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AAAs are freakishly hard to get in beatmania just because the timing is so exacting. I've been playing for about 2 years now and JUST FINALLY got a AAA (then I got another one). I actually passed a flashing 7 (which would be an 8 or higher on the new rating scale) before I managed to get a AAA. Your timing will get better with practice, but it takes a lot of work, especially if you aren't used to AAAing things like mad on DDR or 100king things on pop'n. I'm used to pump timing which is so lax that beatmania can drive me nuts.

Just being able to get AAs as a new player is pretty impressive. I wallowed around in B-C range for a few months before actually getting good enough to get even As (then again, I didn't have a controller, either).

Oh, and if you have an HDTV, it may be doing some crazy things to throw off your timing by introducing delay in the video (and possibly the audio, attempting to compensate). IIDX is completely unplayable on my DLP at home if you run the audio through the TV (which delays it to match the video), and only playable with direct, undelayed audio connections if you take a long time to get used to it or put it on hidden. Darned crappy scalers...

Congratulations, Jim!

You're doing great already! I wouldn't worry too much about your timing. You're doing quite well for as short a time as you've been playing. I would second MonMotha's statement that it just comes with practice.

For the first 2-3 years I played the game I cared only about passing songs and didn't focus on timing at all. As a result, I had a lot of Bs and As, a few AAs, and no AAAs at all. It's only been in the past 6 weeks or so that I've been focusing on timing that I've started scoring AAAs. And it seems that my ability to pass more difficult songs has raised naturally in the process.

Still, my timing seems better than my passing ability. I'm pretty solid on most songs up to level 5 or 6. Beyond that, and I'm struggling just to pass--nevermind score well.

You play piano, don't you? I think the dexterity involved with piano will be a help for you in the long run. I don't have that kind of experience to draw from and find that my fingers just get tangled up on more difficult songs.

I'll bet your timing will come up if you work at it. And even if you don't, I predict you'll be passing songs that make me cry before too long. I'd like to point out that the Ska A Go Go score of mine that you're beating is a fail. I tried playing the song several times and always got trashed in the end. I finally just gave up and logged a fail.

Thanks for the words of encouragement, guys. Don't worry, I'm not thinking about giving up or anything. It's just really annoying to have a long string of easy notes that all register as a 'Good' even when it feels like I'm right on the beat.

As for Ska A Go Go, I learned that ending pattern using training mode. I LOVE training mode!! That's the only song I've used it on so far, but I'm sure as I progress to more difficult songs, I'll use it more and more.

Ho, yes, I do play piano --- that helps in Beatmania I suppose, but even more in Guitar Hero I think...

Interesting... for me, Guitar Hero is most helped by violin and viola experience.

I'm delighted to hear that you play piano, though - keyboardist solidarity!

There are several songs on beatmania that make me wish i played the piano, cause i cant do seperate parts with each hand with out going insane. XD

Just wait till they have you playing 4-5 parts at once. You end up with separate parts on each FINGER if you're one-handing, or still 2-3 parts PER HAND if you use both hands. I can handle separate parts on each hand; I learned that playing pop'n music, but more than about 3 parts total starts to give me trouble if they're very complicated.

You mean like this?

Pheonixguy wrote:You mean like this?

No, that's some dumbass running a BM simulator on his computer and pressing the autoplay button.

Regardless...

Take it from me when I say that getting AAAs takes time and requires major precision skills. As for HDTVs, there are actually new solutions coming out in the form of Splitfish's HDFX (Think Upscan Converter, but specifically for HDTVs instead of VGA monitors) and Xploder's HDTV Player (a software solution that changes the output to 480p and apparently scales to 720p and 1080i) that I am looking into as I have an HDTV and I see a noticible difference in timing when I switch to a standard definition TV.

Xepher [a] isn't as bad as many other charts

Here are some good vids

First is Mei [a], extremely hard, 2nd is Setsugekka [a], which isn't as bad, but still stupid...

This guy also has some hard 14k videos too, and he also had a vid of AA [a] that was pretty ridiculous.

This score currently ranks 5th over on scorehero -- getting the full combo was a total fluke -- it would probably take 1,000,000 more tries to do it again

That is a massive number of notes!

Congrats, dude. Compared to you, my metal is false and weak.

I got 5 stars on Bark at the Moon Expert today. This leaves only two songs with less than 5 stars on Expert -- Texas Flood and Cowboys From Hell. Current score hero rankings --- 10th on Medium, 13th on Hard, and 123rd on Expert.

...still can't wait for Guitar Hero II!!

http://www.scorehero.com/scores.php?use ... e=2&diff=4

As of right now, this reflects my first attempt at each of the 40 main songs on Expert. I haven't yet attempted the bonus songs. The only songs I failed and thus had to play again were Miserlou (failed once) and Institutionalized (failed twice). I especially happy about 5-starring Beast and the Harlot and Freebird on my first try.