Forgotten Gaming- DJMax Portable 3

Name- DJMax Portable 3

Platform- PlayStation Portable (also playable on PlayStation Vita)

Developer- Pentavision

Released- October 2010

ESRB Rating- Who cares?!

With North Korea in the news so much lately, I thought I’d do a Forgotten Gaming segment on one of my hands-down favorite music games which happens to hail from South Korea. You’ve heard of Dance Dance Revolution and Guitar Hero, maybe even Beatmania and Pop’n Music. But how about DJMax?

The original DJMax started as an online note-matching game in 2003 that never left South Korea. As the brand became more popular, games in the series later appeared on the PlayStation Portable (PSP) and spinoffs also made their way to the arcade. In the past few years the series became more worldly, entering Japan, North America and Europe. At least in the case of North America (yes I’m being biased here =P), DJMax Portable 1 and 2 were amalgamated into a single game: DJMax Fever. By the time the latest DJMax game was ready to land, all of the non-Korean regions were brought up to speed and so DJMax Portable 3 was released worldwide.

DJMax is an extremely simple game at its heart, and is very similar to BeatMania. As a song is played, various notes fall down the screen in different lanes, and your job is to tap the corresponding button in time with the note. There is no story or plot, and your goal is simply to get a high score through proper timing and accuracy. However DJMax as a few tricks up its sleeve, as what could be a very boring-looking game:

Is very quickly turned into something like this:

DJMax’s ace up its sleeve it that it’s a complete assault on every synapse of your brain. Dim the lights, crank up your headphones and get ready to be lost completely in the zone while the music and visuals take over completely. The DJMax games are easily the coolest-looking games you’ll ever play, with random lights and accenting every random word that pops up, all in time with the beat. And yet, it’s never too much to the point of being in bad taste (or too taxing for the system’s hardware), nor is it distracting enough to get you off your game. The game’s visual design is meant to blend in with the experience, and oh does it ever.

Every song (of which each game features dozens) has its own music video which plays in the background, and each song has several note patterns of varying difficulties. Though note patterns that feature 4 tracks (buttons) are generally easier than patterns that use 5, 6 or even 8, don’t let that fool you. DJMax’s other ace is that it can be excruciatingly, punishingly, hellishly difficult. Since the notes you tap can represent any instrument in the song, you can be tapping out the vocals at one part and then seamlessly start tapping the drumbeats. It’s lots of fun to play through the songs in different charts and see what part of the song you wind up actually ‘playing’.

So why would you want to play such a hard and unforgiving game? First of all it looks cool and the songs are catchy, as shallow as that is. But it’s also a game that rewards practice and perseverance. After playing the hard songs over and over, consistently failing, you’ll notice you’re getting a little further each time you try. Eventually you’ll make it through the song by the skin of your teeth, and you’ll feel amazing (and sore) at the end of it. Future plays only start getting easier, and that’s when you start considering playing in 6-track mode…

That’s the DJMax series in a nutshell, but we’re here to talk about DJMax Portable 3. Though Portable 3 uses the same 4 or 6 lane setup like its predecessors, the true core of the game is in the remix lanes that flank the sides. Allow the visual aid to demonstrate:

In the Remix modes, you’ll play the song normally in the ‘classic zone,’ but every now and then notes will come down in the ‘remix zones’. By pushing the PSP’s analog nub left or right into the proper zone, the extra notes hit there will remix the song somewhat by adding sound effects, filters, or even by splicing in other songs. Though it is entirely scripted (no freestyling here), the Remix modes enhance the original songs considerably and make the experience much more fun to play and hear. 

But no matter how tight the gameplay is, and how polished the visuals are, music games live or die because of their song selection. Right off the bat, don’t come into DJMax looking for songs you’ve heard of before. Most if not all of the songs in the entire DJMax library are produced in-house, but that should not be taken as a sign of inferiority. Similar to how Konami has a handful of second-party artists make a slew of songs for their DDR games, Pentavision has its own army for their DJMax games. Song genres vary widely, though with a healthy amount of electro songs, K-Pop influence, and genre fusions. The only way you’d already be familiar with a song in Portable 3 is if you came across that song in a past DJMax game. Portable 3’s song list is excellent as long as you open your mind a bit and give it a chance. You may find you can allow yourself to enjoy a song called ‘Cosmic Fantastic Lovesong’ or ‘Get Out (Hip Noodle Mix).’

Besides the standard ‘Arcade’ mode, where you play through 3 songs aiming for the best score, there’s also ‘Freestyle’ which lets you play whichever songs you want. However, in Freestyle your combo is carried over from song to song, giving you the meta-challenge of maxing out the combo meter at 99999. Good luck. Those looking for a little more structure will find Mission mode up their alley, where the player is given a specific song (or playlist) and certain parameters they must keep in order to pass the mission (i.e. keeping accuracy over 90%, achieving a x5 Fever multiplier). Passing missions and just by playing in general will gain EXP points. With enough experience the player will ‘level up’ and unlock wallpapers, additional note skins, new missions, even brand new songs and extra-difficult note charts. There’s a lot to do.

Anyone who owns a PSP or PS Vita owes it to themselves to enter the world of DJMax Portable 3. The physical release was shipped in very limited quantities (and probably for a very high price), so do yourself the favor and download it via the PlayStation Network. Go into it with an open mind and a little patience. Start with the classic layouts first, then try the remix modes. You’ll fail, a lot, at first, but trust me you will get better. The songs will get more familiar, the remixes will get that much cooler, and you’ll find yourself having a great time. That’s all video games are meant to do, anyway.

And as for North Korea… let’s just say they’re really missing out.