BPLプロ選手サポーターズ -SEASON 2-（BPL Pro Player Supporters -SEASON 2-）is an event from 2023-02-09 to 2023-03-09 in association with the second season of BEMANI PRO LEAGUE, Konami's e-sports BEMANI tournament.

In this event, playing the game earns tickets which can be submitted towards your favourite BPL players for rewards.

Earning Tickets

Support tickets can be earned in the following ways:

* There's a long list of eligible arcades at the bottom of the site.
† This is only applied once per song per week, and is the only option that's not endlessly repeatable.

The number of tickets earned shows up at the end of the credit like so:

You can check a history of tickets earned from the site here.

The BPL SELECTION songs are the songs that were played during the most recent week's BPL stream. The songs are conveniently collected in the "Current Events" folder, which makes them easy to find. There's also an ongoing event where playing any of these songs gives a bonus of 39 PCB.

Rewards

Support ranks and rewards are as follows. Note that there's rewards for both player totals and team totals.

Details about specific rewards are below. If you just want to know how to earn rewards, skip down to Submitting Tickets to Players.

Team Appeal Title (Team, Rank B)

The titles that can be earned are all slogans for each BPL team.

BPL Pro Player Cards (Player, Ranks A and S)

These are two designs of cards that are printed via the Card Connect machine. Unfortunately, Card Connect is pretty much Japan-only at this point in time.

See the site if you're curious what the designs look like.

Team Supporter Effects (Team, Rank AA)

This is an in-game effect that appears in the matching screen for ARENA and MEGAMIX BATTLE modes. As your profile enters there will be a "Supporter" background corresponding to the supported team's colour, and once your profile appears the team will be at the top left, like so:

Team Design e-Amusement Passes (Team, Rank S)

Once you reach Support Rank S, you're eligible for an e-amusement pass lottery of 500 passes per team. Applying to the lottery is done on this special page.

Note that, as with all physical merch, shipping goes to the address associated with your KONAMI ID, which must be in Japan to be eligible for the lottery. See this guide if you have not yet done so.

Submitting Tickets to Players

To earn rewards in this event, submit tickets to a player like so:

• Go to the "Support Status" page.
• Click a team.
• Click a player on that team.

You should see a page like this. Here you can select how many tickets to submit towards the player, then press "応援する" to submit the tickets to support them.

There's also a "次のランクまでまとめて応援する" button, which conveniently submits the necessary tickets until the next support rank.

A ranking page here shows the players who have received the most tickets so far.

Do note that there is a maximum storage limit of 9999 tickets. It's unlikely you'll hit this limit, but in any case be sure to use up your tickets!

Last updated: Nov 2 2022.

The yearly Ichika BEMANI crossover event is here again, and this time it's mixing-themed (ごちゃまぜ / gochamaze = "mix"). The event will run from 2022-11-01 (Tues) 10:00 to 2023-01-11 (Wed) 23:59 JST.

How the Event Works

The eight participating BEMANI games each have a spot in this predefined circle:

As we'll see, this configuration determines which games will receive songs from which other games.

Step 1: Blue Gauge

Gauge needed: 800 per game

Playing a game will fill the blue gauge for that game. It will also fill the gauge for other games, with the fill amount lessening the further away the game is.

For example, if you play one light start credit of SDVX (100 gauge points), then:

• Its neighbours (IIDX and GITADORA) get 33 gauge points,
• The games two away (pop'n and DDR) get 15 gauge points,
• The games three away (NOSTALGIA and DANCERUSH) get 8 gauge points, and
• The game on the opposite side (jubeat) gets 3 gauge points.

When the blue gauge for a song hits max, you can click the おすそわけ / osusowake = "Share" button on the site to make a song from that game unlockable in its neighbouring games. For example, if the GITADORA gauge is maxed out, then clicking the おすそわけ button would unlock a GITADORA song for its neighbours, SOUND VOLTEX and DanceDanceRevolution.

⚠ Note: You need to play the relevant game within the event period to actually complete the unlocking of a song, otherwise you won't be able to play the song after the event ends. Don't forget to do this after clicking the site button!

Step 2: Pink Gauge

Gauge needed: 1500 per game pair

Once two neighbouring blue mix gauges have been filled and the corresponding songs have been unlocked, a pink mix gauge for both games will appear.

When the pink gauge for a game pair hits max, you can click the アンロック = "Unlock" button on the site to unlock a new song for both games that is a mix of the songs swapped between the two games in the first step. For example, SDVX and beatmania IIDX swap "I" and "perditus†paradisus" in Step 1, and the unlockable mix song in Step 2 is "[ ]DENTITY".

