Dance Dance Revolution is my favorite game.
It’s a game for couples, swiping their Round1 cards on a date and then laughing definitely-too-loud as they slowly shuffle their feet through a half-decade-old Marshmello song on the easiest difficulty.
It’s also a game for freaks.
During a chat recently with one of the better players at my local arcade, I asked him how he keeps his stamina up when playing a particular chart I’d just watched him blaze through effortlessly. With a grin like he’s constantly waiting for a chance to have this conversation again, he said, “This is my game. This is, like, what I play.” I knew what he meant. Games you like come and go, but games you love are rare, and they can become fixtures of your life. In the case of DDR, it’s hard not to eat, breathe, and sleep foot-to-arrow action once you’ve gotten a taste of what the game can really offer.
DDR has immense depth. The latest release, DDR World, has well over one thousand charts, spread across 19 difficulty settings, within each 21 more hidden difficulty integers. There are different playstyles, and techniques designed to surpass certain challenges. There’s patterns to learn – jacks, crossovers, spins, just to name a few – and different maneuvers to tackle each. What makes DDR rewarding is the journey it takes you on, and I wanted to share some of my own, if not to help another player grow than at least to express my passion for the game.
So here it is.
Be diligent.
Nerves (as in the instructions your brain sends your muscles) are incredibly slow when calculated in rhythm game time. You need to compensate for that with a quick mind. Let’s assume you’re cruising along steadily, getting comfortable with the game at a healthy pace. Eventually, you’ll run into a chart you just can’t read. You can’t even send the information to your feet because the speed or density of the steps has overloaded your mind. Your brain has encountered its first challenge. Try to identify similar patterns in the chart and isolate which ones cause you problems. Then go home and watch YouTube videos, trying to play in your head. Better yet, install Stepmania and try playing on a keyboard. Your fingers will be faster than your feet, providing a great environment to focus on training your brain to read charts quicker. Pretty soon, you’ll learn to trust the rhythm, and your eyes will be scanning ahead, doing recon on upcoming steps while your body confidently pounds away at the current pattern.
Be prudent.
Your mind is cashing the checks, but it’s your body that pays them. Anyone who’s ever tried to learn a tight speedrunning exploit or a tricky fighting game combo can tell you, knowing is only half the battle. It requires time and effort to execute. It won’t take long to get your legs in sync with your brain, but as the tracks get more demanding, that synchronization needs to get sharper. Thankfully, that’s the easiest part of the game. Play more, and you’ll see the results. But here’s the important bit: In DDR, execution is only a small part of the body’s burden. What’s much more important is managing your stamina. Listen to your body. You’re not a shonen protagonist, you’re a human with limits. Accept those limits, and vow to push them a little further each time without overstepping. Don’t try to power through a hot flash, an upset stomach, or extreme fatigue, and when you eventually take a hiatus from the game (unbelievable as it sounds), be gracious to your body as it readjusts upon return. It’s better to drop out of a session early or play some easy songs for a while than to push your body until you’re keeled over outside the arcade, tasting blood and trying not to throw up. Source: I’ve been there. Be smart, be patient with yourself, and always bring a water bottle.
Be malleable.
The first time you see what’s called a crossover pattern, and whether you’re willing to learn how to deal with it, will be a make-or-break in your DDR career. The game doesn’t have any rules beyond “put your feet where they need to go,” but novices will often invent their own rules, limitations that might help their understanding of the game early on, but prove damaging in the long-run. So let’s break some misconceptions: Your left foot is not beholden to the left arrow. Your right foot is not beholden to the right arrow. Your torso doesn’t need to face the screen, and some patterns might even ask you to turn your back fully from the screen. You just need to hit the steps. DDR is, on some level, trying to simulate dance, so familiarize your entire body with the game. Land your full combo by any means necessary, and don’t stifle yourself or overcomplicate things. The way excellent players become excellent is through intelligent and ever-changing posture. Record yourself playing and make note of when you’re overexerting yourself. Watch players better than yourself, paying less attention to the screen and more to their footwork. The control you have over your body is remarkable. You only need to kill the mental block you’ve placed in front of that control.
Be unwavering.
As we established earlier, sometimes in DDR the mind is willing but the body is unable. Never let the opposite be true. If there are arrows on the screen, go for them. Difficult patterns can be overwhelming, and that’s why we practice, but hitting the steps you can is always better than giving up. In a lot of games, it can be a good idea to step back and get a breather. Hide behind some cover and think through your options, or disengage with your opponent and assess the situation. DDR has no cover, it has no options, the opponent is always present, and the situation is only ever you, landing the steps on the screen. Sometimes a pattern hits you hard, and you know you can’t hit every step. That’s okay – do what you can. Do everythingyou can, and worry about what you can’t later. Now, don’t think I’m saying that you should throw yourself at the same challenge again and again. Some charts are going to confuse or disrupt your play in a way that may require you to stop playing and recalibrate your thinking. But when you are playing, play. From the start of a chart to the end of it, there are no breaks. You have to be as locked in as you can until you see that results screen.
Be assured.
This is the worst one I see in new players, not because it’s the most harmful but because it’s the most nonsensical, and it’s something many players seem to need to relearn again and again. Yes, actually, your feet can hit those steps that fast. If you think they can’t, move them faster. Literally just try to move them faster. If you see 1/16th steps coming and you’ve only ever hit 1/8th steps, don’t just stand there, resigned to failure. Move your feet. There’s no room for hesitancy in DDR. Nothing aggravates me more than hearing someone say, “I’ll never be able to do that.” You will. You will be able to do that. You can read that chart, you can hit that pattern, you can overcome whatever hurdle DDR places in your path because let’s not forget: if it wasn’t possible, they wouldn’t’ve put it in the game. Nobody isn’t “good enough,” and no amount of practice can make you a go-getter. If you see a pattern and think, “well I can’t do that,” you’ve already lost. It’s easy to plateau in DDR, when there’s so many charts for players of all skill levels. Instead of getting comfortable where you are, try to always keep in mind that you could be better. Look at each difficulty hump as your own personal boss fight. In other games, you don’t sit around replaying the same levels again and again. You beat a boss and you move onto the next one. Keep pushing, keep grinding out more and more charts, keep killing bosses and discovering new ones, and you’ll only learn to appreciate the game more and more.
The greatest joy for me in rhythm games used to be the moments of clarity I’d experience in a game I’d already sunken my teeth into; when I’d exited the flow state and realized I’d just done something I thought I’d never accomplish for me. It’s a bit like looking at yourself in the mirror and realizing you’d gone Super Saiyan without even noticing it. I say that “used to be” my favorite part of rhythm games because I haven’t questioned my own ability in years. I know I can do it, every time, in any game. When I pick up a new rhythm game or try a difficulty I haven’t before, I’m not looking to shock myself by doing something I never thought would be possible – I’m looking to take what’s mine. And with a game as expansive as this, there’s always more to take.