On October 23, 2005, Nintendo released in America what Japanese players had been enjoying for several months already: a console version of DDR. A multitude of other console versions of DDR had been released already, but this console version of DDR was special: it had MARIO MUSIC! No longer were gamers forced to dance to songs like Butterfly, Bag, or Dam Dariram! Not that that's a bad thing, but still, isn't it GREAT to have a CHOICE? :)
I will review this game like I did Wario Ware: I will explain the gameplay and describe all of the play modes in detail, and then score the game from 1 through 7 in some categories. 7 is perfect, 4 is average, and 1 is the loneliest number – I mean, 1 is awful.
First, I will explain the concept of DDR for the benefit of those of you who aren't familiar with it (I'm sure there's still plenty of you out there). The player selects a short piece of electronic dance music (about a minute and a half long) to dance to. During gameplay, a series of arrows rise from the bottom of the screen towards a static line of arrows at the top of the screen in time with the music. There are four kinds of arrows (Up, Down, Left, and Right), corresponding to four areas on a pad on the floor. When the rising arrows line up with the static arrows, the player actually steps on the corresponding area of the pad with his or her feet. (One of the most common mistakes made by newbies is assuming the objective is to step on the arrows quickly before they hit the top; DDR is a game of staying in time with the music, not a game of merely being fast.) If two arrows hit the static line at the same time, the player must jump on both of them at the same time.
The player scores points by hitting the arrows with accurate timing; the more accurate the timing, the higher the player's score. A combo of many consecutive arrows hit accurately also increases the player's health meter. If the player hits an arrow with very inaccurate timing, however, or misses it entirely, then the health meter decreases. The goal is to survive the whole song, and to get a high score by hitting the arrows precisely in time with the music. In addition to there being many songs to dance to, each song also has several difficulty levels. The harder levels generally have more arrows and are more exhausting, and the arrows often form intricate rhythms which are difficult to figure out without paying close attention to the music.
DDR: Mario Mix is no different, for the most part: it has the same gameplay as the arcade games, just different music. It does add a few twists, however, which will be explained later on in this Review.
The modes of the game are as follows: First off, there is a Story Mode, which, as the name suggests, is the mode that actually has an inkling of a story. It is also the mode you have to play if you wish to unlock stuff. You can choose to play on Easy or Normal difficulty (Hard and Very Hard difficulties can be unlocked later on), and also whether to play as Luigi or whatever the name of the guy with the red hat is. Oh, right, Mario. The story is that a mysterious figure whose silhouette looks exactly like Waluigi (and whose actual identity I shall not reveal, so as not to spoil the plo— okay, it's Waluigi. You got me!) has stolen the Music Keys from Truffle Towers, and Toad and the plumber sibling of your choice have to work to get them back, or else be forced to do a dorky dance forever. However, they repeatedly get stuck in insane situations. For example, right off the bat, Toad discovers that the river that they need to cross to get to Truffle Towers is FLOODED! OH NO! What to do?
Suddenly, Toad remembers that "When the keys make you shake your thing, magic things start happening", so the player is thrown into an electronic dance number, and must dance to it. Success in doing so means advancing to the next random plot point, and if you dance well enough, cashing in some coins as well. The number of coins depends on the letter grade you get; the best possible grade of "A" is worth 100 coins.Alternatively, failing the song by losing all of one's health points results in losing a life; lose all of your lives, and you can't continue your game anymore. Obviously, passing the song is better than failing the song.
After dancing to a remix of Koji Kondo's creative genius, which is the overworld music from the original Super Mario Bros, the plumber and Toad run into this game's first gameplay twist: mini-games. A Goomba pops out of a pipe, forcing Mario or Luigi to play Whack-a-Goomba for 30 seconds. Goombas pop out of four pipes, and the player smashes them by stepping on the appropriate pad arrows. Smashing a certain number of Goombas within the time limit means you get coins; failing to do so means you lose coins (but not a life). Passing the mini-game is not necessary for clearing the Story Mode, and you can play it multiple times (if you're good enough at it to rack up coins, which will be veryvaluable later).
Pass or fail, your plumber then jumps into the pipe, but then discovers that the exit is too high up to jump out of, and he can't get out... except, of course, by dancing. Thus, you encounter a remix of a Mozart song, and if you're playing on a level harder than Easy, the game's second gameplay twist: Mush Mode. Mush Mode replaces some of the gameplay arrows with Mario objects; in Underground Mozart, these objects are Goombas, but later songs have Koopa Troopas, Boos, Podoboos, and other objects. These objects make the steps more difficult to read, as they don't clash with the background action as much as the normal arrows do, making them easier to miss. Also these objects don't show which direction you have to press to hit them; this can only be discerned by seeing which arrow in the static line they're aligned with. In addition, some objects appear unexpectedly at a high speed, forcing the player to react quickly to them (or else memorize when they come up and learn to expect them).