Like with blue gauges, playing a game will also fill other pink gauges, with the fill amount lessening the further away the game pair is. However, the point values are different this time. For example, if you play one light start credit of SDVX (100 gauge points), then:

• The "SDVX × IIDX" and "SDVX × GITADORA" gauges would fill by 100 points,
• Their neighbours, "pop'n × IIDX" and "GITADORA × DDR" would fill by 25 points,
• The next two along, "NOSTALGIA × pop'n" and "DDR × DANCERUSH" would fill by 5 points,
• The two on the opposite side, "jubeat × NOSTALGIA" and "DANCERUSH × jubeat" would fill by 1 point.

Step 3: Purple Gauge

Gauge needed: 1000 per game

This step is unlocked when all previous gauges have been filled. Filling all the new purple gauges unlocks the final new song, "VOLAQUAS". The amount of gauge fill for games other than the one you just played works the same as with blue gauges (i.e. 33% / 15% / 8% / 3%).

If you only main one BEMANI game, then the other steps can be easily completed by playing just that game. However, to unlock and fill all the gauges for this step you'll almost certainly want to get some credits in for a game on the opposite side of your main game, otherwise the unlock will take forever. Boosts may also help (see below).

Earning Gauge Points

Other Game Boosts

Fulfilling a "boost condition" on any of these subsidiary games below will boost the rate at which gauges fill when playing the main BEMANI games. The boost conditions and statuses are listed at the top under the "現在のブースト" ("Current Boosts") dropdown on the unlock status page.

Note that the games with the コナステ icon in the top left are the home Konasute versions of the respective games.

It's a bit outdated, but you can try referring to this past event guide for Quiz Magic Academy. Some of the other similarly available games, like Mahjong Fight Club, might work similar.

Points Per Game

Here's how many points each main game gives (taken from the bottom of the site page):

Merch Campaign

The event has an associated optional acrylic stand campaign that involves earning mix points (completely separate to gauge filling for song unlocking). Details are on this page.

There are two ways to apply for a particular acrylic stand:

• The first 100 people to reach 5000 mix points (probably already gone by the time you read this),
• 100 people drawn from lottery later based on entries, with one entry possible per 1000 mix points.

Applying is done on this page. For the lottery, select the button under "抽選" ("Lottery") for the acrylic stand you'd like to try for, and then choose how many entries to put in + click 同意 to agree.

⚠ Note that this campaign only applies to Japanese Konami accounts, and requires having a Japanese address.

Earning mix points is the same as earning gauge points, except that boosts don't count and the following also give mix points:

Introduced in SOUND VOLTEX VIVID WAVE, PREMIUM TIME is an arcade game mode that lets you play whatever you want on a 10-minute timer, letting you stop in the middle of a song or quickly retry a song from the beginning. It is similar to PREMIUM FREE in beatmania IIDX, and is also effectively the mode used by the Konasute PC port for SDVX, though without a timer.

Basic Usage

After selecting PREMIUM TIME, a 10-minute timer will start.

You can then select a song like normal, with no level restrictions. The song play screen is slightly different from that of a standard credit:

As we can see, there are a few features here:

• SELF CRASH: Tapping FX-L + FX-R + START together triggers a TRACK CRASH, ending the song.
• QUICK RETRY: Holding FX-L + FX-R + START together restarts the song from the very beginning.
• AUTO QUICK RETRY: This is toggled via the 00 button on the numpad. Instead of ending the song, it makes TRACK CRASH automatically restart the song from the beginning instead. You can see whether it's enabled or not from the middle left (under CHALLENGE).

After finishing a song, on the results screen you can hold the START button to play the same song again.

With these features, you can move around songs and grind for whatever goals you wish while the timer is still running. When the timer is up, the next TRACK CRASH will end the song and proceed to the end of the credit.

If for whatever reason you wish to end the PREMIUM TIME credit early, this can be done by pressing all four BT buttons at once on the song selection screen.

Challenge Options

You can optionally set a challenge (PUC, UC, S, AAA+ or AAA) from the song select options menu that appears when tapping both FX simultaneously, or from the touch panel on a newer Valkyrie model cabinet.

When the challenge is no longer possible to achieve (even if you perfect the rest of the chart), TRACK CRASH will be triggered. As such, challenge options are most useful when grinding with AUTO QUICK RETRY enabled.

Notes About the Timer

• The timer continues running for a few seconds after a song ends, whether it be a TRACK CRASH or TRACK COMPLETE. Similarly, the timer continues running during the QUICK RETRY animation.
• If you start a song before the timer hits zero, you get to play the last song to completion.
  • As such, some players like to quit the song they're currently grinding on at < 1 minute left then move to one last song to get more out of their credit.
• If the timer hits zero at song selection, a final 15-second timer for picking a song will start.
• On the results screen, the timer is paused for a number of seconds before it starts ticking, giving you some time to check your performance.

With the above all considered, as well as screen transitions, most PREMIUM TIME credits actually take well over 10 minutes. If you're efficient, you can fit about five full standard 2-minute songs in.

