[How to] osu!

An extensive guide on how to play and everything you need to know about osu! aimed for beginners/intermediate players.

Introduction

Hello everyone! I decided to write a guide on how to play osu! because I have seen many beginners struggling to play higher difficulty maps right off the bat (because of Cookiezi videos? x_x) and there aren't much tutorials or to play osu! the right way. Well at least that's what I think, I will be writing in detail how I played osu! so it will be entirely based on my experience and my journey with osu! so far, therefore pardon if there are any mistakes or things you shouldn't do! Please leave a comment so that I can edit the guide! I will also update the guide as I git gud c:

For those who are already familiar I don't expect you to read everything that is written here, please use the index to directly jump to the section you want to read. And Beginners... please bear with me.

Interesting note: Always remember that osu! is a skill based game unlike 99.5% of games out there. Take any fps game for example CS, CoD, BF, etc. There are chances that a pro COULD be killed by a noob at some point and ranks/level/experience are nothing but a mere number which defines nothing. But in osu!, a noob CANNOT play a higher difficulty map right off the bat, you will just fail within a second that even luck can't help you here. I was the same at first: just because I'm pro in some fps game, thought that I could play 4~6 star maps on start and I still laugh how wrong I was XD

       osu! requires tons of patience, experience and practice. It is solely based on your reflexes,                           endurance, muscle memory, strong coordination and readability

Why should you play osu!?

Advantages:

• Listening to wide variety of songs from around the world
  
• Superhuman reflexes
  
• Readability
  
• Getting better at FPS games
  
• Coordination between the arms
  
• Adrenaline Rush!
  
• Stamina
  
• Muscle Memory
  
• To brag?
  
• More importantly: A totally different kind of 'FUN' that no other game could give you!

Interesting note: Ever tapped your fingers against your thigh/table/etc. when listening to music?
Think of osu! as a musical instrument and you're the one playing it, put ALL those feelings by tapping dat keyboard! So it kinda satisfies your urges if you love to play music/music enthusiast :'3

Disadvantages:

• Dry eyes
  
• Repetitive Strain Injury (RSI)[en.wikipedia.org] I have it :c
  
• Carpel Tunnel Syndrome[en.wikipedia.org] (a type of RSI)
  
• Hypertension is just a click away!
  
• Could break input devices
  
• Noisy to others because of keyboard tapping :l

Play Styles

Before we begin, take a look at these playstyles. There are many more but I will be covering only the four major playstyles. Remember that it varies from person to person, but first checkout all of the playstyles at the beginning and choose one that you are highly comfortable with and stick to it.

• Mouse only (M style): You can play using only one mouse (on default), aiming and hitting the beats with the mouse buttons. Just like an fps game. But I don't recommend this, because at higher speeds it will just limit you and takes time for you to shift to another playstyle. Not only that but you will be destroying your precious mouse buttons! The mouse buttons have higher hit and release time than keyboard keys, could vary from mouse to mouse.
  
  I personally had this problem when I was in around 400pp and I couldn't progress at all because it was limiting me. My friend laughed and told me to immediately change my playstyle to Keyboard + Mouse, and I didn't know that there were other playstyles at that time!
  
  
• Mouse and Keyboard (M + KB style): This is one of the best playstyles. Highly recommended for a beginner. You will aim using the mouse and hit the beats using keyboard keys. Helps in improving your coordination between your arms. Though it seems hard at first, but you will slowly improve in time.
  
  
• Tablet and Keyboard (T style): If you already have a tablet then you can use tablet for aiming the beats (instead of mouse) and keyboard for hitting the beats. Highly recommended if you have a tablet. There are many tablets that support osu! Hell there are even some that are specially designed for this game! (Example: Huion H420[www.huiontablet.com])
  
  
• Touchscreen (TS style): I tried this and it isn't that great as you expect it to be. It has too much input lag which totally defeats the purpose, but can be played casually. Note that you will be ruining that touchscreen of yours! Plus while playing at higher speeds or jumps, etc. your hand will strain a lot. Because your are covering a lot of distance than you do while using a mouse/pen.
  osu! >> Exercise

First Time Setup

You can download osu! game from here[osu.ppy.sh]

Open it, choose and browse the location where you want to install it and then you are good to go!

When you first time open osu! you will be greeted by the login screen, it's generally recommended to login (so your plays/scores get uploaded) AND also do login on the browser as well (to download the songs). Bear in mind that if you play osu! offline, then nothing is saved!

BUT WAIT! Before you play, there are some settings to change first. Change ALL the settings as shown in these pictures: Click on the picture to view it in large size!



Frame Limiter: Even though 240 fps is the maximum, set to unlimited to avoid potential hiccups during the game. Doing so will heavily reduce the frame time and input lag.

