Our pre-Halloween coverage of yesterday's Taiko Team livestream is now on! Find out the lows and peaks of yesterday's event with this handy illustrated recap.
One new peculiar feature of the stream is that live tweets from Taiko Team member Takemoto have been more regularly sent throughout the stream's running time, so for the little few things that we couldn't take a snap we can post the related tweet instead.
Let's start with some tweet from the beginning. Something that should make iOS players really happy!
【太鼓ニコ生】「太鼓の達人プラス」1000万DL記念ぱっくの6曲目は「Ｘａ(裏譜面あり)」に決定ー！ http://t.co/dLAGdkA0ZL #taiko765
— 太鼓チーム (@taiko_team) 30 Ottobre 2014
The popular iOS game's 100 Million Download campaign drew a lot of attention on the Taiko Team's Twitter page, and so one of the most desired songs will be available for it: it's Tatsh's Xa, complete with Ura Oni mode! The song was chosen through an online poll, with the other 2 contestants being Sacred Ruin and Nightmare Survivor, also songs with Ura (Sacred Ruin has an Ura through Picopico Ruin)
【太鼓ニコ生】本日も「みんチャレ・ニコ生版」やります！本日の10万コメントこぼうびは。。。「はたラク2000」です！ http://t.co/dLAGdkA0ZL #taiko765
— 太鼓チーム (@taiko_team) 30 Ottobre 2014
Another early announcement spread on Twitter later on is the name of the mysterious popular Namco Original involved in the one-day revival of the NicoVideo comments challenge: Hataraku 2000! Needless to say, the goal was reached, like all others before it.These two announcements are followed by the the first activity in the stream's schedule: new title brainstorming! Just for a quick reminder, these will be awarded after a Full Combo of Xa (Ura Oni) and Souryuu no Ran (Oni and Ura Oni).
The first winner title for Xa's Ura Oni FC is Sharera Master (シャレラの達人), as the picture above shows. The two titles for the 'no Ran' series song are Double Dragon Conqueror (双竜を討ちし者) for regular Oni and Double God Dragon King (双神竜王) for the Ura Oni. Doesn't matter whether you're playing on one or both drums (which means the Ura Oni title should be a lot easier to get)!
Another user-driven poll activity involved the suggested songs for the songs suggested by the Taiko Cram School feature upon clearing the 10-Dan Dojo Ranking trial. These were the most voted candidates!
However,which of these songs actually made the cut? Let's find out...
...well Mata Saitama 2000, you will get your day soon...
More suggestions for Taiko Cram School are being accepted! 7-Dan and 8-Dan this time. Keep in mind these songs before you throw in some suggestions!
Coming up is the first video-message from external composers! This one features Kawagen Collagen and singer duo Danchinomiya, the younger sister of which sang Yureru Pleats Jikkouiin. They are here today to talk about the song, and also a small promo of their upcoming live performance for the interested fans.
We also see some of the harder-to-decipher lyrics in text. Being school festival themed, there sure are a lot of school subject puns just lying around!
Left: "Today we say goodbye to factors and chemical names"
Right: "Tasks at hand are always Archimedes" (how did that one-pi-r just slip in lol)
After hearing feedback from the Taiko Team followers and a subsequent vote, it was decided that their next installment in this line of school-themed songs for Taiko no Tatsujin games will be on the graduation trip. For more updates about the song's creation, they also invited the streamers to follow their Twitter account. If you have any trouble finding it, just search for the name displayed above!
The poll is followed by another video message for the streamers, this time from a brand-new chiptune unit for the Taiko scene: meet Hige DriVAN!
Mostly known as Hige Driver, this musician and his band will appear in Taiko with one of his most popular songs: Tokyo Soda (東京ソーダ). The announcement was followed by a recorded live performance of the song. And to tease the Taiko scene, the video runs again but with Taiko sounds and parts of the kuchi-shoga (the text usually under the notes). Even if no footage of the Taiko edit of the song has been found yet, you can hear an extract from Tokyo Soda in the video below:
Next in line was the returning 'Namco Sounds Backstage' segment, this time featuring long-time series contributor Yano Yoshihito. Give him a warm welcome, everybody!
Left: List of Yano's creations in no specific order
Right: The same list, but divided by the level of gimmick
These are all the songs Yano has worked on in Taiko (that's a lot!), including all his supporting roles as well. As you can see, the man is the leading force of the 'de' series songs, as well as some of the fan-favorite Namco Original boss songs and recent tracks.
Keywords: Boss, Tanuki, Outer space, Asteroids
Image: Spacey last boss, especially FF-ey?
Attack: Cover lane from the start.
Background outer space, attack with meteors
Lane suffers nuisance attack with falling planets
With Yano Yoshito still on stage, the Song Lyrics feature starts kicking in, with a heavy focus on the songs he sang for, or even the character he dubbed! For the latter category, here's the final boss of the third Taiko DS game's Story mode, with all his lines for the final fight.
(I am happy to report this is all gibberish.)
Here is an extract of Jigoku no Daiou's lyrics, the final boss song from the same game. These are not available on any soundtrack album, and is the song's fictional language being pronounced in Japanese. Fun to see it materialize!
"Are you OK Masao-kun" is said by Masao's teacher primary school, specifically one teaching Japanese language class.
This one is a lyrics sheet extract from Dajare de Oshare, complete with the background voice comments and other notes not listed in any soundtrack to date.
Bouken Hiyori lyrics too! It is also interesting to see how much small tweaks has made to the song before the final version, with all kinds of consideration of mood and environment.
