Taiko Adventures with Pokémon Songs

As I've sometimes discussed on this blog, I enjoy music or rhythm games to a good extent. Because of my Pokémon background, however, I sometimes wish it can be more involved in this area of gaming. While that hasn't happened majorly, it has occasionally happened to a small part, as with the Taiko no Tatsujin game I discussed nine months ago. Before current conditions majorly worsened, I had the chance some months ago to go back to the same machine I played back then to see if I could find a few more Pokémon gems, and I did.

One of them is "XY&Z", the Japanese opening theme for the sub-series of the same title. A friend had found the song on the same machine, so I wanted to play it as well. When I went back to play, I was fortunate to find the song, and so I played it.

"XY&Z", Normal, Clear with 3 Bad...

...and Hard, Fail.

To check my skills, I started out by playing it on the Normal difficulty, and I seemed to have done OK. Two stages later, I tried it on the Hard difficulty, and miserably failed. At this point I'm still a beginner to intermediate Taiko player, so I ought not to touch the Hard difficulty until I'm absolutely certain of my skills.

Surprisingly, the machine had something as far back as the XY sub-series, and that would be the third opening "Getta Ban Ban". While I played it on Normal and cleared it, I did get more of the "OK" judgment than I probably should have, which may be partly attributable to the state of the drums. Some arcade machines where I am may not receive proper maintenance, let alone with the possibility of children mishandling them (in the case of Taiko, banging without playing), and this is always a problem for serious players. Still, I may need to improve my skills first before I can have a final say on anything that I do, particularly on this machine.

"Getta Ban Ban", Normal, Clear.

Opening themes are not the only popular songs from the Pokémon anime; the ending themes are popular as well. This Taiko machine also included "Mirai Connection" ("Future Connection"), one of the ending themes of Sun & Moon. Due to limited time, I was only able to play the Easy chart, so I would have to come back for the Normal chart. When I played it during that session, I only got 2 Bad; I would need to get no Bad in order to achieve a Full Combo. I did achieve a Full Combo then, though not on a Pokémon song. In any case, I'm still curious.

"Mirai Connection", Easy, Clear with 2 Bad.

The last Pokémon gem I found on the machine (at that time) is the 20th Anniversary version of "Mezase Pokémon Master", which appears in another significant something related to 20. I got pretty good results on this one, and even had a full "Soul Gauge" - the measurement that determines clear or failure.

"Mezase Pokémon Master ~20th Anniversary~", Easy, Clear with 4 Bad...

...and Normal, Clear with 3 Bad and a full gauge.

It should be noted that lately I also viewed some footage on YouTube for the Nintendo Switch version of Taiko no Tatsujin, and the footage indicates that "Alola!!" and "Mezase Pokémon Master ~20th Anniversary~" are present on the game, and this may become a prompt to get the game, though even if I do, it would be much, much later. It would also allow me to play without the restrictions of a faraway machine with hard-to-read and comprehend Japanese text.

At this point, the Taiko machine above is out of my reach and so is the game at a practical level. I would have to wait until conditions become feasible to be able to play it again. But thanks to the inclusion of the Pokémon songs above, I've been able to go on an adventure with a very unique music game. It's an adventure that stands to continue with the game in some form (even on the Switch as above) and songs beyond Pokémon. Whatever happens, it's the Pokémon songs that will leave me wanting to return to play (and improve my skills on) this music game.

One year ago: Techno-Poké-Captain

Two years ago: Everyone's RPG vs. Hardcore RPG

Three years ago: (Self) References