“Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan” Fan Obsession Page

Last Updated: 10/02/06

This page is dedicated to all the minor details fans have noticed in Ouendan. If you’re absolutely obsessed with the game, this page is for you! This page may contain spoilers! Huge thanks to Asho for all his contributions to this page, and the other guides.

If you like this, be sure to check out our other Ouendan guides!

Stage Name Translations:

From Asho (translated from Taiyou‘s Spanish translation), and also some from Jn1618:

“Arise, failed student! Revive for the comeback in the entrance exam!”
*Loop & Loop

“Cinderella revealed! Will Junior choose…?”
*Koi no Dance Site

“A robbery?! Burglar pursuit!”
*Guts Da Ze!!

“A summertime festival! The altar race makes a man!”
*Melody

“Choose now! It’s my ramen, alone!”
*Linda Linda

“Art sensation! Depression’s mold is cracked!”
*Kokoro Odoru

“The teacher’s passion, ever enduring! Ladies, be all you can be!”
*Atsuki Kodou no Hate

Smash him! The dodgeball match of love.
*Thrill

Go through justice! Who has the ballot of purity in his hand!?
*Taisetsu na Mono

Recover it! Miraculous beauty!
*Neraiuchi

Stop the fangs of evil! Resist and defeat with your fighting spirit!
*One Night Carnival

Enter your soul! Make a miracle of love for her!
*Over The Distance

Giant beast invasion! Stand up, our Salary-MAN!
*Taiyou ga Moete Iru

Protect peace! Robot VS Policemen!
*Shanghai Honey

~Earth’s Last Day~ Join together! Put all of the world’s fighting spirit in one right now!
*READY STEADY GO

Random Notes from Asho:

• Here’s an interesting Japanese site, Fragment of Ouen. It contains a textual description of every pattern in the game (and a diagram of Shanghai Honey insane’s last part).
• The red area in the life bar is divided in two halves. In the highest half, the slider displays “!”. On the lower half, it displays “!!”. When the slider is in “!”, the Ouendan goes into a tired position and there’s a close-up on the leader’s upper body. If it goes into “!!”, it closes into the leader’s face. If you get out of the red, the Ouendan remains in the tired position until the next move. (Dramatic effects FTW)
• I confirm that you indeed get a “PERFECT!!” for obtaining a full combo on a song (regardless of grade results).
• If you leave the game on the main menu for 90 seconds, it’ll go back to the title.
• While missing a Track, you lose a bit of energy for each dot that you miss.
• If you hit a track with a miss timing, you miss the starting point as the first dot.
• Getting at least one dot on a Track guarantees a 50.
• Missing all dots on a Track give you a Miss, though it looks like two misses (one for each end).
• If you go through the whole tutorial (only skip the introduction and the life bar explanation), a max combo of 242 is possible.
• The character’s profile and a bunch of flames appear on the screen at 30 combos. The profile keeps appearing and the flames go up at 60, 100, 150 and 200 combos. After that, the flames cover the whole screen, but the profiles keep appearing every 50 combos.
• If you put the DS on sleep mode during the tutorial, when you open the DS again Captain Kai scolds you and the tutorial ends.
• The speed of tracks and timing rings, as well as the spacing of dots during tracks, depend on the song and difficulty.
• Each song has a different dance pattern for the Ouendan, which mostly coincides with the placement of the hit markers. A miss will interrupt the sequence. Also, each marker has which sound it uses programmed into it.
• According to RSG’s intro manga, the whole game takes place in Tokyo (except for Neraiuchi, which takes place on Ancient Egypt).
• When you get a combo breaker, the combo counter quickly decreases to zero and then disappears. The flames won’t disappear until the counter disappears completely.
• If you get a combo breaker or the part ends while the leader’s profile is on screen, it’ll immediately slide off the screen instead of doing it slowly as it normally does.
• Something about Nerauichi: On the second part, there’s a bunch of slaves carving hieroglyphs and stuff on the pyramid’s walls. If the scene is on the “depressed” state, you can see a couple scribbles that are the Japanese equivalent of stick figures. But on the other two states, you can see that there are three heads that look, with a little bit of imagination, like a guy with spiky hair and a headband, another with an eyepatch and another with a mohawk. Unfortunately, it doesn’t change between difficulties.
• The S rank emblem has two fans at its sides, one with the kanji for “ou” and another for “en”. “Ou” means “application/response”. “En” means “assist/lead”. Together, they mean “cheer”.
• The spinner has the kanji for “ouendan” written on it.
• The kanji on the life bar’s slider means “spirit”. So, it actually represents the fighting spirit of the person you’re cheering for.
• Getting a symbol at the end of a set wields a life bonus, which is a little bigger at the end of a part.
• The Ouendan’s star emblem that appears constantly throughout the game says “ouen” (cheer).
• The background on the bottom screen from Koi no Dance Site actually interact with the top screen (except for part 2). This doesn’t happen in any other song.
• I just discovered you can pause during the manga intro of a song. There are only two choices in the menu, Start Over and Quit (no Continue).
• The cheergirls have black panties. I’m not kidding. Don’t believe me? Try watching a replay and looking closely at the 3D models. Loop & Loop works (especially if you get a “PERFECT!!”.
  PRO TIP: Aoi (pink hair) has the shortest skirt.

