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[Psymon]

I suddenly got this strong urge: I have to buy a music game! I have been interested in them for a long time now, and if I had a JPN/modded US Cube I probably would be playing Donkey Konga 2 right at this very moment. From what I've read Donkey Konga is pretty simple and easy, which sounds just perfect for a music game amateur like myself.
But since I don't own a modded Cube, I have to exclude DK (for now at least). But then, I remembered, there's also the Taiko no Tatsujin series. From what I've heard the Taiko games are superior to Donkey Konga 1&2, is that correct? If so, superior how? Like I already mentioned I've never played a music game (well, at least not a drum game!) before, and I'm looking for something that is easy to learn and pick up - not something that you have to dedicate 2746980509087 hours for just to learn how to drum correctly.

I'm pretty lost already and, honestly, I don't know what Taiko game to buy... and I don't even know if that's something for me (meaning: easy to pick up and understand, fun to learn, fun to play ). I'd love to read impressions, track lists, some few advices, whatever. That would be very appreciated

Oh, I also noticed Play-Asia's listing Taiko no Tatsujin 4th Generation: Gathering Festival over here -> http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-8g-70-45y-4-5-77-6-15-taiko.html
It's being released in ten days, and that sounds perfect... Or does it? :O
I did a quick Google search on 4th Generation, but didn't find much information. Help, please! ^-^

 

[brandonnn]

Be forewarned -- the Taiko series is brutal on the kana/kanji menus. I dunno if anyone on GFaqs or the like has made a guide for navigating your way through the interface, but if you don't have any/much experience with the language, you're gonna be grasping your head and shrieking when you first boot it up.

Apart from that, though, every casual I have introduced to the series has totally flipped for it -- both it and Konga are very, very accessible and have a breezy difficulty ramp. Taiko somehow seems a little less insultingly easy on the lower difficulty levels, possibly because you're not clapping along to Turkey in the Straw or whathaveyou, which is like someone please get the droolcup.

Taiko's also got the more eye-poppingly impressive visuals/character design, despite the lo-res (which I believe has been upgraded in 4th and will be what we get here in the states as Taiko: Drum Master), and seems to have a more diverse mix of music compared to Konga. There's still more j-pop, anime theme songs, and the ubiquitous MiniMoni than you can shake a stick of almond Pocky at, but it also seems to stray more into classical medleys, Japanese traditional taiko-flavored songs, and a dash of game themes (Soul Calibur 2, Klonoa, Mr. Driller, Mojipittan) for good measure.

It looks like Play-Asia isn't selling any of the earlier combo packs (vol. 1 or 2 packaged with the drum), so your best bet is to go for http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-8g-70-2hl-4-5-77-7-15-taiko.html and pick up vol. 4 in a few days. If you can find an older volume with the drum elsewhere, P-A's also got the cheapie 3rd/anime set (with stickers!) for $64, compared to the $98 you'd pay for both individually, at http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-8g-70-3xj-4-5-77-3-15-taiko.html.

Good luck!

edit:

Also, if it's tracklistings you're looking for, you can find them here:

vol. 1 -- http://www.namco-ch.net/taiko/index.php
vol. 2 -- http://www.namco-ch.net/taiko_doki/music.html
vol. 3 -- http://www.namco-ch.net/taiko_appare/music/index.html
vol. 'anime' -- http://www.namco-ch.net/taiko_anime/musiclist.html
vol. 4 -- http://www.namco-ch.net/taiko_yondaime/music/index.html

 

[Psymon]

Thanks.

Hm, but now I'm a little worried. You see, I can't read a single word of japanese. Hmm. :/

Do you think getting 3rd Generation is a better choice than waiting for 4th?

 

[brandonnn]

Well, someone has done a FAQ at http://db.gamefaqs.com/console/ps2/file/taiko_no_tatsujin.txt for the first volume, and the interface is essentially the same throughout the series, so even if you're picking up a later volume it'll still come in handy.

There's audio cues, too, if you know what you're listening for -- AR-KAY-DO-MO-DO for arcade mode, FU-REE-MO-DO for free mode, etc., and if the little duder sounds scared when you're going to the song select mode, you can bet that you're about to embark on the harder course.