Other Notes

• The BLASTER ENERGY gauge does fill during PREMIUM TIME, with percentage filled depending on how long the song was played for. The EXTRACK gauge, however, neither fills nor triggers EXTRACK.
• Be careful when playing charts that involve holding down double FX then cross-handing (e.g. Opium and purple haze GRV, Daisycutter MXM), as it is easy to accidentally brush against the START button and trigger a TRACK CRASH.

Last updated: Sep 2022

With the SOUND VOLTEX section of BEMANI PRO LEAGUE's second season coming up, here's a summary of how the tournament will work overall, along with specifics of the first few parts, based on what's on the BPL website.

Note that not all details are out yet as there is a lot of information that will be revealed later. Some details might get edited into this post; some might go into a future post.

Team Composition

There will be 8 teams, with each team consisting of 3 pro e-sports players. The teams are all affiliated with entertainment companies in Japan.

Tournament Flow

The tournament will consist of a regular stage, a quarterfinal stage, a semifinal stage and a final as follows:

To summarise:

• The top two teams in the Regular Stage will jump straight to the semifinals, with the teams ranked 3 to 6 moving onto the quarterfinals. The bottom two teams drop out.
• The top two teams from the quarterfinals will move onto the semifinals, joining the two teams that skipped ahead after the first stage.
• The top two teams from the semifinals will move onto the finals.

Regular Stage

Each match in this first Regular Stage will consist of three battles:

• 先鋒戦 (Vanguard battle) – A 1-vs-1 MEGAMIX BATTLE. Worth 3pt.
• 中堅戦 (Centre guard battle) – A 2-vs-2 tag battle. Both teams pick a song each for a total of two songs, and compete by the sum of EX score of the two players per team. Each song won is worth 2pt.
• 大将戦 (General battle) – A 1-vs-1 single battle. Both players pick a song each, plus there'll be a new song from the "BEMAN PRO LEAGUE -SEASON 2- Participation Confirmation Original Song Contest" for a total of 3 songs. The players will compete by EX score. The player-picked songs will be worth 2pt each, and the new song will be worth 3pt.

The player-picked songs in the tag and single battles will be subject to theme and level restrictions.

• The theme restrictions are all EFFECT RADAR attributes (NOTES, PEAK, TSUMAMI, ONE-HAND, HAND-TRIP, TRICKY). How they'll be decided upon will be revealed later.
• The level restrictions are as follows:

The list of selectable songs will also be revealed at a later date.

Some additional restrictions:

• Each player's participation in a match has an associated cost, to be explained in detail later.
• All players must participate in each match.
• Songs selected by a team cannot be selected again by that team within the same stage.

League and Interleague Matches

At the start of the Regular Stage, the eight teams are divided into an "L" League and an "R" League.

The L League consists of the teams:

• APINA VRAMeS
• GiGO
• GAME PANIC
• TAITO STATION Tradz

The R League consists of the teams:

• SILKHAT
• SUPERNOVA Tohoku
• ROUND1
• レジャーランド (LEISURELAND)

The teams within each league will play each other once in a round-robin fashion. After each match (as outlined above), teams will receive victory points as follows:

After all the league matches are over, teams are ranked within each of their leagues based on victory points received. Their rankings within each league determine the interleague matches:

• L League 1st place vs. R League 4th place
• L League 2nd place vs. R League 3rd place
• L League 3rd place vs. R League 2nd place
• L League 4th place vs. R League 1st place

Also based on the results of the league matches, the points awarded in each interleague match will be as follows:

The results of the interleague matches will determine the final overall rankings for the Regular Stage.

Other Stages

The general flow for the quarterfinals onwards have already been described above, but there's level restrictions per stage as follows:

• Quarterfinals, semifinals: Lv17 to Lv19
• Finals: Lv17 to Lv20

Specifics for the remaining stages will come out later.

Draft Meeting

On Sep 18 there'll be a draft meeting where each team's players and theme music will be decided. There are 34 player candidates, so not all of them will be chosen. This page has a list of candidate player profiles.

Player Selection

3 players will be drafted into each team via bidding, with bidding per round working as follows:

• Each team with the right to bid will simultaneously name a player.
• Players chosen by only one team will go to that team. Players chosen by multiple teams will have their team decided by lottery.
• Teams that failed the lottery will have the right to bid again, repeating the steps above until all teams use up their rights to bid.

Theme Music Selection

Each team will pick their own theme music from a number of candidates via the same bidding process as above.

Last Updated: Aug 2022

When Verse IV EXH debuted in SOUND VOLTEX INFINITE INFECTION, it was notable for its long one-handed FX trill:

When the song received a HVN 19 chart the trill was kept, with the knobs switching colours instead in an attempt to fool the player.

Furthermore, Verse IV is present in the KAC 2013 Empress medley... as the trill section played twice.

This post is a list of recommended charts for practising one-handed FX trills and chip patterns, roughly sorted by how fast they are.

