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3 Jul 2020
The Mappers' Report: May/June
The Mappers' Report: May/June
Did you miss us? I bet you did! Sorry for the wait, but here we are again, the fourth and fifth issue of the Mappers' Report in one post! Packed with news and happenings from all over the mapping community in osu!. Did your favorite mapper win a contest? Or did the long awaited Ranking Criteria change finally happen? Jump right in and find out!
This month's issue of the Mappers' Report contains the following topics:
Ranking Criteria Changes
As every month we keep you up to date with the changes to the Ranking Criteria. All rule and guideline changes are listed below and in addition you can see open proposals to give your feedback!
All Modes
- Remove glossaries from RC pages: The content of the glossaries will be put into separate wiki articles! This has already happened for the general Ranking Criteria and the osu! Ranking Criteria. The others will follow soon!
- Allow .ogg files as a main audio source: Always struggle with getting your map uploaded because of too large file size? Then we have good news! You can now use .ogg audio files to save some space! Note that they still have to follow the regular kbit/s rules!
osu!
- Intuitive Reverse Arrow Movement: Reverse Arrows now have to point into the direction in which the slider ball moves after hitting it.
- Restrictions on "accelerating" sliders: A small clarification that the slider path has to be visible at all times.
- Circle size: You asked for it and here it is! It's been a long time since there was a ranked map with a circle size higher than 7. Now we will hopefully see some more coming soon!
osu!catch
- Dashes and higher-snapped dashes on Rain difficulties: This RC change defines the allowed snap for dashes on Rain difficulties. It also clarifies the definition of higher-snapped dashes which was a problem for almost half a year.
osu!mania
- Chord usage at 1/4 pattern in normal difficulties: This change allows the usage of chords at the beginning of 1/4 patterns in Normal and 1/2 patterns in Easy difficulties. Before, you could only use chords to end a pattern.
Open Ranking Criteria Proposals
There are various open Ranking Criteria proposals in the forum. Many of them are listed in the last issue of the Mappers' Report, but we also have some new ones which you can find below!
For all modes:
For osu!:
For osu!mania:
Within the Beatmap Nominators and NAT
The Beatmap Nominators never rest, the Beatmap Nominators never sleep. Just kidding, of course they do, they are humans, too. However, the group line-up is always changing! New people are coming, old are going away. This month was no exception!
BN Additions
Do you want to see your own name on this list? Do you like modding and helping other people with their beatmaps? If your answer to both of these questions is "yes", then you can also become a Beatmap Nominator! The applications are always open.
Head over to the Beatmap Nominator website and apply today!
BN Departures
BN and QAT/NAT Badges
Recently, a new wave of badges acknowledging the time which group members have put into beatmap management teams arrived! Those who are on this list have been contributing to the community in so many ways during their time on osu!, and fully deserve this acknowledgement.
We are thankful for all their contributions and hope to see much more in the future!
Here is the list of everyone who received a badge this past session:
- BN 4 Year Badge: Nozhomi
- QAT 3 Year Badge: OnosakiHito
Mappers' Showcase
The Mappers' Showcase presents lesser-known mappers from every game mode. Since we bundled two issues in one post, we will feature two game modes this month.
Thanks to Jemzuu for the osu!catch selections and Scotty & Unpredictable for the osu!mania selections!
Phob (osu!catch)
Having recently breached the gates of the ranked section, Phob is a new mapper that is currently having a decent breakout year so far. Although he's more known for being a skilled Hidden player, his mapping definitely deserves more recognition! He crafts his maps with brilliant relevance to the music showing such coherence in patterning, proving he clearly knows what he's doing!
His take on Feint - Snake Eyes (feat. CoMa) exemplifies the mapping spirit of clean and consistency-based maps, as throughout his difficulties, they were made of superb quality. For a relatively new mapper, this set is surely impressive!
Moreover, his breakcore map, Lolipusher - why as soon as we become so close, we have to say goodbye? manifests that Phob can still stand out regardless of the song's complexity and genre, while still maintaining players' interest through solid patterning.
Phob also tends to favour mapping lower difficulties, especially Salads, so he is certainly a mapper with promise for the future. If any novice mappers are reading this and looking for inspiration, Phob is a great person to be looking at!
dika312 (osu!catch)
A long-term mapper that has been crafting maps for almost 5 years, dika312 is someone that strives for an intuitive yet a very interesting mapping style that will keep you on the edge of your seat! Despite his long mapping experience, none of dika's works has reached the ranked section (yet!), and most of his maps are sadly unnoticed by the public.