Show FPS counter: It's important to enable this even though if you use another fps counter program, as this will show the input latency below the fps counter. Input latency defines after how much time in milliseconds (ms) the computer reads your input from keyboard/mouse/tablet/etc. The lesser the better which makes it VERY responsive. Make sure that it stays at most < 2 ms. Don't worry if its higher in main menu, it will decrease once you are in-game. Computers get lower latency but laptop tend to have higher input delay even when it's plugged in. I always get 0.4 ~ 0.6 ms :3

Compatibility Mode: This option really varies between systems. For instance, on my PC I get less input lag when it's disabled but worsens on my laptop. I enabled it on my laptop and get around 1.5~1.9 ms otherwise it's around 3+ ms. Just try and make a trial play and decide.

Resolution: Set the maximum resolution your monitor can support, osu! isn't very demanding as popular games so check your fps and adjust accordingly!

Fullscreen mode: Enable this at all costs as it reduces input latency!



Background Video: Enable to watch video while playing, disable if you find it very distracting. Disabling it also reduces your input latency. However I only disable when I'm aiming for a Full Combo. It's fun to watch while playing casually, so you decide.

Storyboard: Special FX created by the beatmapper for their beatmaps.

Combo Bursts: Disable it, it's just annoying and distracting when you play.

Hit Lighting: Displays distracting gameplay elements.

Shaders: Adds special effects such as red screen when at low health, spinning, etc.

Softening Filter: Adds a small amount of blur and highlights around text and elements.

osu! music theme: Disables the default osu! theme.

Seasonal Backgrounds: If you're a man of culture, you'll set it to Always ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)



Background Dim: 80~90% , you can set it before you play the game as well.



Current skin: For beginners, try to get used to the default skin. After having enough experience, feel free to download osu! skins because the default skin is CANCER (i.e too much shet onscreen)
I modified Minimal Weeb noel 1.3[puu.sh] a bit. I'm providing the link here[drive.google.com] if you guys want it.
How to install: Click on the down arrow button on the top right of the page to download and open it, osu auto reads it and applies the skin.

Ignore all beatmap skins: Just ignore them and stick to the default.

Automatic Cursor Size: Depending on beat circle size of song, your cursor will be adjusted by osu! Useful when the beat circles size is the same as cursor!



Sensitivity: This is the base foundation setting for you to play the game. It varies from computer to computer (and mouse or tablet), My sweet spot is around 3.25x to play the game perfectly. You may need to adjust accordingly as you play. Don't go more than 4.00x or above, it makes the cursor jerky af for some reason. (M / M + KB style)

Raw Input: Enable to make osu! adjust to the sensitivity of windows setting. (M / M + KB style)

Disable Mouse buttons: Make sure you enable this if you're gonna play Mouse + Keyboard so as to avoid mis-clicking while aiming with the mouse! (M + KB style)

Confine mouse cursor: The cursor will not leave osu! if it's set to Always even while in window.

Change Keyboard bindings: Neglect all the options except for the top two options left click and right click in osu! standard mode section. Default is Z,X but if you wish to change your keys then make sure the keys are adjacent. So that you will be comfortable in alternate tapping at higher speeds. Example: A,S | W,E | Q,W | S,D, etc. Change your keys on a monthly basis because you are slowly destroying those keys! I rekt my W key, speaking from experience :I (M + KB style)

OS TabletPC Support: Enable only if you want to play with a tablet. (T style)

Click the play button and Single Player and now you will be taken to the list of songs you can play. The game is already bundled with some songs but you can download the songs you like from the website. But before you do that, you need to arrange the sorting to find your songs easily, as shown in this pic.



Group: No Grouping; Sort: By Date Added
Tabs: No Grouping

This way you can find the beatmaps you downloaded at the end of the list instead of all random mumbo jumbo. Stick to this type of sorting and continue playing and never touch these settings again! As you play more and more you will get familiar and know the song that you are looking for (or you could basically search for it but you will love the list you made so far)

Keyboard Types

Skip this section if you recently bought a keyboard or you are don't use M + KB style OR if you are a beginner. There is no need for you to worry about this just yet. It is for players who can play 4 star and above.

There are mainly three types:

1. Membrane: This type is your normal typical keyboards that you would've used at least once. They have large keys which are tetrahedral in shape with top cut like keys. The problem with these kinds of keyboards is you have to press the key ALL the way down for the key to register. So generally when you play osu! at very high speeds which involves many multiple taps per second, you end up "light tapping" as in pressing a key half way through and the press won't be registered, ending up as a miss.

Another important thing is sometimes when you push a key diagonally, say on the sides or one of those corners of a key, the key will be harder to press, again resulting in a miss because it keeps messing with your tapping flow. This could vary from keyboard to keyboard as all keyboards don't have this problem.