Lemures Prelude (EXH 14)

Recommendation level: ★★☆☆☆
BPM: 165
Notes per second: 5.5
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

If you're looking for a gentle intro to one-handed FX chip patterns, Lemures Prelude is a good place to start since it's fairly slow and a level 14.

Stella Sinistra (EXH 16)

Recommendation level: ★★★☆☆
BPM: 180 (song is 120-180)
Notes per second: 6
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

Stella Sinistra's trills are short and slow but they need some transitioning into. There are 4 short trills in total.

僕らの時間 (MXM 17)

Recommendation level: ★★★☆☆
BPM: 214
Notes per second: 7.13
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

The trills here are swung but the BPM is slightly above that of Verse IV, so you can use these to practice the flicking motion for going from one button to another.

シープドリーミン (MXM 17)

Recommendation level: ★★★☆☆
BPM: 220
Notes per second: 7.33
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

Like 僕らの時間, this is also a swung trill. Every 4th note is a shiny FX chip.

黒髪乱れし修羅となりて～凛 edition～ (EXH 17)

Recommendation level: ★★☆☆☆
BPM: 150
Notes per second: 10
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

The chart has quite a lot of BT trills and jacks as well. The trill section here is short and is a bit tricky since it requires switching hands part way.

Far Away (EXH 17)

Recommendation level: ★★☆☆☆
BPM: 155
Notes per second: 10.33
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

Far Away has a short trill in the middle here.

Voynich:Manuscript (EXH 17)

Recommendation level: ★★★☆☆
BPM: 164
Notes per second: 10.93
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

This is more useful for practicing transitioning between BT and FX for trills, but I've included it here anyway. This pattern appears twice in the chart.

Finale (MXM 17)

Recommendation level: ★★☆☆☆
BPM: 176
Notes per second: 11.13
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

Note: This is the Touhou song by A-One, not the Undertale song nor the boss song FIN4LE.

There's a short BT trill into FX trill section here.

Hellfire (GRV 18)

Recommendation level: ★★☆☆☆
BPM: 176
Notes per second: 11.73
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

Hellfire GRV has a moderate trill section with laser slams here.

幽玄の桜 (MXM 17)

Recommendation level: ★★★★☆
BPM: 180
Notes per second: 12
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

This is a short trill pattern but it appears 5 times in the chart, so it's quite a useful chart for repeated practice.

VALLIS-NERIA (EXH 18)

Recommendation level: ★☆☆☆☆
BPM: 185
Notes per second: 12.33
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

It's hard to recommend VALLIS-NERIA because the hard parts are the infamous notes during spins and also the triple jacks, but it does also have an FX trill so...

Sakura Mirage (EXH 17)

Recommendation level: ★★★★★
BPM: 187
Notes per second: 12.47
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

Note: This is the original Sakura Mirage by Ryu☆, not the -Drum'n World- remix.

Sakura Mirage is more notable for being possibly the best practice chart for Booths of Fighters EXH, but the one-handed FX portion in the middle is also a particularly difficult part of the chart. It's also not just a simple trill the whole way, which can lead to early errors if you get the rhythm wrong.

Borealis (EXH 17)

Recommendation level: ★★★★★
BPM: 196
Notes per second: 13.07
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

Borealis is a relatively easy 17 and is a good intro to Booths of Fighters-type patterns, but the ending FX trill is the notably hardest part of the chart since it comes suddenly and is easy to forget about. The trill is shorter and only 16 BPM slower than Verse IV.

Chrono Diver -PENDULUMs- (MXM 19)

Recommendation level: ★☆☆☆☆
BPM: 196
Notes per second: 13.07
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

This is hard to recommend for practice since it's a 19 that has hard spots in other areas, but the one-handed trill-like section here is pretty unique so it's included here.

The Clown of 24stairs (MXM 19)

Recommendation level: ★☆☆☆☆
BPM: 204
Notes per second: 13.6
Links: YouTube (DDX), sdvx.in

This is also a Yu_Asahina song so the pattern is likely a reference to Verse IV. However this is hard to recommend for practice since the chord trill leading into the FX-trill is tricky transition.

Note: This guide is for the arcade version of SOUND VOLTEX. If you're looking for an in-depth setup guide for the PC version of SDVX, see this guide instead.

Seen the rhythm game SOUND VOLTEX and want to try it but aren't sure how to start? Here's a super simple guide for playing for the first time (with a bunch of extra beginner FAQ-type info at the bottom)!

For most of this guide, menu navigation is done via the two side knobs (VOL-L and VOL-R) for scrolling through options, plus the top-centre START button for selecting things.

Logging In

If you just want to try the game once for fun and don't care about saving scores yet, insert credits and hit the blue START button at the top. Skip all the way down to the Mode Select section.

Otherwise, if you want to start an account to save scores on, you'll need either a KONAMI e-amusement card or a card with the red "Amusement IC" logo on the back (common on newer AIME/BANAPASSPORT/NESiCA cards). Most arcades that have SOUND VOLTEX sell these cards at the counter. Once you have one, tap your card against the reader as shown below.

e-amusement Pass Setup

Since this is your first credit your card will have no data on it, so select "New Data" on the next screen.