The rank emblems have a specific color:

• D: Bronze
• C: Silver
• B: Gold
• A: Polished gold
• S: Polished gold of higher quality

Songs with 5 sections:

• Loop & Loop
• Melody
• Thrill
• Over the Distance

Times the Ouendan actually make a comical expression (applies to all difficulties):

• Sucked by the vortex at the beginning of Neraiuchi (a bit hard to see due to the sprite’s zooming out and the onomatopoeia in the way)
• RSG third break fail scene (except for the leader)
• RSG failure scene (just before the meteor hits and the image at the retry screen)

Melody is pretty much the game’s theme. Here are the reasons:

• Only song not a cover (though it is an edit)
• Used in the credits
• The single was promoted as “the song in Ouendan”

The strip that displays the stage’s title and song in the map has a different color for the border and the font depending on which group it is (the song title is always in black):

• Group 1 (Loop & Loop) — Green
• Group 2 (Koi no Dance Site, Guts Da Ze!!, Melody) — Orange
• Group 3 (Linda Linda, Kokoro Odoru, Atsuki Kodou no Hate, Thrill — Light blue
• Group 4 (Taisetsuna Mono, Neraiuchi, One Night Carnival) — Purple
• Group 5 (Over the Distance) — Yellow
• Group 6 (Taiyo ga Moeteiru, Shanghai Honey) — Blue
• Group 7 (READY STEADY GO) — Red

Characters:

From ClearQuartz:

Doumeki Kai (black hair & hat): Chief of the cheer squad, he uses strict control to uplift people’s feelings. His grand vision is one of peace & harmony forever.

Ippongi Ryuta (red hair): He is the hot-blooded leader of the cheer squad. He has a good soul and helps those around him who are in distress by standing up and fighting for them!

Tanaka Hajime (glasses): He is a prodigy and the eldest boy in his family. One day as he returned from school he accidentally encountered Domeki who explained what it is that they do. Tanaka decided to join.

Saito (Eyepatch): Saito is a shy/silent member of the cheer squad. His modesty, consideration and reliability are his strong points.

Suzuki (Mowhawk) – (Not sure just yet about his bio other than the fact he hates stubbornness & inflexibility…)

Cheergirls:

Kanda Aoi (pink hair)
Amemiya Sayaka (brown hair)
Anna Rindo ha-Suto (blonde hair – I’ve also taken her name directly from the katakana, but I’ve seen elsewhere that her last name might be Lindhurst, so take whichever one you want).

These are the 3 cheer girls of the cheers quad who offer help by using their sharp & daring movements.

Character Cast:

From Asho:

Tsuyoshi Hanada, student attempting to get into Tokyo University for three years.
His family, who own a restaurant.

Sachiko Yamagata, an OL at Miyama Products.
Junior, successor to the company’s president.
Sachiko’s coworkers, who despectively call her “Ta-chan”.

Biridon, a racehorse who has only won 1 out of 49 races.
A nameless reporter, known by some fans of the game as “Mr. Announcer”.

Shin-chan, competitor in the festival’s race.
Shizu Noroi, the girl Shin-chan loves.
Shizu’s father.

Yasushi Tanaka, owner of the “Dragon Ramen” restaurant, known by everyone as Tan Yao.
The cat.

Shizuyama Kazebayashi, the pottery genius in an art slump.
Inishi, his manager, who also calls him “sensei”.

