[Hudson]

Not sure how relevant this information is, but I figured I'd post it anyways.

I remember in the headline someone posted that it would be next to impossible to find an ITG player in Japan. Well, ironically enough, I'm an ITG player and I was at the location test 2 days ago (lol).

The new cabinet is amazing, and the graphics are really impressive. The new feature to darken the background behind the arrows in extremely useful, although coincidently, the new backgrounds aren't very distracting at all.
On the subject of backgrounds, DDR X really hits the nail on the head. No more dancers floating around on MGS-esque rubik's cubes. The backgrounds are really fluid, the dancers are in actual clubs (or venues), and the game is overall really impressive.

HOWEVER.

Here's the things I don't think anyone's mentioned yet (no one mentioned it in the headline):

THERE ARE TIMING PROBLEMS. Well come to DDR phase two: DDRIIDX. The new monitor has serious delay problems. You have to hit the arrows a good beat before the actual note hits. I can't tell if the game uses a sync'ing option to adjust to the monitor, but pretty much every Japanese player agreed that the timing was terrible. Arguably if you listen to the music you'll do fine, but for visual players this is very disappointing. Even with a sync'ing option (a la Pump Pro), it'll still hinder visual players' scoring ability. The new cabinet's INCREDIBLE, but I'd honestly rather have upgrade kits.

The "Shock Arrows" don't work very well at all. They're not like mines in any way. The shock arrows are always all 4 panels (and they're only in one song for now). I even ventured to play the chart on Double and it was always just all 8. Thing is, either the new pads are too sensetive, or the shock arrows are just broken, but pretty much no one fc'd the song. They just...go off. No matter what, it seems. Like, if you just up onto the bar you won't hit them, but god forbid you step in the middle (a la ITG), because you'll just get an NG and break combo.
On another note, the song(s) with shock arrows actually has a graphic on the song select screen that says that it has shock arrows, so you know ahead of time. You can turn them off, just like freezes. And after you choose the song, it shows a warning (just like with freezes) on how to do them.

The new rating system...well, many people can agree that most of the ratings are wrong, so I won't go into that. What I WILL clarify is that nothing as of yet is over an 18. Even Pluto Relinquish Double Oni is an 18. Dead End Oni on Single and Double is an 18, everything is an 18. No 19's or 20's.

And finally, for those thinking DDR is taking a step into ITG, that's soooo not true. After their first game or so, pretty much no one at the location test played DDR X songs. They're all like 6's and 7's, with one or two 8's. (All rerated on DDR X's system as 11's and 12's, etc) DDR is still the good old 8th note manifest we've all come to love, with what will eventually be a few overBPM'd boss songs that are physically impossible. It's in no way ITG.

AAAAND, that's about it. The game definitely shows so promise, but the monitor really fucks things up. Shock arrows and ratings they can fix. Monitor aside though, DDR X is a really solid title so far, and graphics are REALLY impressive. One of the best looking dancing games I've seen to date.

peace