Dance Dance Revolution
Created | Updated Dec 19, 2006
The Premise
Released in 1998 in Japan, Dance Dance Revolution, or DDR, is a series of arcade games from game maker Konami's Bemani series where the entire point is to get jiggy with it, so to speak. You stand on a raised metal dance floor that has 4 plexiglass arrows, similar to a game controller. On screen, arrows scroll up from the bottom of the screen to the top, where there are 4 stationary arrows. When the scrolling arrow and the stationary arrow match, you step on the corresponding arrow on the floor. The arrows are arranged in time to music and the series of steps tend to represent dance moves. The levels, measured by a number of feet can go from easy to maybe needing 2 or 3 extra legs to keep up. You get scored on how close your timing to hitting the arrows is, indicated by a dance gauge that fills or empties depending on performance. If they exactly match, it's scored as a perfect, otherwise it can range from anything named "good" to "bad" or "miss". If you step on the wrong arrow or don't step on an arrow when one scrolls by, you "miss" and if you get too many misses it ends your game by draining your dance gauge to zero. At the end of the song, you get a score, and show the world what a good/bad dancer you are. If this sounds good, but you'd like to keep people from knowing what a klutz you are, they also have versions for the Sony Playstation 1 and 2, as well as the Xbox and there is one online at www.flashflashrevolution.com that uses your keyboard. Despite the other versions, much of the attention is on the arcade version, which tends to draw large crowds and good dancers tend to get their 15 minutes by either good dancing or modifying the arrows to appear differently. The game is also great for exercise, and can be fun if you're coordinated. if not.... well, lets not go there.
The other faces of DDR
While the main focus of DDR is in the arcades, there are other venues the game has a face in. For instance, there are currently many releases on home consoles and the game has taken on the name Dancing Stage in Europe with it's own smaller number of "mixes."
An interesting fallacy in the series lies between Japan and the USA. Fearing a major loss should the game be released in the US, Konami waited until nearly five versions of the game had come out in Japan before they considered a US home and arcade version - in all, a 3 year lag and a bit unusual since in Japan the arcade versions set the trend for the series. Feeling a bit more confident when a wider music library had been built up in Japan, Konami USA hand selected the more popular songs for a US Playstation release, while at the same time creating a first version for arcades (which turns out to be a straight port of the first version from Japan). The main point is that while both the first US and Japanese home versions bear the name "Dance Dance Revolution" [1st Mix], the song selection between the two is extremely different and basically are two different games. Continuing the trend Konami released Dance Dance Revolution USA which borrowed the Japanese 4th Mix engine but again with a different, wider selection of songs from all the Japanese versions. Essentially while Konami of Japan has been faithful in bringing the 8 arcade versions home as is, Konami US has been a lot more selective in song options and only recently has begun reflecting the Japanese version names for the US, still with very different song selection. In short, creating the strange problem that the Final Fanatasy series suffers as well.
Gamers are divided on this stance with some bearing the opinion Konami US should bring the series into line with Japan and simply port the game across as is while others enjoy the different, unique selection. The Xbox versions of the series, while not bearing the "nth mix" name conventions, are running on their own program code and do not feel like the arcade but do extremely well in both the US and Europe (sorry Japan, you're on the other side of the coin).
A sad side note worth placing here is the premature death of the arcade editions outside of Japan. A company named Andamiro, seeing success in the Bemani series decided to create their own clone of DDR and bring it to the US, taking advantage of Konami's silence on a US/European port. Some patents and copyrights later and the game Pump it Up was released and when Konami brought the originating game to the US they were slapped with a lawsuit and lost based on the fact that Andamiro was there first. The case is currently under appeal but is expected to die under the weight of bureacracy as Konami does not seem interested in actively supporting the series any more. The aftermath was arcades walking a very fine line, licensing special rights from Konami Japan to import the Japanese mixes to their establishments. (It also confuses gamers that the US/EU home editions do not correspond to the arcade versions).
Where is it going now?
Konami Japan, the mother of the series, has not put out a new arcade version of the game for nearly three years but has promised gamers that they are working on a brand new way to play the game. While somewhat worrisome, Konami Japan has developed several new home versions of the game. Konami of America has released a new edition, named SuperNova, also backing sales with a Playstation 2 release.
Konami of America is actively releasing new home versions, which are unaffected by the Andamiro lawsuit. General consensus of gamers is that this is good but there is a gap in the arcade. Currently a game has been created to fill that gap and has been filled with while success - In the Groove is what gamers consider DDR to the next level, but has angered Konami, who has filed lawsuit. In October 2006 Konami settled this lawsuit and has since acquired all assets associated with ITG.
Konami of Europe seems to be interested in actively pushing the Xbox versions of the game.