Hiroshi Mizutani, a passionate teacher.
The students of class 3-B, a group of rather selfish girls.

Wakana, class idol.
Trao, a boy who likes Wakana. (Special Attack: Tiger Smash)
Ryuuji, Trao’s rival. (Special Attack: Dragon Thunder)

Eisaku Iijima, candidate for city’s mayor.
J-Yama K-Aji, Eisaku’s opponent.

Cleopatra, ruler of Egypt.
Cleopatra’s adviser.
Anthony of Rome.

Kouji Sugiyama, a violinist with dreams of being a solist.
The Virtuous Military Antibacterial Over Death Squad.
The Fangs of Evil.

Tetsu Ishida, a man who died in a motorcycle accident.
Ryouko Ishida, Tetsu’s wife.

Ichiro Tamura, a salary man with a pathetic life.
The Giant Blue Rat.
Ami Tamura, Ichiro’s daughter.

The cops who never do a thing, Joe (panics easily) and Dan (always eating donuts).

Song Lengths:

From Asho:

Loop & Loop
Original version: 3:42
Ouendan cover: 2:57

Koi no Dance Site
Original version: 4:25
Ouendan cover: 2:48

Guts Da Ze!!
Original version: 3:39
Ouendan cover: 2:39

Melody
Original version: 4:08
Ouendan edit: 2:47

Linda Linda
Original version: 3:19
Ouendan cover: 2:54

Kokoro Odoru
Original version: 4:09
Ouendan cover: 2:52

Atsuki Kodou no Hate
Original version: 4:04
Ouendan cover: 2:52

Thrill
Original version: 4:38
Ouendan cover: 2:55

Taisetsuna Mono
Original version: 3:00
Ouendan cover: 2:54

Neraiuchi
Original version: 2:16
Ouendan cover: 2:57

One Night Carnival
Original version: 4:53
Ouendan cover: 2:57

Over The Distance
Original version: 4:04
Ouendan cover: 2:56

Taiyo Ga Moeteiru
Original version: 5:29
Ouendan cover: 2:59

Shanghai Honey
Original version: 2:53
Ouendan cover: 2:46

READY STEADY GO
Original version: 3:43
Ouendan cover: 4:03

Random Notes from thedudewhoadude:

• Over The Distance is the only song where the O!T!O! members (on all difficulties) don’t count down to the start of the song. It simply starts after the intro.
• Normally, when a person needs help, their icon will run around the screen shouting “Help!” Once you complete the stage, only a “stamp” of their face remains. However, with the last stage, you can actually see the hazard (the meteor) to the right of the planet. After you complete the stage, the meteor vanishes, and the running people become a red stamp.
• When on the main map, the number in the box on the top screen (bottom right corner) refers to the number of songs on that difficulty you’ve completed. 15 is the maximum.

Random Notes from 0rionBTL:

• There IS another point in which the Ouendan makes a goofy face, but ONLY the male Ouendan groups. During the Dragon Restaurant stage, when they first appear, they are presented with a bill, and get this shocked expression on their face. The girls’ meals seem to be on the house. (^_^)
• During a spinner, your lifebar will go UP steadily if you’re spinning quick enough, and you get a large lifebar boost for passing it.
• If you “fall off” of a slide, your lifebar depletion rate will be TRIPLE until you get back onto it.
• On the difficulty select screen, selecting easy through hard will cause the leader to shout his name. On Insane, the cheerleaders say “Let’s go!” in English.
• On the Mayor stage, when J. Yama sprays his supporters, their eyes are closed in a way that makes them look like Js.

Spinner Glitch, and others

This whole section is from Asho, except where noted.

As we all know, there’s the spinner glitch (pause a replay during a spinner. This causes some of the spin to be lost, ending with a lower score than the actual play and a bit of a loss in the life bar). Screwing around with that glitch, I found that if you cleared the spinner, the replay will also clear it even if you use the glitch to prevent the gauge from filling. I also found out that if you take advantage of the glitch to deplete the entire life, the song won’t end.

If you use the glitch to manipulate your energy into the red, you could fail a part that you passed on the playthrough. This is reflected in the results screen (both the life graph and the pass/fail).

Performing the glitch will result in a lower score than the playthrough, but it won’t affect the results screen.

It doesn’t affect the amount of hits in the results screen, except maybe turning the spinners into 50s, but I’m not sure.

