Project DIVA was announced to the world on August 27, 2008, along with contest two days later. What was shown in the first few months of development looked very different compared to the final product, however. I mean, just look at this early promotional video. And according to this interview with OSTER project and kz almost ten years later, it looks like there was originally going to be a story mode? And even the Master Book mentions "point and click adventure" elements. So what happened here? Let's find out.
Let's start with what we know for certain is true and verifiably accurate. There couldn't have been much in it - the game was only about 39% complete when it was announced, so much of what was shown early on (such as stages) was probably only in the conceptual phase. It seems that the three difficulties back then were "Normal", "Hyper", and "Change" (or perhaps Charge), and early footage of Strobo Nights and Koisuru VOC@LOID (the only known songs with substantial visual differences from the final product) suggests that some notes could have shapes other than the face buttons, such as stars or diamonds. Strobo Nights in particular took heavy advantage of this.
There was also more visual feedback as you played - Miku would straight up tell you if you were doing good or bad at certain points, and the Chance Time segments seem to have more going on visually.
Finally, the website also had some substantial differences in 2008. From August to November there was more of a blue theme, while in December it was changed to be more yellow-ish to celebrate Rin and Len. I believe they switched to the current branding no later than March 2009, as that's when trailers featuring the final logo and UI got released (though the old purple UI could still be seen in demos at certain events up until May 2009).
There's a couple more things I can get into, but first...
It's about time we start debunking common misconceptions. This was not a playable demo. Not for the general public, anyway. It's a dev build. According to the Master Book, the footage of Strobo Nights ubiquitous in early footage (such as this video) was never meant to represent the final product. They were just short on time and had to present something. I'm 100% certain that nobody outside of the actual dev team and a handful of other important figures (such as Saki Fujita and Asami Shimoda) actually got to play it.
Now, there was an ISO floating around on the 'net claiming to be a demo video, probably around December 2008 (likely earlier, as its mentioned this is the 2nd leak). the original video (link for the curious) was about 15 minutes long. TL;DW: it's the August 2008 teaser trailer, early footage of Miracle Paint's choreography, the NicoNico MVs of Black★Rock Shooter and Last Night, Good Night, and finally capping off with a message saying to quit before the PSP crashes with Anata ni Hana o, Watashi ni Uta o playing in the background. What people generally don't tell you is that it was actually a modified GTA Liberty City Stories rom, with the game ID of Phantasy Online Portable (probably for perceived legitimacy - a demo for a Japanese game ought to have a Japanese ID).
Of course, even if that video was legit (which it isn't), it's safe to say that it's not the same thing as whatever ISO was floating around in late-September 2008... or was it? We'll get to that. At least two different people from that timeframe have claimed the demo has "free DLC" and a "VS mode", and at least one person claimed SEGA's cracked down on them for the leak.
Personally? I find these claims dubious. The second person's screenshots were clearly taken from Japanese gaming magazines/news sites like Famitsu and 4Gamer, and I find it a little unlikely that they'd be using screenshots from a supposedly tight-lipped leak (and if its so secret, how do a bunch of random English-speaking bloggers know about it?). Also, one of the two people making such claims has their sole source as "my Japanese friend and her dad", which. Hmm. Very "my uncle works at Nintendo", innit? I'm willing to bet that this is a ploy by hardcore Miku fans to generate hype for the game outside of Japan. Gotta boost imports. I think it's safe to say this "demo" is #FakeNews.
Is that really it? Well, until someone hacks into SEGA and pulls off a massive leak, yeah. For now. Think about the timeline for a moment: the game was developed in just 14 months, and the announcement was made only about 3 months into it. That's way too early for a substantial playable demo.
And how come it only ever seems to be discussed in English and Spanish communities? Hell, the search for any Japanese information is complicated by the fact that the whole game got leaked less than a week before the game's official release. That's pretty crazy.
All that being said, I'm allergic to shutting up, so I'll do my best to elaborate on the approximate timeline in more detail and dump some screenshots.
Unfortunately there aren't any functioning archives of the site as it existed in 2008, but fortunately we have screenshots from pengy's articles for Vocaloidism. The site opened a few days before Hatsune Miku's 1st anniversary, and acted as a countdown to that date (August 31st, 2008). When that date arrived, details about what exactly Project DIVA is were revealed: a rhythm game starring Miku.
More information was revealed at that year's Tokyo Game Show on October 12, which was added to the site over the weeks following (the biggest content drop being on November 5th).
There was another content drop on December 27th (Rin & Len's 1st anniversary), with the site color scheme being altered to match.
Then things went quiet until March 14, 2009: Yappa Asobinasai 09. This date is notable because that's when the 39 Secrets event happened, which was a massive dump of new info surrounding the game. I believe this is when PjD changed to its current branding, as the scope of the project narrowed down and almost everything unique about the old prototype vanished (save for the purple UI in some demonstrations and promos, but that too was gone by June). Promotion also ramped up within the months between the festival and the release date, which makes sense given how close it was by then.
I believe back in 2008, the only songs that were publicly shown off in great detail were Strobo Nights and Koisuru VOC@LOID. As discussed in the Master Book, their MVs were somewhat rushed in order to have something to present for the Tokyo Game Show, and they are the songs that look the most different from the final product (if we aren't counting the instances of choreography in the void, but I'll get to those).
Then I believe around March-April, they started showing off Dreaming Leaf -Yumemiru Kotonoha-, Miku-Miku ni Shite Ageru♪ (Shiteyan'yo), and Marginal (the first two as screenshots, the latter as an MV).
In addition, there were also a few screenshots of other songs (most obviously World is Mine, and I suspect the harder-to-identify ones are just other songs in very early stages/different camera angles), as well as "Virtual Lives", which were basically excuses to show off choreography. Miracle Paint was shown at TGS 08 as a one-off, then at Yappa Asobinasai 09 they featured Koisuru VOC@LOID, packaged, and World is Mine, and finally in June they dropped Miku-Miku ni Shite Ageru♪ (Shiteyan'yo) on their NicoNico channel.
Demos at events like Yappa Asobinasai 09 in March and THE VOC@LOID MASTER 8 in May had only a few songs to their name: World is Mine, packaged, MikuMiku-kin ni Gochuui♪, The secret garden, Koisuru VOC@LOID, and Miku-Miku ni Shite Ageru♪ (Shiteyan'yo).
As the release date drew closer they released MVs for Fukigen Waltz, Hato, Dear cocoa girls, and the four songs that only got slideshows for MVs, but frankly they're all so much later in the timeline that I don't think they're particularly relevant outside of the slideshows being a Certified 14 Month Development Time Moment.