I don't mean to put you off at all, because I think with a bit of dinking around you'll be able to figure it out and learn your way around in the better part of an afternoon.

As for which volume you'll want to start off with, it's really just whenever you're ready to jump in and get your feet wet. None of the mixes so far have made me leap out of my chair and declare it OMG THE DEFINITIVE MIX -- they're basically all good.

 

[SiegfriedFM]

I really wouldn't recommend Taiko, even as a first music game. It's just insultingly easy, just like Konga. Not to mention that it's dull. There is very little variation and the noise from the drum itself drowns the music (including the notes you play). You could play it alone, but any spectators would most likely just be annoyed by listening.

If you want a fun music game with an expensive accessory, get Pop'n Music, or Guitar Freaks+Drum Mania. Starter songs aren't that difficult and there is room to improve. Once you can keep a rhythm going, Taiko has nothing to offer.

Oh, and if you get Guitar Freaks, make sure to get an official Konami guitar. Four cheap guitars from Lan-Kwei/Lik-Sang have now crapped out on me after very little playing. Next time I'm going official.

And if you really MUST have Taiko (with the 3rd game, with the SC2 song) I guess I could sell you mine if you're willing to wait a month and pay shipping from Sweden (not much more expensive than shipping from Japan I'd assume)...

 

[brandonnn]

I think part of the casual draw and mainstream success of Konga/Taiko is the very fact that it doesn't require an insanely expensive peripheral to get the 'true' experience.

Are hardcore bemani devotees unchallenged by Konga/Taiko? As far as I've seen, absolutely -- no surprises there. Are casuals and those uninitiated in the ways of the music game more likely to embrace them as opposed to the bemani lineup? In my experience, yes.

Coordinating 9 colored buttons arbitrarily to falling circles on a screen is a very different beast than picking up two sticks and whacking a drum, or slapping kongas with a clap in between. The payoff for devoting '2746980509087 hours' to become a Pop'n Master might be much richer (see: the infamous video), but for those unwilling to take that on right off the bat, K/T is a great introduction.

 

[Psymon]

Hm. Hmm. Oh. Hmmm. Now my mind feels really torn apart. :O

I should maybe add that my relation with rhythm isn't very co-operative. I am really interested in music and instruments and so... But no. You remember those music lessons at school where you have to keep a rhythm by clapping your hand on your lap and then with the other hand? Argh, let's just forget about it. So if a music game is insultingly easy, it'll probably still be challenging for me. >_<

Hmm-hmm, Taiko still sounds exciting...

On the other hand... Guitar Freaks, you say? My burning love (uh-oh) for acoustic guitars can't be described... with my lacking English skills.
But on the other (other) hand, an official guitar set sounds very pricey (?).

By the way, SiegfriedFM: jag bor i Sverige.

 

[BugCatcher]

I think part of the casual draw and mainstream success of Konga/Taiko is the very fact that it doesn't require an insanely expensive peripheral to get the 'true' experience.

To be fair, in the case of Pop'n and Beatmania, there are more modestly priced home versions of the arcade style controllers, but there is no ridiculously priced arcade version of the Taiko controllers, AFAIK. However, the controllers for Taiko no Tatsujin and Donkey Konga are still cheaper than the home versions of the other controllers.

I play Beatmania, myself, but because of the price point and learning curve, I would have to agree that Taiko or Konga is the way to go for a beginner.

 

[bobbyconover]

Hm. Hmm. Oh. Hmmm. Now my mind feels really torn apart. :O

With good reason! There are many factors to consider. Let me add a few more to the pile.

I'm not even going to touch Drum Mania, though it's pretty much my favorite of all music games, because of the huge expense and general lack of availability. Guitar Freaks is much more doable, and though I don't know if anyone currently stocks official Konami guitars, shouldn't be too expensive.