A diamond in the rough are his maps such as Kikuo - Neko no Shokutaku, in which he has demonstrated his virtuosity in movement and exquisite patterning to create a gratifying piece of art from such a lovely song. Another solid example would be his rendition of MALVA. - Trane, wherein he has shown his proficiency in varying platter-motion once again — making use of diverse flow and patterns, leaving a pleasurable experience and taste for both mappers and players.
Another of his great works that is worth mentioning would be his take on KikuoHana - Nobore! Susume! Takai Tou, showcasing exceptional progression in style as the song intensifies, along with fine contrast in calmer sections. We hope to see more of dika's maps, and hopefully he can bear us good fruit in the ranked section someday!
BringoBrango (osu!mania)
BringoBrango is a Canadian mapper who's been in the mapping community for about 2-3 years now and has really made a name for himself since late 2019 with his creative innovations and unique takes on the songs he maps. His most popular mapset so far is Iglooghost - Bug Thief, with his later creation set to PSYQUI - Multitalents being used in last year's osu!mania World Cup.
However, some of his other maps that haven't taken the spotlight unlike the other two, such as acloudyskye - Alignment, which perfectly showcases what he's capable of and how to utilize certain aspects of a song to their advantage. The map showcases everything that BringoBrango learnt over the course of his mapping career, which turned out excellently as it features LN layering schemes, jacks, heavy use of repetition, utilizing 1/6 and 1/8 flams, and especially the amount of SVs that adds a lot more to the map than it originally had such as stutters, slowjams, speedups, and so much more that perfectly craft this map together into a complex, yet mesmerizing map for anyone that dares to give it a try.
Other maps of his that definitely deserve more of a spotlight are cYsmix - Classic Pursuit, which features more LN layering schemes, SVs, inverses, and jacks, all of which hold up the map together beautifully.
Another map of his, Husky - Sleepy Boi mainly focuses on jacks and SVs while emphasizing the song's focus on repetition to create a formidable challenge, providing a throwback to his older jacks-oriented mapping style in the process.
We hope to see more of his work in the future as he's definitely quite the anomaly in the mapping scene!
Ticle (osu!mania)
Despite not being around for long, Ticle has been able to develop an explosive style of LN mapping. Their takes on electronic tracks are heavily expressive and intuitive, yet come with a particular level of detail and rigidity. The end results are highly addictive LN maps for both players and mappers alike! Recently, they have been able to gain attention with their debut in the loved section tomatoism – UMP9. However, we believe that is just the beginning of their showcase-worthy mapping career.
An example of a map which demonstrates this is their rendition of Sta - 99 Glooms. Its liberal usage of flams and more detailed interpretation of the track's various piano and synth are what really take it a step above the rest. Another notable work of theirs is sasakure.UK - Jack-the-Ripper, a map featuring complex timing and even more complex representation of the track's guitar sounds.
We hope to see Ticle's maps gain more traction as they are definitely worth a shot for any LN enthusiast!
Mapping Contests
Get your editor ready. The mapping contests are here! Whether you are a veteran or making your first steps in mapping, contests are for everyone!
In this section you can see what contests were held in May and June or are ongoing:
Monthly Beatmapping Contests
The Monthly Beatmapping Contests (MBC) give you your monthly dose of mapping competitions. Each month's contest features a different mapping limitation that entries must adhere to.
The April's contest results are out and we congratulate hypercyte for winning and getting his Tier 2 badge! Good job to fanzhen0019 as well for being the community vote runner-up and Acylica for being the screening crew favorite!
The May and June Monthly Beatmapping Contests both have their submission phases concluded and we hope to see the results soon. Once they are out, we'll be sure to let you know!
osu! Mapping Olympiad #7: osu!mania
Keyboard mashers, rise up! It's your time to shine!
The osu! Mapping Olympiad is a returning mapping contest which features a different game mode in every installment. This time only for the osu!mania mappers out there!
Luring all mappers out there with Olympiad points for the top 3, which awards the Mapping Olympiad badge, and for the winner a unique user title, the "Elite Mapper"!
Do you have what it takes to become the next "Elite Mapper"? Then jump right into it, grab one of the pre-timed .osz and start mapping! We're excited to see all your maps!
