Rave It Out - The Infusion v.1

Thank you for your patience. We did our best to make this first release as awesome as we could. I hope that everyone who plays this has as much fun as we did making this a reality.

Thank you to all of the previous and current RIO Devs. And to everyone who has supported us and the project as whole along with all of our team members + contributors.

Download Link:
https://mega.nz/#F!RcVn2IRJ!kSmEKczyD6SYj39ESdaj6w

Mirror 1:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ydu92wt…/RaveItOut-TheInfusion.7z…

Mirror 2:
http://www.mediafire.com/…/c2rmb8r…/RaveItOut-TheInfusion.7z

Extract "Songs.rar" (ONLY IN MEGA LINK)
SongMovies there as well but not needed to run. Place them in the root "RaveItOut-TheInfusion" directory. It is suggested you use MEGA's sync client.

Let us know if you need help with setup or general bug/issue reporting on our Facebook page @ https://www.facebook.com/raveitoutgame/

Twitter links for Rave It Out Devs and Rave It Out Game will be up before the end of this month.

My journey in Massachusetts.

A well-needed vacation.

From November 3rd to November 7th I was in Massachusetts. 5 days of adventure, new sights, and amazing people. I did not feel like a foreign entity during any point of the trip except during our first restaurant stop. Probably because of my bad experiences in similar locations so I was very hesitant on placing an order and I had to have my friend David do it for me.

I'll try and get everything documented here.

Departure.

I left Miami around 8PM on November 3rd. I woke up about 3 hours early and had my friend Marco take me to the departures spot for JetBlue. Fort Lauderdale International was still in the same old condition as usual and I already knew my way around. The flight seat was a bit snug but I managed to fit and snooze a little. I already pulled an all-nighter before I even arrived so I was powered up solely by Mountain Dew and excitement.

Arrival.

I arrived around 12PM at Boston-Logan International Airport. Alex and David were there already and from there I was swept up. The first thing we all had in our mind was food. And with that headed off to a local restaurant with some delicious roast beef sandwiches. Then it was off to Game Underground to work on the Pump It Up machine and get things ready for GUAC (Game Underground Arcade Championship). The first thing I noticed about the setup was that the Pump It Up pads felt off. Very raised but ineffective at holding down any hold notes and also drops in combo in different stream or tech charts unless you really pressed hard. I was determined to fix it but...for another day.

Round 1 in Taunton, MA.

This place was exactly as I expected it to be from what people have described it to me as. A Dave and Busters with a less annoying environment and overrun with games of Asian origins. The Pump It Up machines were beautiful but not very functional for good scores. No surprise there. I did enjoy playing the older fighting games they had in a dedicated area. Japanese versions of course instead of the localized variants. Street Fighter Zero 3 anyone?

Pad repair and qualifying for PIU.

It took Dave and I about 6+ hours to clean the pads as much as we could in preparation for the tournament on Saturday. Qualifiers were already done by folks on Friday and some on Saturday. By 3PM we were ready to go. Butterfly S13 was the qualifier. Super easy. I made it to semifinals but at that point it was doubles on forward. I cannot do doubles so I got quickly decimated. Not a bad run though!

Rave It Out setup and #oink.

After the tournament was over, we went off to set up Rave It Out as quickly as possible. After a 10 minutes of setting everything, the stream was all set. RIO was projected onto a large wall and a stream set up on pig site. It was glorious.

Sunday RIO chaos. 

This day was dedicated solely to Rave It Out and playing other games at GU. Tons of amazing charts and amazing gameplay. Everyone had a load of fun, There was a IIDX event as well that day and from what I heard, the action was definitely intense.

Return home.

I had to wait at the airport for about 8 hours since my flight didn't leave until 8PM. I was able to hit up the local cuisine before I actually took off. No regrets. It was absolutely delicious. As for the flight, it went pretty quick this time around since I fell asleep along the way listening to pop music on Sirius XM radio in-flight.

A blessing.

Thank you for everything Boston, GU, 1449, and everyone else that made this into a great experience. I will be coming back in April. Or whenever the next event is for GUAC.

Future events and the current scenario.

New stuff that has come up.

There are some awesome things that may/may not be happening this year for Rave It Out...perhaps...?

July 1st through the 4th is Florida Supercon, the largest anime/geek convention in South Florida. I have been asked to bring the Rave It Out setup over to it along with the Florida Arcade and Pinball Exhibition group. As much as I would like to do so, it is still in the air for me. Work has been really crammed on my end and lack of coverage has made it more difficult. I will be trying to make the request for that time though to see if we can bring it then and have an awesome time.

Our second event is a possible one in Massachusetts. This one has not been properly announced on social media just yet. It will be taking place in either October or November alongside another large event loaded with rhythm games galore.

Today my tripod and mount arrived in the mail! It can go up to 6 feet in height so I can really ensure I get some good shots and footage of Rave It Out gameplay. I will also be using Periscope to live stream all Rave It Out testing as humanly possible. I am really excited to start using that and getting more exposure on the air with this.

So Rave It Out has been a bit quiet for awhile. Honestly...it has been some pretty hectic times here on my end so progress has been pretty slow. Every once in awhile I wake up and try to set up a few songs here and there or do some very important adjustments.

So...what now?

Today I will be attempting to set up a live stream and have 4 folks playing Rave It Out. Should be a lot of fun. I obtained a new LG G Pad X 8.0 which has a decent screen resolution and camera megapixel amount. Maybe it will be a tad grainy but definitely good enough for these types of recordings.

