Pulsen Reviews

Nothing that really makes it stand out over it's competitors, and it appears to be have been abandoned. No workshop support, little aesthetic customisation, no options that other games dont already have, flipping the playfield invalidates scores, no editor, and the bundled maps are good, but not good enough to warrant the price tag. Not a bad game, but there just isn't any reason to get this over stepmania.

(note, the developer comment on this is referring to a review I did for this years ago, this one you're reading is a completely different review) I revisited this game after a few years to see how this game holds up and it unfortunately is worse to use today than it is back then. Not to say that much has changed here, but the world of customizable rhythm game clients has grown around it, and this is just unusable by comparison. I understand that this isn't an 'engine', and it's a 'game', but the main problem comes from this game running on an unmodifiable version of the Stepmania 5 engine. The SM5 engine is pretty decent by itself, but the problem is that when you close it off and remove features from it, it loses a lot of its appeal. For example, you can't add any noteskins to this. You can't view or modify any of the charts in a chart editor. You can't enable assist clap or autoplay. You can't enable c-mod. It doesn't seem like you can even use a normal scoring system even after fiddling through the options. It would always give me 100% as long as I hit every note (there was an option in the gameplay settings that supposedly let you change the scoring system, but I didn't notice a difference. maybe it didn't work). There were other small annoyances I would run into while browsing through the song list (including crashing, hell yes, that's early access baby), but you get the idea. It's unfortunate because stylistically, it's all pretty decent. The charts are good (and there's a lot of them. The store page says 85 songs but I counted over 100), the noteskins aren't terrible (mines could use a different texture), and the menus look neat, also. The song list I'm not a fan of (1/3 of the track list is Renard under various pseudonyms, the rest isn't much better), but if you dig the music, the charts are not bad at all. So are these fancy charts worth putting up with the game's annoyances? Not for $15, I would say. And you might be thinking "Hey, $15 isn't even a lot!", and for a rhythm game, it really isn't. But you have to consider just how many good stepmania song packs and themes are available for free right now. There's an endless amount of them, with a lot of them looking just as nice as Pulsen does. This is a tough sell even if everything was perfect, so the problems amplify my hesitancy to recommend this 100 times over. If you don't care about stepmania at all, and you want an easy all in one package of dancing goodness... buy In the Groove on the PS2! Or this. But if you are already familiar with stepmania or openitg, this probably won't impress you.

At the time of writing this review the game is still in early access, so everything is subject to change and update. After roughly 15 years of playing DDR & later moving on to ITG, I was excited to finally see a new take on 4 panel rhythm games. I actually owned this game before it was on steam around 2012. Sadly not much has changed since then. The skin the game is running over StepMania is pretty much the exact same as it was almost 4 years ago. The song selection is pretty decent at the time of writing this, fairly wide varity of genres. I didn't expect to see songs by Renard which was a nice surprise. The song unlock system is a good idea but at the end of the day, if you are a high skilled player at DDR or ITG, unlock songs feels more like a task than a reward. You get points after beating songs, you then use those points to choose what songs you wish to unlock. At the end of the day I had already unlocked every song with points in about 2 hours of play simply because the game is so easy. None of the songs really offer much of a challenge after playing song packs for SM like Pendulum or even some songs on ITG like Vertex or Hardcore of the North. Which I get it can't be to crazy as to allure to new players. But the fact I full combo every song without really trying is kind of sad. Probably the only thing that throws me off are the lifts. The are hugely annoying when playing on keyboard as I'm not holding down the panel after hitting a single note as I would while playing on a pad. All in all, this is a great rhythm game for what it is and I can only hope that it gets updates and support. Things like multiplayer online, marathons, higher difficulties and new songs.

Negative reviews seem to be mostly from people who are just mad to actually have to pay for the work artists have put into songs and mappers have put into charts. I personally am not a fan of being a freeloader and playing copyrighted songs so this game gets my full support. Furthermore, the charts are nice and vibe well with the music, and most of the songs are good too. I also like how they're unique, since I play so many rhythm games, and many of them have similar songs. So this game is a nice addition to my rhythm game library for sure! I also find the charts to be of higher quality than a lot of the ones that one can find in games people recommend to play instead of this. Also the difficulties are perfectly fine. I guess the people calling it 'easy' are used to the kind of trash high difficulties most free vertical scrolling rhythm games churn out. But in any good triple A rhythm game I've played, the difficulty isn't about eyeraping you with bulky overcharted maps paired with insane carpal tunnel inducing button mashing that makes NO sense with the music at all. It's impressive if you can do it, sure. But it isn't fun to look at, nor to play imo. Gotta be able to vibe with the music yo. And I am vibing in this game. The only thing I'd like for this game to improve on is that it remembers your custom settings. It's a bit annoying having to set it up all over again every time I run the game.

Excellent! I have tried Stepmania 5 and outfox. This polished version is simple and functions without stress. The meager fee is also appreciated. The only item that could improve this game is a pump option (diagonal arrows). While the the free alternatives have a pump option and perhaps additional game variations, they are missing instructions and those game variations are not immediately functional. Pulsen Is fully functional and requires simplistic and easy dance pad configuration (assign pad areas to the game directions). Purchase this game and have a stress free and enjoyable experience! Thank you for for the excellent experience, 4-Panel Footprint.

