Elite Beat Agents/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Awesome Music: The whole game. There's a song for everyone on here.
  • Non Sequitur Scene: The level set in 15th century Italy starring Leonardo Da Vinci set to Freddy Mercury's "I Was Born to Love You." It's the only level that takes place at any time other than the present, and is the only level that doesn't have some representation during the final two songs. The only other reference made to it anywhere is a brief picture of its stars at the very end of the game.
    • It's a quick one, but in the Carrington sisters' level, just before everything starts, Commander Kahn does his usual epic "Agents are...Go!" complete with anime speed lines...Except that he's now wearing a Hawaiian shirt.
  • Ear Worm: Come on. Try not to sing one of the songs from this game in public after hearing it.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight: Foxx in the second cutscene in "Jumping Jack Flash". Somehow, a long light-haired girl in a skimpy dancer's outfit saying "Let's dance, baby!" became a lot funnier after 2008...
  • Memetic Badass: Morris and Derek, namely because they can easily adjust whether they're dancing with J, Spin, or Chieftain. This has led to semi-serious theories that they are, in reality, the most experienced agents.
  • Memetic Mutation: You bet, kid!
  • Most Wonderful Sound: Cap White's "Yeah!"s, Bryman's "You bet, kid!".
    • From the final stage: "ARE YOU READY?" "YEAH!" "3, 2, 1, GO!"
  • Narm Charm: "A Christmas Gift." There's a reason we have that page quote on the main page.
  • Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: A lot of the songs would normally be hated by the target audience, but their presence in the game redeems them immensely. "You're the Inspiration" in particular was a hugely hated and heavily criticized song, before this game made it the Tear Jerker theme song.
    • You could thank both the cover artists and the seamless integration with their corresponding scenarios for that. After all, who can argue with Jason Paige as lead singer?
    • How did they make La La good?
    • This game contains the Hoobastank song "Without a Fight". And it is awesome in context.
  • Scrappy Level: "Canned Heat" on the "Sweatin'" and "Hard Rock!" difficulties.
    • Canned Heat is hard on low difficulty levels because it's difficult to hear the rhythm—you're used to tapping on the lyrics, especially after ABC and Material Girl. Canned Heat on "Hard Rock!" gives you the benefit of enough markers to figure out what beat developers wanted you to be tapping.
      • Canned Heat is indeed a major step up in difficulty on any level. Where as previous songs either have you more or less following the beat or the lyrics, Canned Heat is the first level that makes you do both.
    • ABC, on pretty much any difficulty. If you're going for all-300s on the higher difficulties, the sliders during the "A-B-C! Easy as 1-2-3!" part are pure murder, since to hit the beat right after it (which is across the screen), your reflexes tend toward jumping off the slider a millisecond before the slider actually ends, leading to a 100 (if not an outright combo break). Considering the (mostly) consistent beatspacing, the fact that that beat across the screen is pretty much the very next beat is frustrating for many.
      • "Survivor" can be a pretty tough level for the exact same reasons.
    • Jumping Jack Flash is an awesome song but it is extremely painful to play at times. Especially on the last section where it likes to throw lots of spinners at you in very rapid succession and then almost immediately switch back to tapping markers.
  • Scrappy Mechanic: The spinners are not a very popular feature of the game.
  • Tear Jerker: This is what happens when fiction and reality collide.
    • "You're the Inspiration". If you didn't cry, there's something wrong with you.
      • The tears start before the level even begins. Usually, the person in need of assistance screams for help as Commander Kahn watches, and he then turns around to say "Agents are...Go!" to start the mission. Here, Lucy is simply pleading for her father to come back, and Kahn is just... Sitting there, watching her. It's almost as if he's just as heartbroken as the person playing the game. And if you fail the stage... well...
    • Additionally, this "E... B... A. E... B... A... E... B... A! E B A! E B A! E-B-A! E-B-A!" may make you tear up.
      • So good that the second Ouendan game shamelessly copied it. And many Manly Tears were shed.
  • They Changed It, Now It Sucks: This seems to be the opinion among several of the uh... more militant Japanophile fans of the original Ouendan, even though this game clearly retains all the Widget Series charm of its counterpart.
  • The Woobie: Lucy, hands down. Hulk, the former baseball player, may be a way-less-extreme, male version.
  • This Is Your Premise on Drugs: Men in Black... On The Power of Rock!
  • Woolseyism: To the point where it's a new game around the same gameplay concepts, just to make the humor and quirkiness hold appeal outside Japan.