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Rhythm Game and its
Hidden Track
Games that will be mentioned in this blog:
- Arcaea
- maimai FiNALE
- Lanota
Screenshot taken from DJ Genki's Arcaea Livestream
When it comes to Rhythm Games, one of the elements that must be included in this genre is music or tracks. Depending on what music the game can offer, it could impact the gameplay and the quality of the game. Now one thing I found rhythm games interesting is hidden tracks due to it makes rhythm games more fun and much more interactive for the player and the game itself.
Hidden tracks, as the name implies, are songs that are hidden in the rhythm game song lists until players have to find a way to unlock the songs and play them. Hidden tracks also tend to not get revealed in their respective rhythm game social media. For example, when Arcaea released their new song pack which was called Vicious Labyrinth back in 2017. These were the songs that they'd announced on their social media:
Image from @arcaea_en via Twitter
When it was shown to the players, they thought that was all the songs they will be getting. However, little did they know that there is actually one more song in this pack. That one last song was called, Grievous Lady.
Image from @arcaea_en via Twitter
Most of the hidden tracks in rhythm games are usually applied as boss tracks or challenging songs. An example would be Grievous Lady which I mentioned above.
Now, what makes hidden tracks one of the great rhythm game designs is that it allows players to discover the game itself. Not only that, but players are also able to connect to each other so they can discuss how can they unlock the hidden tracks or discuss whether is there any hidden tracks and try to "play" around with the game itself. An example of this would be maimai FiNALE, an arcade rhythm game where they included a new feature called PANDORA BOXXX which includes SEVEN hidden tracks for players to discuss the unlock requirements through the Internet due to the game won't be telling you the clues on unlocking the hidden tracks.
Another great thing about the hidden track is that it can give the player challenges. Since most of the hidden tracks are boss tracks or challenging songs. Rhythm games will add a health system when an interaction between players and that hidden track begins. That means that players must clear the hidden track while at the same time not getting too many misses in the game to unlock that hidden track. Making one way for players to figure out how to beat the boss and how can they get the reward which is the hidden track itself. This makes rhythm games more ways to play and gives a way to add more songs since songs are very important in rhythm games.
Hidden tracks can be also used as a way to tell the story. An example would be Lanota, when Fisica and Ritmo (the main protagonists of Lanota) first discovered an area called the Apocalypse, they detected very high-level energy in that hole so they decided to go inside and discover nervously and cautiously. Since it was an unknown area, it can be a great way to add in hidden track for the story purposes.
In the game, because they sense something that could be dangerous inside that hole, the moment they went inside a boss cutscene will be triggered and the player will be forced to play the boss song as in the Lanota story, the way to keep the energy down is to use a device to tune it down and in the game, the player will use that device to play the rhythm game.
These are all of the 7 hidden tracks in the PANDORA BOXXX
The boss cutscene that was mentioned above from Lanota.
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