One of the most annoying things about playing #DDR at my local #Round1 is that there's two different versions of the game and the eAmuse profiles don't sync up.
It turns out the reason for this has to do with Dave & Busters, revenue sharing, penny-pinching, and upgrade kits. And it was supposed to be fixed two days ago except #Konami's upgrade kits just wound up bricking all the NA cabs
In order to explain the story, I first need to do a bit of a deep dive into arcade business practices. When you operate an arcade cab in Japan, you're expected to pay for auto-updates and pre-pay a revenue share for each play that your customers pay for. Because of that the cabinet needs to be always online at all times or it won't boot.
This is entirely contrary to how American arcades work, where you just buy a really expensive cabinet and keep all the money for yourself.
Problem is, this is a tall order that requires a lot of software development and Konami wants a minimum cabinet order that's too high for #DaveAndBusters to commit to. So... somehow, D&B convinced #Round1 to join in on the deal and run the new NA region DDR cabs.
And of course, the upgrade kits are also custom jobs that D&B and Round1 have to joint-order. D&B actually didn't bother paying for the DDR A3 upgrade last year, and that's why Round1 is stuck with a bunch of outdated cabs.
Meanwhile Round1 goes and imports Japanese Gold Cabs, because they're Round1 and apparently just... able to do that. So now every location is running both #DDR A20 Plus, AND DDR A3, which is something that never actually happens in Japanese arcades because they all pay for updates on subscription.
Yeah, uh... Round1 actually prefers it that way, because apparently it's way easier to maintain. Why? Because Konami has no fucking clue how to make upgrade kits.
Round1 convinced Konami to sell the NA DDR A3 upgrade kit to them anyway, and rumor has it that it also locks the cabs to e-Amusement and requires a revshare just like the Japanese DDR A3.
I say 'rumor', because the upgrade kits are bricking cabinets across the country. Which apparently also happened with the A20 and A20 Plus updates before it, because Konami has no clue how to make upgrade kits when all their JP cabs just autoupdate to the new version when it comes out.
BUT WAIT! How do we know that NA A20 Plus wasn't locked to e-Amusement? Only D&B and Round1 were able to buy them!
...well, someone's got a white cab running A20 Plus on auction, here:
And you can see a little "Operating in local mode" badge on the screen.
Local mode is not a thing in JP DDR. Hasn't been a thing in a long time. D&B demanded it get patched in.
One other quirk of e-Amusement is that old versions of games get shut down very quickly (because everyone's supposed to just get updates). A20 Plus is a 3 year old version of DDR that Konami is keeping the servers operating for... some reason.
I suspect that is going to change, especially if Round1 is finally getting upgrade kits (assuming Konami can fix them).
At which point nobody is going to bother going to D&B to play a dead version of DDR.
So what does Dave & Busters do?
We don't know yet. But we DO know that they have a habit of only operating ONE dance game cabinet per location, and their locations are split between Pump It Up and DDR. If you take DDR out, what's there to replace it?!
...oh no.
Oh no no no.
They're going to roll out StepManiaX as "We have DDR at home", aren't they?
Yeah, people seem to think so.
Now, look, I actually really like #StepManiaX. Step Revolution is way more friendly to indie operators and they're run by ex-ITG people. And I like seeing Konami take the L.
On the other hand, if you take away people's access to DDR and give them SMX or PIU, they're going to hate it.
And all of this is because Dave & Busters is pinching pennies.
Side note: I actually REALLY don't like going to Dave & Busters. It currently has the only operational #PumpItUp cab in my county, and it's surrounded by like 40,000 jackpot redemption games and bigger versions of games I have on my phone already.
If I want to play #StepManiaX, I'm not going to D&B. I'll go down to the indie operator that's a little out of the way. The same guy who's apparently such an arcade freak that they bought TWO exA-Arcadias.
...ugh. I need to explain exA-Arcadia now, don't I?
It's an arcade platform specifically designed for indie operators. No, it doesn't have rhythm games, but it has Cave shooters like #AkaiKatana, #Touhou fighting games, and an enhanced remake of #Gimmick. It is designed for an entirely different kind of arcade freak than I am but I wholly respect them for the same reason I respect Step Revolution and SMX.
Dark Sage Torunka 