Posted February 2, 2007 IGN Hands-On The words Konami and Dance Dance Revolution are synonymous with each other, so it was no surprise to us when Konami decided to further the franchise's success with the addition of Dance Dance Revolution: Hottest Party for Wii. We've had far-fetched dreams (delusions, mostly) about the possibility of Wii DDR, strapping a pair of Wii remotes to our feet, greasing up the hardwood floors of Matt Casamassina's beach house, and break-dancing in furious, heart pumping, multiplayer action. Hey; we already rearranged our family rooms to play Wii sports, so why not bust a move with a little DDR too, right? Well it's here, but it seems that someone over at Konami had nightmares about potential catastrophes that could result from a true, foot-controlled DDR game on Wii. Broken furniture, kicked cats, busted ankles, and the necessity for pack-in leg straps was too much to deal with, so Konami instead ventured down a new avenue of dancing. With Wii controllers in hand, players will make use of the classic dance mat in conjunction with new hand control, adding different upper-body actions to the original DDR gameplay. In an extremely smart move, Konami has made use of the GameCube port on the Wii, allowing for four dance mats, four Wii-mote/nunchuk sets, and the ability to use the original Dance Dance Revolution Mario Mix pads that hardcore GCN owners may already own. In fact, at last night's event we were playing with an original Mario Mix pad, and though Konami continued to stress that Hottest Party is in its very early stages team members wanted to get the game on the floor and playable for Wii fans to check out. As for the guts of the game, DDR Hottest Party is all about merging everything fans expect form a classic Dance Dance Revolution game, adding motion control on top of the already-successful formula. Players will step onto the mat, select their favorite songs, and dance by hitting the four arrow directions as they rise to the top of the screen. Though the demo shown was only single player and featured a short list of three songs (with our favorite being "Gonna Make You Sweat"), Konami boasts that DDR Hottest Party will feature songs that everyone in the family can jump right into, offering a huge mix of classic - and remixed - songs spanning four decades. Your mom may not be the biggest fan of DDR, but when a hip-hop remix of "Mr. Sandman" starts bumping in your living room you can expect heads to turn, clothes to fly, and mad dancing action a plenty. *Editor's Note: Mr. Sandman hasn't been confirmed, and IGN in no way is condoning any loss of clothes from any mother, anywhere. Also, the words "mad dancing" may not apply to many parents out there, so we apologize ahead of time for any childhood scarring that may occur. And when it comes to game modes, Konami is working to deliver a very Wii-specific experience as well. In the new Friendly Sync multiplayer mode players will work together as a four-player team to co-op each of the game's songs as a team. If anyone misses the step or gesture, everyone misses it. We get why Konami would call it "Sync", but we're a bit confused as to how this extremely difficult mode can be considered "friendly" at all. This should be a classic for DDR fans that know the steps and want a real challenge. In addition, a second multiplayer co-op mode called Support Mode was mentioned, although there are no details to encompass the name. From what we can assume, Support Mode may require only one person in the team to hit the note or motion, allowing players to "support" a newbie dancer. As for the classic Battle Mode gameplay, Konami has a few new ideas to go with the Wii controller as well, allowing players to gesture with the Wii remote to taunt, add possible improvisation to the steps, or actually send more arrows over to other competitors by gesturing in a throwing motion. As with everything else in Hottest Party, details and game modes are subject to change, as Konami looks to have started the game mere weeks (a month tops by our estimates) ago, so essentially Hottest Party currently consists of a motion demo and a whole lot of design ideas. For hardcore single player fans, Konami also mentions that Hottest Party will contain all the expected modes of the other DDR games. Whether this means we'll get some of the more advanced song editors or WiiConnect24 support for new tracks is still to be determined, but you can fully expect two-mat play, an already confirmed workout mode, and newly added multiplayer mini-games to boot. From the looks of it Hottest Party may be one of - if not the best - DDR experience we've seen simply because of all the added modes for Wii co-op and competition. Where gameplay is concerned, Hottest Party is literally just scratching the surface in the Gamer's Day demo we played. The demo featured three songs, each with three difficulty selections, and only one player. As for the actual motion control, the game's arrow design now includes an icon that looks similar to a Wii-mote/nunchuk next to each other. When the icon raises to the top of the screen, players could gesture with either the nunchuk or the Wii remote to input the action. Motion control worked just fine in the demo, but it is obvious that this is extremely placeholder, as the motion control icons merely replaced where normal arrows would have been. In a four note run, for example, the song would normally show left, up, down, right, which forms across the screen from left to right (a common run in Dance Dance). For the demo, one of the arrows was replaced with the motion icon, which broke up classic foot steps entirely. It showed off tech, but it was very obvious that this was merely the first step for hand control. So how will the final motion control for DDR Hottest Party actually work? Well, it's still being determined. Konami has made it abundantly clear that this is a new avenue for DDR, and that they're simply going to try things out until it feels right. Will this ultimately mean a new layout for the screen, allowing for a separate area for hand motions? Will these motions just replace arrows like we saw in the demo? Can characters really put their own motion and feel into the game and have it matter? We wouldn't be surprised to see the final versions of DDR Hottest Party looking significantly different from the demo at last night's event, and with the game still in the conceptual stage Konami seems to be pretty open to new ideas and styles for Hottest Party which designers will be exploring over the next few months. It may only be in its preliminary stages, but DDR Hottest Party is already catching our interest quite nicely. Konami's demo was basic, but appreciated, showing off simple motion control, IR cursor usage for the interface screens, and a crisp, clean visual look on Wii. The team seems to have some solid ideas for game modes and gameplay elements, and from here it'll just be a matter of focusing on a few key areas for the game, adding in a solid mix of songs, and watching the Wii version of DDR fly off the shelves, which - looking at the support the system has, as well as the love for DDR Mario Mix - it will when it hits. We'll have much more on DDR Hottest Party as development continues, and you can expect a ton of new info on motion gameplay and game modes within the next few months, as DDR Hottest Party is slated for a late 2007 release. Trailer Images can be found here. