Elite Beat Agents and the Meaning of Passion

Video game concept: A group of snappily-dressed gentlemen travel the globe and inspire regular people by dancing to popular music. Hope and motivation would be in short supply if not for these suit-wearing male cheerleaders.

If you're wondering what such a game would be like, look no further than Elite Beat Agents for the Nintendo DS. This game absolutely took the handheld scene by storm during its release and people I know are still making references to this game. Just like in the paragraph above, the game is about the titular agents as they travel the world and spread passion to the people. How do they do it? By acting as cheerleaders singing and dancing to popular music.

As you can tell by now, Elite Beat Agents is set in a modern world of cartoon fantasy. And even though the game revolves around the agents, the stars really are the people that the agents inspire. These aren't your typical video game problem-solvers. Instead of saving the world, our protagonists have more relatable goals and issues such as babysitting, creating art, proving their worth or just trying to survive in a rough-and-tumble culture.

Some typical gameplay. The player is following the beach ball left to right and afterward going to tap the 2 and 3 buttons

Instead of saving the day behind the scenes, the Elite Beat Agents are all about filling their targets with the courage and passion they need to do it themselves. This being a game, simple problems quickly turn into wild adventures. But the themes of overcoming doubt in one's abilities are still there. Let's quickly go over how this game is played.

For the uninitiated, Elite Beat Agents is a rhythm game that tasks the player to tap buttons on the DS touch screen following the melodies of well-known songs. These buttons fade into the screen and have circles closing in on them, indicating the right time to tap. In some cases, the button then prompts the player to follow a path on the screen, or some other follow-up motion. The result is a whole routine of button-pressing that compliments the song perfectly. As the song goes on, there is a status bar on the top of the screen that goes down. Should it empty entirely, the stage is lost and the player has to try again. This bar is bumped back up by the player performing the song well. This gameplay does very well to excite and push the player to do well and earn a good ending.

On the note of endings and stories, Elite Beat Agents has some of the most energetic presentation I have ever seen in a game. It's rife with passion, over-exaggeration, endearing charm, great characters, excellent themes, and is just a pleasure to experience the whole way through. Let's take a look at one of the game's stages.

The "Makes No Difference" stage - Interesting because the outcomes rely on the lead actor, which relies on Chris's directing

Stage 2 of the game introduces us to director Chris Silverscreen as he works hard to produce the next great blockbuster hit. Morale drops when one of Chris's bosses comes onsite to tell him that his job is strictly on the line. Chris carries on, but the extra weight is dragging him down. Chris's self-doubt and stress pile up, culminating in the desperate cry of "HEEEAAALP!" Thus, the Elite Beat Agents embark to motivate Silverscreen and make "Romancing Meowzilla" a huge hit!

I really must stress the significance of the "HEEEAAALP!" screams in Elite Beat Agents. It's the call that summons the agents to the target's aide, but it means so much more. The emotion that drives every character to yell this call is a very relatable one. Even though the situations are different, the emotions are the same: Self-doubt, anxiety, stress, maybe even helplessness. In short, the nagging voice that says "I can't do this. This is way bigger than I am." I am absolutely sure every person has felt this at some point. Perhaps some among us are feeling it right now. And I can assure you many of us will feel it more times in the future. Thus, I am certain we can all relate to feeling this emotion, especially to the point where we would shout "HEEEAAALP!" if it meant receiving any degree of help.

You can see the magic of the agents right away when they lift Chris straight out of his funk and get him waving with the music. After all, the best start to a daunting task is to loosen up. A little bit of waving with the music to take his mind off of the stress of the task will only help. You may also interpret this as him "riding the wave" of positive thinking and progress. This will be more significant in a few paragraphs.

Here you can finally see the game in action. All gameplay is reserved for the bottom screen while the top screen shows Chris as he works toward producing his movie. On the bottom screen, the  buttons appear to the beat of the music and you will gain points for tapping and dragging, depending on your reflexes and timing. Your performance not only affects the meter that you keep above failing levels, but it also affects how the events on the top screen play out. Performing the gameplay well will depict Chris as making progress. Performing poorly will depict Chris as struggling or failing to reach his goal. Performing perfectly will depict Chris succeeding greatly and with infectious gusto.

