2.3

This is the final feature update from DJ Hitori (@macmillan333) in the foreseeable future. As such, it contains a grab bag of features that were low priority but I wanted to realize before leaving. In the future, you can continue to expect bug fixes, and possible contributions from other developers.

Statistics

TECHMANIA now collects a few basic statistics, available for viewing at the information screen.

Skins

A few updates for skin creators:

• It is now possible to customize the combo text's animation. Refer to documentation for details.
• It is now possible to specify some skin elements to be horizontally flipped on right-to-left scans. Also refer to documentation for details.
• Added a button to reload skins immediately at the select skin screen.

Performance graph

The result screen has been redesigned to include a performance graph.

• The little squares correspond to notes in the pattern. If a square is above the middle line, it means you hit the corresponding note early; if it's below, it means you hit it late.
• The blue line shows your HP throughout the pattern.
• The yellow sections in the background correspond to Fever activation.

This graph is not displayed for setlists.

Jukebox

Added a jukebox mode, accessible from the filter side sheet in the select track screen. In this mode, TECHMANIA will auto play all tracks in the current folder in a random order, like a music player.

Miscellaneous

• If TECHMANIA fails to load a pattern's BGA, it will start the game without BGA, instead of reporting an error and exiting.
• Added an option to the pattern editor to auto save every 5 minutes.

Fixed issues

• An issue where the sort basis dropdown in the select track panel's side sheet is not re-localized when changing language.
• An issue where Noisysundae was not listed as a developer since 2.0.

Known issues

• scanCountdownBackground, scanCountdownNumbers and touchClickFeedback in the game UI skin will not display if they use additiveShader. Refer to the "On shaders" section in 2.0's release notes for an explanation.
• After selecting a track or setlist to edit, sometimes the entire window stops responding to clicks. A workaround is to press Alt+Tab to switch to another application then back to TECHMANIA.
• The first keystroke to the application will be ignored.

For theme developers

The Theme API version has been updated to 4, adding APIs related to new features. To keep the release notes from becoming too technical, API changes are listed separately in documentation.

Which files to download

Existing players: download TECHMANIA.zip and overwrite the previous version.

New players: download both TECHMANIA.zip and Resources.zip, then extract them to the same folder.

2.2: Setlists

For beta players

• There were no ruleset tweaks, so your records on 2.2 beta will continue to be recognized.
• The tutorial's BGA has been updated.

Highlight

Added setlist mode.

A setlist is a named collection of patterns. After selecting a setlist, you need to choose 3 patterns from it, and play through them in one setting, on one HP bar. After finishing all 3 stages, TECHMANIA will choose a 4th pattern for you, and you need to complete it as well to finish the whole setlist.

To further increase the challenge, you can only use 25% of your HP bar for each stage. This means, if you finish the 1st stage with more than 0% but less than 75% of your total HP, it's still counted as a failure. Likewise, you must finish the 2nd stage with more than 50% HP, and the 3rd stage with more than 25% HP.

TECHMANIA comes with a sample setlist to give you an idea of what setlists are like, but you can create more using the built-in setlist editor.

It's important to note that setlists only contain identifiers to the patterns in it, not the patterns themselves. Therefore, when distributing a setlist, make sure to tell your players where to download the patterns in it. Likewise, if you open a setlist and see a warning that some patterns are not found, you may need to download them before you can play the setlist.

Other changes

• The boot sequence now loads setlists, bringing the total number of steps to 4.
• The main menu has been redesigned.
• Rulesets' format version has been updated to "3" to allow defining different HP deltas for each setlist stage. Refer to documentation. Existing custom rulesets in older format versions will continue to work; HP deltas for each stage will be the same as playing single patterns.
• It's now possible for a pattern to specify legacy ruleset overrides for each setlist stage.
• Replaced the tutorial BGAs with ones made by Stanford J. Calvin (Mirai Akari) from The Big 6 League.

Fixed issues

• An issue where the game will freeze when loading a pattern if there are certain problems with audio clips in it.
• An issue where tracks in streaming assets are visible when selecting a track to edit; these tracks are not editable.

