Today's weekly feature is Idolm@ster-themed, as we take a look at a couple of songs that have been composed in two different "game generations" of the franchise from each other.
Kamisama no Birthday (神さまのBirthday) THE iDOLM@STER| Version |  |  |  |  |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| All arcade, Taiko Wii 1 | x3 (160) | x5 (220) | x5 (330) | x7 (506) |
| im@s MS Red | x3 (136) | x5 (162) | x5 (335) | x7 (506) |
Taiko 12/12 Asian, Taiko 12.5, Taiko Wii 1, im@s MS Red
148
none
kamism / imskam (im@s MS only)Originally featured in Taiko grounds as a shared hidden track between the first Taiko Wii title and the 12th arcade installment, Kamisama no Birthday (lit. 'God's Birthday') is one of the Idolm@ster tracks featured in our drumming franchise that comes from the fan-dubbed '1st Generation' of games/media from Bandai Namco's idol-centric series. It was also included in the General Asia of Taiko 12, with a slight title alteration to better suit the Chinese language (as '上帝的Birthday').
This is one of the songs composed by the nick-named series resident Yoshi that made into Taiko gaming alongside others, such as shiny smile and S(mile)ING!, with Sachiko Inamura (伊那村さちこ) writing the lyrics for it. Originally, the song was made for the album THE IDOLM@STER MASTERWORK 00, published by Columbia on December 20th, 2006 as the first entry in the MASTERWORK album series, only to be featured a couple of years later into actual Idolm@ster games, starting with 2008 THE iDOLM@STER: Live for You! as one of its DLC tracks.
In the Im@s titles (as well as Taiko games), the main version of Kamisama no Birthday is performed by the original 765PRO ALLSTARS unit that is made of all the 1st Generation idols, but the later-released Must Songs twin titles revived the song with the addition of the original MASTERWORK 00 version as an unlockable playable version, only starring three of the original idols as the singers: Haruka Amami (VA: Eriko Nakamura, 中村繪里子), Chihaya Kisaragi (VA: Asai Imai, 今井麻美) and Miki Hoshii (VA: Akiko Hasegawa, 長谷川明子).
Contrary to common belief, there are some old-generation songs where the only notechart that hasn't received any changes of sorts is the Oni/Donderful mode, and Kamisama no Birthday is one of them! While the KFM notechart set has been tweaked by Kuboken (くぼけん) for the song's release on the Must Song duo's Red Album version, the cluster-based blend that has distinguished early Im@s tracks in Taiko fields is up and accounting to all of its outings, starring several regular cluster formations for a pure 1/16 notechart challenge.
Day of the future| Version | | | | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| All | x3 (125) | x4 (200) | x5 (362) | x9 (765) |
im@s MS Blue 104-158 none imsdayFor our representative coming from the '2nd Vision' series, we have one of the original 765PRO idols once again, for a song whose creative background is definitely bearing more than beneath the surface... especially if you're a general music games appreciator!
Unlike with tracks like Kamisama no Birthday which are composed/lyricized by Bandai Namco artists, many Im@s tunes like Day of the Future were created by freelance talents, making the main bulk of Columbia's MASTER ARTIST album collections' song repertoire. For this track in particular, we have Oruka Homi (オミ織葉) as the lyricist (mostly known for her works with the IOSYS doujin group) and the nick-named Tatsh as the composer... yes, that Tatsh! Day of the future is one of idol Hoshii Miki's image songs and its debut occurred with the release of Columbia's THE IDOLM@STER MASTER ARTIST 2 -FIRST SEASON- 03 Hoshii Miki album, released on November 3rd, 2010 as part of the MASTER ARTIST album series' second cycle. It's also probably the closest Taiko gaming will get in terms of a beatmania IIDX tie-in; according to Tatsh himself in one of his blog entries (link), the song was originally made in 2010 for bemani's everlasting music game series, under the title 'Two Rainbow'!
Day of the future made its Taiko debut with the other title of the Idolm@ster Must Songs twin release; as such, its charts were made - once again - by resident Taiko Team member Kuboken (くぼけん). With many Go-Go Time bursts and scrolling speed double-ups for some added visual flairs, its notechart set's Oni mode is sure to keep high the pressure with more irregular and longer note clusters to keep the mind busy on pattern-reading skills, with the occasional 1/24 hybrid note spikes as customary for modern Oni charts. Considering how the Oni max combo total counts 765 notes, it may be interesting to point out how the notechart will count precisely 573 notes before its most generous pause portion, right before the song's last Go-Go Time rush!
