A collection of some beatmania merch items.

First up, here is a selection of a few beatmania-branded items. On the far left, this is some kind of voice recorder? I'm not sure, but I found it online a while back. It was pretty cheap. I'm not going to open it as it is a collectable, but it's probably just a device that can record short audio snippets and play them back. Additionally, I have two beatmania keitai straps for your cell phone. Likely Internet Ranking prizes.

As with DanceDanceRevolution, I have a beatmania-flavored cap and glove. Not much to say about it other than it's bright Tom DeLonge-orange colored. It is the same size as the DDR variant.

Here we have two beatmania typing games both still factory sealed. beatmania DA!! and beatmania BEST DA!! were both released in 2000 for Windows and Mac. I gave these games a shot and WOW are they hard. I'm pretty good at typing, but these games are something else. The notes come down from the top of the screen with a keyboard letter on them, and you have to press the corresponding key. At some point in the song, the gameplay will shift to where you have to type a full word before it reaches the bottom of the screen.

Konami didn't keep their beatmania typing experience to home computers. In 2001, beatmania DA DA DA!! was released on the PlayStation 2. It comes with a genuine Konami keyboard that plugs into the USB port on the front of the console. I haven't played the game yet, but I assume it works very similarly. I have tried out the keyboard and...this thing is rough. It works, but it's nothing I'd use as an everyday computer keyboard. I'm not sure if they were expecting people to do that...