So I had no idea this was coming out until a preorder and get a free song popped up on my twitter so I pretty much bought it the day before release, digitally via PSN 😂 Big props to play asia for their instant PSN card codes lol.

Like all Taiko no Tatsujin games, this is NOT easy. I know some people can play Oni songs with their eyes closed but for me it’s quite the struggle. That said, I’d still say it’s easier than the Vita vesion because I at least managed to clear 15 oni songs on the ps4 one and only 1 on the Vita.

Like the previous Taiko game you get a variety of songs to choose from, some from popular anime, jpop and games along with Namco originals. You can sort by whether you’ve played or cleared it, favorites, genre, or as I like to sort – by extreme star difficulty.

The main menu has various modes to choose from. Taiko mode is just playing the game and trying to complete bingo cards (which also give you a trophy for completing 100 of them.) Ranked match you play against recorded plays of other players on PSN.

You do not get to choose who you get ranked with and if you forfeit a match you automatically get a loss. To get all the ranked match trophies you need to get to rank 50 and since it pairs you up randomly (regardless of equal ranking) it’s actually really hard to do. Sometimes you’ll get nooblet mcnoob and annihilate them, but others you’ll get put up with some guy who is 20 ranks above you and you lose and lose your rank along with it.

Customize room is where you can edit Don-chan’s appearance and there’s a lot of really fun outfits – which you get from don coins in the Treasure Box.

You can get don coins by completing bingo cards or by playing against some of the friendly NPCs in select songs like Hello Kitty, Pac Man, Hatsune Miku and this angry GGE from Tekken 😂.  Additional DLC is just extra songs , most of which are Namco originals – although a Hatsune Miku pack is coming in December. Game settings you adjust your timing for your controller OR if you have the custom drum that you can buy for the game you can adjust the sync for that as well. (According to Amazon Japan reviews though, the drum is poor and unresponsive.)

Within each song there’s also a practice mode option so you can slow down parts of a song you need to practice or go forward & backwards. This is really helpful if you’re stuck on a certain part of the song BUT when you slow down a song, the song sound vanishes. Practicing without sound is almost pointless so your best bet is to practice in regular speed mode but go back & forth until you get the part you’re messing up right. This is especially helpful if you’re trying to get the hang of Oni mode.

Unfortunately unlike the vita counterpart, you cannot set your drums to the joysticks of the dualshock controller. You have to basically smash the buttons as fast as possible for any drums and drum rolls could literally be the difference between you winning or losing or getting a certain score threshold – as shown in the screenshot above. The number of GOODs vs OKs also can really buff up your score so if you feel like you aren’t getting enough goods, check your sound calibration in the settings. Sometimes certain songs need to be calibrated differently vs others.

One of the other customization options as in most Taiko games, is the customizing of the sounds of the drum. I like to always one called “Wooden Fish” but this time they gave a ridiculous variety – although most of these are so stupid they’re actually a distraction 😂 See below:

And if you think that’s a distraction get a load of this one:

😂😂

So honestly while some of these sounds are nice, I just want something simple. That said if you wanna annoy the hell out of your opponents, make your best record using one of these sfx and when they play you in VS they will be forced to hear this because you can’t turn off opponent sounds in VS mode 😱

There are 2 sets of Bingo cards – normal & hard. For Normal bingo cards, you can usually complete every cell by clearing the Normal mode of that song with a Full combo and a lot of GOODs. For the hard mode though, it honestly varies – but you can USUALLY complete them by getting a full combo in  Hard mode of that song. Certain cards require you to full combo or get really high scores in extreme mode though. A lot of the trophies really require you to be good at playing Oni songs though so unless you’re a Taiko pro, don’t expect to ever complete this trophy listing. 😂

You can also customize your title and vs mode greetings from the greetings you randomly get via Treasure Box. Titles can be gotten via treasure box or obtained upon completing bingo cards of songs.

One final tip is for the 5 consecutive extreme clears, you actually need to clear 6 songs to get it. That means you need to clear an oni mode song that’s 2★,3★,4★,5★,6★,7★ for it to trigger. There are a couple songs that are slow and doable that with some practice, you should be able to get this trophy.

Overall, I love music games, so even though a lot of trophies will be unobtainable to me, I still enjoy playing this every couple days. I’m still fumbling over getting full combo on some hard songs and still trying to complete the remaining bingo cards for the trophy. Additionally, if you have friends on PSN who have this game, you can play against their best records as well! Overall if you enjoy music games, or just think Don-chan is uguu af, you should absolutely buy this game. The best part? There’s an English interface if your PS4 language is set to English! 👍