Dead Rhythm Games: Bemani Edition

[@FNWeeaboo]

It has come to my attention that I made a few mistakes on this video so I would like to address them here. Reflec Beat In regards to Reflec Beat there is no definite consensus as to whether or not the game is actually dead. Some may consider it still an active series due to the fact that it is still receiving updates, while others consider it dead as many Japanese arcades have sold their cabinets. So while the future of Reflec Beat is uncertain, I'll leave it for you to decide whether or not the game is actually dead. Other Rhythm Games As one comment mentioned earlier I left out Toy's March and it completely slipped my mind. A brief overview would be that its gameplay is similar to Taiko no Tatsujin but the overall theme is more of being a drummer boy in a marching band. There were also a few games like Rap Freaks, Marimba Heaven, and Rizminance which I could not really find videos for nor was there a lot of information for me to go off. I hope this clears up anything that I missed in the video. Thanks.

[@lajenehuen260]

Thanks for litsening to my comment!

[@DonnyKirkMusic]

Keyboardmania is dead but Synthesia is a thing still. Very thankful for it because its a great concept.

[@DismemberTheAlamo]

Beatmania didnt die, it literally evolved to IIDX. You can even play IIDX in 5key.

[@nate567987]

Rap Freaks never came out Rizminance was only local tested before being canned Marimba Tengoku is a plug and play tv game

[@nate567987]

also remywiki is great for info on games

[@videogamesruinedmylife3769]

Problem is that konami released so many music games they were only competing against themselves. It's good that we got so much variety but most mainline hardcore rhythm gamers just stick to the same games like pop'n, ddr and beatmania

[@thundersharkpanda]

That's why $ega is quietly catching up to Konami in terms of music game. Sega's music arcade releases, which never meant to compete with hardcore bemani titles like sdvx and beatmania, successfully draws in new or casual players. But I think what's more impressive about maimai/chunithm/ongeki is that they each still possess niche that renders the machines hard to be replaced by other tablet/ home console music game experiences. (Especially due to their unique cabinet designs that is impossible to simulate.) Maimai is meant to be the most casual and wide appealing due to its over-the-top cabinet design and built-in 2-player mode. Chunithm looks like a pretty standard mobile music game until you realize it has a built in hand drier. And on a more personal level I find the touch-pad way more comfy than smashing my tablet. Ongeki combines music game with touhou and love live's scoring system and monetization practices.

[@nate567987]

1998-2001 was a fad era for music games

[@TechniqueSan]

That's essentially what happened to guitar hero. Once something's popular, it seems companies can't control themselves and try to milk it for all it's worth instantly, killing the niche in the process.

[@mia_2043]

​@@thundersharkpandaOngeki has normal scoring independent of card mechanics, most people only pay attention to technical score unless you're trying to rush unlocking something specific

[@zeronxepher]

Oh that's my museca video. Nice lol

[@cammy573]

Museca's online services are actually not discontinued. There are cabs in Japan that are still online. But konami kinda made it seem like your only options were to get an offline kit or convert to bbc.

[@FNWeeaboo]

Really? Well the more you know

[@sespis2r]

Convert to what

[@useless4692]

@@sespis2r bishi bashi channel

[@hannah_red]

Yep, there's a Museca cabinet at my local arcade in Florida, and the last update the cabinet was advertising was dated 6.20.2022. So definitely still getting updates.

[@noctuid9353]

@@hannah_red These are fan updates though. Konami doesn't care about it anymore unfortunately.

[@myntmetro]

I never really knew that there was so much in terms of obscure bemani games, great stuff!

[@ThePixelPolygon]

5:39 dude i feel you i grinded the ever living hell out of din don dan. that one was super fun

[@carn109]

F for all the Dead games TT

[@nathank-jw7uv]

Hi, I came from the subreddit, I'm not going to lie I did not expect a good video but I actually ended up watching the whole thing, really well made, keep it up

[@Asrenic]

bruh earlier this week I saw museca at a game galaxy arcade and it was SO STINKIN FUN

[@weegee9k656]

I played Beatstream at an anime convention and it was one of my favorites they had available.

[@flow2bro602]

every time I see dmx/Dance Maniax it makes me nostalgic and sad bc i remember every arcade having it from the 2000s to the early 2010s i resonated with that game even as a kid that now i feel it impacted me more than ddr rhythm game wise even if technically i did play ddr more in total time

[@pxlmoth]

same here!

