What will probably be remembered as one of the most original ideas for a videogame in quite some time will have to be Dance Dance Revolution by Konami. Taking a hint from a huge dancing boom in Japan, coupled with the recent onslaught of "music games," DDR takes this recreational activity (one step forward if you will) into the digital age.

The most noticible aspect of DDR has to be its control interface - a large 3 foot by 3 foot floormat with four directional arrows for the cardinal directions. While the game can be played using any PSX controller, the experience is far from the same. In fact, if the game wasn't played on such a device, I would have to give this game a lower score. I will stress once again that should you decide to pick this game up, get the pad along with it. ^_^

Gameplay is extremely simple: On the top of the screen are the four directional arrows that are located on the floormat. As the song that you have selected plays, arrows will start to crawl their way from the bottom of the screen to the top. The moment the moving arrows match up with the still arrows, step on the corresponding floorpad direction. Every time you make a mistake, you are penalized by having some of your dance bar (located above the still arrows) disappear. Correct steps not only help to refill your bar, stringing several correct steps in a row will bring up a combo counter in the middle of the screen. The higher the combo, the more points you will net. When you complete three songs or when the dancing bar is completely eradicated, your game is over.

The tunes that you get to dance to range from classic 70s songs such as "Kung Fu Fighting" and "That's the way I Like It" to some reggae, ska, club, rap, techno, Pop, and Rave. All the songs in this game have English lyrics to them so you won't have to deal with your non-gaming friends scratching their heads trying to contemplate what your listening to.

Sounds easy? Yeah, right. While the early light disco songs such as "Have you Ever Been Mellow?" may be a breeze in normal mode, you MAY be able to get a Perfect score on the trip-rave "Parnoia 180" within 200 gameplay hours. Even if you did get through Paranoia without a hitch, you still have Another Mode (more steps implemented), Mania Mode (even more steps), Mirror Mode (steps reversed), Another Mirror Mode, Mania Mirror Mode, and even Doubles mode (if you have another partner and another DDR floorpad) to get through!!! Then there are the hidden songs that will appear after you clear 300-700 stages in the normal and hard modes. To say that there is replay value in this game is an understatement.

One question that always seems to come up is "Do you REALLY dance in this game or is it just a bunch of stepping around?" While you may not see it at first, some of the harder songs in the game require the players to actually do dance steps in order to clear the stage. For example, there's a part in one of the hidden songs where the directions left, up, right, down are so close together that you have to actually take one of your feet and place it in the middle of the mat and spin yourself in a circle while you drag your other foot around the arrows to get the steps in!

To sum it all up, DDR is totally original, totally unique, totally fun, and will totally give you a workout. Ever wanted to REALLY sweat from playing a videogame? Ever wanted to learn how to dance? Ever need a new party game that everyone can enjoy? DDR is what you are looking for. Hats off to Konami for continuing to give us great titles after all these years.

· · · Yar