   

2. Chiclet: This is also a membrane type keyboard but the difference lies in the key shape and layout. The best example of this would be the inbuilt laptop keyboards if you haven't seen a PC one yet. The keys are generally square or round corner shaped with very less height when compared to a typical membrane keyboard. Hence it's easy to tap even at higher speeds.

The problem with this type is the keys could get out of place or damaged due to intense tapping (especially laptops)


   

3. Mechanical: Last but not least, mechanical type looks like a membrane with/without those fancy RGB lighting including a tactile hit feedback. Whenever you press a key you can feel a hit feedback on your finger which is quite relaxing and fun to tap a mechanical key. This type could be the best for playing osu! but I prefer Chiclet type.

The problem with this one is they are VERY noisy than a typical membrane or chiclet type keyboards. And may irritate people nearby when you are playing osu! Very similar to a typewriter.

Note: Please don't use laptop keyboard for playing osu! as you will totally destroy it.
Change your keys in osu! settings on a weekly basis. This way the keys won't get damaged.
Example: 1st week: Z,X 2nd week: A,S, etc.

Interface

Some keyboard shortcuts that osu! doesn't tell you, unless you check the bindings by yourself:

While at main menu, osu! starts playing some random song/default song. The pause, stop, etc. controls are to the top right. But you can also use hotkeys such as:

C - Pause
X - Play (Resets the currently playing song)
Z - Previous Song
V - Next Song

F8 to toggle the osu! interface (similar to steam interface) where you can interact with players, chat, find friends, etc. This interface consists of two layouts: One is the bottom which is chatting which contains chat tabs and the top is about finding players, sorting, etc.

F9 will show both layouts but on pressing it again it will hide only the top layout. So get used in pressing F8 only.

Click (left/right) on a player to bring up more options in interacting with that user:

1.) Start Spectating: You can watch the player when he is playing. How it works is interesting. It isn't a video broadcast but sends the player's input data to the spectators and the play is reconstructed on the spectators computer. So that spectators with slow internet connection can also watch without any problems! BUT you will need to download the beatmap song the player is playing or you can only see the play without any music :/

2.) View Profile: You can view their profiles, opens the browser

3.) Start Chat: Opens a separate tab in the bottom chat layout. Your messages wont reach the recipient if they're offline though.

4.) Add as friend: The friends system in osu! is different than what you have seen in most of the other applications. When you add someone as friend then only you can see him but the other guy won't have any clue that you added him or anything, its just like stalking someone you admire/etc. Unless you contact them and tell them to add you as well and then only they can see you in their "Friends" list. This option is replaced by remove friend if you already added someone. If you do remove someone then remember that the other guy can still see you lols. Note that you need to restart for your friend to appear in your 'Friends' sort list on top layout.

There is another hidden menu while playing osu!

It can only be accessed at the start of a play for a player but can be accessed anytime by a spectator though. Put your cursor down at the bottom of the screen before the song starts and the menu should pop up. Here you can change some of the settings on the fly such as: Disable Video, Disable Storyboard, Ignore Beatmap Sound, etc.

However these settings apply only to the song (also difficulty) you are currently playing and doesn't apply to ALL. These settings are helpful when you want to try out how a beatmap skin looks like, or sounds or video. Background Dim to 100% if focusing on making a record.

Game Modes

osu! has 4 game modes: osu! standard, osu!catch, osu!taikoa and osu!mania. But this guide mainly focuses on how to play the standard mode, however I will give a brief explanation about these modes.

1.) osu!: This is the major mode of osu! that almost everyone plays, also called as standard mode. Hardcore beat clicking action. The rest of the modes are also played but not as much as this one.

                                                    

2.) osu!mania: This mode consists of a piano kind of game style. All you need to do is you have 4 (minimum) or more columns/piano keys with their respective keyboard buttons. A small beat approaches the base line in a column at the bottom, you need to hit or hold that corresponding key accurately as possible depending on how long the beat is (just like the slider in standard mode)

                                                             

3.) osu!catch: Otherwise known as Catch the Beat or CTB in short. This is one of those classic games you might have played in your childhood. You will control a girl guy holding a plate and you need to catch the fruits that fall according to the beat. Holding Left Shift will make her move at 2x speed. The fruit size varies according to the beat and most of them are very small and there is a great chance that you might miss these small fruits.

                                           

4.) osu!taiko: Drumstyle play where you need to hit the drums with the corresponding symbols that come near. Check your controls first before playing this mode. Similar to that of mania but with a drum. Taiko and mania requires a different kind of coordination that standard mode nor CTB will require. These two modes are also great for those who are struggling to aim properly in standard mode.

                                                         

Note: Mods can be enabled when you are playing these modes too which we will discuss further. There might be some mods that are unique to each mode.

