Charles445

Uhh, okay... Let's see...

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Mappers are listed by first appearance in ranked.
Note that the list isn't always "I think they're good".
It's sometimes "I think they're not bad right now." or "They haven't forgotten how to map yet."
Honestly most of the time it's "I haven't gotten offended yet." or "I was upset at them but then they did something else."
BLAHBLAHBLAH
You should probably check these mappers out.

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Side (Dec. 6, 2015)
Nerova Riuz GX (Nov. 19, 2015)
sukiNathan (July 11, 2015)
Bonzi (May 31, 2015)
Smoothie World(May 22, 2015)
Naitoshi (April 11, 2015)
Saut (Feb. 13, 2015)
deetz (Jan. 15, 2015)
Nozhomi (Dec. 26, 2014)
appleeaterx (Nov. 23, 2014)

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Hahaha after making this list I see it's "SHOWS POTENTIAL" more than anything else.
They've got some good stuff so go look at them, here's hoping they keep it up.

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First, let the player know that you're going to be using circle stream jumps very early on. IMO the best way is to shape a stream very suspiciously... http://bombch.us/BsVC
Or just introduce them REALLY early on. At the start of a map the player will be trying to figure out what style the map is in, so let them know ASAP.
Don't introduce them like, two minutes into the map. Think first 30 seconds, preferably first 15.

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Second, start with the easier variant, circles into sliders. Sliders are naturally more lenient, so the player can finish up the circle normally, then hit the slider far later. http://bombch.us/BsVN
Once the player has completed one of these they'll be on edge for the rest of the set and will be prepared for the circle to circle variant.

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Third, try to keep circle stream jumps from blue to white/red, not the other way around. They work best in even groups, not odd groups.
Do these mostly: http://bombch.us/BsVV
Do these infrequently / never: http://bombch.us/BsVX

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Fourth, set your OD lower than usual. The player is going to be purposely hitting circles late, so set the OD lower to compensate. Don't circle stream jump on OD 9 unless your BPM is really really damn low.
The earliest map with this gimmick that I know of has OD 5 (!) which is way too low, but you get the idea.
Use OD 7 if you're having trouble choosing. OD 7 only hurts PP, and the circle stream jumps will be breaking PP anyway.

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Oh and one last thing, don't circle stream jump into a buzz slider.
Buzz sliders already have to be hit early to avoid combo breaking off of a repeat.
If I break one more time on the jump into buzz in sionKotori's dopamine diff I SWEAR I'm going to brkraowuehawehakwejha https://osu.ppy.sh/ss/4087219

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They were pretty tough to play (still are). The maps ask the player to do weird movements as well as incredibly consistent movements. This usually meant spaced streams at WEIRD angles, or spaced streams in rectangle shapes with sharp corner turns.
If you hate square jumps you haven't tried square streams yet.

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Mapping style wise, most of the KIRBY Mixes follow strict symmetry similar to other maps in the era. A pattern will play out, then the repeat in the song will mirror it horizontally.
Spacing used to be all over the place in the KIRBY Mix maps, until people started getting more strict with spacing. That posed a problem, it's hard to make weird movement if spacing is consistent! However, new combos could be used to 'reset' spacing... so... in later KIRBY Mixes, every time the spacing changes there's a new combo...
There are a LOT of new combos. Way too many. It was basically abusing a loophole.
It ended up working out, though, and it's a practice still done by many mappers today.

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So KIRBY Mixes would present the player with tough challenges that asked you to focus more on movement than usual, and the maps complied with the rules and guidelines just enough to get ranked.

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That's a really hard question, I'll need to back up through the years first.

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2007 - Wasn't around for this, but it established the basis in its short span. Extor dominated quality then.
2008 - Wasn't around for this either. Few established styles means people had to pull it out of nothing but loose Ouendan ties. James and darri showed how it's done (and a ton others). Some really great maps, but unmistakably dated.
2009 - The strangest year to look through. A few mappers have the game almost completely figured out by now and are making insanely good stuff (see nullpointLOL's guest on Whip the Blip), but others are making virtually unplayable garbage.
2010 - Styles are starting to smoothen themselves out, spacing is a lot more consistent overall and you can expect a solid map on just about any set. Lots of people bitching about nonsense at this time, though, as users get old enough to experience a climate change (why is the old thing I like changing??)
2011 - The year of DNB, Shiirn and galvenize show up and basically demonstrate 1/2 filler. Nakagawa-Kanon shows how to map cleanly and intuitively. Extremely important year, set the tone for jump maps to come.
2012 - The year of gimmick (surprise!), this is when the mass populace figured out how slider stream jumps worked (many Chinese mappers had it figured out years ago, like v2b and tsuka).
2013 - Things started rough. Gimmicks were being used a lot, but failed to take into account readability and for the most part gameplay. This died out halfway through when RLC looked at Nakagawa-Kanon maps and got a boner. The ensuing map storm resulted in newer mappers trying to map clean, structured style. That's all, though, more of the same. Saw some great mappers retire due to yet another climate change.
2014 - Definitely the worst year for mapping, very few real developments here (with the exception of Miss You, and nobody has managed to build off of that map's 'success'). Started to see the climb of artificial difficulty in maps as Twitch streaming became more popular. Many great mappers who didn't retire last year retired here.
2015 - Mappers who started in 2014 are getting more comfortable as they gain fame, and as such are starting to lose their idea of quality. Some mappers are cranking out maps extremely quickly, with little regard for self-improvement. The boundaries of difficulty are being pushed not for a fun experience, but to see if Doomsday can upload a video to his Youtube channel of the pass.

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So out of all of these, which one is it going to be?...
Gonna have to say 2011. Maps from that year still hold up.

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