I find this very well represents what it's like to progress through a daunting task. You'll have your highs and your lows, and moments when you're just coasting through with moderate progress. In fact, depending on your task, you may coasting much of the time.

More sample gameplay. The circles around the buttons close in and when they overlap with the border of the button, that is when the player must tap.

The music you're hearing is a cover of Sum 41's "It Makes No Difference." And I must say, Elite Beat Agents has one of the most memorable soundtracks not necessarily because the songs on it are all original and of great quality - in fact, the entire core soundtrack are all covers of popular music. What makes the songs stand out is the context that they are used. In this game, music and gameplay are intertwined. The routine of button-pressing is set to the music, so you become intimately familiar with the music out of necessity for playing the game well. I find that this set-up has given me a fondness for all of the songs in the game's soundtrack. It helps that when you perform well, these songs are the background themes for your awesomeness. You can see comments all over the Internet from people who have a problem with popular music saying that this game makes it enjoyable.

You'll notice that in this game, stages take place in typically four sets. At the end of each set, depending on if your meter is above or below 50%, an event occurs that shows if your protagonist succeeds at the immediate task. In the case of this stage, we see if Chris's directing pays off and his lead actor pulls off the performance of a lifetime. In this stage and any other, seeing these little victories along the way to completing the stage is very rewarding. Remember that quivering ball of doubt that your character was at the beginning of the stage? Well look at what they're doing now!

Between sets, we return to seeing our character doing the wave, but as the stage progresses we see more characters joining in. I love this aspect of the game, since in my eyes it signifies the point when those characters are "on the same wavelength" as our protagonist, so to speak. It's one thing for Chris's lead actor to do his job, but it's another for him to really understand Chris's passion and motivation. With the lead actor joining Chris in the wave, I feel like he's really on board and sharing in that passion to make a great movie. Later on, even the antagonistic executive joins the wave, which goes to show even the bad guys in these stories see things more the protagonists' ways. To be fair, the executive does soften up when he sees the progress made in the movie.

The ending you get for a stage is based on how many sets you passed. The best ending is if you pass every set, there's  a neutral ending if you miss any sets, a bad-ish ending if you miss all the sets but still pass the song, and running out meter entirely will "reward" you with a soul-crushing failure scene. Trust me, these are hard to watch. In Silverscreen's case, all of his efforts and directing prowess pay off. "Romancing Meowzilla" is a huge hit, he makes his bosses happy, he keeps his job and can keep doing what he loves.

For me, what's more rewarding than winning in this game is seeing the evolution of its characters as the stages progress. They go from self-doubt to unflinching confidence - which you may notice is signified with a very distinguishable face bearing sharp half-circle eyes like masked superheroes - something that I refer to as the "fervor face." It's the face of a person who is well past the point of "Can I do it?" and only focused on where and how to make it happen. I love it.

The "Sk8er Boi" stage - A prime example of the protagonist using the fervor face

The next stage places us in the backseat of Jack, an ace taxi driver. He's good at his job, but he has a problem driving too fast. After being let off with a "friendly" warning from a police officer, a woman in labor barges into his car and tells him to step on it for the hospital. Jack can't risk being caught speeding again, but time is of the essence. With nothing else to do, Jack starts his engine and makes for the hospital with a shout of "HEEEAAALP!"

As we can gather, most - if not all - of the cries for help are not so much "This is out of my league, please help me out of this responsibility" but more "I'm going in to make this happen! Back me up!" For characters like directors and taxi drivers that are normally mundane in video games, this is a great attitude. The music for Jack's stage is Avril Lavigne's Sk8er Boi. The fun part about this song is how it tells a story, thus the lyrics are prevalent and clear. Even though the lyrics don't have much to do directly with the events of the stage, I still feel there is some connection. Perhaps because the pace of the song's story arc matches the stage's pace and there's some synergy when both stories are at their climax.