As a StepMania and osu!mania player, my opinion may be a little biased here and there. [h1] Things I enjoyed [/h1] [list] [*][u]Graphics[/u] The game is probably the best looking VSRG around. [*][u] The Music [/u] While not the kind of music I enjoy most of the time, it works. I would personally love more high-bpm songs, hardstyle, eurobeat, etc. though. [/list] [h1] Things I did not enjoy [/h1] [list] [*][u] The difficulty [/u] The difficult part about these maps is that it isn't the actual note mapping that makes the songs hard, it's the scroll speed changes and various effects. Coming from SM and o!m where such effects are unusual, the scroll speed changes annoy me. Yes, such effects should have a place in maps, though I feel they are majorly disruptive to the general flow of how a map goes (see CTRL ALT BELIEVE @ approx 0:45). [*][u] Lack of Variety with Note Patterns [/u] (Going to use some SM-terminology) In Pulsen, most of the maps I played (admittedly not many of them though) had rather simple patterns. They mostly consisted of rolls, trills and a few jumps. What I would like to see are maps that challenge you with note patterns, and not Scroll Speed changes. An example for a somewhat challenging map from StepMania would be [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryEj6xuQekI] Everytime I Hear Your Name [/url] consisting of mostly jumpstreams, rolls (1:10~) and eventually a handstream (at around 1:17). [u]This[/u] is the kind of mapping I want to see. [*][u] Difficulty finding fixed speed in modifications [/u] I had to fool around with the Note Scroll Speed Multiplier before I realised the option for "fixed" scroll speed even existed. I would also like more options for fixed scroll speed, increments of 50 are okay, but I would like to be able to choose even more. [*][u] Few songs and lack of difficult songs [/u] I realise this is something that most likely would be fixed when the editor is released, but as it stands at the moment I feel there are relatively few maps. [*][u]Lack of leaderboards[/u] Incredibly important for me as I like to play "competitively", be it world wide or with others in my country. All in all, I would recommend the game [b][u]IF[/u][/b] you aren't looking for the hardest maps, with quadstreams, jumptrills and songs with other patterns like these. The game is more aimed towards the casual VSRG player, so it failed to cater to me as it stands right now.

TL:DR: This game isn't worth $15. Free alternatives are Stepmania, FFR, and osu! mania (to an extent). Long answer: Out of curiosity I thought I would try this game to see how much it differs from other VSRGs. $15 is a bit steep for these types of games but I thought they might've done something interesting that would make it worth it. Here are some pros and cons I have with the game: *DISCLAIMER*: I will be comparing this game A LOT to Stepmania, another VSRG. The reason for this is that they are so similar to each other, it would be crazy not to compare the two. PROS: - The game seems to have a fairly professional feel and doesn't feel like it was made halfassed - The customizability in the settings for the game is extensive (feels VERY similar to stepmania) - Supports replays. This is especially good for this game because Stepmania, the game that is most similar to this game, does not have this feature at the moment - There is no prep work to get this game running with an assortment of maps CONS For rhythm game enthusiasts: - If you are halfway decent at Stepmania, this game will be way too easy. I've gotten platinum scoring (99%) on practically all of the hardest difficulties with only one or two tries - The timing is way too basic. At this point, there are only two timing windows: you hit the note, or you missed it. There is no other timing windows e.g. in stepmania there is Marvelous, Perfect, Great, Good, Bad, Boo and Miss - It's difficulty is based more on modifiers of the file rather than actual note density and patterns. Also a lot of the maps play like maps in Stepmania that are not supposed to be played with c-mod due to rapid bpm changes CONS for caual players: - It's just so expensive. 15 dollars for a game that could be played virtually the same and subjectively better for free is just not worth paying money for Conclusion: This game would have been pretty good if it were the only option for this type of game genre. It's well-put together and has a good assortment of songs. Since this not the case, however, I cannot recommend it. There are other games that do this concept, in my opinion, better AND for free.

it's literally stepmania packaged with a bunch of (pretty easy) custom charts for some mediocre songs and a few noteskins maybe worth it for $5, not for $15 if you like this type of game, just play etterna

I'm a really big fan of rythm games, having played DDR, ITG, PIU, osu etc.. Sadly pulsen feels like a gimped version of existing software out there.. Sure it's easy to install since it's on steam but overall it has been a negative experience..

From the viewpoint of someone who is hardcore into Rhythm gaming I just can't recommend Pulsen for its cost. If you're looking for a packaged standalone experience that requires no additional setup and is super casual friendly, then it might be the game for you. But for an advanced user, who is already accustomed to modifying a game like StepMania to fit my needs, I find the experience lacking. There is the promise of a song editor coming eventually and steam workshop integration, but nothing you can't already get in SM for free. No custom themes, noteskins appear to be limited to paid DLC, limited mod-ability. The chart gimmicks are cute, but I don't really feel the same depth in them as other packs. Look up WinDEU or charts made for D.O.W.N.S. for some examples. And as far as overall difficulty, even the most challenging of charts was relatively tame compared to the majority of what I commonly play on SM/FFR. If you're a pad player, you can expect a similar experience to picking up an old console copy of DDR or ITG in terms of content and customization options. And if you're OK with that, and you rather not deal with setting up everything yourself (if you haven't already) then you should probably get this game. Nothing but respect to the developers, they are trying, they do listen to feedback. Its simply not something I'm looking for as a veteran rhythm gamer.