Beatmap Listing » Crystal Castles - Vietnam

Storyboard created by Starset! - Any sort of appreciation towards him would be highly appreciated, as his storyboard adds an amazing experience to the gameplay!

- Please consider playing both with custom combo colors and storyboard! (If the combo colors are not blue, red & gray, they are NOT on!)

The background's themes are fairly glitchy (with blue and red shades) and very dark in textures, making the storyboard very simplistic, yet effective in giving off a chilling vibe. You'll be seeing direct elements from the background exclusively throughout this map, hopefully adding to your enjoyment!

The map itself is a quirky CS6.4 map with a sinister off-putting design (and some easter eggs scattered throughout!), aimed at being passable for a large chunk of people, but consistently difficult, and very hard to FC.

When I started out mapping this, I was surprised at how fun a (seemingly) repetitive song would be to map. Hopefully you feel the same way when playing! Hope you enjoy!

The HP references the start of the Vietnam war (1955)

The OD references the end of the Vietnam war (1975)

The first slider is a somewhat accurate cartograph of Vietnam on a world map.

The last slider is a "broken" Vietnam, signaling the suffering the war brought to its people.

I
This too
I
Alive
Alive
Alive-I've
I
Alive
I
I

I
This too
I
Alive
Alive
Alive-I've
I
Alive
I
I

I
This too
I
Alive
Alive
Alive-I've
I
Alive
I
I

I
This too
I
Alive
Alive
Alive-I've
I
Alive
I
I

I
This too
I
Alive
Alive
Alive-I've
I
Alive
I
I

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The meaning I got out of the song was generally that most of the "I" sounds sound like gun shots (Example: 00:59:263 - ), and that the vocal parts are purposely glitched out to give off a sinister vibe, with the Vietnam war being probably the most terrible period in Vietnam's history. Those "I" sounds being somewhat distorted and chilling is also the main reason why I mapped them in a very jarring manner in every spike where those lyrics are present.

"I, this too, I've, alive" gives a good idea about the general mood of the song and theme, considering the song is also quite sinister in the first place.

"Alive" being one of the words could also have something to do with the war in regards to how terrible the condition of living was during that time period - While it's hard to know for certain (unless if the actual artist speaks up about it), it's a decent assumption to make imo considering the suffering the war caused.

Considering the song doesn't really have any obvious meaning, and there's not a publicly available full-on analysis (to my knowledge), the majority of the ideas I had when mapping are all fully interpreted from the assumption that the song is about the war.