Known issues

• scanCountdownBackground, scanCountdownNumbers and touchClickFeedback in the game UI skin will not display if they use additiveShader. Refer to the "On shaders" section in 2.0's release notes for an explanation.
• After selecting a track or setlist to edit, sometimes the entire window stops responding to clicks. A workaround is to press Alt+Tab to switch to another application then back to TECHMANIA.
• The first keystroke to the application will be ignored.

For theme developers

The Theme API has been updated to version 3, adding support for setlists. To keep the release notes from becoming too technical, API changes are listed separately in documentation.

Which files to download

This time everyone is encouraged to download both TECHMANIA.zip and Resources.zip to receive the new setlist and new tutorial BGAs.

2.2 beta 1: Setlists

This beta is meant for public testing, and may be less stable than the full 2.2 release. For the latest stable version, see 2.1.

Please also note that the rulesets on setlists are still being tweaked. If the rulesets changed between this beta and the full 2.2 release, records set on this beta will not be recognized.

Highlight

Added setlist mode.

A setlist is a named collection of patterns. After selecting a setlist, you need to choose 3 patterns from it, and play through them in one setting, on one HP bar. After finishing all 3 stages, TECHMANIA will choose a 4th pattern for you, and you need to complete it as well to finish the whole setlist.

To further increase the challenge, you can only use 25% of your HP bar for each stage. This means, if you finish the 1st stage with more than 0% but less than 75% of your total HP, it's still counted as a failure. Likewise, you must finish the 2nd stage with more than 50% HP, and the 3rd stage with more than 25% HP.

TECHMANIA comes with a sample setlist to give you an idea of what setlists are like, but you can create more using the built-in setlist editor.

It's important to note that setlists only contain identifiers to the patterns in it, not the patterns themselves. Therefore, when distributing a setlist, make sure to tell your players where to download the patterns in it. Likewise, if you open a setlist and see a warning that some patterns are not found, you may need to download them before you can play the setlist.

Other changes

• The boot sequence now loads setlists, bringing the total number of steps to 4.
• The main menu has been redesigned.
• Rulesets' format version has been updated to "3" to allow defining different HP deltas for each setlist stage. Documentation on this will be added later. Existing custom rulesets in older format versions will continue to work; HP deltas for each stage will be the same as playing single patterns.
• It's now possible for a pattern to specify legacy ruleset overrides for each setlist stage.

Fixed issues

• An issue where the game will freeze when loading a pattern if there are certain problems with audio clips in it.
• An issue where tracks in streaming assets are visible when selecting a track to edit; these tracks are not editable.

Known issues

• scanCountdownBackground, scanCountdownNumbers and touchClickFeedback in the game UI skin will not display if they use additiveShader. Refer to the "On shaders" section in 2.0's release notes for an explanation.
• After selecting a track or setlist to edit, sometimes the entire window stops responding to clicks. A workaround is to press Alt+Tab to switch to another application then back to TECHMANIA.
• The first keystroke to the application will be ignored.

For theme developers

The Theme API version has been updated to 3, adding support for setlists. Documentation to be added later.

Which files to download

Existing players: download TECHMANIA.zip and overwrite the previous version. It includes the sample setlist.

New players: download TECHMANIA.zip and Skins_and_Tracks.zip from 2.1, then extract them to the same folder.

2.1: FMOD and ASIO

Highlight

TECHMANIA now uses FMOD as the audio engine, instead of Unity's built-in one. This enables players on Windows to use ASIO, an audio driver that greatly reduces audio latency.

To enable ASIO:

• Install ASIO4ALL
  • ASIO4ALL's website may appear rather shady, but the software itself is legitimate.
  • Alternatively if you have an external sound card, its driver may already support ASIO, then you don't need ASIO4ALL.
• Go to the newly added "Advanced audio" section in the options menu and turn on "Use ASIO".

