A Few Suggestions to the Devs

[Nico]

Hi.

literally me [imgur.com]

I am very normal about rhythm games, so I wanted to share a few personal suggestions I have for Dankagu.

The presentation in Danmaku Kagura is good, but it can be improved:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbzaEB_Ft10 (gameplay example)

We can look at other games for reference, such as DJMAX Respect V:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VauftbTGCAk

From this game I’d take the customization options and lane design cohesiveness. For example, you could put the groove gauge on the sides instead of at the bottom and give the borders of the lanes some sort of theme or design. The timer bar and song info/mitama card could also be included as part of the lane design.

Another thing we can take from DJMAX (and other Vertically Scrolling Rhythm Games) is the size of the lanes. Dankagu lanes are, in my opinion, a little wide, which makes the gameplay feel less focused and doesn’t leave space for the gorgeous backgrounds to be visible. I’d suggest making the lanes thinner and moving UI elements a little bit.

Example [imgur.com] (i'm not an artist lmao)

The hit detection VFX in DJMAX is also very sharp and intense. For Dankagu, I’d focus on making the hit detection effects cooler, or maybe make them customizable.

Another thing that could be nice is giving the option to not have characters on screen, letting the background or jacket art shine while you’re playing the game. Something like this:

only background [imgur.com]
only jacket art [imgur.com]

(These were done quickly in paint/power point, I’m not an artist lol)

Another game that dankagu takes a lot of inspiration from is Pop’n Music:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmGNhXqljjQ

Pop’n Music is a game filled with personality, fun little animations and colorful screen transitions. My suggestion would be trying to make the visual style of Dankagu have more personality and its own style.

Another thing we can take from Pop’n is perhaps trying to make the look of each character layout more unique. I was thinking of something like each character having a dedicated background, or even some sort of pattern/design.

Something like this [imgur.com]

Something else that could make Dankagu more enjoyable is giving the gameplay more visual and audio flare. Things like the combo counter changing color and font when we reach high combos, or the groove gauge shining when it’s filled. Think of things like Taiko no Tatsujin when you fill the bar and more character start showing up (plus the background change), or things like in DJMAX when you get to x5.
In general, you could give the gameplay UI more movement in the form of reflection effects, pattern movements, little particle effects, etc.

Another possibility is making something happen on screen when we reach certain parts of the song, like the chorus or the climax. Again, think of Taiko no Tatsujin when the lane gets on fire and Don-chan starts drumming, or in Muse Dash when a boss character shows up, or even the original Danmaku Kagura where the boss attack started (not to say that should come back, it was mostly distracting).

I also think it would be useful to have a “speed up/down” message before there’s a bpm change. Something like how Cytus II does it.

In the case of menus, I think it’d be a good idea to make a simple “press any key” start screen, and then transition to a more interesting mode selection screen with icons, like some of the menus of the original phone game.

There are a lot of games to take inspiration from. I’ll mention a few here:

1.- Vivid/Stasis. A free 4k vsrg with a simple but charming pixelart style:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOlb1Z4YIdc

2.- Cytus and Cytus II both have a fantastic robotic/futuristic style:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B48BAhyUbPU

3.- Deemo has a gorgeous minimalistic look with a very creative use of jacket art:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHbyNkquTUc

4.- Taiko no Tatsujin has a very strong traditionally Japanese look, alongside a lot of visual flare and audio cues when you reach certain combos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_CCI6PVqAQ

5.- Rotaeno also has a futuristic look, this time with gyroscopic gameplay:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJOcqReYrPo

6.- Voez has a very dynamic look to its menus and song selection screen, while also having a very clean gameplay look and dynamic lane movements:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TeCpOkx-eyI

7.- Phigros also has dynamic lane and note movements, but it goes to an extreme:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBvIMyXsTxM

8.- Muse Dash has a very distinct sense of style and use of colors for its menus and gameplay, and it’s also been implementing special effects for some of the latter charts:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cP9W8pc8YqE

9.- Unbeatable is a currently in development rhythm game that plays similarly to Muse Dash but it has more of a focus on story/characters and a unique, raw artstyle:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvScyPWjKCw

You can use these for reference/inspiration when tweaking the visual presentation of the game, if you ever decide to modify it. That is all 😊