[@BadWallaby]

Nostalgia is such a good piano style game

[@noctuid9353]

Beatstream is still playable unofficially and is often at American conventions. There is also a clone (part of CarmVTR). Museca also has an unofficial community that continues to make new tracks (museca plus). Both still support cards (it's just not the official konami server).

[@Max-X87]

Haha, Didn't expect that my video was listed in your video here. Thanks for the credit. Ya, it's really sad that Konami canceled most the fun Rhythm game.

[@FNWeeaboo]

Haha, it was your videos that got me into DanEvo. Hopefully, they bring the charts over to DANCE aROUND

[@BadWallaby]

YO DANCE FREAKS!! Ive been trying to remember what it was called! I remember playing this years ago as a kid!

[@twilightexabyte]

My local arcade has two Museca cabinets and I enjoyed my time with the game. Maybe not as much as MaiMai or Groove Coaster but there’s something so satisfying about spinning the disks during the songs. It’s just a shame that it died, it’s solid and I can see the potential in there, I was always hoping that they’d release more tracks but oh well.

[@MochaMochaMochaMochaMocha]

my local arcade has a dance maniax cabinet! i didn't know it had that short of a lifespan, but it's really cool to have a piece of bemani history like that just down the road from me

[@atomicbomb5000]

reflec beat.... man I can't help but to feel sad whenever I hear reflec beat. Such a great game. Could have been a great KAC title too

[@riffcrypt8438]

Dance Maniacs was the first Bemani game I ever played. Waving my hands over the sensors was a day I'll never forget. I lucked out having grown up close to a large arcade in the states that loved importing more obscure Bemani games. This was in the classic era though but I got plenty of time in playing Guitar Freak, Drummania, Parapara, IIDX, along with the newest DDR machines.

[@jasonperez7250]

Museca is dead?!? That’s sad. I played it for the first time last week and I really enjoyed it

[@alanneus]

I've been playing that game alot recently, the round one near me has 1+1/2 and I've been trying to master it. I didn't know it was considered dead tho 🤔

[@nate567987]

@@alanneus fans have been making more for it

[@AriaTheSongKeeper]

This was really interesting. The only games I've heard of were Museca and Beatmania 1. Good work!

[@ZuiVeemo]

I've always wanted to try out dance evolution, and recently Bemani announced a new game with a rather similar concept to Dance Evolution called Dance Around I'm hyped!

[@Dongulator]

That's really cool, I always thought the DE concept deserved another shot.

[@fvig2001]

It's out on PC. You just need a kinect and kinect usb adapter. It eorks well but doesnt support hdmi audio for some reason

[@jackp7675]

I am so lucky that my local round 1 has a museca cabinet with offline because it is actually super fun

[@ashineer8697]

Museca was one of the first games I played when I went to a round one for the first time. I was heartbroken when I found out there wasn't any more online. The online community is still really active as there's a custom version with custom songs as well

[@hai1touch]

5:12 - DanEvo was succeeded by DANCE aROUND, which has more permissive motion detection and a more diverse soundtrack.

[@widyatara_randy20]

It's true. But if you want to play a "Real choreo" from Dance Evolution, you should play MASTER level (if that game have a DanEvo songs before, including Din Don Dan, Mermaid Girl, or even Daisuke). If you played Advanced to lower, some choreo have a little of different.

[@Youtubeuser797]

Nice Video. To be honest, the only reason why I know about some of these discontinued series’, such as Mamba a go go and ParaParaParadise, is because of their music appearing in DDR extreme lol

[@zeronxepher]

*sees osu* Oh okay.

[@bills-beard]

Aw yeah, I remember playing DanceManiax in the arcades!! Miss that one

[@radiantansel202]

I remember seeing Mambo A-Go-Go in a rural arcade I had near my home in... well... Rural Mexico haha I can add that the game was actually pretty fun, and the nature of everyone of us being kinda poor also helped, because we could play "hard songs" where you are forced to play all 3 mambos but instead, 3 players could dedicate each other to play one of them, pretty nice The interior of the mambos (I remember seeing maintenance of them once) had 3 buttons in the interior, clicky buttons. I wish I could play the game again, but haven't seen it in so long (probably more than a decade at this point). If I ever find it out, I might buy it and keep it public for people to enjoy.

[@mdifaazhari9591]

Really glad my city arcade still had dance evolution

[@ViraRiva]

i wanna try parapara paradise so bad but ive never seen a machine even in japan. im sure theres gotta be one arcade that has it still!

[@kruks]

It's not the same thing (and far less accurate), but there was a home version on PS2 with its own motion sensing controller.

