Dance Dance Pads

1. 

   Michael Kerner
   October 25th, 2009 - 20:57

   This past year has really been all about rhythm games for the video game market. With the smash success of classics like Guitar Hero III: Legends Of Rock, and the amazing gameplay of Rock Band, which takes great classics like Bon Jovi’s Wanted Dead Or Alive, into the beat of your own guitar rifts, it is hard to find a game that can be beat. But, that sadly, hasn’t been shown as well with Dance Dance Revolution, the orignal music dance game. While it has faired well, it just hasn’t been able to really keep up the pace of gameplay. Now, a new spin will try to make Dance Dance Revolution more appealing to a younger audience, but is it just a rhythm or 2 left feet?

   Dance Dance Revolution: Disney Channel Edition for the Playstation 2, takes the DDR gamble, and brings in the appeal to a younger audience by using songs from Disney Channel staples you can dance your way to. You get songs from hits like Hannah Montana, Kim Possible, That’s So Raven, and their made for TV movies like The Cheetah Girls and especially High School Musical. The graphics fair well, as you step each and every way to the beat of the songs, but the gameplay misses out for die hard older fanatics of the game franchise. The feeling of the game feels a bit old, and doesn’t measure to choosing songs from classics like Cars or other movies.

   All in all, Dance Dance Revolution: Disney Channel Edition is good for young fans of these Disney Channel shows, and those who think Miley Cyrus is hot, but misses the rhythm of the dance floor for veterans. I think it is time for die hard fans of DDR to find something better to play with music too. Perhaps Guitar Hero would be a better buy for the Playstation 2.

   Graphics: C+

   Sound: C

   Control: C+

   Fun & Enjoyment: C 1/2- for solo; C for multiplayer; D- for die hard DDR veterans

   Overall: D+
   Rating: 2 / 5
2. 

   Kimberly Mcfarland
   October 25th, 2009 - 22:16

   This game is clearly aimed at introducing younger kids to DDR. Its Disney theme and overly-cute look will draw in Disney Channel fans who are new to DDR, but hardcore arrow-stompers (like yours truly) may get bored quickly.

   This game was developed by Keen Games, not Konami. There are a lot of little quirks that may frustrate experienced players, but won’t bother newbies. Among them are: grading based on stars instead of letters, Marvelous steps being weighed much heavier than Perfects, arrow colors not reflecting their timing well, and songs swapping jarringly between the song selected and a “background” song during song and option selection.

   The songs are not bad. The steps were created by Konami, and there are some surprisingly fun stepcharts for the Disney Channel songs. The Konami songs are mostly repeats from earlier games. As for the Disney Channel songs, whether you like those is purely a matter of taste.

   I have several major complaints with the game. One, the background videos for the Konami songs are simply awful. The faces in “Candy” are distracting; a person’s eyes tend to snap to a face when it appears. The video for “Brilliant 2U” is such a dreadful whirl of color and motion that the song is nearly undanceable! Why in the world did they replace the original Konami videos? I recommend turning the brightness way down on background videos, or turning them off altogether. Much worse, though, is the fact this game supposedly has 40 songs, but for practical purposes there are only 37. According to Keen Games, the only way to unlock the final three songs is to get a full Marvelous combo on each of the first three levels. That’s all but impossible even for DDR champions – as of this writing I have seen no postings on any of the major DDR boards saying that anyone has managed it yet – but somehow the target audience is supposed to be able to manage it? Shame on them for not giving those songs a timed unlock as a fallback option.
   Rating: 3 / 5
3. 

   Anonymous
   October 26th, 2009 - 00:12

   Any thing ddr is a worth less than a 1 star to me. but i gotta give this one a bit of a thumbs down.
   
   Graphics:blah blah blah good banners blah blah blah good character models blah blah blah
   
   Presentation:i dont care for disney channel stuff. i liked the idea of dancing along with mickey and friends with ddr disney mix. but i dont care for the idea of dancing with artists such as the cheetah girls. also i dont care for the characters being disney channel characters.
   
   Music(Disney Channel):There is only 1 thing to say about this. the covers are even worse than the original versions that i dont even like.
   
   Music (konami):these songs are even worse!!! they where going to put cutie chaser morning mix in the list (a great song) but they just said “kids dont like that” so they put in terrible big idea songs. and they also put in paranoia max dirty mix. but to be hip they just called it “pn max” and they gave new generic backgrounds and banners to the songs. they look fine. but they are too generic.
   
   Over-All:
   
   This game is fun. dont get me wrong. but its only for hardcore disney channel lovers. and im not sure there is much of them. so i would skip this one unless you are a big fan of the disney channel and your 6 or something.
   Rating: 2 / 5
4. 

   Y. Bi
   October 26th, 2009 - 00:15

   This DDR Disney Channel Edition is not what u think it is. In the game the songs are not sang by the original people. The songs doesn’t even sound good. The songs are fake. When you play a character it’s fake too. They just drew them. I only played for 2 times since I’ve bought it.
   Rating: 1 / 5
5. 

   Aubrey Manongsong
   October 26th, 2009 - 00:20

   I enjoy playing this game! This Disney edition is actually more challenging than the regular DDR game that I own. If you or your child(ren) are fans of the Disney Channel shows, then you’ll enjoy dancing to familiar Dinsey Channel songs. The only problem that I had with this game is that the arrows on top are very light (I prefer the top arrows to be darker so it is clearer to see when the arrows moving up reach the top arrows in order to better time when to step on the dance pad).
   Rating: 4 / 5

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