Agree to the terms and conditions by selecting "YES":

Set a PIN for securing your card data by entering a 4-digit number twice. On newer cabinets with a touch screen the keypad will appear there; on older cabinets there is a physical keypad in the top-left.

Read the bit about card data transfer here. The FX-L button is at the bottom left. Hit "OK" when done.

Set an up-to-eight character player name here. Use one of the knobs to scroll through the characters, and hit START to select the character. Select "BACK" if you want to backspace and erase the last character.  Select "END" when you're done.

That's it! Your card is all set up! Now hit "START".

Mode Select

Select "NORMAL". This is the default mode you'll want to be playing.

Now you'll have two choices here. STANDARD START guarantees 3 songs for your first credit, but is usually slightly more expensive. LIGHT START is cheaper, but if you fail a song then the credit is over immediately (except you get to fail a song at level 7 or lower once¹).

I'd recommend STANDARD START here, but if the price difference is massive then go for LIGHT START.

Appeal Card

Select an appeal card, which is basically an avatar. You're spoilt for choice here, so just pick whichever you like the look of.

My Room

Select "GAME START" here to begin the game!

Tutorial

Here you'll get asked whether you want to play the tutorial. If you're unsure how the game works, then I'd highly recommend playing it.

To give a brief summary of the tutorial:

• Hit falling objects as they pass the horizontal CRITICAL LINE.
• Tap/hold the top BT buttons to hit white objects.
• Tap/hold the bottom FX buttons to hit orange objects.
• Turn the knobs to hit laser lines. Blue = left knob, red = right knob.
• Horizontal laser lines are slams – to hit them, give the knob a small but quick turn in the corresponding direction.

Song Selection

Now to play your first song! I recommend using the right knob and scrolling until you find the "LEVEL" folders.

For a first song, I usually recommend somewhere from level 3 (if you've never really played rhythm games before) to level 6 (if you have considerable rhythm gaming experience). If you're playing LIGHT START, you'll want to err on the easier side because being able to clear the song is better. Press the START button to enter the folder, use the right knob to pick any song you like, then press START twice to play the song!

If you accidentally entered a different folder, you can go up a folder with FX-L.

Matching

Here you'll be matched with other players playing the same song, regardless of difficulty. The waiting time can be quite long though, so you can skip matching by tapping both FX buttons at once.

Results

Once the song is over, you'll be presented with a results screen showing whether you cleared, your score and some detailed breakdowns. Press START once you're done.

There'll be a "FORCE +PLUS" animation that happens – the number here is for VOLFORCE, the rating system used in SOUND VOLTEX to indicate skill level. You can just ignore it today.

Song Selection (2nd and 3rd Tracks)

Congrats on finishing your first song! How was it?

If it was too easy or too hard, you can go back up with FX-L and choose a different "LEVEL" folder.

If you felt that the notes were coming at you too fast or too slow, open up the options menu by tapping both FX buttons at once, or by tapping the settings cog on the touch screen for newer cabinets. Find the "レーンスピード" / "Lane Speed" option, and adjust as needed. For beginners, somewhere between 1.00 to 4.00 should be good.

Once the second song is over, ask yourself the same questions and re-adjust as necessary.

Total Result

Once your credit is over, you'll be presented with a screen summarising the songs you played. You'll also get a bunch of achievements for the first time – don't worry about those. Press the START button when you're done.

Continue?

This is the very last screen, asking if you want to play again. If you're done playing, select "NO" to end the game. If you want to go again, select "YES", but be sure to check if anyone else is waiting to play before you do so.

Hope you had fun!

Your Next Credits

Now that you understand how the game works, here are some things that are useful to know for your next few credits. There's a lot of beginner FAQ-type info here.

e-amusement Pass

If you played your first credit without an e-amusement pass but enjoyed the game and want to play it more, you might want to consider getting one to save scores on now. Just go back to the e-amusement Pass Setup section for your next credit.

If you did play with an e-amusement pass, rest assured your next credit will be much simpler – just tap the pass to log in, enter your PIN, and you'll skip straight to Mode Select.

Headphones

On newer cabinets with a touch screen, there's a headphone jack at the bottom left. This is useful if your arcade is noisy. Headphone volume can be adjusted by 7 (louder) or 1 (softer) on the keypad, or on the touch screen for newer cabs.

Changing Difficulty at Song Selection

At Song Selection, the left knob changes the song's difficulty. This explanation was skipped since I recommend using the "LEVEL" folders for beginners, but if you want to look through songs by other folders (e.g. song genre) then it might be useful.

