Dead Rhythm Games: Bemani Edition

I don't really have anything witty to say except that dead rhythm games are often forgotten. Yet, the stories behind them are pretty interesting. So I thought I'd give a brief overview of the Bemani games that couldn't survive to the present day and shed some light into an obscure part of rhythm game history.

Timestamps:
0:00 Introduction
0:56 Beatmania
1:42 Pop'n Stage
2:20 Keyboardmania
3:18 ParaParaParadise
4:11 Reflec Beat
5:12 Dance Evolution
5:56 Beatstream
6:55 Museca
8:02 Other Bemani Games
10:17 Conclusion

All songs and footage belong to their respective owners. I just own the voice over.

[FNWeeaboo]

It has come to my attention that I made a few mistakes on this video so I would like to address them here.

Reflec Beat
In regards to Reflec Beat there is no definite consensus as to whether or not the game is actually dead. Some may consider it still an active series due to the fact that it is still receiving updates, while others consider it dead as many Japanese arcades have sold their cabinets. So while the future of Reflec Beat is uncertain, I'll leave it for you to decide whether or not the game is actually dead.

Other Rhythm Games
As one comment mentioned earlier I left out Toy's March and it completely slipped my mind. A brief overview would be that its gameplay is similar to Taiko no Tatsujin but the overall theme is more of being a drummer boy in a marching band. There were also a few games like Rap Freaks, Marimba Heaven, and Rizminance which I could not really find videos for nor was there a lot of information for me to go off.

I hope this clears up anything that I missed in the video. Thanks.

[videogamesruinedmylife]

Problem is that konami released so many music games they were only competing against themselves. It's good that we got so much variety but most mainline hardcore rhythm gamers just stick to the same games like pop'n, ddr and beatmania

[zeronxepher]

Oh that's my museca video. Nice lol

[cammy]

Museca's online services are actually not discontinued. There are cabs in Japan that are still online. But konami kinda made it seem like your only options were to get an offline kit or convert to bbc.

[ThePixelPolygon]

5:39 dude i feel you i grinded the ever living hell out of din don dan. that one was super fun

[myntmetro]

I never really knew that there was so much in terms of obscure bemani games, great stuff!

[riffcrypt]

Dance Maniacs was the first Bemani game I ever played. Waving my hands over the sensors was a day I'll never forget. I lucked out having grown up close to a large arcade in the states that loved importing more obscure Bemani games. This was in the classic era though but I got plenty of time in playing Guitar Freak, Drummania, Parapara, IIDX, along with the newest DDR machines.

[ZuiVeemo]

I've always wanted to try out dance evolution, and recently Bemani announced a new game with a rather similar concept to Dance Evolution called Dance Around
I'm hyped!

[jasonperez]

Museca is dead?!? That’s sad. I played it for the first time last week and I really enjoyed it

[nathank-jwuv]

Hi, I came from the subreddit, I'm not going to lie I did not expect a good video but I actually ended up watching the whole thing, really well made, keep it up

[jasonartamis]

love this video! thanks for making this! im very into previous bemani games and this sum it up great!

[radiantansel]

I remember seeing Mambo A-Go-Go in a rural arcade I had near my home in... well... Rural Mexico haha
I can add that the game was actually pretty fun, and the nature of everyone of us being kinda poor also helped, because we could play "hard songs" where you are forced to play all 3 mambos but instead, 3 players could dedicate each other to play one of them, pretty nice

The interior of the mambos (I remember seeing maintenance of them once) had 3 buttons in the interior, clicky buttons.

I wish I could play the game again, but haven't seen it in so long (probably more than a decade at this point).
If I ever find it out, I might buy it and keep it public for people to enjoy.

[zorac]

Being an avid rhythm gamer for more than a decade, this was a very well-made and interesting video! New sub here

[bills-beard]

Aw yeah, I remember playing DanceManiax in the arcades!! Miss that one

[noctuid]

Beatstream is still playable unofficially and is often at American conventions. There is also a clone (part of CarmVTR). Museca also has an unofficial community that continues to make new tracks (museca plus). Both still support cards (it's just not the official konami server).

[flowbro]

every time I see dmx/Dance Maniax it makes me nostalgic and sad bc i remember every arcade having it from the 2000s to the early 2010s
i resonated with that game even as a kid that now
i feel it impacted me more than ddr rhythm game wise
even if technically i did play ddr more in total time

[ViraRiva]

i wanna try parapara paradise so bad but ive never seen a machine even in japan. im sure theres gotta be one arcade that has it still!

[UnknownFlyingPancake]

I feel like I've seen Dance Maniax a long time ago at an arcade that shut down. Unless there's another game that has a similar physical setup anyway, as I can't remember what the game screen was like at all. I only remember that I couldn't figure out what to do lol

It seems like unless a rhythm game becomes a huge hit, companies tend to cease support of them quickly. I only got to play Final Fantasy Theatrythm: All Star Carnival at Round 1 with online features enabled a few times before it was discontinued =( I'm glad it can still be played, but it's not as fun without your own personal team to level up.

[DragonMasterSubo]

Dance Freaks was awesome, very happy to have had one at my local mall arcade back in the day.

You could use your knees for the under swipes and it became very dynamic with how you'd play.

[GUCFan]

Dance Evo can be played on PC or if you don't want to go through the fuss of trying to find the game's data to run on PC. Well there's still the original Xbox 360 version out there