Gameplay Elements

List of all the gameplay elements and things you could do while in-game:

• Single Beats: Single beat circle that only needs a tap.
  
  
• Slider: Slide the circle by dragging it from starting to the end along the path. Note that there is no 300/100/50 points when you hit the initial beat of the slider. Use this to your advantage at high speeds. It however gets tracked in the Accuracy Meter to show you in the replay which will be discussed below.
  
  
• Slider with reverse arrow: Some sliders have reverse arrows, you need to drag back and forth.
  
  
• Spinner: Spinner is a great section where the more you spin, the more you score. Check your dominant spin: either clockwise (CW) or counterclockwise (CCW). I have more control and grip when I spin CCW. There will be a short RPM meter down below the spinner. Don't spin too much as it affects your accuracy after spinning, spin between 220~300 RPM and you should pass easily. But if the spinner appears at the end, go all out. 477 RPM is the max possible by computer.
  
  
• 300: 300 points or pts appears when you perfectly hit a beat when approach circle is near to it.
  
  
• 100: You probably hit a bit late or early
  
  
• 50: It is worse than 100, anything other than a 50 results in a miss
  
  
• Combo: Combo is shown on bottom left of the screen. Different maps have different max combo.
  
  
• Health: It is displayed on top of the screen. It depletes if you miss a beat/combo break/partial beat/etc. once it runs out the play will end.
  
  
• Blue Symbol: It's called Geki Symbol. All the beats in a song are divided into many sequences. For example there are these beats with numbers in a song: 1,2,3,4,5,1,2,3,4,1,2,3. So there are 3 sequences in this song. In a sequence if you get all perfect beats i.e 300 pts, and only then you will get this symbol on the last beat of the sequence. Gives large health boost.
  
  
• Green Symbol: Called as Katu symbol. If you didn't score all 300 pts in a sequence regardless if it's a 100 or 50, then this symbol appears at the end of the sequence. Gives a small health boost.
  
  
• Timing Window: I don't really know what is it called but there is a very thin bar on the mid bottom which acts like a time window for the hits you make. It has a mid point which denotes exact 100% without any milliseconds of error. The blue line is the safe region where it considers 300 points for your hits, then green and brown range as the timing gets farther (either slow or early) anything outside is considered as a miss. The more you go to the left side from midpoint, means early and right represents that latency of the hit. This is useful when you watch your replays and criticizing yourself of the mistakes you made.

Things you can do while in-game:

• Tab to toggle scores on the left side. Also toggles spectators.
  
• Space to skip initial loading of song and jump right where it starts.
  
• You can still chat while playing using F8

Grades:

osu! rates your performance in a beatmap in terms of grades.

• SS: Only by achieving 100% accuracy
  
• S: 93%+
  
• A: 88%+ sometimes you might get an A for 98% too, if you made some 50 pts or slider break or a miss.
  
• B: 80%+
  
• C: 75%+
  
• D: Less than 75%

Interesting note: Whenever you finish up a song, don't quit the summary screen but wait a bit and scroll down to see if the scores are uploaded, you can see the pp change in your total pp score here.
This also works if you close the summary screen and going back to song list but sometimes the scores won't upload. It's just a feeling that it uploads when you are at the summary screen. You can also rate beatmaps from a scale from 1 to 10 stars at here.

Stats

                          
                                                Stats of users are shown altogether like this

• Performance: osu! rates your skill in terms of pp or performance points and if anyone checks your skill, then its based on this value. pp is awarded based on several parameters such as: beatmap difficulty (no. of stars), mods enabled, your combo, accuracy and misses.
  
  Note that pp CANNOT be farmed. For example say you played a 10pp map and SS'd it (assuming it's your first song) you get 10pp. Play another 10pp song and you get 9pp and total will be 19 but NOT 20. It decreases as you play similar pp maps. Say you played ten more 10 pp maps.
  Then total pp will be somewhat like this: 10 + 9 + 8 +...+ 1 = 55pp (just an example) up to the point where you won't EVEN gain 1pp for playing 10pp maps lol.
  
  So the thing here is UNLESS and UNLESS you really improve your skills, you're just stuck there!
  For example say later on, you SS'd a 20pp map then that 20pp becomes 100% weighted and then all the 10pp maps you've played before gets re-ordered in terms of weightage so you don't really get 20pp extra to the 55pp but somewhere around 5~10pp more because the bottom maps get re-ordered. You can view all of this in your profile page under Top Ranks section.
  