There’s also the tutorial spinner glitch:
I was screwing around in the tutorial by missing every single hit. Now, the tutorial has a couple differences from the actual game:

• The red part of the life bar is smaller.
• The bar depletes at Easy mode Loop & Loop pace.
• Misses won’t affect you life.
• Hits will replenish more of the bar (specially spinners)
• If the life reaches the red, it’ll stop as soon as the slider goes into “!”, and there’s no zoom into Ryuta, nor tired position.

Now, depending on how you hit some stuff, you may actually see the Ouendan go into the tired position briefly (you’ll always get to see it if you miss every hit and don’t skip anything).

The actual glitch is performed by…*drum roll*… missing a spinner while the slider in the life bar displays “!”. For this to actually happen, you’ll have to run through a couple sections without doing anything. When you miss the spinner, WHAM, the Ouendan trips. Only, the zoom in occurs, even though it shouldn’t happen. On top of that, the zoom in doesn’t interrupt the Ouendan’s movements like it should. And when the Ouendan gets up, they’ll be in the crossed-arms position, not the tired position. And since the camera’s zoomed in, they won’t do anything. You can go through the rest like that.

Even more, if you hit something to recover life, and then let the bar go into the red again, you’ll get the zoom and the tired position as it’d normally be. Since misses don’t produce any sounds, you can hear the Ouendan hymn without any sounds (except for the spinner at the end).
If you fill the bar all the way to the top, the glitch is disabled.
There’s only three chances at doing the glitch: either of the two spinners in the spinner lesson, or the spinner at the end of the Ouendan hymn.

And while being lesser, there’s two sound glitches:

• Pause during a sound effect, and it’s muted when you unpause.
• Close the DS during a sound effect. When you open it, the sound plays again from the beginning. Most notable with long sounds. You can keep doing the glitch on one sound to see how far it goes.

FFandMMfan: I’ve also noticed that if you pause and close the DS right before a very fast section, and reopen and unpause, you’ll miss the first few notes, no matter if you hit them perfect or not.

Cheer Girls observations

All from Asho:

Here’s what I’ve deduced about the cheergirls from observation (I’m using the First name-Family name order):

Sayaka Amemiya: Leader of the group, most enthusiast, seems to be the only one who actually focuses on helping people.

Aoi Kanda: Smallest rack and shortest=youngest of the group, shortest skirt, clumsy, is always screwing around (can either mean being silly or doing it wrong).

Anna Lindshearst: American, hot, always minds her own business.

And from what I’ve seen from navigating Japanese sites and looking at fanart, Aoi seems to be some sort of fan favorite (unless the fan in question is a girl who spends her time drawing Ryuta and/or Hajime).

Kanda Aoi’s Adorable failing skills

All from FFandMMfan:

Kanda Aoi, the pink haired cheerleader in Insane mode, is the game’s sole source of loli adorableness, and she pulls it off so well, because of her inability to do anything but cheerleading correctly.

I have compiled a list of adorably poor things she does:
1. Gutz da ze!! – While the other two cheerleaders sit in the stands cheering like normal people, she looks like a crazed soccer fan about to punch the nearest cheerleader.

2. Kokoro Odoru – While the other two cheerleaders display normal looking pottery spins (the brown haired one) and a curvy, and shapely one (blonde), her’s is lopsided and about to fall off, with a pathetic look on her face.

3. Atsuki Kodou no Hate – While the brown haired cheerleader is taking notes, and blonde one has her hand in the air, to ask a question, Kanda sits in her chair, slouched down with her pencil between her nose and lip, clearly not paying attention.

4. Linda Linda – Blonde eats with a spoon (being that she is American), brown uses chopsticks, gently slurping the noodles, miss Kanda is chomping her food from her chopsticks, with a mess all over her face.

5. Melody – Blonde seems to be making a normal meal, brown is trying to gather customers, while Kanda has… some sort of painful to eat-looking green mess sitting in front of her, with a pathetic look on her face.

Other neat facts:
1. If you play Morning Musume – Go Girl! ~Koi no Victory~ over Morning Musume’s Koi no Dance Site, within Ouendan, and you start it at the right time, the first part of the song actually syncs up with the door-busting, and frame changes, and the line “Victory!” will actually happen EXACTLY as the first completion O appears.

2. Thrill on Easy can be played to almost any song you may own.