Configuring Judgement

This one's more useful if you have some rhythm gaming experience, and find that you're hitting a lot more EARLYs than LATEs, or vice versa. At Song Selection, open up the options menu by tapping both FX buttons at once, or by tapping the settings cog on the touch screen for newer cabinets. Find the "判定タイミング（描画）" / "Judgement Timing (Graphics)" option, and adjust the number to the plus side if you're hitting significantly more EARLYs, or the minus side if you're hitting significantly more LATEs. You might need to play a few songs to figure out your sweet spot.

I generally don't recommend touching the "判定タイミング（音）" / "Judgement Timing (Sound)" option, but feel free to play around with it if you think it'll help.

Unlocking Songs

I won't go into detail here about all the different ways songs can be unlocked, but the vast majority of songs with the lock symbol can be bought with the PCB currency, which you earn as you play. You start off with 10000 PCB, which is plenty for getting started!

Hand Placement

Some hand placement tips to avoid building bad habits:

• Try to grip knobs between your thumb and index/middle fingers to turn them, instead of the side or palm of your hand.
• Try to hit FX buttons with your thumbs, rather than your wrists. This will be more important when you get to higher difficulties.
• Personally I recommend hitting BT-B and BT-C with your index fingers, and BT-A and BT-D with your ring fingers (rather than middle fingers).

Knob Turning

How much you turn a knob doesn't matter, just as long as you're turning in the right direction. If you're having trouble getting used to knobs, try Profession NOV (Lv3), Issen NOV (Lv4) or Sharkbait NOV (Lv5) – these charts consist of only knobs and nothing else, and hence are useful for getting used to lasers.

LIGHT START Restrictions

Aside from the possibility of failing a song ending a credit early, other LIGHT START restrictions include:

• Level restrictions on what songs you can play on each track, depending on your SKILL ANALYZER level (won't matter until you progress much further into the game).
• The ALTERNATIVE RATE SYSTEM (ARS) gauge (which starts at the harder EXCESSIVE gauge and switches to the default EFFECTIVE gauge upon depletion) is unavailable.
• For newer cabs, S-CRITICAL judgement (tighter timing window than CRITICAL) is unavailable.
• The BLASTER ENERGY gauge does not fill (used for unlocking certain songs).
• The EXTRACK GAUGE gauge does not fill (gives a bonus song play).

Don't worry if none of this makes sense, this is just to give an idea as to what differences LIGHT START and STANDARD START have.

Customisation: Crew Navigators

On the "My Room" screen, there's also a "Crew" option. Here you can change the navigator character that appears as you enter/exit a credit, and also on your results screen. Non-default navigators can only be obtained from time-limited events or paid gacha systems.

Customisation: Generator

There are two main paid gacha systems in SOUND VOLTEX:

• A card generator where each gacha roll gives a physical card, only available in arcades that have the card printer. Crew characters can be obtained from rare PUR cards. Dupes are possible across credits, but not within the same credit if rolling multiple cards.²
• A digital-only VALKYRIE GENERATOR only available in some countries. Never gives dupes, always gives some type of customisation item, e.g. menu BGM, touch screen background or navigators. Customisation is done on the website.

About VOLFORCE

VOLFORCE, or VF, is a single number used to represent player skill in SOUND VOLTEX, similar to rating systems in other rhythm games. The number is based on your best 50 scores, with each score assigned a value based on a formula involving song difficulty, score, score grade (e.g. A, AAA, S) and clear type (e.g. normal EFFECTIVE RATE clear, or the harder EXCESSIVE RATE clear). As such, once you play 50 songs you'll notice the number start to increase slower until it stabilises, upon which getting better at the game to increase VOLFORCE becomes a common player goal.

Data Transfer Notice

When setting up an e-amusement pass, aside from "New Data" there was also a "Data Transfer Notice" option. This second option is for people who have played the previous version of SOUND VOLTEX. New versions come out every year or two, and when that happens existing players need to port their data to the new version via this second option to continue playing.

¹  Technically the condition is "Level 7 or lower and playing with the EFFECTIVE RATE gauge", according to bemaniwiki.

²  There's also a whole "generator power" de-duping system here I won't go into.

When song pack 15 was released for the Konasute PC port of SOUND VOLTEX, there was an e-amusement card campaign that allowed anyone who purchased the pack to receive a "666" e-amusement card. Now a similar e-amusement card campaign is happening for song pack 17, allowing players to get cards for both "XHRONOXAPSULΞ" and "MixxioN" at once.

Since similar campaigns might happen again in the future, I figured a post might be useful since people may have concerns about how to obtain the cards from outside of Japan.

This post assumes you've set up and are already playing the Konasute PC port of SOUND VOLTEX. If you have not yet done so, here is a setup guide that might help.

Step 1: Ensure you have a Japanese address in My KONAMI

See this guide for updating your address in My KONAMI. Note that it needs to be a Japanese address since the campaign only ships within Japan – if you don't have a friend who can help, you may need to use a proxy service like tenso (guide here).