[@aaronmerkel5216]

I have the ps2 home version.

[@zxc930213]

I live in Taiwan and there is still one PPP arcade machine i know exists, I also manage to get a copy and the controller for my ps2 but the controller only works for phat models though.

[@zorac91]

Being an avid rhythm gamer for more than a decade, this was a very well-made and interesting video! New sub here

[@jasonartamis2655]

love this video! thanks for making this! im very into previous bemani games and this sum it up great!

[@windowsxpnt2347]

while 5 key beatmania had it final release in 2002, its true death was with the release of iidx 26 rootage in 2018, as it was the first mainline iidx game to not include a 5 key modifier

[@ARSZLB]

Dance Maniax is the one i miss the most, my local shopping mall used to have one!

[@jirobaduya170]

Toy's march, Rapfreaks and one bemani i forgot the name.

[@MAIcrosoft]

Such a surprise to randomly see my ancient Mambo a GoGo video from 15 years ago passing by while I was casually enjoying my evening on KZbin with a few beers hahahaha 😂😂 You forgot to mention a few though like Toy's March, Hello! Pop'n music and DDR Karaoke Mix, which for the latter 2 you could argue they are a spin-off but they were actually quite a thing on it's own unlike a game like DDR Solo which only added 2 arrows. Other than that there were a few more unreleased stuff like Saikyo DJ Anikurage, Rap Freaks and that weird ass Pop'n game called "something wonderland". There's probably a few more but that's all I can think of out of my head. I still play Bemani actively nowadays, mostly SDVX and Pop'n :)

[@abrogaming5976]

I didn't actually know Musica was dead, I was at round one and someone left without using the credits they put in, so I tried it, and it was a pretty fun game

[@zipmoth]

i got into rhythm games in 2015 but took a giant pause in 2017 and i got back into them at about mid-late 2021

[@qkmr534isme]

Sad when I saw Reflec Beat is on list (Not intended to debate its alive or dead but simply feel desperate)

[@DragonMasterSubo]

Dance Freaks was awesome, very happy to have had one at my local mall arcade back in the day. You could use your knees for the under swipes and it became very dynamic with how you'd play.

[@deceptivecompactmemoryseal610]

Beatstream and OTOIROHA REALLY HAVE A HUGE POTENTIAL. but specially for the discontinued project, "OTOIROHA". This is a very intersting Arcade Style I would really look forward if they do this project, it takes the playstyle into the whole new level.

[@kagechu2005BISVG]

"...that is, *if you existed in 2001"* Me: *existed since 2005* Oh...

[@arcadesunday4592]

So many cool looking rhythm games from Japan. I only really played Guitar Hero, but would have loved to have played some of these!

[@sehun4814]

Unironically liked and subscribed, Also this was probably a mistake by you showed gameplay from bms for beatmania. Its kind of as if you had showed ITG or stepmania for DDR :). Also Bms world is known for distributing songs without permission from artists and is generally hated by bms players, understandable mistake doe

[@hi_im_los]

Hi sehun

[@__Robin_______8765]

Sehun joe mama

[@retrozaid1600]

Sad Dance ManiaX had to end so soon as it had a ton of Good Dancemania/Original Music

[@ReVerTFx]

Cool video! Keyboard mania always looked cool to me. U earned my sub

[@UnknownFlyingPancake]

I feel like I've seen Dance Maniax a long time ago at an arcade that shut down. Unless there's another game that has a similar physical setup anyway, as I can't remember what the game screen was like at all. I only remember that I couldn't figure out what to do lol It seems like unless a rhythm game becomes a huge hit, companies tend to cease support of them quickly. I only got to play Final Fantasy Theatrythm: All Star Carnival at Round 1 with online features enabled a few times before it was discontinued =( I'm glad it can still be played, but it's not as fun without your own personal team to level up.

[@sureyyacohen2223]

You might be thinking about EZ2Dancer.

[@UnknownFlyingPancake]

@@sureyyacohen2223 Looking it up, that might be possible! Unfortunately it was such a long time ago I can't remember enough to say definitely what game it was.

[@samicrossfusionxben-dhiab5441]

and thats why im trying to build my own arcade.

[@aaronmerkel5216]

I love parapara. I wish i could find a machine

[@iBoujin]

Local conventions are really the last ways to play these

[@alexis_evo]

Dead Bemani Games, from Konami's perspective: everything but IIDX and SDVX.

[@data4163]

In Norway we have a Museca cap with you can still can use online cards *I forgot what they were called*

[@RobertPatrician]

I still see Dance Maniacs cabinets in arcades. It's a fun game, particularly if you're heavier and thus can't jump around like on DDR.