  
  
  Interesting Note: Note that pp is LARGELY dependent on the accuracy of all the other parameters. Say you scored 99% in some map but you got 1x miss or combo break, you get nearly the max pp for the song, and you play the same map again with no combo breaks but you FC'd it with less accuracy than before (say 95%?), you will LOSE total pp. Beware. High score doesn't mean that you get more pp. A guy who aced a map with mods with a higher score and lesser accuracy than a guy who played the same song normally with higher accuracy, he can gain higher pp cuz accuracy! (unless it's DT/NC)
  
  
• Accuracy/Level: Just don't care about these two. Only watch your pp :3
  
  
• Global Rank: The number with hashtag displayed faintly in the background is your global ranking.

Beatmap Parameters

When you click on a song in the list, look to the top left of the screen to view the beatmap parameters:

                              

• Length: The total length of the song that you will have to play, represented in mm:ss
  
  
• BPM: Known as Beats per Minute. Defines how much faster you will have to hit the beats.
  
  
• Objects: All the objects in the beatmap: Sliders, Beat circles and Spinners.
  
  
• Stars: Stars difficulty is actually calculated based on the above parameters so naturally it's a float value up to 2 decimal places. If you're looking to get achievements/medals for playing certain star medal you can look up here if it qualifies to that certain star medal. Example: You won't get 2 star medal for playing a 1.99 star map, etc.
  
  
• FC: Full Combo, not really a parameter but it's used while chatting it with others, etc. to represent if you got Full Combo in a map or not.
  
  The below parameters range from 0 ~ 10
  
  
• CS: Called as Circle Size, the higher the value the smaller the circles are.
  
  
• AR: Approach Rate, the higher the value the faster they approach.
  
  
• HP: Health or Hit Points, the higher the more health you lose.
  
  
• OD: Overall Difficulty, you will notice this when you play some different maps. For some beatmaps even if you hit a bit late you get 300 pts but for some you need to hit MORE accurately to get 300 pts otherwise you end up getting 100 pts or 50 pts. Basically what it does, is it increases/decreases the "Timing Window" that we discussed earlier depending on the value (0-10), it's length varies from beatmap to beatmap because of this.

Mods

Mods are the game modifiers that can spice up a beatmap than usual. Generally when you play a beatmap all that score is multiplied with a universal multiplier: 1.00x, so when you enable certain mods this universal multiplier could increase or decrease based on the difficulty of the mod applied.
There are 3 types of mods: Difficulty increasing, Difficulty decreasing and Special mods.

Difficulty decreasing mods:

• Easy (EZ): Makes Circle Size a lot bigger and makes Approach Rate slower.
  
  
• No Fail (NF): You cannot die. Use this to practice harder maps that you can't usually play and see how you fare.
  
  
• Half Time (HT): Makes the song 25% less speed than the original speed

Difficulty increasing mods:

• Hard Rock (HR): Reduces CS by 30% and increases difficulty by 40%. Also flips the beats, say usually beats are a bit downwards are now on top.
  
  
• Sudden Death (SD): If you miss a beat or even break your combo, the play gets restarted.
  
  
• Perfect (PF): Click on Sudden Death (SD) again to activate this mod. If you score 100 pts or 50 pts or a miss or combo break then it restarts, so it's either 100% or die. I don't really encourage you to try these two mods and just play as you, go who know what will happen?
  
  
• Double Time (DT): This infamous mod speeds the song 1.5x so that it's twice faster than normal, not for beginners. You can try this mod once you get much faster later on.
  
  
• Nightcore (NC): Same as DT but makes the song nightcore-ish. Ex: Barbie Girl song lol
  
  
• Hidden (HD): Hides the beats and you have to hit where the beat appeared. It's really a challenge to get used to this but once you figure it out, it's easy.
  
  
• Flashlight (FL): Obscures and limits the view around the cursor.

Special mods:

• Relax (RL): No need to hit the beats! Just aim! Use this to practice your aim. But don't rely on this too much as it varies greatly in actual play and you may lose coordination. (Unranked!)
  
  
• Autopilot (AP): Reverse to above mod, hit the beats and the computer aims automatically. I don't play this much, it just breaks your coordination. (Unranked!)
  
  
• Spun-out (SO): Computer auto spins the spinners when they appear. It's for those who are really struggling with spinners for a cost of 0.20x multiplier. Not really necessary.
  
  
• Auto: Watch osu! nailing all those maps. ♥♥♥♥ HAXXOR REPORTED! ;-; (Unranked!)
  
  
• Cinema: Click on Auto mod again to activate this. All gameplay and display elements are hidden. As if watching a movie with the beat hit feedback sound! (Unranked!)
  
  
• Score V2: It's an experimental future scoring system. (Unranked!)

1 Star - Easy

I've put each star difficulty as new section so that players could find what they're looking for via index.
I will discuss the optimal pp range, duration that you can play for each difficulty and recommended songs for those difficulties. The lowest duration is for people who can play for hours daily, highest is for players who play for like at least 10 min per day.