After escaping the pipe, the heroes walk into an item shop, which is the third gameplay twist in Mario Mix. The items that can be bought using your coins serve to make the game easier, either by replenishing your health or giving you extra lives. (That's right, there's 1-Ups in this game – and they're 100 coins apiece. Wow.) When you're done shopping, the heroes look to the side, and notice the key to Truffle Towers. The Lakitu running the shop will only let them have it if they can drive some Koopa Troopas out of his garden; to do so, the plumber in the duo must dance to a remix of a song from Bizet's opera Carmen. Additionally, the player can now buy items before playing any song in the game, although item shops will still be encountered along the way.
His garden now Koopa-less, the Lakitu gives the protagonists their key, and they enter Truffle Towers, but not without first jumping on a random flagpole for some reason. Segue into another mini-game, where you can score up to 50 coins, depending on how high you hit the flagpole. After that, the heroes are hit by one of Walui— I mean the mysterious silhouette's Bob-ombs, who claims the music keys in the name of himself and challenges them to a dance-off. In this dance-off, it's not enough to merely survive the song; you must also score higher than Waluigi in order to not lose a life. Not to worry; the CPU player isn't that good. Beating Waluigi in the dance-off allows you to claim the first music key; however, the other three have been scattered across an ocean world, an amusement park, and a frozen wasteland, requiring the heroes to travel a bit.
This is pretty much the gameplay of Story Mode; you play mini-games and songs until you collect all the music keys and complete the game. After beating it the first time, you unlock an EX game, where some of the songs are replaced with other songs. For example, when you have to escape from the pipe in world 1, instead of dancing to a Mozart song, you get to dance to... a DIFFERENT Mozart song! WOW! What a difference! Additionally, four extra songs that can only be played in Free Mode (which I'll get to later) may be bought at item shops, for 100, 200, 300, and 400 coins, respectively. Beating Normal mode unlocks Hard mode, and beating Hard mode unlocks Very Hard.
The next mode I shall be discussing is Free Mode. You can play any song you've unlocked here. To unlock a song, simply play it in Story Mode (except for the four songs you have to buy in the EX game, and one song, a Twinkle Twinkle Little Star remix, that is unlocked right off the bat). Since you can quit Story Mode at any time and return to it later, you should play Free Mode to practice a song with which you're having trouble. Each song you unlock is available in Easy, Normal, Hard, and Very Hard difficulties, regardless of what difficulties you have opened up in Story Mode. Passing a song on Very Hard unlocks the Super Hard level (which is only available in Free Mode) for that particular song. Also, if Mush Mode's available for a song, you may turn it on or off. And in case that's not ENOUGH options for you, if you have two pads (or controllers... you can play the game with a controller, too, but shhhhhh... it's our secret...) plugged into the console, you can play Versus mode with a friend, where both players dance to the same song (although they may choose their difficulties separately). The game records your high score for each song and difficulty, and for songs with Mush Mode, it records separate scores for whether Mush Mode is on or off. That's a LOT of scores.
Seeing as Free Mode didn't require nearly as many paragraphs as Story Mode, I'll now discuss Mini-Game Mode, where you can play any mini-game you've unlocked. Most of them are unlocked by playing them in Story Mode, although a few require you to actually beat Story Mode. Some of these mini-games, too, record your high score. Mini-games range from flagpole jumping to running away from a Chain Chomp to breaking bricks.
Information Mode shows a list of messages explaining things you've unlocked. It also records achieving such feats as getting an A grade on a song, or getting a 100 combo. Not much to talk about, really.
Records Mode shows your high scores. Again, not much to talk about.
Workout Mode has a bit more to talk about. You can input the names and weights of up to eight players, and when that player plays, the game will calculate how many calories were burned during the songs. The game shows the total number of calories you've burned, and how many calories were burned on your last five songs. This is a rough indicator of how much you've played the game. You may also delete profiles and clear the calorie history of a player.
Finally, Options Mode allows you to change some options, such as the sound (Stereo or Monoaural), the Rumble feature (which only applies to, shhhhh... controllers), the announcer (whether or not you hear the cheering audience and the announcer saying "100 combo!" and "Are you watching the sequence okay?" while playing a song), and whether or not the song ends immediately in Free Mode when your health runs out.
Now that all the modes are discussed, let's GRADE this baby.