[@DannySt4rr]

Dance Maniax 2nd mix has one of the best soundtracks of any Bemani game.

[@heyjakeay]

RIP Museca

[@RyteAway]

Subscribed, great vid. I'd love to see more rhythm content like this, maybe some groove coaster in the future?

[@121597Luke]

I'm so happy I found this channel

[@FNWeeaboo]

Well I'm happy you found it too

[@dcstanda]

Over here in the UK, where I am based there is a building with loads of arcades and includes imports from Japan and some of those that are mentioned I have played but I'm more a DDR fan than any of the others

[@GUCFan]

Dance Evo can be played on PC or if you don't want to go through the fuss of trying to find the game's data to run on PC. Well there's still the original Xbox 360 version out there

[@ZhadTheRad]

Meanwhile Europe: rhythm game cabinets at arcades are connected to shared servers, even dead ones, allowing for saving data for any game on the "network" and even online leaderboards.

[@nadesicola]

I didn't even realize half of these were dead

[@digitalsoftwarekillagaming]

My local round one had a Dance Evolution and its now replaced with dancearound

[@IIDXChem]

One of the design flaw of dance mania x is hitting your wrist if you are not of the right height. =/

[@berseerk987]

I saw keyboardmania only once in an arcade. The weirdest part of it, was that the selectable song list genuinely never stopped moving upward or downward. (depending on which direction you last pressed the leve on the left) . I don't know if it was a machine issue, but such thing was extremely annoying. Dancemaniacs was super fun to play. Anyway. if it wasn't for the roxor, the DDR would have been part of this list.

[@ronansorgdrager]

really solid video! loved it

[@wyattrees4449]

I played future tomtom at a con probably in 2017 or 2018 and it was actually really fun and easier to have fun as a first time player than most rhythm games. I can see why it failed but its a shame it couldn't reach its potential and I'll probably never play it again. I also got to try dancemaniax which was ok but not as fun and didn't work as well.

[@PsycheTrance65]

I know this is video is specifically for dead Bemani rhythm games, but it still reminded me how I'm still very salty at the death of DJMax Technika. Sure it had an iOS iteration, but it just wasnt the same. (plus even THAT's dead now lmao)

[@D31T7]

9:46 this UI and gameplay is similar to takt rhythm that use Leap motion to hit the side notes.

[@videogamesruinedmylife3769]

I remember seeing a korean rhythm game like dance maniacs that uses both hands and feet together

[@videogamesruinedmylife3769]

I looked it up it's called ez2dancer

[@dcvanta]

Also: Martial Beat (Bemani martial arts rhythm game for arcade and PS2) Beat Squares (Jubeat but a skill-based slot machine concept for Konami casino gaming) other Bemani pachinko and slot machines

[@jesseidk1069]

Man I’ve always wanted to play dancemaniax 😔

[@jackwithahat8601]

God I wish I could play these games, my local arcade only has a busted copy of Guitar Hero 3 roflmao

[@FNWeeaboo]

Well hey now we got Clone Hero

[@twilightexabyte]

I just learned that a local arcade near my house has DanceManiax 2nd Mix. Too bad that arcade is apparently shutting down at the end of the month. Maybe I’ll head out there and take some videos of the stuff they have before it closes

[@therandommemecat7738]

Beat mania still alive tho but it's a different version

[@Hyragana0]

What's funny is my local arcade has a dance evolution machine

[@ShiroCh_ID]

well looks like Japanese People had a fun times playing rythm game than us in the US and most country around the world and im from Indonesia and the only Rythm arcade here was Bemani SDVX,Beatmania IIDX and rare DDR machines,whie back when i was childhood(2007) theres a Drum mania and Guitar Freaks and for Korean Titles was Pump It Up,Neon FM(Rare),and Miscalleneous was Mai Mai(The Giant washing machine) and Danz Base was the game like Dance Evolution but from China

[@eXCeL2523]

There's drummania in jakarta and bali

[@viviantan1034]

Ah, shoot. My darkest secret as a Danzer (a term for DB players) got exposed lol

[@coelacanth1343]

wish they revived mambo a go go with a latin american release, also all games mentioned, and hope iidx 29 has also one too, same for all series greeting from El Salvador (^^)

[@shinuou1251]

The rumor about Dance Evolution's death is like Naoki wants to make crossbeats but got rejected. He left 573 with the dev team, then game die out soon(I am not 100% sure about this)

[@nate567987]

evolution arcade was not on naoki as he left in 2013 and evolution died in 2016 likely because MS stopped making Kinect

[@cft-nilou6609]

Before: Dance 86.4 Now. DanceRush Stardom

[@yukko_parra]

huh, i should try that future tom tom game we don't have wacca in australia yet i can find future tom tom here... funny.