Range: 0pp ~ 80pp
Duration: 1 day ~ 1 week

• Play the tutorial first to get used to the game mechanics and elements. Don't be discouraged if you score less on your first attempt because that's how it is! Requires several or more tries to ace them. I got 40% accuracy and D grade on my first try ahaha.
  
  
• To be honest, the bundled songs that come with osu! are a lot harder for beginners. I experienced it myself and it was way too fast and wasn't noob friendly at all.
  
  
• I recommend you to play this map[osu.ppy.sh] it's very easy, short and helps you in timing your beats. This song was my first SS song! Took me like 40+ tries ._.
  
  
• All the beats in a sequence appear closer to each other with a constant general hit timing. Once you grasp that you can pass all the maps (both 1 and 2 stars) with ease.
  
  
• After a sequence ends, a beat circle might appear far away. Then time to slow down and watch the approach circle and hit it once its near.
  
  
• Don't just hit what you see, but listen and rely on the song. osu! is a rhythm game, you can rely on the beats of the songs. If you play a song multiple times you can predict when a beat appears and you will automatically hit it without even carefully looking on that approach circle.
  
          NOTE: ALWAYS USE HEADPHONES WHILE PLAYING OR DON'T PLAY AT ALL!
  
  
• If you can SS it then start activating mods (except for DT/NC) individually and try to aim for 100%
  After that, combine two or more mods for an even more challenge! Try at least using HC, HD and FL. This way you will really improve faster! Once you've done that or close enough (at least >95% with FC) you're now ready to take on 2 star (Normal) maps.

Recommended Maps:

I mentioned difficulty in brackets that you need to play. When you download from the website, you will download all the difficulties, regardless of what difficulty tab you are looking in the website.

Rameses B - Timeless (Easy)[osu.ppy.sh]
Rameses B - Mountains (Easy)[osu.ppy.sh]
Rameses B - Transcend (Easy)[osu.ppy.sh]
Brad Breeck - Yummy Yummy (Collab Easy)[osu.ppy.sh]
Owl City - Shooting Star (Normal)[osu.ppy.sh]
Reol - No Title (Irre's Beginner)[osu.ppy.sh]
Rammstein - Mein Herz brennt[osu.ppy.sh]
Hanz Zimmer - Samara's Song[osu.ppy.sh]
The Ghost Of 3.13 - Sleep Prelude (Easy)[osu.ppy.sh]

2 Star - Normal

Range: 80pp ~ 200pp
Duration: 1 week ~ 1 month

• Normal difficulty is just like easy but with more faster approach rate (AR). You will be fine and be able to do it, if you played how I told you to in the 1 star section.
  
  
• Play the bundled maps now, could be still a bit fast but you will get used to it after 10+ plays or so.
  
  
• Most of the beatmaps have this kind of pattern: A slider, single beat in middle, slider. So it's like drag, release, hit, drag and release. It's a kind of finger twister (derived from tongue twister lol) that aims at screwing up your coordination.
  
  
• Sliders may have more than one returns! Followed by another beat or worse! The trick here is to keep your eye on the next beat's approach circle and once it's near, just move over to it. For these small sliders you don't have to move your cursor rapidly as it rattles like a bird in a cage, because the safe circle is large enough for you to stay stationary. You can just stay there, focus and move on to the next beat!
  
                                               
  
                                                     

Recommended maps:

Panda Eyes & Teminite - Highscore (Standard)[osu.ppy.sh]
jinsang - affection (love)[osu.ppy.sh]
Feint - Reprise (Normal)[osu.ppy.sh]
WOODKID - Iron (Normal)[osu.ppy.sh]
Rameses B - We Love (Chris' Easy)[osu.ppy.sh]
Hiromi Satou - Kowarekake no Orgol (S i R i R u's Pleasant)[osu.ppy.sh]
Poets of the Fall - Carnival of Rust (Normal)[osu.ppy.sh]
Alan Walker - Faded (ReFaller's Runaway)[osu.ppy.sh]
Din Don Dan (Hard)[osu.ppy.sh]

3 Star - Hard

Range: 200pp ~ 800pp
Duration: 1 week ~ 4 months

• If you are around 150~200pp range then you can start playing 3 star maps.
  
  
• This difficulty will be nothing like 1 star or 2 star but you will be able to read it!
  
  
• From this difficulty onwards you will encounter triplet beats that are one after the other, and you need to start using your alternate beat hitting key from now on. If you were using default keys then the alternate key is X. To hit this kind of beats, you need to hit in this order: ZXZ. And without hesitation you must continue with the flow. In default skin you can't even see that they are one below the other! The last beat in the triplet could also be a slider.
  
