In today's bit-sized feature, we see the return of a Taiko song genre that it's not showing its head around here for quite a while...
| Game | Genre |
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| iM@S MS Blue |
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★3 (159) |
★4 (182) |
★6 (317) |
★8 (600) |
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175
imsweh (Idolm@ster We Have A Dream)While nowadays the iDOLM@STER craze on the Taiko front was somehow toned down in recent years (and sometimes for other companies' arcade music games, too!), one constant factor to it is the amount of care it went to give some kind of representation to each and every entry in the multimedia franchise. This rings doubly true with this exclusive piece from one of the Vita-aimed twin collaboration titles, which aimed to touch every 765Production-related media to date since their release... and when I say everything, I mean it!
Little known fact among most casual Idolm@ster series fans is that the series has branched into the arcade rooms more than with the eponymous arcade series opener at some point... and it was in for of an actual slot machine, of all things! On May 23rd, 2012, pachislot company Sammy has released an officially-licensed arcade under the name of THE iDOLM@STER LIVE in SLOT! (アイドルマスター ライブインスロット!), in the style of the 1st-generation titles and running under Sammy's Type 5 proprietary format. This is your classic slot machine fanfare with symbols that have to be matched in rows/columns/diagonals of 3 of the same kind for a mon etary prize, with the addition of a smaller screen on top displaying the 765Pro girls practicing for their live performances, with special slot events being triggered as their coin-tossing producers keep up flinging coins at it. Just like any regular Idolm@ster game, it's possible to change the idols' outfits and make them perform with one of the original arcade's songs. Hell, it even has today's SotW pick as its debuting song, first heard before going anywhere else!
We Have A Dream is lyricized by Nemuri Nakamura (中村恵) and composed by Hiroto Sasaki (佐々木宏人), a former Bandai Namco employee. One of the five original composers for Ridge Racer's score with the Sampling Masters artists, sanodg and Takayuki Aihara, he was the one to stay with Namco for the longest time, before going for the indie musician. Mostly known as 'Saotoko' (さ男), he's been affiliated to the Yellow Magic Orchestra parody unit OMY among other units, while still being is touch with Bandai Namco from time to time, making some of the Idolm@ster series' most popular 1st-gen tracks as well as Namco Originals for Taiko games like Takara no Oka and -more recently- Inu no Norinomo, the first DLC-debuting original for Nintendo Switch/Drum 'n' Fun.
It's a full 1/16 romp to stroll by, but the abundance of note couples and not-beat-opened stanzas make for a track to play under a well-sustained pace, on par to im@s-Taiko-ports course.