[@haihatrinh3647]

IIDX and SDVX ruled the world

[@kyonamugench.]

yoooo i used to play dance 86.4 hahaha

[@NamedKid10]

Could you talk about Technomotion? Its a 8 panel ddr style rhythm game from Korea

[@nate567987]

stage has one player useing part of both pads and standing in the middle

[@wohdinhel]

Unfortunately they can only work on so many rhythm games at one time - a lot of these came from the “golden age of experimentation” in bemani where essentially I think they were just throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks, and from that separating of the wheat from the chaff arose SDVX. Unfortunately most of the others were just too niche. Like, who was gonna play Dancemaniax? That game is built to make you look like an asshole while playing. Well, more so than other rhythm games. But really, they only have so many slots for games that they can develop “long term”, and they’re not gonna keep around titles that underperform relative to their mainstay titles like IIDX and DDR. Market saturation also makes me afraid that Konami might try to kill off the studio altogether, because lord knows they’re not afraid to dismantle their powerhouse game studios.

[@mmichaelwwong]

If you ever do non bemani, look into paca paca passion it's stupid obscure

[@FNWeeaboo]

Definitely gonna do a non-Bemani video on dead music games

[@SinistralArcVI]

I love beatmania I have the console version on ps1

[@greentea_vsrg]

I like this video.

[@Jal_Ei]

beatstream is just inside-out maimai lol

[@theriseoftony]

You forgot karaoke revolution

[@samicrossfusionxben-dhiab5441]

keyboardmanias PC design was also hot garbo, gpu chips always died and other PCs similar had different amounts of gpu chips.

[@nate567987]

???

[@DanceDanceNorth]

5:31 This isn't exactly true. While the online-only version is discontinued, the offline version does have optional online support. It's just that very few _DanEvo_ machines are still on the official e-Amusement service, due to the offline support.

[@ANGRYANGRYANGRYANGRY]

I don't know that BEMANI past game. I usually play game beatmaniaIIDX, but I want play other rhythm game. I think so most hard game is pop'n stage. I'm sorry,I'm not good at English.

[@nate567987]

mame

[@sked984]

why does this vid has so little views?

[@sked984]

i meant views not vids

[@lajenehuen260]

Wasn't there a game called Toy's March? I swear I saw it being mentioned on Remywiki.

[@lixion3536]

Yes. Toy's March is actually the predecessor to Future Tom Tom. Only two pads to hit: one that correspond to the tom and the one that I think represent the crash cymbal of sort.

[@DollarStorePanda]

I played Beatstream at CCE22 at their pop up arcade. You sure it isn't possible to convert machines?

[@Mcoskii]

I doubt dancemaniax was discontinued after a year in 2000, last time I went to game underground (which has dancemaniax), I played it once and I remember both brain power and c18 were part of the song list, and the thing about this is that they were released in the last decade while beatmaniax was apparently released and discontinued a couple decades ago in the early 2000s

[@amyr1636]

What you played was Dance Maniax Update, which is a look-and-feel PC-based clone of Dance Maniax, with many new songs added. The original game did indeed die in 2000

[@Mcoskii]

@@amyr1636 thanks for letting me know, and just real quick, there were some other Japanese arcade rhythm games at the place that included museca (updated one where all songs are unlocked in an amazing song list that included songs like brain power, donut hole, 2 camellia songs (not name of a song), froggy dive (basically freedom dive with no differences except for the song cover), and plenty more), reflec beat (2 machines, there were many songs, some of which being Sakura reflection (p*light remix), towards the horizon (camellia song), chirality (also by camellia), and so many others that I can’t really remember other specific songs), and a good few others with jubeat and groove coaster being a couple of them (both Japanese arcade rhythm games here are the only ones there with Garakuta doll play, which is such a good jammer)

[@Bearcade]

Have you tried Dance aRound? I was not impressed as much as Dance Evolution.

[@ToroTor0]

Synchronica isn’t a Bemani game but it still is a really interesting game you could say it’s like Osu but it has enough of its own style and presentation to be better. Each level had its own flair and the original soundtrack was decent. Perhaps it failed because the cabinets themselves were marketed with Taiko No Tatsujin characters, confusing potential newcomers.