                                     
  
  
• Till now you have encountered beat flow that has constant beat timing between beats in Star 1 and Star 2. It will be a bit irregular from here on out.
  
  
• You can now start playing the 1 star maps you've played before using DT/NC mods! They count as normal/ hard as well and gains you more than 2.5x the normal pp of that map!
  
  
• When you git gud, apply mods and repeat! Beware of HR from here on, it will be TOO hard.

Recommended maps:

Usher ft. Will.I.Am - OMG (Hard)[osu.ppy.sh]
cYsmix - Dovregubben's Hall (Hard)[osu.ppy.sh]
Vicetone - Kaleidoscope (Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Dreamtale - The Dawn (Hyper)[osu.ppy.sh]
F-777 - He's a Pirate (Hard)[osu.ppy.sh]
Owl City - Beautiful Times (Hard)[osu.ppy.sh]
BoA - I Did It For Love (Hard)[osu.ppy.sh]
Yasuda Rei - Passcode 4854 (Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Stigmata - September (Rmdy's Hard)[osu.ppy.sh]
Yiruma & Skullee - River Flows In You (Love Note)[osu.ppy.sh]
Rostik - Liquid (Hard) (Bundled)
Rameses B - Flaklypa (Hard) (Bundled)
Tear Rain (Hard) (Bundled)

4 Star - Insane

Range: 800pp ~ 2000pp
Duration: 4 months ~ 1 year

• When you are in range of 700~900, you can start playing 4 star maps now. And o boi, this is where the game gets real imo, because of the introduction of JUMPS and STREAMS (and other kind of beat types)
  
  
• Jumps are randomly placed single beats that are far from each other, involves single tapping without losing control over the aim and tapping flow. These require lots of coordination between two hands because you can aim faster but hit too late or vice versa.
  The jumps may also contain the triplet beats we talked about before.
  
                                             
                      The above jumps are not from 4 star but from 7 star, don't be scared :p
  
  
• Jump Practice 1[osu.ppy.sh]
  Jump Practice 2[osu.ppy.sh]
  Jump Practice 3[osu.ppy.sh]
  
  
• Streams are the continuous queue of beats placed one behind the other at a certain interval which involves alternate tapping at high speeds. Requires lots of stamina.
  (Example: ZXZXZXZXZXZX default pattern)
  
                                                      
                                                              Again, not from a 4 star
  
  
• Click this[osu.ppy.sh] to download variety of stream practice maps.
  
  
• If you are a tablet player then you can handle jumps pretty well after a lot of practice, subconsciously. Streams you ask? Well...they're the worst kind.
  
  
• Short Sliders are also a type of mapping. The trick here is you should consider them as a single beats and hit once as how you would hit those single beats. But there will be also a risk of slider break, so annoying. Some beatmaps have very low beat hit feedback sound or no sound at all at the slider end, even more annoying! I have no idea why beatmappers do that. Because you rely on beat hit sound feedback to proceed, if there is no sound you think that you have missed something and screw up the next part, but you actually didn't XD
  
                                             
  
  
• From here on out, the approach circles could be cancer to the eyes and may fool you in thinking a slider as a single beat and vice versa! Practice Hidden mod to avoid this.
  
  
• Increase stamina and focus more on beatmaps that involve single tapping all the way through, very hard at first but playing them more will gain you more stamina. Also play another marathon when your hands hurt (don't play again if it hurts TOO much) you gain stamina much faster this way and you can play normal maps easier which have many jumps with triplet beats.

Recommended maps:

Maffalda - pensamento tipico de esquerda caviar (Kuron's Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Drop - Granat (Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Shawn Mendes - Stitches (Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Tarpey - Close Call (Stratega's Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
C-Show - Rocking to the Beat (Frey's Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Meiko - Leave The Lights On (Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Goose house - Hikaru nara (Doormat's Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
DJ Genericname - Dear You (Dear Rue)[osu.ppy.sh]
Shawn Wasabi - Marble Soda (Narcissu's Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Agressor Bunx - Tornado (Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
DJ Genericname - Dango Dango DnB Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Pegboard Nerds - Emoji (Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Porter Robinson & Madeon - Shelter (Phomi's Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]

5 Star - Expert

Range: 2000pp ~ 4000pp?
Duration: 0.5 ~ 1.5 year

• Play lots of maps with AR 9+ to get used to this difficulty.
  
  
• Has jumps with even greater distances between beats and longer streams with high BPM.
  
  
• More irregular beat patterns.
  
  
• Even smaller beat circles.
  
  
• Tips and tricks won't work here on out, as it is all based on your total experience until up to now. You will automatically time and hit the beats if you have had enough practice.

