So my wife wants to buy a dance game/dance mat for our oldest daughter and her suggesting games is something to encourage. But it’s a genre that I due to high levels of testotorone know absolutely nothing about.
So can any of you fairies (not that there’s anything wrong with that) help me out?
We have a Wii and a Xbox 360 - I’m considering buying a PlayStation 3 but haven’t decided yet.
I’m also considering a PS2 since my freelance game reviewer sideline often has me turning down assignments for that.
But I would prefer something that works on my existing platforms - I know there’s a dance mat for the 360, but I don’t remember reading any reviews. But again, that might just be me not following the genre.
Edit: I just saw that DDR is out for the Wii… but with bad reviews.
Another important question is skilllevel. I’ve only seen older kids play this - are these games playable for a six year old? We really like the physical aspects of these games (she was having great fun with EyeToy at her friends house last weekend) and thought the Wii was the ultimate platform for this… but frankly waggling the wiimote isn’t quite enough. Why is Wii sports still the only game doing this right?
Nobody?
While I didn’t expect Bill Dungrosman to come out as a big DDR fan, I did suspect that Tom or perhaps Gary wasn’t adverse to donning their game reviewer hats and a leotard… apparently I was wrong.
I found out that apparently DDR is out for both Wii and Xbox 360, but as Dancing Stage Universe (360) and Dancing Stage Hottest Party in Europe. Now I just need to know, which is best.
Anyone?
I only know the US titles, but over here we have –
Dance Dance Revolution Universe 1 and 2 for Xbox 360.
Dance Dance Revolution Hottest Party for Wii.
Backward compatibility on the Wii opens up other titles like DDR Mario Mix for Gamecube on Wii. I don’t think any of the Xbox DDRs are on the 360 BC list, though.
DDR Universe 2 on 360 (if there is a European port yet) is what I’d suggest. Keep in mind that the DDR franchise has been around and released LOTS of titles which are more or less just engine upgrades to new platforms and/or song packs on a disc, so the semi-negative reviews you see for the more recent releases have less to do with them being objectively bad and more to do with the fact that they don’t substantially innovate the genre (a problem which has no impact on someone who is playing their first DDR game).
There is Stepmania for PC. I’ll leave you to research the free-ness or legality of this thing, as well as how to hook up a dance pad to a PC.
I don’t think a 6 year old should be playing dancing games. The pads are probably spaced too wide for her to reach the opposite arrows. Also, note that the dance pad may be slippery on certain floors.
I don’t now anything about dancemats, but I do know you can throw a 6 year old with time on their hands at pretty much anything and they’ll have mastered it and will be beating you before they change shoe size.
We’ve got DDR Universe 1 for the 360. It’s pretty fun, and on the beginner level my 7 year old daughter can do it pretty well. It’s also loads of fun when we have our (adult, 30ish) friends over for drinks. It only takes one or two people to try and before you know it you end up with everyone drunk dancing.
This is true.
While she still turns over the controller for Super Mario Galaxy when it gets a bit too hard, she can’t do that anymore with New Super Mario Bros, because she’s way better than me.
I’m sure that in a year or two she’ll beat me at anything.
That reminds me of a song they used to make us sing back in grade school… The lyrics went something like this:
I can beat my daddy at Nintendo
I can beat my mommy too
I can beat my [brother/uncle/sister] at Nintendo
And I’ll bet I could beat you!
The music director also had a thing for the Batman (TV series) theme. There’s nothing quite like a room full of youngsters chanting Na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na, Batman! in unison, and almost in the same key, too!
DDR is awesome, but more something I play at other people’s houses than own myself. It is definitely something at least some six year olds can handle, because I had a five year old whup my ass at it the other day.