Please note the following:

• Make sure no application is playing any sound when turning on ASIO.
• While using ASIO, no other application will be able to play any sound either.

Other changes

• The boot screen now contains an attribution to FMOD as required.
• In the default theme, the select track screen now dynamically loads and unloads eyecatches as you scroll the track list. When a track scrolls into view, its eyecatch will load; as it scrolls out of view, its eyecatch will unload. This reduces memory usage, but you may momentarily see blank eyecatches if you scroll faster than the eyecatch can finish loading.

Fixed issues

• An issue where the shifted half speed modifier does not affect BPM changes and time stops.
• An issue where the layout of some panels may be incorrect on some devices.
• An issue where the "scaling mode" option does not work as intended.
• An issue where the brightness slider in the pause menu does not work if the pattern started at full brightness.
• An issue where dropping input on a long note (hold or drag) may result in one MISS judgement per frame until the note's end.
• An issue where the game may freeze at the loading screen if the BGA fails to play.
  • TECHMANIA is unfortunately unable to detect and react to such errors. As a temporary workaround, when TECHMANIA begins loading a BGA it will start a 10-second countdown. If the BGA does not start playing within 10 seconds, it will be treated as an error, and you will return to the select track screen.
  • This issue is currently confirmed to occur on the iOS version when the BGA has a variable frame rate. You can resolve this issue by re-encoding these BGAs to use a constant frame rate.
  • You can also bypass BGA altogether by turning on "No video" from the modifiers menu. In a future version, TECHMANIA will automatically turn it on when it fails to play the BGA.

For theme developers

TECHMANIA Theme API has been updated to version 2. To keep the release notes from becoming too technical, API changes are listed separately in documentation.

This release is mostly backwards compatible with API version 1, but if you have work-in-progress themes on version 1, you are encouraged to migrate to version 2 as soon as possible, as version 2 added methods to release assets loaded from files, allowing your theme to reduce memory usage.

This release also added a debug window to the game, only visible when running inside Unity editor, that displays statistics on FMOD and number of currently loaded assets. This can be helpful to make sure your theme is releasing unneeded resources and conserving memory.

Known issues

• When selecting a track to edit, tracks in streaming assets (the built-in ones in mobile builds) are visible when they shouldn't be.
• scanCountdownBackground, scanCountdownNumbers and touchClickFeedback in the game UI skin will not display if they use additiveShader. Refer to the "On shaders" section in 2.0's release notes for an explanation.
• After selecting a track to edit, sometimes the entire window stops responding to clicks. A workaround is to press Alt+Tab to switch to another application then back to TECHMANIA.
• The first keystroke to the application will be ignored.

Which files to download

Existing players: download TECHMANIA.zip and overwrite the previous version.

New players: download TECHMANIA.zip and Skins_and_Tracks.zip, then extract them to the same folder.

2.1 beta 1 hotfix 1

Fixed an issue where the game's performance degrades every time the user enters the select track screen.

New players: download TECHMANIA.zip from this release and Skins_and_Tracks.zip from 2.0, then extract to the same folder. Make sure to read the release notes of 2.1 beta 1.

2.1 beta 1: FMOD and ASIO

About this beta

• This beta is meant for public testing, and may be less stable than the full 2.1 release. For the latest stable version, see 2.0.
• No new features will be introduced between this beta and the full 2.1 release.

Highlight

TECHMANIA now uses FMOD as the audio engine, instead of Unity's built-in one. This enables players on Windows to use ASIO, an audio driver that greatly reduces audio latency.

To enable ASIO:

• Install ASIO4ALL
  • ASIO4ALL's website may appear rather shady, but the software itself is legitimate.
  • Alternatively if you have an external sound card, its driver may already support ASIO, then you don't need ASIO4ALL.
• Go to the newly added "Advanced audio" section in the options menu and turn on "Use ASIO".

Please note the following:

• Make sure no application is playing any sound when turning on ASIO.
• While using ASIO, no other application will be able to play any sound either.