Step 2: Purchase the song pack in question

Purchase the song pack that's part of the campaign from the store here. This should be doable even if you're not subscribed to Konasute for the month.

Step 3: Apply to the campaign on the campaign site

Each card campaign has its own campaign site which needs to be agreed to or else the cards won't be shipped. For song pack 17, the site was here.

• Click "キャンペーンにエントリーする" to enter into the campaign.

• Click the checkbox then "エントリーする" to agree to the listed terms (e.g. can only enter once per player, ships to Japan only, card design can change, specifies a shipment date, and more).

• You should then land on this page, which tells you that you've entered into the campaign. The buttons take you to My KONAMI and the top of the campaign site respectively.

• If you go back to the top of the campaign site, it should now say "キャンペーンにエントリー済みです" which means you've already entered into the campaign.

After that it's just waiting for the shipment to happen.

Last Updated: Oct 2022

ARENA BATTLE is a matching mode added in SOUND VOLTEX EXCEED GEAR only available on Valkyrie model cabs. In this mode, 2–4 players each nominate tracks to be played and compete against one another. Initially only local matching was possible, until the 2nd season of EXCEED GEAR extended this mode by adding online arena events, similar to the ARENA mode in the beatmania IIDX series.

Modes

There are four ways to play ARENA BATTLE.

• LOCAL MATCH: Battle players in the same arcade as you. For 2 players, each player selects two songs (main + sub), and after both main songs have been played the sub song of the losing player will be used for the third and final song. For 3 players, players select one song each, also for a total of three songs.
• ONLINE MATCH: Battle players online. Players are free to choose which difficulty to play.
• RANK MATCH: Only available during event periods. Battle players online in an Arena Rank Battle, with play results affecting your rank. You'll be matched to players as close to your rank as possible.
• ULTIMATE MATCH: Only available during event periods, for players at ULTIMATE rank (U4 or higher), and only usable with STANDARD START. Battle players online in an Arena Ultimate Battle, which enforces the use of S-CRITICAL and uses EX score for scoring. Play results affect your placement in the Ultimate Ranking, with your placement after the event ends determining the special title you receive.

For online modes, if four people aren't able to match together, the remaining slots will be filled with CPUs. In 4-player battles, players select one song each for a total of four songs, one more than a 2- or 3-player LOCAL MATCH.

Rule Systems

There are two types of rule systems used in arena to determine player rankings:

• Score system: Players compete for the highest total score across all songs.
• Point system: Players receive points based on their ranking after each individual song, and compete based on total points received by the end.

For LOCAL MATCH and ONLINE MATCH, the rule used will be decided by a vote. For RANK MATCH, the rule system for the arena event is decided beforehand.

Score Results

After each song you'll have a short amount of time to view your score result screen, which can be visited by pressing both FX buttons at once.

Ranked Arena

For ranked battles, the chart below shows the list of available ranks and the VOLFORCE of players that start at that rank. Note that all players at VF 19.750 or higher start at S1, and nobody starts at ULTIMATE rank.

Ranks below U also have max level restrictions for the songs you can choose, as listed in the レベル制限 column.

Players start out with their ARENA RANK bar half-filled. If the bar is filled then the player goes up a rank, and if the bar is depleted then the player goes down a rank, starting with a fresh half-filled bar at their new rank.

The better the placement the more rank points you get to fill the bar, and conversely the worse you do the more you lose. There is also a consecutive wins bonus that boosts the number of rank points you get.

ARENA STATION

During event periods, the ARENA STATION shop will be available from the MY ROOM screen, allowing limited-time songs, charts and other extras to be purchased using ARENA POWER (AP) points.

AP is obtained by playing during the event period, and disappears after the event ends. The amount of AP obtained is as follows:

Historical Notes

• Arena used to skip the MY ROOM screen, meaning that you couldn't play arena and buy from the ARENA STATION in the same credit. This was fixed partway through the first arena event.
• The score result screen was initially missing, and was added halfway through the first arena event. However when it was added there were two bugs: 1) the player's SKILL ANALYZER badge would swap with another player's, and 2) in many cases the personal best score difference would be erroneously displayed as +00000000 no matter what the previous personal best was.
• In the first arena event, there was only a single U rank above S1. This was later expanded into U1–U4 ranks.

Last Updated: Mar 2022

Vaddict (Twitter: @Vaddict2022) is a fan-made tool which lets you generate cool-looking summary images based on your scores. This guide will cover how to upload scores to the tool and use it.

⚠ Using these tools requires having e-amusement Basic Course for score fetching.

⚠ Using Vaddict will make it possible for others to see your scores if they know your SDVX in-game ID. This might be something to consider if you have your SDVX scores set to private (note that scores on the official SDVX site are public by default).

Uploading scores

⚠ Vaddict requires running JavaScript bookmarklets to fetch scores, which does mean running someone else's code in your browser. Use at your own risk.