Asides from that, I will be dedicating a large portion of tomorrow towards setting up proper sync of many charts and using the rerates that David has sent us in. He is pulling a big effort in trying to document every single chart and ensuring that it is properly rated for all players. There were some nasty errors that have been there for years. Examples being Turn Me On being rated a S14 when it should have been cranked to an S17. OUCH! With these corrections I can get an better idea of how to balance the game out when I start making the levels.

Release date?

There is no release date set in stone yet. However I am hoping mid-july we have something to show for. Let's see how things go.

Onwards!

StepF2 and Rave It Out

This is not a negative critique of StepF2 or the development team behind them.

Back in October, Rave It Out's "Arcade Mode" content was released to the public after a lock down lasting nearly 4 years since December 31'st, 2012. After that date, the project went silent and content was worked on like crazy.

When an update finally appeared online in October of 2015, it was met with surprising positive critique. This pushed the team to work on it further and firmly create something that would package it all together and present the content in a way that it was meant to be show in. 

Some images from the project while it was in its earlier stages...

We were proud of this screen.

...we were trying.

RIO on a daily basis.

Old main screen. 

Two designs we had for Mines using the Rave It Out noteskin.

So what does StepF2 have to do with any of this?

In my private messages I have been receiving complaints from players that the content from Rave It Out does not function correctly with StepF2. Certain arrow effects or strange placement of arrows causing problems in StepF2 has been the biggest concern. With all that said, I do need to set the record straight.

We do NOT care about compatibility with StepF2. We will NOT officially have ANY support for use of the content in StepF2. And the likeliness of it ever happening by us is zilch.

Why though?

StepF2 is a great project by a small team which sets out to make available all content from Pump It Up into a modernized format using assets borrowed from Pump It Up: Fiesta 2 decrypted HDD. Even the step content is ripped from the game and synchronized as best as possible for using in StepF2. For players new and old, it is a nostalgia trip and also an economical way for one to play the newest content at home when there is no modern mix available locally.

That is all fine and dandy. But this is also the reason why Rave It Out cannot associate with StepF2 in any way. We don't want to be a part of a recreation or degrade our work to just an "addon" to something that is supposed to bring a Pump It Up experience to a player. RIO is NOT Pump It Up. It is its own 5 panel rhythm game with a unique flow in its step charts and personality overall. We have worked very hard to separate ourselves from being labelled as "just another fan pump game" and instead be recognized as a true and definite alternate experience.

Hope this clears up players questions about the relation of StepF2 towards Rave It Out and vice-versa. As horrid as it sounds, I guess it is a case of "seperate but equal"? (cue Animal Farm)

Onwards!

Our ups, downs, and results so far.

The Negative

"Why do you even bother if you know it sucks?"
"Just stop it and kill the project already."
"No is going to play this."
"You're not even going to make money off of this?"

These questions and statements amongst many others are part of the flurry of negativity Rave It Out has received over the last 5 years.

And that is ok.

I think that having done a very short stint at Andamiro's Pump It Up Infinity and possessing a supportive circle of friends who have pushed me up and not pull me down has helped me immensely to keep on going forward like I do nearly every day for the project. I am not really thick-skinned. But my supporting circle is what helps endure through the ups and downs of making this project a reality.

The Positive

Storm 16 was a pivotal moment for Rave It Out.

Why?

At Storm 15, the machine which was utilizing the exe for RIO was a older version which had a UI which was far from pleasing to the eye although it was somewhat functional. The machine itself was just newly obtained and I was not able to do any proper maintenance or repairs in time for the event. People still gave the game a shot and it had mild success. It was a decent start.

2016 was the real year that RIO started flying though.

New members joined the team and a new breath of fresh air filled the project. After a constant campaign of promoting the content in RIO via social media, people started trying it out on their own setups and asking questions of where they could play it on a machine or more information on the product as a whole. I kept building up hype for it on the Storm 16 page and crammed as much as I could to deliver the experience I promised them.

And we did it.

Rave It Out was new. It was different. It was LOUD. It looked beautiful. It had great new content. It was like the whole thing had a facelift. The machine itself was heavily repaired so it would be ready for even tournament play. I was really proud of what I had in front of me all thanks to the support of my friends and the awesome folks at Rave It Out Devs.

"How long have you been working on this project?"
"What is your end-goal?"
"Do you plan to make this a commercial product?"
"This game honestly looks the most beautiful out of all of the ones here."
"Will you be making a public release soon?"
"We need to have a Rave It Out tournament!"

All the negativity I had in the back of my head suddenly disappeared and a sense of positive pride filled me. I thought to myself..."we did it"...

The Result

The machine has been successfully relocated back to Miami, Florida. With it being only 8 minutes from my house, I can do full tests on new hardware for it and have it prepared for large events in the future. I am eyeballing Florida Supercon from July 1st to July 4th as the next event. But it all depends how things play on during the weekend of June 17th. I also have a major Rave It Out event in October and something potential before then.

We have a lot of tweaks and fine-tuning needed for the initial 200 songs in the game itself. This includes content, sync, and overall fixing of errors. It is a big effort on our team's part. But it will all be worth it.

Onward!

Progress Update

Rerates

Breakn' A Sweat
S16 -> S17
S17 -> S18

New Steps

679
S17

Breakn' A Sweat
D13

Wild Ones
D17

Hella Good (Full Track)
D18

Good Night!

Did you know I have a YouTube channel? Whoa!

 

Yep. I actually upload chart videos from time to time up here. This channel doesn't have a dedicated URL yet. But this is indeed where you will find videos of my shenanigans involving Rave It Out or other stuff I fancy.

 

Within the next two months I want to make a video where I actually showcase the program so far, it's features, and things that we have planned for it in the future. It will get more serious once I get Premiere up and running on the good ol' red PC.

 

Onward!