Camellia feat. Nanahira - Seashore on the Moon by melloe

back in this comment box for another long-form late night ramble. i figure if melloe leaves enough long comments on other stuff someone ought to return the favor

i wanna talk about the first kiai. i thought it was a little ridiculous when i first saw it back in, what, 2019? 2020? like, i'd seen jump maps before, but at the time this felt like a step too far. i can't blame my younger self. when all you play are shitty jump farm maps, seeing anything else feels like alien technology.

those back-and-forths, on their face, are such a simple solution. the absoulute, bare-minimum, simplest solution would be just placing circles to the melody, all in the exact same spot. this is just that, but, like, a micron more complex: they alternate position each time. that's so dumb! and needlessly difficult, too! that's such a primitive way to treat the song!

right?

i certainly thought so when i saw it from the first time. maybe not in such verbose terms, obviously, i hadn't been actively playing for very long, but i definitely saw it and thought "that's dumb."

but, in spite of it, i liked it. i saw it and thought, hey, i'm curious now, and i downloaded the map when i got home and i played it a ton. even though i was, like, six digit. i struggled pretty hard at the time. i don't think i ever passed it until way later.

but it's FUN! (at least i think so, your mileage might vary lol.) and fun in a good way, too, in a way where you can tell it was done with intent. you've been hearing the rhythm used in this section in the song for the entire verse leading up to it. if you've been paying attention, and if you pick up on what this pattern is doing, there should only be guesswork regarding WHEN to click on a sightread. the rhythm's nothing special; the aim component, WHERE to click, is what really makes it work, i think. the feeling of dashing your cursor from one end of the playfield is gratifying when you stick the landing. yes, it's a challenge that is difficult, but immediately understood once you see it, and it's all on the player to conquer it.

this map does a ton of stuff with this simple idea, not just in this kiai. you mapper folk probably don't need me to tell you that; if you've looked at the map, you've seen it all already, i'm very tired so i'm going to save myself the effort of explanation lol.

but that's the kind of thing i respond to in a map. i think that from a game design standpoint, if you want to make a map that's memorable and enjoyable for people, these are the kinds of things you should be building your maps around. so long as the challenge can be easily grasped by the player, and it's enjoyable to pull it off, then the difficulty or the audacity of it should be irrelevant. maybe that's why so many people, my younger self included, get satisfaction out of playing jump maps. what challenge could be more immediately understood than "go to the next circle"?

p.s. - after some thought i'm realizing now that all my maps are trying to be like this map. melloe you fucking gave me concept brainworms

it plays well

lovely

i remember thinking this pattern was the coolest shit ever when it cmae out 03:00:881 -

seashore on the goat

I take half a star off sounan everytime jason says mid

i read seashore on the mid and got so angry i almost got toxic im logging off

watching btmc play this- what, four years ago maybe?- was one of the things that inspired me to map in the first place. my view of what an Osu Map could be was so restricted by the shitty sotarks maps i retry-spammed at the time, and this blew it wide open, and for that i will always be thankful

seashore on the quadrilateral

seashore on the mid

https://media.tenor.com/8d5N07HfPwIAAAAd/jon-flex-tape.gif

every few months i open this map back up and realize how incredible it is

I love melloe

swiq 🐐