DJMAX Ray

I like to like things. I like many things, and in that long list of things is a rhythm game series called DJMAX. Though it’s suffered a few downs, it’s also seen tremendous highs. If you asked me, (which I think you are, else you’d probably not be really interested in this review) DJMAX Portable and its Technika arcade cabinets are the current peak of rhythm games. They represent an amazing commitment to addictive gameplay mechanics, combined with beautiful presentation and an always impressive tracklist of original and licensed music.

DJMAX Ray is none of those. It has poor gameplay, a broken network, and an unimpressive tracklist. I like to like things, and DJMAX Ray is not one of them.

Currently out on Android and iOS, DJMAX Ray is a free-to-play rhythm game based on TapSonic, another rhythm game developed by Korean music gurus Pentavision/Neowiz. It uses a scrolling note chart similar to that of Rock Band, though plays much more similarly to Konami’s Beatmania series. You tap and hold notes to play music, with a new type of note added from TapSonic where you must swipe a note into a specified direction to play it. Other than that, it’s pretty standard fare. Fever Mode remains, and speed, fade, and orientation effectors are present, as is unlockable notes and gears. (Though more on that later.)

The game comes with one pack of six tracks, one of them being unlockable after completing a set of challenges. All 25 other packs cost $2.99, with bundles offering a few packs with some XP/Point booster items for $9.99. It’s a model that could theoretically work but little content is provided upfront and the price of buying every other pack adds up pretty quickly. Veterans of the series might be especially peeved, since classic tracks such as Oblivion (Rockin’ Night Style), Hamsin, Syriana, and Memories of Beach are all broken apart into different packs of different bundles.

Why this model could “theoretically” work is if it faced no other competition, which it does. In fact, it faces competition in the form of the game it’s derived from: TapSonic. TapSonic’s model is simple: offer a small, free list of songs that rotates every so often (last I played, it was every two weeks—this might have changed since) and contrast that against a massive library of paid content, all of which is offered cheaply. Every song costs about a dollar and has a massive spread of genres and artists, including DJMAX releases and whatever hot new pop singles South Korea has to offer. For a game you’d kinda only play on the toilet or to kill some time in line somewhere, it’s a brilliant model. If you’re more invested than that, then a few dollars will net you a decent library to keep you busy.

Somehow, Neowiz opted for a different model with DJMAX Ray and I feel it suffers for it. The DLC support has been greatly lacking as of late (it continues on TapSonic) and while DJMAX’s music library is not as endless as TapSonic’s licensed treasure trove, the series has used licensed music before and could ostensibly do so again.

On a more positive note, you get a decent amount of use out of the tracks you do have at your disposal in DJMAX Ray. You can play the first five songs of a pack for high scores or complete a challenge list that will unlock the sixth song, in addition to a set of more difficult challenges. Completing them, and replaying them to earn a better ranking, will get you pretty decent play time. Passing songs will also earn you MAX points and XP, which are used to buy items in the shop. XP will let you gain levels to unlock better items and MAX points will allow you to buy those items, giving you bonus stats such as extra Fever duration or faster HP regeneration.

However, none of this matters. Getting a good amount of playtime and gaining new items is completely useless because getting there is a frustrating task. Of all things in a music game, hit detection and audio syncing issues are probably top on the “List of Things to Get Right or Else You’ve Done Fucked Up Fierce”. Though it varies per device, the audio sync is abhorrent on any device I’ve tried it on. My HTC One had it worst of all, which is a shame considering it has speakers practically made for these types of games. It was pretty bad on my 2nd Gen Nexus 7 too, though nowhere near as unfortunate as my One. The syncing is so busted on that device that it’s practically unplayable past the easiest of easy difficulties. Ray provides a hit detection slider in the options menu but tinkering with it did nothing to help on either device, either making every note far too early or far too late. It’s worth noting as well that TapSonic did not have any of these syncing issues when I played it for an extended amount of time a few months ago.

I spent the majority of playtime with DJMAX Ray on my Nexus 7 as a result, which is a less-than-ideal experience considering the game was not made to scale to tablet resolutions. It looks very much like a stretched-out phone game, though I hear that is nowhere near as bad as what it looks like on iPad, where a native version for the device is not even available. (It is currently iPhone/iPod Touch only, though it can be searched for on the iPad’s App Store through proper filtering.)

And if the knife wasn’t deep enough already, the game requires a constant online connection to Pmangplus, Neowiz’s online ID service. Your DJ, rank, items, and DLC is all stored on your Pmangplus account. The game requires a constant connection because it syncs your scores online to its service alongside checking for your DLC, which is especially funny since you download all of it at the start. The initial download for the game is 958MB, so your connection to Pmangplus is nothing more than a “key” to your paid content. If you’re not connected to Pmangplus, you can’t play. Seriously. There’s no offline mode.

Which, hey, it’s 2013. My phone’s on a 3G connection most of the time and my tablet is synced to wi-fi at work and home, so it’s never an issu—haha, fuck you, there’s another problem. Pmangplus’ servers are MMO launch-like unstable, dropping connections more frequently than I’ve ever seen in an online-enabled game. Logging in at the start can take anywhere between a minute or two and the results scoreboard will often be disrupted by a “Connection Unstable” prompt, forcing it to wait for a minute while it reconnects. Testing it at home, at work, and at a friend’s house yielded me the same results every time.

My friend was kind enough to tell me what it was like on iPad, where his comments were quickly followed by him deleting the game off his device. He continues to be concrete in his belief that Ray is a terrible product and, having played TapSonic for a few months on one of my older phones, I did not want to believe him. The base that it’s built on was solid, I saw no reason why that would change. When I got a new phone and tablet that could finally play DJMAX Ray, I played here and there at night, thinking that it’s not that great of an experience but it’s not that bad. I mean, it’s free, right?

Turns out that kind of emotional attachment to a franchise just vanishes when you’re on the metro after a long day’s work, wanting to Full Combo Oblivion, only to open DJMAX Ray on your Nexus 7 and forgetting that that you’re not connected to wi-fi. Of course, it gently reminds you with a pop-up saying ‘Connection Unstable’ and leaving you no other course of action, forcing you to close the application despite knowing that all 958MB of content is there, waiting to be played.

I like many things, and in that long list of things is a rhythm game series called DJMAX. Its mobile iteration, DJMAX Ray, is not a good game. It is, in fact, a terrible game. It’s a music game that has audio syncing issues. It’s an online game that has an unstable network structure, rendering it unplayable half the time. It’s a DLC enabled game that forces an almost-1GB download, only to limit you to less than 10% of its content. It’s a mobile game that is not supported on most mobile devices. It’s a DJMAX game that offers little value to long-time veterans of the series.

I like to like things, and DJMAX Ray is not one of them. It kind of breaks my heart to finally admit that.