Other changes

• The boot screen now contains an attribution to FMOD as required.
• In the default theme, the select track screen now dynamically loads and unloads eyecatches as you scroll the track list. When a track scrolls into view, its eyecatch will load; as it scrolls out of view, its eyecatch will unload. This reduces memory usage, but you may momentarily see blank eyecatches if you scroll faster than the eyecatch can finish loading.

Fixed issues

• An issue where the shifted half speed modifier does not affect BPM changes and time stops.
• An issue where the layout of some panels may be incorrect on some devices.
• An issue where the "scaling mode" option does not work as intended.
• An issue where the brightness slider in the pause menu does not work if the pattern started at full brightness.

For theme developers

TECHMANIA Theme API has been updated to version 2. To keep the release notes from becoming too technical, API changes are listed separately in documentation.

This release is mostly backwards compatible with API version 1, but if you have work-in-progress themes on version 1, you are encouraged to migrate to version 2 as soon as possible, as version 2 added methods to release assets loaded from files, allowing your theme to reduce memory usage.

This release also added a debug window to the game, only visible when running inside Unity editor, that displays statistics on FMOD and number of currently loaded assets. This can be helpful to make sure your theme is releasing unneeded resources and conserving memory.

Known issues

• (NEW) If a long note's (hold or drag) keysound is shorter than the note itself's duration, and you drop input after the keysound stops but before the note ends, the game will produce one MISS judgement per frame until the note ends.
• (NEW) If TECHMANIA started with the options file missing, it will freeze upon entering the select pattern screen.
• (NEW) The game's performance degrades every time you enter the select track screen. (Fixed in hotfix 1)
• scanCountdownBackground, scanCountdownNumbers and touchClickFeedback in the game UI skin will not display if they use additiveShader. Refer to the "On shaders" section in 2.0's release notes for an explanation.
• After selecting a track to edit, sometimes the entire window stops responding to clicks. A workaround is to press Alt+Tab to switch to another application then back to TECHMANIA.
• The first keystroke to the application will be ignored.

Which files to download

Existing players: download TECHMANIA.zip and overwrite the previous version.

New players: download TECHMANIA.zip and Skins_and_Tracks.zip from 2.0, then extract them to the same folder.

2.0: themes

For beta players

• Fixed an issue in the default theme where the welcome screen does not respond to keystrokes.
• Fixed an issue in the default theme where the F11 and F12 shortcuts in practice mode do not update UI.
• Slightly decreased memory usage by discarding textures loaded from files when not used.

Thank you for helping us test this monumental release. The following release notes are written in context of 1.1 hotfix 1.

Highlight

TECHMANIA now supports themes, allowing you to customize almost the entirety of TECHMANIA's UI.

• Most of the existing UI is migrated to the "default theme".
  • The editor is not migrated at this moment, and will remain outside of themes for the foreseeable future.
• Added an option to change theme.
  • A theme is a single .tmtheme file. Once you place a theme in the Themes folder next to TECHMANIA.exe, it will show up in the theme list.
  • You can also change the location of your themes folder, the same way as tracks and skins.
  • Please note that each theme is specific to a platform, and specific to certain TECHMANIA versions. Please double check whether a theme is compatible with your platform and TECHMANIA version before downloading. The theme developer should provide these information when releasing their theme.
  • Please also note that themes contain executable scripts, which may contain malicious code. We have made our best effort at locking down themes' access to the user's device and data, but we cannot make guarantees. Please exercise caution when choosing, downloading and using themes, the same way you would with downloading software from the internet.
• When TECHMANIA launches, it will now display a boot screen, where it loads skins, the track list, and the current theme. TECHMANIA will display the theme only after these resources are loaded.
  • If using a non-default theme, on the boot screen you will have a chance to revert to the default theme. This is so that you can continue to change themes even if your chosen theme does not provide that option.

If you are interested in making themes, you can find documentation on theme development in the techmania-docs repo.