The game starts off very easy, though there's some small shred of inherent coordination needed since you'll be "picking" on the guitar at the same time that you push down the "frets" on the neck, and ramps up in difficulty. And up, and up. Once you get it down, which honestly doesn't take long - I may be one of these 4343287492 hour bemani experts now, but I still remember my first Guitar Freaks baby steps - it's the most satisfying feeling in the world. It really blows away the monotone don-don-don-dondondon that you're stuck with playing over every single song in Taiko no Tatsujin, especially when you include friends for 2-player simultaneous play and start pulling off blistering dual-harmony solos. It makes you actually feel like a rock star in the heat of the moment.

Very few songs are acoustic - Guitar Freaks is all about the cheesy 80s-style hard rock and pop, with a nice mix of ska, surf, jazz and blues thrown in to keep it from becoming too redundant. A love of that kind of music, above all, will endear you to this game (and Drum Mania, which shares its track list). If it's not your thing, you probably won't find the game as easy to get into.

There are 4 mixes available for ps1 and ps2, all of which are packed with awesome original content, and the ps2 versions even include the full corresponding Drum Mania mixes in case you ever want to expand your setup to include that controller. Compare this to 4 Taiko no Tatsujin mixes to date, all of which are decent but not particularly memorable outside of the obligatory one or two game-songs included in each. The downside is that there will likely never be any new Guitar Freaks console mixes, despite the series' seemingly endless popularity in arcades - Guitar Freaks 4th Mix & Drum Mania 3rd Mix came out for ps2 a good 2 or 3 years ago now, and there are no known plans for newer (they're up to 11/10 in arcades) mixes to follow. Taiko no Tatsujin seems to be going very strong on the console front, so at least if you buy that you can rest assured that you'll have many to choose from.

Then again, I know at least 5-10 people who own Taiko no Tatsujin, and I don't think a single one of them has bought all 3 sequels. Once you dondondon through one or two mixes you've pretty much seen it all, sadly. Everyone I know who is into Guitar Freaks, on the other hand, owns all 4 mixes, bought each in a near-religious fervor upon its release, and still plays them at least occasionally all these years down the line.

Taiko may still be for you, though. Brandon summed up the positives well and I more or less agree with him. It's definitely easier for first-timers than any other music game (for better or for worse), it's very easy to obtain for a reasonable price, and if you pull it out in front of someone who is unaccustomed to all this zany rhythm game business there's a good chance he or she will flip out - at least temporarily.

Taiko no Tatsujin is a safe-bet rhythm game without a lot of true longevity, which may or may not be enough to satisfy you. If it's not, you can always take the plunge into the vast bemani catalog. Who knows, you might even become obsessed to the point where you gotta catch em all. I've seen it happen enough times before!

 

[brandonnn]

To be fair, in the case of Pop'n and Beatmania, there are more modestly priced home versions of the arcade style controllers

Yeah, I realized I was out on a shaky limb there, I was just running explicitly counter to the 'if you want a fun music game with an expensive accessory' bit.

 

[brandonnn]

I know at least 5-10 people who own Taiko no Tatsujin, and I don't think a single one of them has bought all 3 sequels.

I've bought four, if you include Anime, and I'll be picking up vol. 4 in a few weeks time for some messymouth watermelon fun.

I was always the least 'bemani' of the '#bemani's, tho.

 

[SiegfriedFM]

You're in Sweden? If you really want Taiko, I could easily part with it, but I won't have access to it until August. If you happen to live close by, I could also give you a demonstration of the other games. Send me a mail and I guess we could arrange something (siegfriedfm (at) hotmail.com)...

I own DrumMania 1st, Guitar Freaks 1st, GF4th+DM3rd, BeatMania 1st, Pop'n Music 1-3 (Dreamcast versions) and Taiko 3, all with the corresponding controllers. I've also played Donkey Konga enough to have mastered it (an hour ), so I almost have that setup already. Looking at either getting Keyboard Mania or PS2 versions of PnM one of those days.

Anyway, the most important thing to consider is longevity. Konga or Taiko aren't that inexpensive compared to the Bemani games, and you will most likely get tired of them in a few days. Any gamer can learn the easiest songs on GF in minutes and then play them until they get a feel for the controls. After that it's just a matter of practice. Oh, and those games have practice modes where you can slow down the song...

