Mods / Gimmicks challenge the player's reading ability through effects that change how a chart looks and/or plays. These songs may make the chart move around, change speed, spin, disappear or in some cases turn into a new game altogether. In many cases these effects are used to draw attention to some feature of the music, make the chart more difficult to read, or compliment the tech or stamina present in the file.
The two terms are often used interchangeably; however there is a distinction between the two.
Mods is simultaneous catch-all abbreviation for Modifiers and Modding.
- Modifiers are built-in effects the engine can apply to the arrows, like Drunk or Reverse. The application of these during gameplay is known as an Attack.
- Modding is the scripting side where folks will use Lua to control those effects or do stuff beyond what the built-in modifiers offer.
A gimmick can refer to a specific motif or trope in a chart, including a mod that repeats itself or unconventional pattern. For example, a chart where the arrows (or the player) spins every time the artist says “woo”, one could say the gimmick of the chart is such. Gimmicks, broadly, are the use of StepMania mechanics to influence the speed of arrows as they travel toward the targets. Some examples:
- Scroll, BPM, and Speed changes
- Stop, Warp, and Fake segments
- Combo and Tick changes
- Unconventional use of Mines or Uncommon Note Types (Fakes, Lifts)
The Technical and Fantastic Attack community often notates timing gimmicks with XMOD and Mods with MODS. In quick-hand:
- Timing Shenanigans → Gimmicks
- Attacks/Lua → Mods
One fairly common misconception is that mod files can only be made and played in NotITG, this is NotTrue! Most modern mod charts are either made in an SM5 fork (ITGmania, Outfox) or NotITG.
- SM5 - StepMania 5 introduced a new system for writing mods, thus mod files made for SM5 will mostly work in it's forks (ITGmania & Outfox); however, these mods are not compatible with NotITG.
- Both ITGmania & Outfox have added new features that may make specific files incompatible with the other. Generally most SM5 specific mod charts will work in both, and there will usually be a note if the file is itgmania or outfox specific.
- NotITG is a mod focused fork of OpenITG, which stems from the older StepMania 3.95 codebase. It's been developed with mod content in mind and has accrued tons of features over the years. This is a different engine from SM5/ITGm/Outfox, so for more details see forks.
Mods/Gimmicks on this wiki primarily refers to ITGmania/SM5 based mods to avoid confusion.
- Directional Events:
- D.O.W.N.S
- U.P.S.
- R.I.G.H.T.S
- L.E.F.T.S.
- UPSRT
- S.M.H
- Bubble Tea Invitational
- ONDER
- D.O.W.N.S., U.P.S., U.P.S.M.H, R.I.G.H.T.S., and L.E.F.T.S. (directional series): An annual tournament where the pack is built from community-made submissions. The event allows content from all play styles with minimal restriction. As such these tournament packs have a mix of just about every type of content. While the events are known for their silly and shitpost content, we often see some high-quality mod/gimmick files make their debut in the event.
- MrThatKid Conversions: Mr. ThatKid's collection of mod charts ported over from NotITG or older versions of stepmania to work in SM5 or one of its forks.
- UPSRT: A series of adventures leveraging lua to create Dance Game RPGs starring community members. The first one introducing the Pokemon world of which subsequent packs have used as its foundation. These are typically tied to a directional event and debut unannounced.
- Cringle's packs: Collection of mostly mod/gimmick content, where each song has some kind of gimmick. Many files aim to create effects without using attack-based modifiers (though these are still present in many files).
- Bubble Tea Invitational Co-Host's Exciting Sightreadables
- Squeaky Beds and Leaky Faucets
- Secret Simfile Santa
- S.M.H (Stepcharts Made Horribly) series
- ONDER series
- WinDEU Hates You
- Gay4Gimmicks
- DivinElegy's Gimmick Competitions