Other changes

• The game now supports non-integer refresh rates, such as 59.96 Hz.
• Reduced lag spikes.
• Added "modified time" as a sort basis of tracks.
• Pausing the game now temporarily hides VFX and combo text, so they don't obscure the pause menu.
• The game will now correctly extract zipped tracks without a directory in it.
• Added an option on how to pause the game via the pause button. Choices are "single tap" (default), "double tap" and "hold".
  • This does not affect pausing by pressing the Esc key, or pausing by switching to another window.
• New modifiers
  • Sudden death: instant fail on any MISS or BREAK.
  • Shifted half speed: similar to half speed, but the entire pattern is shifted by half a scan. This may produce more musically "correct" grouping of scans than half speed.
    
• Editor changes
  • Added a new field in track metadata: preview BGA. The default theme does not use them, but other themes may.
  • When sorting patterns automatically, the sort is now first by control scheme, then by playable lanes (new), then level.
  • Scan and beat numbers now start from 1 instead of 0.
  • Entering preview no longer resets zoom.
• Official track changes
  • f for fun: converted BGA from .wmv to .mp4 for better compatibility and smaller size.
  • Run 4 Cover: added BGA made by Via.
  • Ash Barrens: adjusted a few scans in EX pattern to be less repetitive.
  • All official tracks now come in a subfolder named Official Tracks, to improve feature discovery around subfolders.

On shaders

UI Toolkit currently does not support shaders. Therefore, until supported is added, TECHMANIA will be unable to display any element that uses custom shaders on UI Toolkit. This includes skin elements that use additiveShader, as well as any visual element in themes that wish to use a custom shader.

• We see VFX as a fundamental part of TECHMANIA's visual experience, so there is a workaround: VFX will be displayed in Unity UI, in a layer above everything in the theme. This unfortunately means it is impossible for any element in the theme to obscure VFX.
• The combo text is displayed above VFX, so it gets the same workaround.
• scanCountdownBackground, scanCountdownNumbers and touchClickFeedback in the game UI skin are displayed below notes, so no workaround is available. These elements will be hidden if they use additiveShader.
• If Unity adds support for shaders in the future, we will promptly update TECHMANIA to fix this issue.

On records set on 1.0 and 1.0.1

If you don't care about records, you can skip this section.

TECHMANIA 1.0.2 changed the way pattern fingerprints are calculated. This would cause all records set on 1.0 and 1.0.1 to become invalid, but special logic was added to recognize these records and fix their fingerprints when you play the same pattern again on 1.0.2 and onward. This causes extra complexity in the logic that reads and updates records, so starting in 2.0, it will be removed.

This means, if you set a record on 1.0 or 1.0.1, and never played the same pattern on the same ruleset again on 1.0.2 or 1.1, these records will no longer be recognized by 2.0. To check whether you have such records:

1. Open TECHMANIA\records.json in your documents folder
2. Check if any record contains the line "gameVersion": "1.0" or "gameVersion": "1.0.1"
3. If such a record exists, take a note of its ruleset and guid
4. Open the track.tech file inside each track with a text editor, and search for the guid until you find the pattern that contains it

Unfortunately there is no easy way to automate this process at this moment. If there is significant need from the community, we may release a tool for it.

To fix records set on 1.0 and 1.0.1, you need to play the same pattern on the same ruleset (0 is standard, 1 is legacy) in TECHMANIA 1.0.2 or 1.1. You do not need to achieve a higher score than your record. There is no UI to tell you if a record is fixed, but if done correctly, the record in records.json should no longer say "gameVersion": "1.0" or "gameVersion": "1.0.1".

Known issues

• scanCountdownBackground, scanCountdownNumbers and touchClickFeedback in the game UI skin will not display if they use additiveShader. Refer to the "On shaders" section for an explanation.
• After selecting a track to edit, sometimes the entire window stops responding to clicks. A workaround is to press Alt+Tab to switch to another application then back to TECHMANIA.
• The first keystroke to the application will be ignored.
• (NEW) Shifted half speed does not work correctly for patterns with BPM changes or time stops.

