to change difficulties in Pump (press the up-left arrow once to cycle through difficulties; up-right changes the song channel, much like Exceed 1&2). Especially if you speed mod. It's too easy to pick the wrong song on the wrong difficulty. I accidentally speed modded to 3X, then picked a song, and instead of playing the K-pop song I wanted on Crazy, I wound up playing a Pop channel song on Freestyle. Which is why I'd prefer Pump to have a Modifier Options Menu instead of foot-codes. My advice to Zero players is to speed mod first, then pick your song and difficulty.

Other than that, I was VERY impressed with the songlist. All the new K-pop songs are really good (All Famy's the only one that didn't do anything for me), the Chinese Pop song Up Up is catchy, and the new Banya songs are awesome (Jump on Crazy is one of the most FUN stepcharts I've seen so far; finally, a nice easy Banya song!). I don't like that Ignition Starts and Hypnosis were removed from the songlist, though; those two are my favorite warm-up songs.

Overall, I <3 <3 <3 Zero. Easily the best Pump arcade mix by far.

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"It's not God who created humans. It's humans who create God." - Cowboy Bebop Ep. 24 (Brain Scratch)
Atkins is dead. Long live exercise and dance games.

Dawgbowl · Trick Member Joined: 22 Sep 2003 Location: Frederick,MD

Pretty much all D&Bs have it now, arundal mills and white flint in maryland both have it.

Things I hate:
They changed the steps to rolling Xmas to some really retarded stepchart that is so boring. Those steps used to be my absolute favorite steps to play daily... now I can't stand them.

Thats really the only thing that got me swearing at the machine

Things I like:
Everything else... The new tracks are for the most part nice except the difficulties are nasty, and super uber slowdowns what? (moonlight)

I didn't play any of them, but Po did... stupid stupid stupid...

But how dare they change those steps to rolling christmas... god they didn't leave them... h8...h8....h8.....
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SM mix 3!! RELEASED! (Temp. Link)
http://rapidshare.com/files/94968330/DawgbowlsThIrdmIx.zip.html

Razma · Posted: Wed Mar 22, 2006 4:46 pm Post subject:

I truely hate (and yet the same time, love) songs that make you do the splits.... Chinese Resturant...

Beat of the War 2 is hard, LiaDZ2 is stupid hard, and Try to BPM is just retarded. In all, though, the game is magnificant.
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Honda Z

Synaesthesia · Posted: Wed Mar 22, 2006 5:59 pm Post subject:

I was amused that LiaDZ is a 7 on Normal (which is just about my current limit at PIU; best I've done is BotW2 Hard). It's definitely an awesome game. Considering the condition of my hometown arcade's DDArgh pads, even if they upgraded to ITG2, I would probably have to play more Zero.
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Robert H. Magnusson · Trick Member Joined: 18 Jan 2003

Dave & Busters St. Louis (technically, Earth City, near where I work, as well as near the Riverport Ampitheater) has finally upgraded to Pump Zero as well. Very nice; I actually did fairly well with some of the easier, more familiar songs. (For me, playing's a little like DDR Solo.) I only had time to play one set (three easy songs and the bonus - all A's, rank 28 on that machine. Not many people at D&B are that familiar with dance games yet) before my bus came, so hopefully later I'll have time to challenge myself properly.
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ddrHorse · Trick Member Joined: 28 Mar 2002 Location: Rockford, IL

I'm not sure why, but Rock Valley Community College near Rockford, IL has one of these. The game room there consists of a pinball machine, a pool table, another old arcade machine, and PIU Zero. The machine is only 25 cents and the volume is at a decent level. The pads were working mostly last time I was there, but I've been told they are at least trying to fix the problems with them. While it is 25 cents, I'd say most people who frequent this board would be better off going to Dennis' in Chicago. However, if you're a Rockford local, this machine might be something you'd like to support.

Agent J · Trick Member Joined: 29 Feb 2004 Location: Dimension X

Razma · Posted: Fri Apr 14, 2006 10:34 pm Post subject:

Baka of the Orochi · Trick Member Joined: 26 Jan 2002 Location: Chicago area

DARREN HAYEZ · Trick Member Joined: 13 Apr 2006 Location: Michigan

I played it today...and was very angry with it. I went to Dave & Busters in Philly and they had it. Anyway, I'm used to the four arrow setup, and I've never been able to get used to the five button thing on PIU! I liked the music, but I was terrible at the game itself. The pads seemed VERY unresponsive. You literally had to stomp on them (as it says on the sensors) to get them to react, which doesn't work well when you're trying to flail around and hit all the sensors in quick songs. And since the card reader screen was broken, I didn't know how many chips it was, and I think I spent more than half failing on that damn game. However, I can see how PIU! would be better for freestyling. I was sliding around on the pad a bit to get a feel for it and I could totally see myself freestyling on it if I was a more experienced player. I long for the arcade back home and nice round of DDRExtreme.

Synaesthesia · Posted: Thu Apr 20, 2006 7:41 pm Post subject:

I've seen more people use Freestyle mode at my home arcade than the other modes. But that's just me. Oh, how I long to play PIU more...
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Agent J · Trick Member Joined: 29 Feb 2004 Location: Dimension X

Baka of the Orochi · Trick Member Joined: 26 Jan 2002 Location: Chicago area

[KIMO]Wolfen · Trick Member Joined: 08 Jul 2004 Location: Flossmoor, IL

How are the pads up there in Addison?
I'm getting a bit sick of the people and the management of OFW... so I need a GOOD place to play Pump

If it's good. Don't be surprized to find me there with Bee one day.

Baka of the Orochi · Trick Member Joined: 26 Jan 2002 Location: Chicago area

Better than Gold Coast, OFW, and Dennis' pads. Easily.
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