June Update – (not) OT Tournament, New Batch, Update Issues

Hello everyone, just a general update post going over the official tournament news, and opening of a new standard batch.

19th Official Tournament

Normally around this time we would be gearing up for another year of our annual Official Tournament and if everything had gone to plan then sign-ups would have just closed, but for those that have been paying attention you may have noticed quite a lack of news or any post regarding it.

Going into this year the possibility that pulling off a full tournament would be even harder as our overall buffer for new songs has dwindled over the past few years, This raised the question early into the year if we should instead run a 18.5, a tournament mixing both new and old songs and hoping for a larger pool of choices next year. Ultimately while the bounty batch once again fulfilled a lot of the holes in difficulties that we needed to cover, it still left more holes then we felt uncomfortable filling with older songs especially in the upper groups that would have felt very underwhelming.

Given the timeline that we had left, getting all the songs we wanted to use that came from the bounty batch judged, rated, and ready for release would basically have been a rush job at best assuming all the files didn’t need any changes and could be used directly as is. That is why we came to a unanimous decision between those on OT committee at the end of May to postpone the Official Tournament this year.

While the news might not be entirely shocking as the Official Tournament would have been starting just next week, we still wanted to at least run some form of tournament over the summer for everyone to enjoy while we prepare hopefully for an Official Tournament next year.

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(not) Official Tournament

Just because there’s no Official Tournament doesn’t meant there’s no official tournament, but this time being run by our lovely events team.

This tournament follows the standard elimination format of week long rounds, spread across 6 weeks, with each group having their own song per round.

For those that have participated in Frozen Finger Rumble just a few months ago, it’s the same only I told them to pick more normal song picks this time around.

More details can be found over on the events thread, and Sign-Ups are open!.

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New Seasonal Batch

For those that have stepfiles that not don’t have any slot available to them in the current bounty batch, or are just itching to submit your latest and greatest, head over to the new Summer/Autumn 2026 Seasonal Batch.

Standard submission rules apply, along with a new rule added:

2.4 No AI Policy
FFR has always been extremely grateful to the human artists who grant us permission to feature their creations in our game. Out of respect for these artists and broad community support, the judge team will make every attempt to prevent AI generated content from appearing in FFR.

Judges will reject without review any submission found to feature substantial use of generative AI. This applies to both audio and simfile components.

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Site and Game Issues

For those that have experienced and issues or found something that no longer works, head over to #site-issues on our Discord, or into the forums and leave a post in the bug thread.

There’s been a lot of effort and pain switching our nearly 20 year old platform over to something newer then 2006, and effort will continue until everything that needs to work goes back to working.

It’s just neat,
- Velocity

Song of the Week 5/29/2026

We’re finishing off May with a varied tech file from ositz, which requires passing another varied tech file two times in a row!

Song of the Week releases will be taking a break for June.

Cobra Commander v2*
Musician: Venetian Snares
Step Artist: ositzxz369
Song Length: 4:42
Song Style: Digital Breaks
Note Count: 3878
Difficulty: 97

*Pass Cobra Commander twice in a row to unlock Cobra Commander v2.

Enjoy!

- The Game Management Team and the Community Managers

Song of the Week 5/22/2026

We’ll be having the last two song releases of May packed with powerful charts! For today, we’ve got Reausez from our very own “varied tech file” stepartist ositzxz369!

Reausez
Musician: Terminal 11
Step Artist: ositzxz369
Song Length: 1:44
Song Style: Esoteric IDM
Note Count: 1610
Difficulty: 97

Enjoy!

- The Game Management Team and the Community Managers

Song of the Week 5/15/2026

We’re midway through May now and we’ve got a re-step of a legacy chart for you!

Bubbleman Stage Theme v2
Musician: Project X
Step Artist: devonin
Song Length: 1:22
Song Style: Rock
Note Count: 288
Difficulty: 16

Enjoy!

- The Game Management Team and the Community Managers

Song of the Week 5/8/2026

Hey Everyone, we now have A CYBER’S WORLD? If you want to enter it, pass WELCOME TO THE CITY!

A CYBER’S WORLD?*
Musician: Toby Fox
Step Artist: Ultimate Mike7
Song Length: 2:16
Song Style: Game Music/Techno Pop
Note Count: 1090
Difficulty: 56

*This skill token can be unlocked by getting a passing score on WELCOME TO THE CITY.

Enjoy!

- The Game Management Team and the Community Managers

Song of the Week 5/1/2026

Everyone, we’re now starting May with a song release!

Following this Song of the Week release, we’ll have 5 PM Server Time releases on Fridays.

Everyone
Musician: Sakuzyo
Step Artist: jh05013
Song Length: 2:25
Song Style: Hardcore
Note Count: 1552
Difficulty: 74

Enjoy!

- The Game Management Team and the Community Managers

Song of the Week 4/24/2026

Tonight, we have some white notes 2NITE for you on this last Song of the Week Release for April!

2NITE
Musician: nanobii
Step Artist: LavaLambz
Song Length: 1:36
Song Style: Handz Up
Note Count: 536
Difficulty: 38

Enjoy!

- The Game Management Team and the Community Managers

Song of the Week 4/17/2026

As we head on towards 4/20, we’re blazing it with Le Grand Chase!

Le Grand Chase
Musician: Kevin MacLeod
Step Artist: ositzxz369
Song Length: 1:33
Song Style: Orchestral Carnival
Note Count: 802
Difficulty: 52

Enjoy!

- The Game Management Team and the Community Managers

Song of the Week 4/10/2026

Last week it’s not a phase, this week I’m just accidentally shedding my skin a little bit later!

Accidentally Shedding My Skin
Musician: Sintel
Step Artist: M0nkeyz
Song Length: 2:05
Song Style: Esoteric Breakcore
Note Count: 1201
Difficulty: 76

Enjoy!

- The Game Management Team and the Community Managers