Story: 4
Story Mode is the only area of the game with a story; this story is quirky and funny enough that people who like quirky and funny stories will enjoy it, but not intricate and detailed enough that people who like intricate and detailed stories will enjoy it. Plus, the story gets a little boring the second time around, and you have to play it through at least twice to unlock everything.
Graphics: 4
The graphics for the arrows are cool and modern, and at the same time very functional (which is a good thing, since all of the gameplay focuses on them). The background visuals for the songs are pretty much standard graphics for a GameCube Mario game, meaning they're very good, but not good enough to win the Best Graphics Ever Award from Completely Made-Up Gaming Magazine. Chances are you'll be much too focused on the arrows to really notice the background visuals anyway, but that doesn't make them any less good.
Sound: 6.9
The incidental music is appropriate to the mood of the game, but the meat of the game is in the 29 songs you dance to. They are very dance-to-able, and extremely awesome. Most of them are remixes of songs from Mario games. These games range from old classics like Super Mario Bros. 3 to new classics such as Mario Kart: Double Dash!!. Most of the remixes are instantly recognizable if you're familiar with the original song, although it took me a while to recognize the Wrecking Crew song, and I spent a ton of time listening to the sound test in Mario Party 5 trying to figure out which song was remixed for Cabin Fever, and was unable to figure it out without finding the answer elsewhere. The rest of the soundtrack is made up of remixes of public domain songs, such as compositions by Mozart, Waldteufel, and Stephen Collins Foster. I personally think the public domain remixes are just as awesome as the Mario remixes, although I have rather eclectic musical tastes in general (using Napster, I've downloaded songs by Aretha Franklin, Lindsay Lohan, Steppenwolf, and Weird Al Yankovic, three musicians and a music group who otherwise would never be mentioned in the same sentence), so "caveat emptor" ("let the buyer beware", if you're allergic to Latin). I personally don't think there are any bad songs, though, or even any mediocre songs. The only bad thing about the songs is that there isn't enough of them. I mean, TWENTY-NINE? Granted, I like all 29 of them, but it would have been even better if the game had THIRTY songs for me to like. :)
Gameplay: 7
Aw, come on. What's NOT fun about dancing around to cool music? It's something we all do anyway; why not make a video game out of it? (Stay tuned in 2008 for Super Mario Eating, Breathing, and Sleeping!) It's fun to get up and actually get exercise. You may never want to touch another video game with buttons again.
Difficulty: 6
There's a wide variety of difficulty here, ranging from REALLY easy stuff (if you can't pass the first song on Easy, then you seriously need to quit playing video games) to some challenging stuff. If you regularly play catastrophically hard songs in the arcade, then even Bowser's Castle on Super Hard mode will likely be too easy for you. Everyone else will be able to find a difficulty level that is an appropriate challenge for them.
Controls: 6
The controls are pretty easy. The pad that comes with the game slides around a bit, which marginally affects my ability to play. I've used the same pad since the game was released in October, and it still works very well, however. I think most of the misses I get in this game are because I merely didn't aim properly with my foot; perhaps the sliding around causes some of this. Also, occasionally it will register two quick Downs in succession when I hit Down, but that doesn't affect me too negatively, either. It doesn't ruin the fun for me, at least.
Replayability: 6
The game records a bunch of high scores, and getting higher scores provides incentive to keep playing. However, I've gotten the maximum score possible in 28 out of the 29 songs in Super Hard mode by getting a Perfect on every arrow, and I still continue to play, simply because it's a fun workout for me and the songs are so awesome.
Fun Factor!: 7
Dancing is fun, and Mario music is fun. This game finally brings them together. Every time I play the game, I burn off a lot of energy because I don't want to stop playing.
Overall: 7
Dance Dance Revolution is the only activity that's ever made me sweat, because it's so fun that I actually WANT to do it. Having a home version of the game is one of the best things that has ever happened to me. I VERY rarely play my other GameCube titles anymore; DDR: Mario Mix has pretty much monopolized my console.
Recommendation:
As this game requires you to get on your feet, do not buy it if you're not fit enough to do so. Also, the difficulty level and number of songs in this game isn't as many as in other home versions of this game, so DDR veterans may not want to buy this game either; stick to the PlayStation and X-Box versions for your at-home DDR-playing needs. Also, some people... don't like Mario music. Gasp! Those people should DEFINITELY avoid this game, as the soundtrack's knee-deep in it. Other than that, I can really see no reason not to buy this game if you can afford to do so. The music is extremely awesome, and the game is fun to play. Plus, it's just plain healthy! :)
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