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 2, 2007 This sounds like it's going to be fucking incredible. Something vaguely similar to actual dancing? We live in hope. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 2, 2007 Sounds very interesting. Mothers everywhere will be thrilled. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 could be my first DDR too... i wonder might it be possible to to use ones own songs using SD cards? EDIT: oh they should definatley make it so the background dances can be your Mii's, that would be cool Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 Great, I was gonna get the new one for 360, and then they announce this. More money out of pocket. I hope they don't leave out the cool background movies, I might get tired of seeing the same background and same dancer. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 I hope they don't leave out the cool background movies, I might get tired of seeing the same background and same dancer. After DDR SuperNOVA's home release Konami hasn't used background movies anymore. I don't know reason for this, but it really sucks. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 After DDR SuperNOVA's home release Konami hasn't used background movies anymore. I don't know reason for this, but it really sucks. I didn't know that the last DDR game I bought was Extreme for PS2. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 why do the graphics look like sega saturn? otherwise ya good Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 why do the graphics look like sega saturn? otherwise ya good Because it is running on standard DDR Arcade engine. Seriously, game actually does look worse on the arcade machines, as they run on PS2 based hardware. X360's DDR looks pretty much same. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 Keep in mind this is a genre that consits mainly of a series of arrows. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 yes i would be expecting picture perfect graphics as we are essentially watching a movie playing in the background. Unless i am missing something here.i mean look at the pokemon graphics for instance(weird comparison i know) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 yes i would be expecting picture perfect graphics as we are essentially watching a movie playing in the background. Unless i am missing something here. They aren't background movies, and you can select dancers by yourself. But yeah, those dancers are quite lame. Originally DDR games did have good looking movies and single dancer on the background, but recently Konami decided to stop using movies in favor of using polygon stage instead. This was probably because movies took lots of space from the disc, and this limited how many songs you could have on the disc. I also believe designing new videos for each song was pain in the ass. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 Because it is running on standard DDR Arcade engine. Seriously, game actually does look worse on the arcade machines, as they run on PS2 based hardware. X360's DDR looks pretty much same.But wouldn't it be easier to just use Dance Dance Revolution Mario Mix engine on this one? I remember it looking a little better (less low polygon); perhaps nothing "impossible" on PS2 though: -> http://www.gametrailers.com/player.php?id=6562&type=wmv&pl=game Just wondering, why not beefing up the graphics a bit, next gen is comming, isn't DDR mooving away from PS2-based arcade engines just yet? Still, I wonder, wouldn't it be easy to start modeling for that existing GC engine instead of porting stuff from the PS2-based versions? Unless they had equal-looking DDR running on GC at some point in time or the engine was done well enough to port contents like that easily. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 Just wondering, why not beefing up the graphics a bit, next gen is comming, isn't DDR mooving away from PS2-based arcade engines just yet?. Nope, and it is unlikely that Konami will change board for long time because then arcade owners would be forced to upgrade their hardware also when they decided their game into new version. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 Nope, and it is unlikely that Konami will change board for long time because then arcade owners would be forced to upgrade their hardware also when they decided their game into new version.Makes sense, DDR is not even a graphics driven game. They could put in some effort though, even PS2 can do a load better by today's standards. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 Has anyone (assuming anyone other than me actually bought it) noticed that the animations on the dancers are the exact same as Mario in DDR: Mario Mix? It looks right weird. I'm looking forward to it, but I just moved my entire room around so using the Wii remotes for dance moves puts me at high risk of falling out of a window. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 3, 2007 Has anyone (assuming anyone other than me actually bought it) noticed that the animations on the dancers are the exact same as Mario in DDR: Mario Mix? It looks right weird.I'd still like to buy it someday, is it good? The music I expect from a Mario game doesn't pull me that much to DDR. I guess it should also be easier than the norm. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 4, 2007 It could be an interesting concept this one. I love rhythm games and its nice to see them getting a remodel on the Wii. The one I would really love to see though is an all new Space Channel 5 (Little chance though) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 4, 2007 I'd still like to buy it someday, is it good? The music I expect from a Mario game doesn't pull me that much to DDR. I guess it should also be easier than the norm. If you don't have access to a PS2 then it's a life saver, but if you have a decent mat and want a challenge on DDR stay on the PS2 version. That said, Mario Mix has a good high quality soft mat free, so it was a really good deal for me. It's also a good break-in for new DDR players. The music isn't all too bad if you get into it I suppose. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 4, 2007 When can I buy it? (or a damn wii for that matter >_>) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 5, 2007 As the series is known as Dancing Stage in Europe, any guesses as to title changes? LOL Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted February 6, 2007 Apparently konami couldn't even confirm if the game would make it over here to europe within the next year. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Posted July 9, 2007 Konami has posted their teaser site for the Wii's new DDR, DDR: Hottest Party. "Wow! The sound and dance come together and make me feel so wonderful!" Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