Like nearnoah.net, Vaddict uses bookmarklets for uploading scores. If you go to the "How to use" section on Vaddict's main page you'll see a box with some JavaScript code:

Copy the code in the box and create a bookmark with the code as the URL – this will create a bookmarklet.

Go to your SDVX profile page and click the bookmarklet. There'll be a pop-up with various information, such as telling you that the score uploading process will take 1–2 minutes. Let it run, and eventually it'll automatically redirect to a confirmation screen on Vaddict. Click 登録する to confirm the score uploading. There is an optional checkbox here which you can check if you want to be listed on the VOLFORCE Ranking page.

Once this is done, your score data will be on Vaddict at https://vaddict.b35.jp/user.php?player_id=<your SDVX ID>, where the SDVX ID is of the form SV-xxxx-xxxx.

If the bookmarklet does not work, you can always try opening up your browser's JavaScript console (F12 for most browsers), pasting the bookmarklet code, then hitting enter.

Features

Note that for image generation features, the image link will only be available for a short amount of time and will need to be regenerated past that.

These are the features present as of writing:

• 前回登録時との差分 (Compare with Previous Uploads): If you upload multiple times, you can compare with previous uploads to see what you've improved on.
• VOLFORCE対象楽曲表示 (VOLFORCE Songs Summary Image): Generate a summary image that shows all 50 songs that count towards your VOLFORCE

• Lv18 S 難易度表塗りつぶし (Lv18 S Tier Chart Filling): Generate a summary image that shows Lv18 songs by S rank difficulty (based on maya2), and crosses out ones matching certain clear medal or score grade criteria. The options are as follows:
  • 更新日時 (Update Time): Which data upload to use.
  • 塗りつぶし条件 (Filling Criteria): What criteria to use for crossing out. Criteria options are PUC/UC/EX-COMP/COMP/specific score. Fill options are 赤色 (red), 青色 (blue), 黄色 (yellow), 黄緑色 (light green), 紫色 (purple), オレンジ色 (orange), ピンク色 (pink), 水色 (aqua) or 半透明 (semi-transparent).
  • Tier別の表示 (Tier-wise Display): Extra data that can be shown per tier. Options are average score, fill status (e.g. all AAA+ or all EX-COMP), or both. Note that fill involves all songs in the tier, including time-limited event songs.
  • 特殊条件 (Special Criteria): Show scores instead. Overrides the above filling options.

• Lv18 PUC 難易度表塗りつぶし (Lv18 PUC Tier Chart Filling): Generate a summary image that shows Lv18 songs by PUC difficulty. This tool is almost identical to the Lv18 S tool – the only difference as of writing it the 難易度帯毎にスコアを降順に並び替えて表示 checkbox, which invalidates the fill options and sorts scores within a tier by score descending.
• VOLFORCEランキング (VOLFORCE Ranking): Ranking of all users on the site that have allowed themselves to be listed. You can check out other players' top 50 VF songs here, which may be a useful reference.

Last updated: Oct 2022

BLASTER PASS is a time-limited item which speeds up and simplifies progress towards the game's various unlock systems. The pass can be bought for ¥550 from the e-amusement store here, via PASELI.†

Specifically, the pass lasts for 24 hours from the time of purchase and has the following effects:

• For songs in BLASTER GATE and Ω Dimension, just playing the song once will unlock it, instead of needing to clear the song or play it 20 times.
• BLASTER ENERGY gain is doubled, making it faster to hit 100% BLASTER GAUGE on standard credits.
• HEXA DIVER damage is multiplied by 1.5. It also enables the ALTERNATE RATE SYSTEM, i.e. if you fail the HEXATIVE RATE gauge you automatically switch to the regular EFFECTIVE RATE gauge and keep on playing.
• AP earned during arena event periods is increased for non-arena modes as follows:

The above means that the BLASTER PASS can be useful in the following situations:

• You are having trouble clearing a song on BLASTER GATE or Ω Dimension in order to unlock it, and don't want to play it 20 times.
• You are unable to clear a chart on HR1 in HEXA DIVER, and don't mind repeatedly failing the ARS (on top of the initial damage on lower difficulties) in order to unlock the chart.
• You want to require less shots to unlock a song in HEXA DIVER (on average, one less shot per song).
• You want to unlock items in ARENA STATION more quickly during arena event periods.

In order to get the most out of the BLASTER PASS, you'll likely want to use the more expensive BLASTER START mode, since that allows for 1 shot at HEXA DIVER and 2 shots at BLASTER GATE/Ω Dimension in the one credit.

If you have purchased the pass, you can check whether it's still active and when it'll expire from your profile here, or at various screens that'll come up in-game. Note that the expiry time listed is in Japan time.

† A PASELI purchasing guide may be added to this blog in the future, but in the meanwhile you can charge PASELI from this page, then choose the amount you want to charge. The next screen will ask for the payment method — クレジットカード (credit card) should be sufficient for most people. For a PASELI guide currently available, see bemanistyle's guide here.