Aspire V
The Category Stage Voting for the newest iteration on the game's oldest freeform mapping contest is currently open.
Out of all submissions, 9 unique categories were created with each having 5 hand picked entries. Make sure to check all of them out and vote for your favourites!
You can find the categories, links to the voting pages and downloads in the Aspire V - Category Stage Voting newspost.
Voting closes in less than 4 days from the date of this post, so get in quick!
2020 osu!catch Mapping World Cup
Fruit catchers, now's your chance!
The 2020 osu!catch Mapping World Cup has arrived! In its 2nd edition, the best osu!catch mappers from ten countries will compete against each other in a round based elimination format to decide who is the best of the best.
Will the Philippines be able to defend their title or will we see a new country as the osu!catch mapping champion?
We will surely keep you up to date on the results as things unfold!
Mapping Weekend #7
Coming soon to a Cozy Mappers' Café near you is the latest contest in their series of mapping weekend contests!
The Mapping Weekend contest series has been running for a while in the Cozy Mappers' Café Discord server, and it's still going strong! For full information, check out the forum post.
When the contest begins this Sunday, a theme and 3 to 4 songs will be revealed for mappers to try out mapping. Once the contest begins and the songs are released, applicants will have around 5 days to create and submit their entries.
After this, entries will be judged based off the map's structure, creativity, relevancy, hitsounds, and the impression of the judges. The best entries for each song will receive a month of osu!supporter in addition to the judge feedback on their entries and special perks in their Discord server.
Be sure to check it out!
lu^3 Mapping Cup
Third time's the charm! The lululu Mapping Cup has returned with its third edition.
This is a mapping contest for the osu! game mode only, featuring a specific song theme in every installment, with this year's one being "Swing Beat".
So what are you waiting for, grab the pre-timed .osz and join in! You could win osu!supporter or even a profile badge for your efforts, so why not give it a try?
Are there any other mapping contests going on? Or being announced soon? Please let us know! We would love to give them more attention to the public. No matter if it's mode or language specific.
Head over to the forum post where you can find the submission form for them, and help us keep abreast of the latest competitions going on!
Around the Community
New Review System in Beatmap Discussion
Modders, listen. We have great news for you! As some may have already noticed, the modding system got an update and the review system teased many months ago is now finally live.
Some of the mapping boomers among us may remember the old modding system which worked through the forum, fondly titled at times as 'moddingv1'. People would post mods as responses to individual beatmap forum threads, outlining all their issues and improvements at once in big blocks. This was very different from the way that the more modern beatmap discussion system handled things, with it favoring highlighting single issues or improvements at a time.
A lot of modders both old and new favored the older way at times for more in-depth modding, and the big news this time around is that you can now have your cake and eat it too! The beatmap review system now allows you to bundle your individual mods into one big post, reaping the benefits of both worlds.
To access this fancy new wizardry, go into the beatmap discussion of any beatmap you like to mod and then go to the "Review" tab. That's it!
Now you can mod in a format that lets you control what order the mod is read in, which is very useful for reoccurring or bigger issues in maps. Be sure to check out all the features which the current modding system offers to you!
Do you think it could be better or something is still missing? Or did you find a bug in it? The developers would love to hear your feedback! Come join the osu!dev Discord server and join the discussion about the review system in the #modding channel!
The osu!wiki needs you!
The osu!wiki is a huge, community-maintained knowledge base for all things osu!. This includes mapping, modding and gameplay oriented articles, on things ranging from individual map settings to the entire Ranking Criteria, who's on the osu!team, current tournaments, contests and so much more.
This giant compendium of osu! lore is run by a handful of intrepid individuals known to the world as 'wikifriends', and we're always in need of more of them!
If you'd like to help out by reviewing articles, writing them, or translating them into your native language, head on over to the #osu-wiki channel on the osu!dev Discord server and say hello.
The world needs you!
Phew, that was a bit of a read, right? We're happy that you made it all the way 'til the end! Once again, we're sorry for the long wait with this month's double-issue. We will work on our schedule to make sure future issues of the Mappers' Report get released on time.
And please, don't forget, should you have anything interesting and mapping or modding related for us to mention, make sure to contact Feerum or Noffy with all the details.
Until then, thank you for reading and stay safe and healthy!
—Feerum, Noffy, Jemzuu, Scotty & Unpredictable
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