osu!weekly #44

I hope I haven't been overwhelming everyone with the amount of exciting things that are happening recently, because there's no way we're slowing down! The round of 16 of the osu!mania 7K World Cup has concluded and the bracket has been divided cleanly into two. We also have some exciting previews and information for what's to come in the future for the weekly, so grab a seat and join us for what promises to be some of the biggest developments in the community yet!

Last monday, Peppy reached out to members of the osu! reddit community hoping to restore/encourage relations with a large number of players. This comes after several occasions where the /r/osugame community has brought the presence of circle clicking to the top of /r/all, causing a great commotion on the website. For me, the idea of being able to share information with such a large amount of players without holding back is like a dream come true as someone who thrives on details! In the coming weeks, I'll be looking to be posting some interesting things on both the weekly and within the subreddit, so be sure to keep an eye out for that.

The application deadline for Beatmap Nominator applications has passed! Best of luck to those who applied and remember to relax if you don't make it as the call to arms sounds very frequently. If you are waiting on the edge of your seat, remember that the selection phase doesn't conclude until the 24th of this month, so be patient!

Flyte has been absolutely relentless with these design drops. As more and more of the neat things Flyte has designed for the game get steadily implemented, the form of osu!next is finally taking shape. I left the blog post peppy made last week in haste, but here's a reminder that osu!next is definitely happening this year!

The Top Standard Players of 2015 Voting has concluded!. Stay tuned for the results, as they are likely being tallied by HappyStick right now. Elsewhere in the community, we also have a neat video showcasing the results of a similar vote that happened in the korean community. If you want to see who players thought were the best of the best over there, be sure to check that out too!

The Video Game and Internet Packs have been updated! The older entries on our beatmap pack list were in dire need of some love, and Stefan has stepped up to tackle the problem. Hopefully, this is the beginning of restoring faith these beatmap packs as more of the outdated ones are revisited and restored.

This week, I am joined by -KousakaHonoka- for the World Cup section of the weekly. He has assisted me greatly in providing interesting details for everyone to really understand the ins and outs of what is happening in this competition. If you like what you see, please show your appreciation to him for helping me out!

With the conclusion of the round of 16, the bracket has now been split into two! Dropping down to the losers bracket are teams Australia, Japan, the Russian Federation, Poland, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Brazil.The other teams will advance in the bracket they are currently in. The difference in power in the round of 16 was immense, with most matches ending in a 5-0 sweep.

There seems to be some obviously avoided picks in the round of 16! The Italian Crack Job [Insane] was banned a total of 6 times out of 8 matches. It would seem that the unpredictable nature of the map was too much of an investment to practice for to most of the participating teams. This Will Be the Day (James Landino's Magical Girl Remix) [Agka's 7K MX] was banned 5 times out of 8 matches for nearly identical reasons.

On the other hand, despite not being banned as much, there were some maps that were not picked at all! In line with the prediction I had made in last week's map pool showcase, Haryu [Another] proved neither important enough to ban nor desirable enough to pick. The complex patterns in Haryu made it a difficult choice for captains to impose on their players. However, on the other end of the difficulty spectrum, anemone [Kawa & Julie's 7K Extra] was also absent from the contest. The predictable and consistency-dependant chord patterns may have made it too nerve wracking to choose at the critical moment for our competitors, as even the smallest of mistakes would be devastating.

As for maps that were loved all around, Quo Vadis [lZenxl's 7K SHD] was picked a total of 6 times out of 8. The unique and well balanced patterns made it a comfortable selection when push comes to shove, and the consistency of the long note placements were a sight for sore eyes in contrast to the rest of the map pool. After Quo Vadis, Ketsarku Mozgalom [i remember being happy] and STORIA [Julie & Kawawa's 7K Insane] ended up being tied for second most picked.

We're not done yet! Here are some more interesting trivia for you on the recently concluded round of 16:

• jakads (South Korea) was the only player to achieve an SS rank in this round during his match against Poland. He achieved the 100% accuracy play on Madpakke [richard's 7K Another].
• Vygatron (United Kingdom) and [MY]Idiot (Malaysia) played the entire round using the flashlight mod! Having sat out for the most part of the group stage, my first interviewee finally came out and showed us what he is capable of.
• Degeneracy (China) played with hidden on for the entire match! The last time someone has done this was when Zeradok played in osu!mania 7K World Cup 2014.
• The United States is the only non-asian country remaining in the winners bracket, with France, Australia, Germany, Russian Federation, the United Kingdom, and Poland losing their respective matches.
• China and South Korea have not lost a single match so far, carrying forward their undefeated record with clean and confident victories in the round of 16.

Woah. That was a pretty crazy summary of the Round of 16, don't you think? I want to thank -KousakaHonoka- again for his contribution, as well as Deadbeat for supplemental information. Coverage to this amount of detail would not have been possible without you guys! If you want to help us out as well, send us an email at news@ppy.sh with your suggestions. I'm always looking to know about what kind of content you guys would like to see more of here, so don't hesitate to drop a comment below about how you felt about this week's article!

—Nyquill