Konya wa Homi, another of his works, actually has a deep story running behind it, with an imaginary show that lasted two episodes before being 'cancelled'.
Then, we cut to... ehm... something completely different.
What you're looking at is the title card of Audio Deka, a 2-part funny side-show full of cheese from the Taiko Team itself! In this weird segment, Masubuchi and NAMCO SOUNDS audio programmer Hiroto Fushimi (伏見洋人) are private investigators put in charge of finding out more about a mysterious hidden song. Everything was narrated by a dubbed slide-show of still images, in the vein of real, frame-centric TV and Radio dramas.
Sadly for you guys, no video footage of this wacky interval segment have been spread on the Internet, but here are some still images for you to enjoy. I know that a little bit of context would make you enjoy this more, but trust me when I say that these would have had as much sense as with the proper context...
During the rolling credits, both the parts of this mini-drama hinted that the song used for the show are coming from a rather obscure Ps2 title -CRITICAL VELOCITY- whose soundtrack can be bought on iTunes. Will it be on Taiko someday, too?
After Audio Deka's ending, we got yet another live performance, featuring Masubuchi on the drums and Yano Yoshito at the keyboard, using a xylophone-themed sound palette. The two performed the always-popular Soul Calibur II ~Brave Sword, Braver Soul~ and a lyricless version of Boku wa Shinse. No Youtube/Nicovideo recording for this fragment either, so... sorry.
After Yano Yoshito left, Taiko 3DS 2 game producer Sasaoka steps in. By this point you already know what's going to happen, right?
Yup, it's time for our monthly DLC pack foreshadowing! The next song pack for Taiko 3DS 2 is slated to release on November 20th, featuring the folllowing songs:
In a not-so-surprising twist, all the songs are returning tracks from previous Taiko games, featuring the 10* Oni GUMI CF contest song, Juukinzou Fugitive's console debut, yet another returning 2000 song and -surprise, surprise!- the return of playable long versions of songs on console with Hikari no Kanata e! Even Dr. Waruru's theme song is in this pack as well.
At this point, try guessing which familiar Taiko characters will appear in the extra story chapter this time...
...no really, try guessing before scrolling down...
....
Yup, it's the
Coming next is Taiko Team mascot Daifuku, bringing some food to the stream's hosts. But these are not any regular goods! The Meiji brand is doing a collaboration with Taiko games, featuring special QR codes in 4 different kind of snacks which can grant custom outfits in Taiko 3DS 2 for Don-Chan! Try out every snack!
Right after Daifuku tried to block a weird survey and subsequently leaving the stage, Etou showed the two mini-albums from IOSYS featuring the two latest Namco Originals on Taiko Kimidori, featuring long versions and karaoke edited cuts.
Up next is the current Taiko Kimidori talk, at first aimed at what we already know such as November's monthly unlocks and Game Version 5.06's new songs, mentioning of course a certain fan-gasmic tournament.
While nothing new was said about the Tenkaichi Otogesai, we have a more extended talk on a side feature coming soon on arcades. The Top 3 individual scores for each song and each mode will be displayed both on the songlist and after a play just like console games do, whether the play results in a pass or a fail.
Note: Shin-uchi scores are not ranked. At the song selection part, Ura rankings are not shown. Only when you confirmed the song and made Ura Oni appear will the Ura rankings start rotating out.
Some other new features introduced more recently are new custom folders, including one for the Tenkaichi Otogesai songs and a brand-new one for all the Idolm@ster tunes.
Coming up next is a brief talk about the upcoming Hakurei Shrine Fall Reitasai festival and all the Taiko content previously announced, including the limited songs and Marisa Don-Chan outfit.
What follows this Touhou reminder, however, is something completely new: Namco Sounds composers actually remixing existing songs from Touhou games!
Further proving how the legacy started by a single man on independent shooting games knows no boundaries, four Namco in-house composers are arranging four Touhou tunes and make them playable tracks on arcade Taiko games! Below we have the four tracks that will be arranged for this collaboration:
And here are the participating composers to this event: Linda AI-Cue, Junichi Nakatsuru (Sports Digesdon, junction), Kyo (Zero no Nocturne) and Watanabe Ryo (Kimi no Akari).
Note: the 'New Space Order' in the Linda AI-Cue 'contributing series role' line refers to a planned RTS game with Xevious elements which was ultimately scrapped in 2009, but it's been credited anyways as the songs used still appear in the related Anime series, also called New Space Order.
After this, the Taiko Team tackles a boss for the Taiko RPG iOS game, pulling off a perfect run. Well done! Showcased here includes the special Bind skill that disable your team members, and the corresponding technique to scroll your team structure to hide away your binded members.
This Dokodon Fighter style Omen-kosou boss will be released shortly to the public game. It can even be evolved to a much more muscular form.
Around this time, the 87600 comment goal has been reached, so the streamers had to decide which one of these Codename Katsu-Don costumes deserved the most to be revived on Taiko Kimidori.
Wouldn't you know it, the Halloween costume won with a staggering majority! This outfit will be split into two parts and made available for Kimidori users later this year (for those who didn't unlock it from Katsu-Don).
And the final piece of news is about the Huis Ten Bosch Taiko no Tatsujin 3D Projection Mapping exhibit. Not only is the exhibition period once again due to popular demand, they are stepping up a notch and holding a Huis Ten Bosch Cup tournament! We will do a full coverage with the upcoming special page on the Huis Ten Bosch site.
In celebration of this victory, the Taiko Team hosts with Yano Yoshito and Sasaoka ended the stream by raving a bit under the notes of Hello! Halloween. Have a spooky Halloween, everybody!
