Hi ya'll, so I've been playing the rhythm game called "osu!" for 32 days now and I've been wanting some friends to play with.
If you're not familiar with what osu is, it's a free, musical rhythm game that's most widely known for the standard circle clicking game mode but includes 3 other games modes such as, osu!taiko, osu!catch, and osu!mania. You play to the beat of the song and how well you perform reflects on your player ranking globally and regionally.
[size=50pt]Standard
Taiko
CatchTheBeat
Mania
If you click the osu! picture above it'll take you to the website and all you need to do is download it and setup whatever you need. It's optional to make an account with osu but I highly recommend making an account as it will be a way for you to keep track of your performance and all your songs on the website.
(Ex. https://osu.ppy.sh/users/10776489 )
If you want more help and something that explains better than I did, here's the wiki https://osu.ppy.sh/help/wiki/Welcome
Once you've created an account and set everything up, you can add me from the website and we can start playing together.
For casual players this is as far as you'll need to go.
I do have recommendations for others who do want to take it more competitively.
Disclosure: If you choose to go through the competitive route of osu, you will make sacrifices and if you are REALLY into it, money.
Repetitive rhythm games can cause stress on the joints of your fingers and ache's in your arm. Recognizing these dangers and dealing with them with compression wraps or wrist / hand exercises to prevent Carpal tunneling or Repetitive Stress Injury (RSI) is EXTREMELY important so that you do not hurt yourself.
Sacrifices such as at least playing 3 times a week to improve yourself in reaction time and instilling muscle memory into your arms/hands. I do not recommend playing for more than 2 hours at a time in a day as you WILL feel pain. (Personal Experience)
As for the money part, affording money to buy a mechanical keyboard and a pen and tablet is not always cheap but you can find the pair under $80 quite easily.[/size]
Opening the options in-game simply by "ctrl+o" will open up the options menu.
Change some visual settings to lessen any distractions that could cause you to fault in a song, such as: Turning off video, dim level to 100%, disabling that EXTREMELY distracting character that pops from the sides of your screen when you hit a milestone for combos. Whatever that can serve as a distraction.
Adjusting your mouse sensitivity to something that you won't run out of mouse space with. (Unless you're using a pen and tablet)
Transitioning from a mouse only player to a keyboard and mouse player is recommended for the best performance. You will primarily be using the "Z" and "X"
keys to tap but you can change them to whatever is comfortable for you.
Getting a skin, whether you are minimalist and prefer very simple skins or want to spice it up by having pictures or cool effects here and there, a skin will MASSIVELY improve your time in osu as the default skin is not recommended at all for competitive play. You can find one here: https://osuskins.info/
Record your progress, have you been improving the past week? Re-watch what you're doing wrong and see if you can fix the issue. Every play you make is re-watchable!
Watch others and ask how they trained up to that point. The osu community is much friendlier than most communities and will lend a helping hand to those who need it.
There is always more to talk about, but this is as much as I am comfortable typing. Here's a Q&A for some quick answers.
Q: What is PP?
A: PP is your performance points that you earn if you well in a beatmap/song and directly relates in your global and regional ranking, The higher PP, the higher ranked you are.
Q: Common hotkeys?
A: Ctrl+O for options / F8 for chat / ~ the tilde key can be pressed to quickly retry a map / F12 for taking a screenshot.
Here's more: https://osu.ppy.sh/help/wiki/Shortcut_Key_Reference/
Q: Isn't this game super weeby?
A: Honestly it is, but you have the choice in getting a non-anime skin and playing non-anime or non-Japanese related beatmaps. There's a point where you reach where the "Weeb" factor doesn't matter anymore and you can see the raw skill involved in some insane plays and you respect the person no matter the platform they play on.
Q: Do I really have to get a pen and tablet to get good?
A: No, it's just preference. I in particular NEED it because I noticed my slow and inaccurate movement with the mouse and need a quick and accurate pen to pick up where I'm lacking.
That said, I just want more friends to play with. It's quite fun to competitively play with people you know instead of just grinding for that SS by yourself BibleThump