Which files to download

This time everyone is encouraged to download both TECHMANIA.zip and Skins_and_Tracks.zip, then extract them to the same folder, in order to receive updates to the official tracks.

2.0 beta 2

About this beta

• This beta is meant for public testing, and may be less stable than the full 2.0 release. Please read through this release note carefully to understand your risks before deciding whether to install this beta.
• If you install and run this release, then view or change any option (including no video and background brightness on individual tracks), the options file on your disk will be upgraded to a new format (version "3"). Later if you run 1.1 again, it will be unable to understand the new format, and therefore revert all options to default.
• This beta also serves as a feature freeze. No new features will be introduced between this release and the full 2.0 release.

Highlight

TECHMANIA now supports themes, allowing you to customize almost the entirety of TECHMANIA's UI.

• Most of the existing UI is migrated to the "default theme".
  • The editor is not migrated at this moment, and will remain outside of themes for the foreseeable future.
• Added an option to change theme.
  • A theme is a single .tmtheme file. Once you place a theme in the Themes folder next to TECHMANIA.exe, it will show up in the theme list.
  • You can also change the location of your themes folder, the same way as tracks and skins.
  • Please note that each theme is specific to a platform, and specific to certain TECHMANIA versions. Please double check whether a theme is compatible with your platform and TECHMANIA version before downloading. The theme developer should provide these information when releasing their theme.
  • Please also note that themes contain executable scripts, which may contain malicious code. We have made our best effort at locking down themes' access to the user's device and data, but we cannot make guarantees. Please exercise caution when choosing, downloading and using themes, the same way you would with downloading software from the internet.
• When TECHMANIA launches, it will now display a boot screen, where it loads skins, the track list, and the current theme. TECHMANIA will display the theme only after these resources are loaded.
  • If using a non-default theme, on the boot screen you will have a chance to revert to the default theme. This is so that you can continue to change themes even if your chosen theme does not provide that option.

If you are interested in making themes, please note that documentation on the Theme API is not yet complete, but you can start reading what is there in the 2.0 branch of the documentation repo. Keep in mind that there may be significant, undocumented API changes between this beta and the full 2.0 release.

Other changes

• Reduced lag spikes.
• Added "modified time" as a sort basis of tracks.
• Pausing the game now temporarily hides VFX and combo text, so they don't obscure the pause menu.
• The game will now correctly extract zipped tracks without a directory in it.
• Added an option on how to pause the game via the pause button. Choices are "single tap" (default), "double tap" and "hold".
  • This does not affect pausing by pressing the Esc key, or pausing by switching to another window.
• New modifiers
  • Sudden death: instant fail on any MISS or BREAK.
  • Shifted half speed: similar to half speed, but the entire pattern is shifted by half a scan. This may produce more musically "correct" grouping of scans than half speed.
    
• Editor changes
  • Added a new field in track metadata: preview BGA. The default theme does not use them, but other themes may.
  • When sorting patterns automatically, the sort is now first by control scheme, then by playable lanes (new), then level.
  • Scan and beat numbers now start from 1 instead of 0.
  • Entering preview no longer resets zoom.

On shaders

UI Toolkit currently does not support shaders. Therefore, until supported is added, TECHMANIA will be unable to display any element that uses custom shaders on UI Toolkit. This includes skin elements that use additiveShader, as well as any visual element in themes that wish to use a custom shader.

• We see VFX as a fundamental part of TECHMANIA's visual experience, so there is a workaround: VFX will be displayed in Unity UI, in a layer above everything in the theme. This unfortunately means it is impossible for any element in the theme to obscure VFX.
• The combo text is displayed above VFX, so it gets the same workaround.
• scanCountdownBackground, scanCountdownNumbers and touchClickFeedback in the game UI skin are displayed below notes, so no workaround is available. These elements will be hidden if they use additiveShader.
• If Unity adds support for shaders in the future, we will promptly update TECHMANIA to fix this issue.

On records set on 1.0 and 1.0.1

If you don't care about records, or have already read this in 2.0 beta 1, you can skip this section.

