Hatsune Miku: Project Mirai 2 Hands-On: Tapping To Electric Love

Hatsune Miku: Project Mirai 2 is one of Sega’s key titles this holiday season and the first thing I noticed in my hands-on time is Sega sped the game up. The first Project Mirai game felt like a slower and cuter version of the Project Diva series.

Hatsune Miku: Project Mirai 2 has two control schemes button mode and touch mode. I selected Electric Love and played with button mode first. A line zigged and zagged over a video with button prompts and hold notes. Button mode also has two line notes where you have to hold down a face button (ABXY) and an arrow at the same time When a rainbow hold note pops up you can spin the slide pad to earn Mirapo (Mirai Points) which are used to unlock items like costumes. Pressing R in the song selection menu changes the sound effect when you hit a note.

Speaking of costumes the Hatsune Miku: Project Mirai 2 demo lets players select three costumes Original, World is Mine, and Electric Love. You can have Miku perform World is Mine in her Electric Love outfit and you can customize some costumes like the Electric Love one further by changing the costume’s color.

Touch mode has one less note to worry about than Button mode. If you play a song in easy difficulty there’s only a pink note to tap while Button mode has two notes. In the hardest difficulty setting, Touch mode has three notes (pink, blue, and yellow) while Button mode has all four face buttons. Touch mode also has hold notes, but instead of double hold notes there are swipe notes. You can hit these notes by swiping in the same direction as the arrow. Rainbow notes in Touch mode are kind of like the wheel in Elite Beat Agents, you earn Mirapo by rapidly drawing circles.

Button mode seems easier than Touch mode, partially because of familiarity, but also because you have to lift the stylus from one colored panel to another. In hard mode when there are three panels it’s easier to press buttons because even though there are four buttons your thumb doesn’t move as much when reaching for another button as the stylus does when you move over to another panel.

Hatsune Miku: Project Mirai 2 comes out on November 28 for Nintendo 3DS.