 

[bobbyconover]

I've bought four

Dammit man. I knew I was taking a risk saying that and really hoped you woudn't be able to call me on it!

I would gladly own them all as well, and I will probably buy the nice new high-res version(s), but I'm excluding myself from the statistics on account of the fact that I'll buy anything even remotely rhythmy regardless of quality. See Dog of Bay, Unison, and Love Aerobics. >_<

 

[Psymon]

Thanks for the replies, all of you!

I have to admit that Guitar Freaks sounds rather interesting. Can I find videos of it in action somewhere, perhaps? And, oh... how do you play the guitar? I don't know if I'm blind, but I really can't see any strings. Is it something like this: the red/green/blue button setup represents the frets and the purple rectangular-like spot is a button you have to press while holding the fret button(s)?

About the music: I'm not a big fan of epic 80's rock ballads (well, not yet, anyway ). However happy, poppy, catchy pop tunes make my brain melt and usually make me sing along. What's the music selection like? Some kind of mix of progressive-hypnotizing-alternative rock epics or happy-omghi2u-weii-whee-lalala pop songs (I prefer the latter).

Actually, I'd get Guitar Freaks right away. Guitars... oh, guitars. Oh, wait! You don't have to be a great guitar player to understand GF, do you? Although I love acoustic guitars (and have never ever touched an electrical guitar), I admittedly am a very bad guitar player (those crazy bar chords still are puzzling to me ).
The biggest gripe, though, seems to be the price. Play-Asia has "GitaDora! Guitar Freaks 4th Mix and DrumMania 3rd Mix" (that's the game I should get, right?) for $65+shipping, which is pretty reasonable, I guess (?). But then there's the guitar. Where can I find the Konami guitar, and how much should/will it cost? Are the third party guitars (for example $15 from Lik-Sang) really that bad?

And again: where can I find videos of GF?

 

[SiegfriedFM]

I've never seen a video of it. Check Lost in Translation for a short clip .

Yes, the control is exactly that way, with one addition. There is a sensor inside that lets you do "wailing" motions to score extra points...

There aren't many rock ballads in GF4, more pop and various other genres. Some 60s pop, some J-pop, some taiko (!)...

I haven't touched a real guitar for years and have no idea how to play, but GF is quite intuitive.

The game goes for around that price, guitars should cost around $30. You might want to check rinkya.com and then yahoo.co.jp auctions... it costs a bit to buy from Japanese auctions through them but chances are much higher that you will find used copies which are non-existent on Ebay.

As I said, the first two guitars broke down after a weekend session. The two I have now both are glitchy from the start, randomly pushing one of the buttons. I'm gonna open them up and see if I can fix anything.

 

[Belfast]

You don't need to know much about guitars to play guitar freaks and while a peripheral controller certainly helps, the game can be played fairly effectively on a bog-standard Dualshock. Its a weird kind of set up where you sort of turn the controller upside down and use three fingers on the face buttons to hold the frets, while using a finger on your other hand to hit the up/down buttons on the pad to strum. Its situated this way so that it feels like you're holding a mini-guitar, with the frets at the top and the strummer at the bottom.

Taiko's a fun game, but ultimately its pretty easy. I would recommend going for it, though, and if you like it and eventually get tired of it, maybe you can graduate on to some of the harder music-based games.

 

[Psymon]

Sounds great, except for that I don't think my bank card & e-card hybrid works well with auction sites (life is tough when you're not 18 yet ). :/

I did some more searches on Google and found these, though:

http://www.goldenshop.com.hk/AI-trad/psx/p_guitarrum.htm

http://www.dcslinks.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=395

Are those two utter garbage as well?

---

Or, hmm, I don't know. Maybe Taiko still is the best choice for someone who's never played music games before...?

 

[bobbyconover]

Belfast is right - I completely forgot how well Guitar Freaks translates to the dual shock. I actually played it that way for a good 6 months myself and got very good at it before buying the official guitar. You might want to consider doing that before going all-in and buying the guitar.

