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Saturday, February 17, 2018

Song of the Week! 17 February 2018


...yeah, you've heard the news. You might have even predicted this kind of feature coming back, didn't you?

Whatever, let's just get this over with...

 Cocotama Happy~Paradise! (ここたまハッピ~パラダイス!) Kamisama Minarai: Himitsu no Cocotama
Version
Allx2 (52)x3 (87)x3 (229)x6 (375/369/360)
 Taiko 0 Y (removed)
 147
 none
 ???


Over the course of the last years, we got used to modern Taiko arcade gaming's infamous rounds of song deletion, more than often picking other tunes that haven't been (or are never going to be) featured in any other Taiko games ever since, and by this point we're seen plenty of curious cases. We've seen perma-deleted songs that avoided the eternal slumber thanks to future DLC means and we've also seen songs that have lasted less than a year on the arcade soil (Snow halation lasted only 308 days, in fact!), but this might be the biggest sob-story that a soon-to-be-removed licensed pick has ever faced in Taiko lore to this date...

Proceeding with order, however, let's take our usual look at the source material first. Premiered on October 2015 on TXN, the Kamisama Miranai: Himitsu no Cocotama (かみさまみならい ヒミツのここたま) Anime series by Bandai is one of the more recent in-house animation productions that has had its share of Taiko-collaborating action to boot, which can also nover a pluri-million-seller merchandise plan and a theatrical movie release. Written by Michihiro Tsuchiya (of Mirmo De Pon! and PriPara fame), this Fantasy/Slice of Life series stars the 5th-grader Kokoro Yotsuba, a clumsy girl who cherishes her belongings with care and lives with her brother and grandma. One fateful day, Kokoro has witnessed the birth of a Cocotama from her well-preserved color pencils set. Having presented itself as Luckytama, the newborne Small God has no choice but to be bound to Kokoro in a contract, forcing the girl not to tell anyone about the Cocotama's existence while living with her until he's fully grown up, leading to many adventures in suburbia with more Cocotamas to meet.

This Shinto-rooted Anime series for children has had its own share of Taiko action with its first two opening themes getting ported in a playable state: Korokoro Cocotama (the 1st OP) and this arcade-exclusive track, both of which are sung by the nick-named ERIKA. For Cocotama Happy~Paradise, however, the lyrics are written by Erika Masaki (真崎エリカ) while the base track was composed by Kuwabara Sei (桑原聖) and arranged by Takuya Sakai (酒井拓也). With this song's removal being set on Blue Version's release day, not only it's going to be the first arcade-exclusive track that has only lived through a single firmware board's lifespan, but also the new least-available-to-play song in all of Taiko gaming to this very day, beating the aforementioned Snow halation on this dubious milestone with a playable-availability window of only 288 days!

The second Cocotama OP's Oni mode is one of the latest forked-paths additions to the Anime genre, with all three paths leading to clear sections mostly made of short clusters. The higher the accuracy the player gets, the more intricate (but still rookie-friendly!) hand-switching action will be required in the higher routes in order to pass the track.

 Enmei Chiryou (延命治療) Neru feat. IA
Version
Allx5 (171)x5 (222)x6 (449)x8 (603)
 Taiko 0 S to Taiko 0 Y
 135-180
 none
 ???


The Vocaloid genre in Taiko gaming doesn't have that hot of a track record in recent years, with only a handful of new playable licenses each year and the coming of several song-deletion courses of action that more than often broke arcade ties with selected Vocaloid tracks. This next round of song removals will also see the disappearance of a lot of IA songs, with one of these not being officially playable anywhere else afterwards...

Enmei Chiryou (lit. 'Life-Extension Treatment') is the first Vocaloid song by Neru/Oshiire-P in Taiko gaming, predating of several years the coming of Lost One no Goukoku and Tokyo Teddy Bear. Born August 10, 1992, this independent composer is in activity on the Vocaloid scene since the late 2000s, with many rock-styled songs to boot that have managed to reach the Hall of Fame/Hall of Legend statuses over time. The song Enmei Chiryou is one of those, counting over 1.15k views on both Youtube and Nicovideo combined since its release on December 28th, 2012.

This song's overall debut, however, actually dates one month back as part of the tracklist of the VOCAROCK collection 4 feat. Hatsune Miku (VOCAROCK collection 4 feat. 初音ミク) compilation album by FARM RECORDS, with the nick-named Siru making the song's official video for its video service broadcasting the month after. Other albums that feature Enmei Chiryou include January 2013's IA/02 -COLOR- and March 2013's Sekai Seifuku (世界征服, lit. 'World Domination'), the latter of which featuring the Kagamine twins as the digital singers. While this song has no place in the modern arcade-broad music game network outside of the Taiko no Tatsujin series, Enmei Chiryou was featured as a playable track in IA/VT -COLORFUL-, MARVELOUS Inc.'s mono-Vocaloid music game for the Ps Vita, released on July 2015.

Charted by Taiko Team member Nocchi (のっち) of Senbonzakura fame, This IA song was made first playable as an event preview during the 2nd Niconico Chokaigi event, only to be then publicly released on Sorairo Version arcades some time after. The linear, compount charting of the song's Oni patterns may be better associated with an high-tier 7* challenge, but watch out for the change of pace half-away through the performance!