My copy of DJ Max Portable 3 arrived yesterday.
-Broken English, which is still better than no English translation at all. I'm looking at you, Sega and Konami.
-Several play modes: standard four-button and six-button, plus new Remix modes involving the analog nub.
-Standard three-song arcade mode.
-Mission mode and level system for unlocking stuff.
-Awesome soundtrack.
-DJ Max games in general go a lot farther than other rhythm games in terms of accuracy measurement: rather than a Konami-style system with a few levels, it displays a percentage for your accuracy on a given note in increments of 10%, plus a 1% accuracy measurement if you just barely hit a note or if you forget to release a hold note. While I haven't had it happen to myself yet (still adjusting to some of the weird stuff this game does, so I can't come close to full perfects quite yet), I've seen the horror of a 99.9% judgment rating. I've also heard one of the challenges requires you to get a 1% judgment rating, which sounds harder to me than a perfect full combo.
-On-the-fly scroll speed adjustment (1x-7x in increments of .5x). Yeah, yeah, I know, increasing the scroll speed is cheating in something like Guitar Hero, where player accuracy is less important than note chaining, but DJ Max is more like beatmania IIDX or pop'n music, in which even pro players have to use speed mods. (Incidentally, IIDX also lets you adjust scroll speed in-game.)
-Something you don't normally see: rather than being like Star Power (which weaker players can and often do store and then use as an easy way out of tough sections), things get more difficult when you activate Fever mode: in addition to boosting the chain multiplier for higher scoring, it increases the scroll speed, which is especially bad if you've already got it boosted manually. And you have to use Fever to get more Fever; to increase the multiplier, you have to fill up the Fever gauge and activate it again while already in Fever mode.
-Speaking of things not being made easier: they killed off the foul beast that is autocorrect (a non-optional mechanic in some of the previous games by which you could press the wrong button for a note and simply be penalized slightly on your judgment rating without breaking your chain). DJ Max Trilogy, the PC game, had autocorrect, but they killed it in a recent patch, so I'd guess Pentavision realized what a mistake the feature was.
-SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC (yeah) SUPERSONIC
Overall I've been loving the game so far, but I'm not sure I'd recommend it when it's $40 for the download version. The UMD version is worth the $40 because you actually own the game you're paying for.