On that note, please don't even consider buying 3rd party knock-off controllers. They are truly horrible, and all they'll do is frustrate and annoy you to the point where you'll want an official controller more than ever. Please trust me on this. I know the allure of the $20 Guitar Freaks controller is strong, but buying one never works out for the best. Like Brandon hinted at, he and I frequented a bemani chat room for years and we saw many many folks come and go, most of whom either wanted to know which controller to buy (and then ignored us and bought the 3rd party ones anyway) or were fed up with their 3rd party controllers and wanted to know where to get official ones.

The rule of thumb - and I've yet to see a single exception - is that every single bootleg controller for every single Bemani game sucks ass.

Seriously. Don't buy a bootleg. You'll regret it.

I'm not kidding.




Really.

 

[Belfast]

The third-party Drummania controller isn't that bad (don't remember the company's name at the moment). Its not as responsive as it should be, but for the price, its probably the best bet. Of course you can always get the special Yamaha set for a billion dollars if you want.....

 

[SiegfriedFM]

Well, as I said, if you can hold off on your purchase for another month, you can have a nice set of Taiko sent within Sweden, and I can finally get rid of the stuff . I'd still suggest that you look into Guitar Freaks, and yes, the controller works quite well. Although I use L1, L2 and Right for buttons and X to pick when I don't have any working guitars.

 

[Psymon]

Initially I was planning to buy Taiko pretty soon so that I'd have something new to play around with the rest of my summer vacation. When school kicks off again in late August that's also where my concentration will be set for the reamining half of this year. When in August do you think you can ship it? And, of course, how much do you want for the set? Play-Asia has the 3rd Generation bundle for ~$80+$28 shipping (805 SEK), and Lik-Sang has it for $70 (but I don't know what the shipping will end up being), just for reference. I live in Stockholm, by the way.

I have to mention one thing, though. And that is that I often end up getting strong "omg-that-I-must-have-I-need-that-now-import-store-here-I-come" impulses (luckily, I can't afford to live that ). These impulses usually die off after a few days and this whole music game obsession could be one of those. That said, I can't guarantee I'll buy something, yet.

---
Another question: Which is better - Taiko no Tatsujin or Donkey Konga? I somewhere read that Konga is inferior to Taiko, is that correct?

 

[Belfast]

Konga is quite inferior. Besides, even if both games are really easy, you at least have the awesomely cute characters from Taiko to look at rather than that ugly DK sprite. Seriously, those Taiko drums are freakin cute! I ordered a plush one for my girlfriend for her birthday and it made her VERY VERY happy (especially since she'd been having a pretty crappy day all day and on her birthday no less). You can't look at them and NOT cheer up.

 

[bobbyconover]

I totally disagree, and think Donkey Konga is superior to Taiko no Tatsujin in both music selection and gameplay. The clap alone adds a hilarious and silly element to the game that is absolutely awesome, especially when you get multiplayer games going. On top of that, while DK is pathetically easy compared to the best Bemani games, it's still far more difficult than Taiko at its hardest levels. I also greatly prefer playing the nice rubbery-top drums to the slab-of-flat-plastic Taiko drum. There's no question that the Taiko characters (and Mr Driller, Klonoa, the Mojipittan guys, etc) blow away the 2-frame-animated Rare-style Donkey Kong characters in the radness department, but it doesn't really make up for inferior, well, everything else. Also, the Konga can be used for DK Jungle Beat, which is a kickass game all its own. Who knows what other uses they might come up with for the drum - worst case scenario it'll be a two-trick-pony, which still beats the competition.

 

[Psymon]

Interesting, interesting. :O

I completely forgot about Jungle Beat! How could I do such a thing! It's absolutely one of those - few (!!!) - games I'm actually looking forward to play. Donkey Konga, hmm. There are going to be some song list changes between the US and PAL versions, right?

 

[evilromero]

If you can wait a little longer both are coming stateside. I would recommend DK just because I prefer the controller over the taiko. But both are damn fun. Also both, depending on the version, have very similar song lists.