2012 Golden Music Forum: Industrial executive talks about relations between game and music

"2012 Golden Music Forum", part of the 2012 Golden Music Exposition, a professional exposition for achievements of the music industry and its cross-fields in Taiwan, started varied topics from music to the other related or extended ones within a four-day event. In the second day of the 2012 Golden Music Forum last Sunday (June 17th), industrial executives talked about relations between game and music with the topic "Applications of music in games".

"Before the copyright issue is not mentioned and valued by several game developers, some of them (companies) chose several well-known canned musics to be materials of audio and clip enhancements when arranging musics or a simple clip to a game. However, there is still a great copyright issue on 'Canned Musics', if someone still uses them, they may not afford financial losses when they confronted lawsuits from original (music or audio) authors. As though, a specified department of music and audio production in a game company will be a key factor to show the value of 'original music' in a company (or its game).

"Music is undoubtedly a great element to effect on several factors including enterprise culture, design and image of a brand in a company or a game. For example, 'Miku Hatsune', an virtual idol from Japan, stands for not only a boom of subcultures but also productions and extensions on gaming, music, and performance art like cosplay and the other related events."

"Miku Hatsune" made great impacts on several extensions from music and games to subcultures. (Archived photo from the "2012 Taiwan Miku Hatsune Utilization Anniversary Tournament".)

The latest "Project Diva" work on PlayStation Vita named to "F"

Since "Project Mirai" on Nintendo 3DS was released about a season ago, Sega was still positively developing a new work on PlayStation Vita. According to the official Japanese blog "Weekly Diva Station", the latest work of the "Miku Hatsune: Project Diva" on PlayStation Vita will be named as "Miku Hatsune: Project Diva F".

Same with the "Project Mirai", the augmented reality interactive system will be featured in this work, users may use bundled AR card to do several customized interactions when gaming. As the "Project Diva F" is the initial version on PlayStation Vita, Sony and Sega will jointly feature a "Console Bundle" in the Limited Edition when shipping.

More Information

• Official Information: Game Cover and Console Bundle (Japanese)
• SGCafe: Hatsune Miku Project Diva F demos to appear in 740 stores around Japan; game package shots

2012 REFLEC BEAT Taiwan Summer League ready to start

After the golden era of "REFLEC BEAT Taiwan Grand Prix", another major event named "REFLEC BEAT Taiwan Summer League" prepared to welcome new challenger. Before this, the warm-up friendship made a friendship debut to evaluate popularity and fevers of the REFLEC BEAT in Taiwan.

Although the arcade music game in Taiwan changed vary, participants still battled high-level matches as well.

According to Kugayama Tech Co., Ltd., the opening match of the "REFLEC BEAT Taiwan Summer League" will be scheduled when all the possible determinants are considered and prepared.

Taiko no Tatsujin Arcade named as the official game in the 2012 New Taipei Music and Dance Festival in Taiwan

Taiko no Tatsujin is designated as the official game for the "Drum Gaming Master Tournament" in the 2012 New Taipei Music and Dance Festival. (Picture for reference only.)

Recently in Taiwan, to celebrate administration upgrades from Taipei County to New Taipei City, the Cultural Bureau of New Taipei City decided to make a major event with drum-based theme named "2012 New Taipei Music and Dance Festival".

According to the organizer, there are two main tournaments during this event. One is "Golden Drum Master Competition" (in Chinese: 金鼓王爭霸賽) for instrument players, and the other one is "Drum Gaming Master Tournament" (in Chinese: 電玩鼓林盟主爭霸賽) for music game players.

Although "Taiko no Tatsujin AC" by Namco is designated as the official game of the "Drum Gaming Master Tournament" during this major event, but the organizer just released group divisions and qualifier areas instead of gaming versions.

Online registrations for the "Drum Gaming Master Tournament" will be started on June 1st, 2012. Qualifiers of this event will be scheduled every weekend from June 23rd to July 8th, and the Final will be scheduled on July 21st to 22nd in the New Taipei City Plaza near the New Taipei City Hall.

2012 GTI Asia Taipei Expo: New music games, new bright impression

Last week in the Taipei World Trade Center, the 2012 GTI Asia Taipei Expo (GTI Taipei), the most famous arcade-oriented gaming trade show in Asia and Taiwan, showcased several new line-ups especially music games by several companies including Sega, Konami, IGS, and Injoy.

New line-ups in a glance: Gaming with just simple intuitions, complex gaming techniques may not required

After the golden past of Miku Hatsune, We Dancing Online, REFLEC BEAT last year, there is a great variation on arcade music games during the 2012 GTI Taipei. Besides of new events from IGS and Konami, "MaiMai" by Sega and "Love Touch" by Injoy (in picture) were respectively showcased to show visitors.

Some new line-ups are designed for light players who just likes to enjoy music or multimedia visual than pursuit advanced gaming techniques (e.g. "Love Touch" and "MuziBox"). But after somatosensory feature is considered by several developers, some games may need advanced gaming techniques if a player wants to be familiar with new gaming systems (e.g. "Sound Voltex Booth" and "Dance Evolution" by Konami and "MaiMai").

IGS vs Konami: Interactive event as the best practice for positive impressions of music games and arcade game industry in Taiwan

If a golden era is over, the best idea to maintain gaming popularity and showcase positive impression is to hold interactive events. In this alternative battle of the 2012 GTI Taipei, IGS and Konami respectively held key events when promoting their own new games.

Succeeded to We Dancing Online Arcade Edition (WeDo Arcade), IGS introduced their new product "MuziBox". To stabilize gaming popularity from WeDo Arcade, IGS and Saint-Fun jointly provided several memorial WeDo Arcade Tournament T-Shirts and IGS Super Collection Original Soundtrack during lucky draw events for players.

To last upsurges from recently-ended 2011 REFLEC BEAT Taiwan Grand Prix, Yoshitaka Nishimura (DJ YOSHITAKA), music composer and director of Konami BEMANI Series, was invited by Sume Corporation (agent of Konami in Taiwan) to interact with Bemani players. During the showdays, DJ YOSHITAKA demonstrated new games including "Sound Voltex Booth" and "Dance Evolution" to players and described variations and differences from past works.

Booth experience event by IGS and Saint-Fun (agent of IGS).

DJ YOSHITAKA (center) introduced "Sound Voltex Booth" and "Dance Evolution" to Bemani players.

Generally in new music games at the 2012 GTI Taipei, the first impression of music game has to be changed because of variations on functionality and different gaming-style orientations.