TECHMANIA 1.0.2 changed the way pattern fingerprints are calculated. This would cause all records set on 1.0 and 1.0.1 to become invalid, but special logic was added to recognize these records and fix their fingerprints when you play the same pattern again on 1.0.2 and onward. This causes extra complexity in the logic that reads and updates records, so starting in 2.0, it will be removed.

This means, if you set a record on 1.0 or 1.0.1, and never played the same pattern on the same ruleset again on 1.0.2 or 1.1, these records will no longer be recognized by 2.0. To check whether you have such records:

1. Open TECHMANIA\records.json in your documents folder
2. Check if any record contains the line "gameVersion": "1.0" or "gameVersion": "1.0.1"
3. If such a record exists, take a note of its ruleset and guid
4. Open the track.tech file inside each track with a text editor, and search for the guid until you find the pattern that contains it

Unfortunately there is no easy way to automate this process at this moment. If there is significant need from the community, we may release a tool for it.

To fix records set on 1.0 and 1.0.1, you need to play the same pattern on the same ruleset (0 is standard, 1 is legacy) in TECHMANIA 1.0.2 or 1.1. You do not need to achieve a higher score than your record. There is no UI to tell you if a record is fixed, but if done correctly, the record in records.json should no longer say "gameVersion": "1.0" or "gameVersion": "1.0.1".

Known issues

• scanCountdownBackground, scanCountdownNumbers and touchClickFeedback in the game UI skin will not display if they use additiveShader. Refer to the "On shaders" section for an explanation.
• After selecting a track to edit, sometimes the entire window stops responding to clicks. A workaround is to press Alt+Tab to switch to another application then back to TECHMANIA.
• (NEW) The title screen despite saying "press any key", does not respond to keystrokes.
• (NEW) The keyboard shortcuts F11 and F12 in practice mode do not update corresponding toggles in the UI.
• (NEW) The first keystroke to the application cannot be received by any element.

Fixed issues

• An issue where upgrading some pre-1.0 tracks may fail due to missing fields.
• An issue where changing language causes some option dropdowns to stop working.
• An issue where input feedback may remain on screen if the finger is lifted while the game is paused.
• An issue where the select track screen does not scroll to the previously selected track.

Which files to download

Existing players: download TECHMANIA.zip and overwrite the previous version.

New players: download TECHMANIA.zip and Skins_and_Tracks.zip from 2.0 beta 1, then extract them to the same folder.

2.0 beta 1 hotfix 1

Fixed issues

• An issue where VFX and combo text are drawn at incorrect locations when the resolution is not 1920x1080.
• An issue where the approach overlay does not display when notes are scanned from right to left.
• An issue where, if you currently use a game UI skin with undisplayed elements, changing note / VFX / combo skin will bring up the "element can't be displayed" warning even though these skins are not related to the issue.

Known issues

• (NEW) Some tracks created before 1.0 may fail to load due to incorrect handling of missing elements in the file.
• (NEW) After creating a new track in the editor, the select track screen will show duplicate tracks.

New players: download TECHMANIA.zip from this release and Skins_and_Tracks.zip from 2.0 beta 1, then extract to the same folder. Make sure to read the release notes of 2.0 beta 1.

2.0 beta 1

About this beta

• This beta is meant for public testing, and may be less stable than the full 2.0 release. Please read through this release note carefully to understand your risks before deciding whether to install this beta.
• If you install and run this release, then view or change any option (including no video and background brightness on individual tracks), the options file on your disk will be upgraded to a new format (version "3"). Later if you run 1.1 again, it will be unable to understand the new format, and therefore revert all options to default.
• This beta does not include any significant new feature compared with 1.1.

Highlights

Most of TECHMANIA's UI is migrated from Unity UI to UI Toolkit, a modern UI framework. This allows the UI to be scriptable, paving the way towards themes.

