Play Modes - stepmania/stepmania GitHub Wiki

StepMania supports a number of play modes, normally selectable after you pick your profile and style.

The name before the slash is what it's referred to in fallback, the name after the slash is the common name.

Table of Contents Normal Evaluation Rave / Battle Courses Nonstop Oni / Challenge Endless Net Play only modes Arena In-Store Battle

Your regular play mode, normally with 3 stages.

Plus an additional EXTRA STAGE if:

• Extra Stage is enabled in the options.
• the player achieves the theme's requirements to unlock the extra stage. In the default theme an AA on the final stage is required. Themers can choose to make this easier or harder. In some themes, enables EXTRA STAGE STARS to access. In 3.9 era, clearing hard charts on the final stage with an AA is required.
  • Using EXTRA STAGE STARS in some themes you gain up to 3 stars per stage. With 9, all stars are used and you are forced to access to EXTRA STAGE. You gain a star only for clear the song. A second star can be obtained if using "battery", 4 LIVES or RISKY options. A third star can be obtained if FULL COMBO is achieved. With AA (signs also count), you gain 2 stars, and with AAA or higher, you gain all 3 stars.

Plus a Special Stage (More commonly known as Encore Extra Stage or One More Extra Stage) if:

• the player passes the Extra Stage.
• the player achieves the theme's requirements to unlock the Special Stage. Usually this is an AA (or 950.000 points using Supernova2 Scoring system) on the Extra Stage, but some themes can disable it (since SM5).

When Event Mode is enabled, Normal mode is switched to FREE mode, stages are unlimited and named Event Stage (in some themes, this is renamed EXTRA STAGE, and some DDR themes can be numbered as 1st STAGE, 2nd STAGE, 3rd STAGE, etc.). You are always taken back to the music select after song results, so there is no total results. Extra and Special stage are not accessible.

Some themes uses this default mode and don't be changed, and some themes use different scoring systems (as ITG, EXTREME, Supernova2, Money Score, Etc.).

Note for players: the Dance Points (or DP) is showned on some themes as EX-SCORE.

Note for themers: some themes show ScreenEvaluationStage (Results on actual stage) regards if any player passes or fails the song, and, when Event Mode is disabled, if the player passes FINAL STAGE, EXTRA STAGE or ENCORE EXTRA (or fail the song in DDR A-based themes), the last result is showned and changes to ScreenEvaluationSummary (TOTAL RESULTS), this last can be configurated to support failed songs due to ZeroDivitionError during a count.

• NO PLAY: Song/course not played, or use any setting that disables score saves.
• FAILED: Fail the song/course
• ASSIST CLEAR: Clear the song/course using NO HOLDS/NO MINES/REMOVE options
• CLEAR: Clear the song/course without using NO HOLDS/NO MINES/REMOVE options
• HARD CLEAR: Clear the song/course using PRESSURE/SUDDENDEATH/BATTERY/4 LIVES/RISKY options
• FULL COMBO: Clear the song/course with FULL COMBO
• ALL W1: Clear the song/course with W1-only judges (marked as Fantastic on default themes of the 5.x branch) and displays the maximum score.

Grades can be applied (exc. in NO PLAY).

FLARE GAUGE badges can be applied if you clear the song/course using FLARE I-EX options (exc. in NO PLAY and FAILED).

Battle against another player or a CPU. Only SINGLE charts are used. A gauge at the top determines who is winning or losing, and a gauge at the bottom fills up as you hit notes. When the gauge is full an attack modifier is temporarily applied to the opposite player. A draw can be happenned.

The gauge fills up to level 3 and then restarts at 0. Attacks can be defined per "character" which different character have different attack, defined in Characters\[Character Name Here]\character.ini. Some themes disables access to some or all OPTIONS, and LIFE GAUGE option is disabled.

Note for players: Additional to (or instead of) the grades, all players can see the win status.

Course mode. Pick a course to play a series of songs in order. It reads from .crs files in the Courses folder, but also has auto generated randomized ones from your song groups (examples of theses courses are CLASS grades). Some themes disables access to some or all OPTIONS, LIFE GAUGE or difficulties. Normally 4 songs. CLASS courses disables LIFE GAUGE and this is set to GRADE.

Note for themers: During this mode, you stay in ScreenGameplay until the course ends (or fails) and then you're taken to ScreenEvaluationNormal.

The same as Nonstop, but the LIFE GAUGE is set to 4 LIVES. LIFE GAUGE is disabled but you can adjust the MAX number of lives.

The same as Nonstop, but play songs until you fail.

The next play modes only req. net play. If only detects CPU, you are forced to Normal mode (or FREE when Event Mode is enabled).

Note for players: Additional to (or instead of) the grades, all players can see the win status.

Note for themers: ScreenEvaluationSummary (TOTAL RESULTS) can be edited to shown the player that won the play.

4-songs play. Same as Rave / Battle, but with up to 4 machines connected at same time. LIFE GAUGE is disabled and set to NORMAL, all players must select the same style and all OPTIONS are enabled (disabling options that disables score saves). The Rave / Battle rule of 3-level gauges are not applicable. Instead, you view the graph area that determines who is winning or losing. Use EX-SCORE or different scoring systems to determinate the winner. Unavailable when 2-players are present. Unavailable for now.

2-songs play. Same as Arena, but with 2 machines connected at same time. Only SINGLE charts are used when 2-players are present. Unavailable for now.