The "YMCA" stage - Look at this man tear through his plight

Another of the game's stages which makes great use of lyrics is the game's seventh stage, in which we join the quest of a sailor out to find treasure. The song for this endeavor is the time-tested and iconic YMCA, credited as being covered by TC Moses. And I must give props to TC Moses because regardless of if this song sounds like the original or not, the version we have in Elite Beat Agents is every bit as fun and energetic. I know I would be down to explore the depths of the ocean to such a tune. I can't tell you how pumped I was just hearing the initial horns and drum beat.

The "Anthem" stage - The story of a wash-up who hasn't given up on himself

The last stage I want to mention is the game's fourteenth stage, featuring an allegedly washed-up baseball player, Hulk. He had his run in the big leagues and struck out in more ways than one. He lives a life downtrodden melancholy until one day when the amusement park he works at is under attack from a volcano monster. It's up to Hulk to save the park from destruction using weaponized baseball skills! Of course, this story isn't as down-to-earth as the rest, but the themes are possibly deeper. Hulk has already seen the worst brunt of failure and yet puts in the effort to save the park and his biggest fan who is caught in the action. To me, that makes Hulk's story powerful in its own right. Rather than avoiding failure at all costs, he is overcoming the current paralyzing effects that a past failure can have on a person.

In the end, the power of music may get our protagonists up and doing, but it is the power of passion that makes everything possible. Behind every character and story is some sort of passion or drive. The same can be said of anyone. Every person has something they're interested in, and if we could we would pursue those interests with our hearts and souls fully invested. However, many of us don't pursue these interests for a variety of reasons. Either we don't find them practical as a living, we believe we don't have what it takes to make a living of it, or we just turned to the more practical occupations to place all our effort. And in some cases, the more practical occupations are our passions and we're as happy as can be. In any case, we all have something we want to do and do it well, and in a perfect world, we would all be masters of our trade. And to all of the masters of their trade currently reading this article, I commend you.

In Elite Beat Agents, antagonists take the forms of executives, traffic cops, aliens, unruly children, and the weather itself. But the real conflict throughout the entire game is people versus themselves. Every character is perfectly capable, but the only thing stopping them is their own self-doubt. Once they get that confidence, the problem doesn't stand a chance. It's in this way that we might even think of the agents themselves as purely symbolic. It's incredible to think all these people can gather the courage by themselves, but more comforting and empowering to think that we all have this group of agents somewhere in the distance confident enough in our ability to cheer us on by dancing to popular music.

The first stage of "Osu! Tatake! Ouendan" - The simple story of a student needing to study for exams

And I can't end this article without talking about Ouendan. Many people in the gaming community already know about Ouendan, so they can skip to the next paragraph while I clue the rest of us in. "Ouendan" is the colloquial name for "Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan" the Japan-only game to which Elite Beat Agents is an international "sequel" of sorts. I'm no expert, but I'll explain this as best I can with my limited knowledge and research: An Ouendan (spelling may vary) is a Japanese cheer squad not unlike cheerleaders in function. Though whereas cheerleaders rally up support by having a good time, the typical Ouendan will instead deliver an intense, stoic performance. I imagine it's because they take belief and inner strength very seriously. Thus they project such a professional tone to help their team's resolve sturdy up as well.

The Ouendan game very much takes a stoic approach to passion and motivation. Compared to the Elite Beat Agents, the Ouendan members are serious. Not mean or disagreeable, just very intense and focused on their task of bringing drive to the people. Instead of doing the wave, character in Ouendan put on their fervor faces back with the flames of passion. I guess you can say the attitude in Elite Beat Agents is "Take it easy, you've got this" and the attitude in Ouendan is "You are so capable of overcoming this challenge that it is your solemn duty to do so!" Personally, I can see how the stoic approach well represents Japan while the laid back approach powered by popular music appeals much more to the general international audience.

Different though their methods may be, Elite Beat Agents and Ouendan both set out to celebrate the common person and to me they succeed. Every profession, hobby, and undertaking in these games are shown in an impressive light. And you know what, in the right light, that applies to us in real life as well. Anyone can truly seize life if they keep their passions front and center in their minds and in their hearts.

We can't discount the power of music, either. With my playlist open as I type, I can vouch it helps. How about you? What music do you listen to that gets you in the mood for what you love? Perhaps the next time you listen to it, you can imagine a squad of agents dancing to it in the distance.

But before we sign off entirely, let's cut some onions