• Most of the UI now exists as the "default theme". An option to change themes will be added in a later release.
  • The editor is not migrated at this moment, and will remain on Unity UI for the foreseeable future. When you select a track to edit, TECHMANIA will hide the current theme and temporarily switch back to Unity UI in order to display the editor.
• When TECHMANIA launches, it will now display a boot screen, where it loads skins, the track list, and the current theme. TECHMANIA will display the theme only after these resources are loaded.
• While we attempted to recreate the existing UI as accurately as possible using components and styles on UI Toolkit, there may still be minute differences in appearances.

If you are interested in making themes, please note that documentation on the Theme API is not yet complete, but you can start reading what is there in the 2.0 branch of the documentation repo. Keep in mind that there may be significant, undocumented API changes between this beta and the full 2.0 release.

Other changes

• The game now supports non-integer refresh rates, such as 59.96 Hz.

On shaders

UI Toolkit currently does not support shaders. Therefore, until supported is added, TECHMANIA will be unable to display any skin element that uses additiveShader on UI Toolkit.

• We see VFX as a fundamental part of TECHMANIA's visual experience, so there is a workaround: VFX will be displayed in Unity UI, in a layer above everything in the theme. This unfortunately means it is impossible for any element in the theme to obscure VFX. For the default theme, it means VFX will be displayed above the pause menu.
• The combo text is displayed above VFX, so it gets the same workaround.
• scanCountdownBackground, scanCountdownNumbers and touchClickFeedback in the game UI skin are displayed below notes, so no workaround is available. These elements will be hidden if they use additiveShader.
• If Unity adds support for shaders in the future, we will promptly update TECHMANIA to fix this issue.

On records set on 1.0 and 1.0.1

If you don't care about records, you can skip this section.

TECHMANIA 1.0.2 changed the way pattern fingerprints are calculated. This would cause all records set on 1.0 and 1.0.1 to become invalid, but special logic was added to recognize these records and fix their fingerprints when you play the same pattern again on 1.0.2 and onward. This causes extra complexity in the logic that reads and updates records, so starting in 2.0, it will be removed.

This means, if you set a record on 1.0 or 1.0.1, and never played the same pattern on the same ruleset again on 1.0.2 or 1.1, these records will no longer be recognized by 2.0. To check whether you have such records:

1. Open TECHMANIA\records.json in your documents folder
2. Check if any record contains the line "gameVersion": "1.0" or "gameVersion": "1.0.1"
3. If such a record exists, take a note of its ruleset and guid
4. Open the track.tech file inside each track with a text editor, and search for the guid until you find the pattern that contains it

Unfortunately there is no easy way to automate this process at this moment. If there is significant need from the community, we may release a tool for it.

To fix records set on 1.0 and 1.0.1, you need to play the same pattern on the same ruleset (0 is standard, 1 is legacy) in TECHMANIA 1.0.2 or 1.1. You do not need to achieve a higher score than your record. There is no UI to tell you if a record is fixed, but if done correctly, the record in records.json should no longer say "gameVersion": "1.0" or "gameVersion": "1.0.1".

Known issues

• VFX and combo text may be displayed above the pause menu. Refer to the "On shaders" section for an explanation.
• scanCountdownBackground, scanCountdownNumbers and touchClickFeedback in the game UI skin will not display if they use additiveShader. Refer to the "On shaders" section for an explanation.
• After selecting a track to edit, sometimes the entire window stops responding to clicks. A workaround is to press Alt+Tab to switch to another application then back to TECHMANIA.
• (NEW) VFX and combo text are drawn at incorrect locations when the resolution is not 1920x1080.
• (NEW) If you currently use a game UI skin with undisplayed elements, changing note / VFX / combo skin will bring up the "element can't be displayed" warning even though these skins are not related to the issue.
• (NEW) The approach overlay does not display when notes are scanned from right to left.

Which files to download

Because there were recent additions to official tracks, we will release an updated Skins_and_Tracks.zip for your convenience.

Existing players who have already downloaded the new tracks: download TECHMANIA.zip and overwrite the previous version.

Everyone else: download TECHMANIA.zip and Skins_and_Tracks.zip, then extract them to the same folder.