Recommended maps:

Cartoon - Whatever I Do (Freedom)[osu.ppy.sh]
Blue Stahli - Shotgun Senorita (Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Station Earth - Age Of Reason (Extra)[osu.ppy.sh]
Komiya Mao - (can you) understand me? (uhh?)[osu.ppy.sh]
Reol - No Title (Lust's Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
Owl City - Up All Night (Insane)[osu.ppy.sh]
EVO+ - [A]ddiction (Vert's Expert)[osu.ppy.sh]
SawanoHiroyuki[nZk]:mizuki - aLIEz (captin's Extra)[osu.ppy.sh]
CLIFF EDGE - Endless Tears (AIRakuen's Extra)[osu.ppy.sh]

6 Star - Expert+

I'm currently able to read and barely pass this difficulty so I can't really say from here on. Sowie!! ._.

Recommended maps:

Panda Eyes & Teminite - Highscore (Extra)[osu.ppy.sh]
Ayase Rie - Haitai (Ultimate)[osu.ppy.sh]

7 Star - Crazy!

This is perhaps the easiest 7 star map. Thanks Sotarks!
But remember that just because you've passed this one doesn't mean you can DO other 7 star maps.

Recommended maps:

Panda Eyes & Teminite - Immortal Flame (Eternal Blaze)[osu.ppy.sh]

B-But what about McOsu??

Yeah I know I covered all about a game that is actually not on steam and using McOsu to upload my guide. But I will also tell you about how to use this amazing game simultaneously using osu!

• McOsu is just a practice client alternative to osu! which doesn't upload your scores or anything like osu! does. McOsu is helpful for some people who are embarassed for their increasing playcount value, but still don't improve (slowly). You can kinda practice here in McOsu to reduce that count to a minimum.
  
  
• It has a special function called 'Scrubbing'. While in-game hold on Shift and drag mouse left or right to control the song! This way you can jump right to the part where you are struggling in osu! You can continue replaying that part without replaying the entire song! Also works with mods and even Auto mod where you would like to check how the computer plays in that certain section. This is a very neat feature.
  
  
• You can check how much pp you will be getting, realtime in-game and displays the total pp after finishing the map. Needs to be enabled in the settings.
  
  
• Can change beatmap parameters on the fly by pressing F1, such as OD, HP, etc. heck even BPM!

Conclusion

That's all folks! Please don't compare yourself with others (with similar skill) or top players (who have decades of practice and experience) because the skills varies from person to person. One may git gud in a week or so and another can do the same, but requires more time. And don't play when you are angry XD, it will only make it worse and the result will always be: RAGE QUIT or some broken input devices...

Don't get be discouraged if you don't get any pp for the day. You might compare yourself with a player nearby your skill level and he might be proceeding leaps and bounds leaving you frustrating behind. Let them go, and don't worry about it. pp will automatically increase if you keep practicing the songs you love, the game is all about FUN and not entirely about being competitive. Take periodical breaks and show some love to those poor hands, playing too much will put lotsa pressure on them and you might face permanent problems in future (like me :c)

Remember that osu! is a super hard game and you cannot hope to improve unless you fail more than hundreds or thousands of times. Want to get better? Then PLAY MORE, I can't stress this enough, because no matter how hard/lame/common as it sounds it's the only wae. You cannot hope to become a pro player in just a day or days, it takes loads of practice and patience. I myself rage quit this game twice when I first created an account and didn't touch it for an year. Then I gave it another chance and it's my favorite game evar! Third time's the charm I guess.

                                                      So just keep calm and play osu!

                                                        
                                   If you liked my guide, don't forget to rate up and favorite!
    

[OMGkawaiiAngel]

instructions unclear built an atomic bomb

[Francis113]

my latency is always above 3ms, what does that mean?

[Shiro]

if I use mouse only style, do I have to alternate left and right mouse buttons for triplets and then streams? Middle finger seem to have not as trained reaction/timing, so when I tried alternating it in stuff like slider-beat-slider it worked a bit less reliably than just using LMB only (tho LMB only gets tiresome faster)

[D0g3r1up5]

Flowerhead is sorta right, all games require some amount of skill. Unless it is literally a game where all you do is roll dice. Anyways, detail on how to actually play the extra modes should probably be added. I just started playing today

[The Cactuar]

No, everyone improves at different intervals. Play at your own pace, and enjoy the game!

[Simply leaf]

So wait is it bad that I am doing 4 star maps at 250 PP?

[SaucyGamerXOXO]

fieryrage pp farm

[eatcake]

you're wrong about the 7 star the easiest one is vivid insane + DT just button mash

[goober]

What about 8 stars and above

[bladee]

there are so much aspects in i.e. csgo to learn for a noob. general aim (raw aim, spray control, crosshair placement (WHERE and HOW do i aim?), probably VRT), communication (teamplay, being able to make a good call as an IGL, self explanatory), proper use of nades, decision making, self-control, and most importantly gamesense.