Pop'n difficulty questions

[KMasaki]

So I've been playing Pop'n for almost two years now, starting on 8 AC in New York, then Iroha AC in Japan, and finally all the CS' in my current home of Las Vegas.

But there's a problem- I'm stuck.

Now I don't play on those tiny KOC2s. I play the game the way it was meant to be played- first with my own homemade controller, and now with my Konami ASC. Besides, I'm not very good at IIDX anyways. I also play on HS 2x AT THE MOST, usually sticking around 1x when possible (what can I say? Old school DDR player here).

It's around the 28-31 range where it seems I'm unable to progress. 17-21 was pretty easy, 21-26 was a little rough, and now it seems that getting into the 30's are nigh impossible.

For starters...

How come I can pass Nijiiro (31) but not Ska Ska no. 4 (28)?

Not only that, but why are some songs in the same difficulty level miles apart in terms of scale? It's not DDR or IIDX where you're limited in scope to the difficulty; there ARE, after all, 48 (50?) levels.

Are there any techniques out there for the advanced Pop'n arcade player that I can learn?

And lastly, if there was a Pop'n mix and a set of songs you could suggest to help me (and other players) through the 30 barrier, what would they be?

Thanks to any that help.

[[NesS]]

The reason you can pass Nijiiro and not Ska Ska no.4 is because Nijiiro is easy. It's more a few buttons then chords where as Ska Ska is like.. gay I guess. I have the same problem where I can pass every other fucking 35 on Pop'n EXCEPT Goemon EX. That's just not a 35 to me.

[風の]

pop'n only goes up to level 43. The only things above that is a 44, 46, and 48 in Battle mode, but they're honestly easier than most 36's, so don't take those into account.

I'm pretty sure almost anyone here could tell you what your first step should be: USE HIGHER SPEED MODS. I'm an old school DDR player myself. That's really nothing to be proud of. This isn't DDR -- it's pop'n music. Speed mods are not only more than acceptable, but quite necessary. If you're wondering how fast exactly you're going to have to achieve, most advanced players here use 5x on most things around 150bpm, 4x on 200bpm, 6x on 120 or below. On harder songs, I use 5x on up to 165bpm.

As for the rating system, it's completely subjective. What one person may find easy, another may find hard. It really depends on what you're good at. If you're talking about score though, every song has different timing (for the most part), so if you're having trouble scoring on an easier song for some reason, it's probably because it has a tighter timing window. More times than not, songs in the lower difficulty levels have harder timing because they're probably from an earlier pop'n music game.

Get used to higher speed mods and you're garunteed progress. It's not a crutch.

Originally Posted by [NesS]

The reason you can pass Nijiiro and not Ska Ska no.4 is because Nijiiro is easy. It's more a few buttons then chords where as Ska Ska is like.. gay I guess. I have the same problem where I can pass every other fucking 35 on Pop'n EXCEPT Goemon EX. That's just not a 35 to me.

Goemon is a 37 now.

[Bemani_lover]

But you forgot something Kaze. The unbalanced speed mods on Pop'n 10.

What I mean KMasaki is that Pop'n 10's speed mods seem alot faster then the any of the other versions out there.

And Kaze is right, speed mods are your best friend in this game, especially when you get into the early 30's
where chords and clusters become unreadable at such low speeds

[風の]

Originally Posted by Bemani_lover

But you forgot something Kaze. The unbalanced speed mods on Pop'n 10.

What I mean KMasaki is that Pop'n 10's speed mods seem alot faster then the any of the other versions out there.

And Kaze is right, speed mods are your best friend in this game, especially when you get into the early 30's
where chords and clusters become unreadable at such low speeds

Umm...except the fact that he never once mentioned pop'n 10 in his post...?

[ThatsGobbles]

Speed mods are pretty much necessary in Pop'n. Even starting out, I adjusted BPMs to around 400-500 BPM scroll rate (i.e. if a song was 125 BPM, I'd use 4x). I'm up to 600-750 BPM now.

As for recommended songs, I'm familiar with quite a few songs at that range that offer a lot of practice on certain aspects of notecharts. Russian Pop EX, Propose EX, Dark Opera EX, A Capella EX, Plastic Pop EX, Elegothic Sabbat H, Jungle Go Go H, Tozan H are all recommendations.

[Bemani_lover]

Originally Posted by Kaze

Umm...except the fact that he never once mentioned pop'n 10 in his post...?

It was meant for future reference

[Alex]

Actually, Pop'n 10's speed mods are exactly the same as in 11, 12, 13, and 14. And 15 too! The lack of HS5 makes things a bit weird, but they've been pretty standard for six games now. The only Pop'n with "weird" speed mods is Pop'n 9, because they made the screen bigger but didn't make the pop-kuns go any faster to compensate, which they fixed in 10. Though at least Pop'n 9 had Hi-Speed 8, haha.

FOR EXAMPLE: I'm comfortable with reading at about ~750-800 bpm on Pop'n 10-15, ~900-950 bpm on Pop'n 9, and ~750-800bpm on Pop'n 8 and below. I've noticed that this is pretty much 100% consistent throughout the series, too.

So far as difficulties go, you also need to keep in mind that the pop'n difficulties are by and large kind of arbitrary until you start hitting the higher levels. Some 28s may be harder than some 31s, but not for everyone. If one song is harder than another for you, don't let the number confuse you; because it was set by someone who probably had a somewhat different idea of difficulty than you. Which, to use another example, the low-30 range in Pop'n 10 was extremely hard for me to play when I was getting into that difficulty range, but now that I've surpassed it I can go back and score extremely well on those songs, much better than I can on songs of a higher difficulty.

It's all relative, and sometimes it just doesn't even matter. Just remember that one song's harder for you, and don't get hung up on "but I can't pass a 28 :< :< :<".