N-Philes

Dance Dance Revolution: Mario Mix

Posted November 3rd 2005 by Ben Wood.

Konami oft suggests that the GameCube is a children's system. The games they release for the system, featuring the Ninja Turtles, Frogger, and Disney sports reflect this view. Well, they've finally brought their wildly popular Dance Dance Revolution franchise over to the KiddyCube. In the process, they've given the series a Mario makeover by setting the game in colorful Mushroom Kingdom universe.

Like any good Mario spin-off, Dance Dance Revolution: Mario Mix comes complete with the obligatory half-baked story. Waluigi steps up his villainous role and steals four spherical Music Keys and spreads them across four themed worlds. This disturbance prompts the brazen Mario and a rather wimpy Toad to seek out these musical wonders before chaos spreads throughout the Kingdom. Many obstacles lie in their way but--just like in real life--the portly plumber and his little buddy can dance his way to victory each and every time.

All of the dancin' action takes place between the little text driven cut scenes. With the "action pad" that is included with Mario Mix, players dance to the music by tapping their feet on large up, down, left, and right directional arrows as the respective arrows float to the top of the screen. Timing is everything here. You can make combos by hitting the arrow with perfect, or near perfect timing. If you're too early or late, the combo will reset, but you'll still get some points. Missing entirely not only resets the combo, but it also decreases the dance meter. At the end of the song, the player's performance will be graded on a letter scale from A to F. Some of the dance sequences in Story Mode will have you dodging fire, stomping goombas, and staving off boos in addition to timing the arrow cues. To break up the dancing action, minigames are spliced into the story mode. There are dozens of minigames available in the game, ranging from a goomba-inspired Whack-A-Mole game to one which has you running and jumping onto the classic Super Mario Bros. flagpole. Yes, fireworks ensue.

The Story Mode is short, and can be beaten in no time on easy or normal difficulty. Beating it once will unlock the hard setting, which you can play to unlock songs for the more important free mode, where most of the Dance Dance action takes place. In free mode, you select a song and difficulty level, and play Dance Dance straight up. You can play by yourself, or with another person. This mode offers something called Mush Mode; when toggled, you dance to the songs with the unique Mario elements found in Story Mode.

The visuals, which are very Mario Party-esque in their presentation, work well with the game. Mario, Luigi, and any other characters that end up on the dance floor boast well-animated dance moves and eye-catching character models. Mario's spinoff games have often treated gamers to a wide selection of characters to select, but unfortunately, Mario Mix limits selection to the two Mario brothers. Those looking to see Peach and Daisy square off will have to look elsewhere. The backgrounds are fully polygonated, and get the job done almost too well, as they can be distracting when trying to focus on the arrows. An option to dim the background would have been welcome.

Dance Dance is all about the music, and it's here where Mario Mix begins to unravel. Even when everything gets unlocked, there's still fewer than 30 tracks. While most of these are songs from various Mario games, some of them are dance remixes of traditional songs like Pomp and Circumstance, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, and the Hungarian March. There are brilliant remixes of Mario-inspired tunes that will keep you coming back for more, but some tracks should be avoided whenever possible, and there's only one song that sounds as if it could have come from any previous iteration of the Dance Dance Revolution series. The selection of Mario themes is somewhat disappointing. Rainbow Road is the only offering from the N64 era (and even that is just a remix of the SNES version), and there isn't a single handheld remix in sight (the music from Super Mario Land World 1-3 would have been killer, and you know it). Super Mario World 2, Super Mario 64, Tetris Attack!, and Mario Paint feature some of the best music from all Mario titles, yet Nintendo and Konami seem to have forgotten them entirely.

Difficulty is a huge bone on contention for many. Ever since the first previews started hitting the net, Mario Mix has been criticized for its baby steps. The game on Easy and Normal is blindfoldingly simple to get through. Hard mode steps up the challenge a little, but even then the songs can be passed through with little effort. Fortunately, the game creators threw in Very Hard and Super Hard modes. The latter will definitely separate the men from the boys, as even the veteran Dance Dance fanatic will break a sweat in order to get through the entire session.

This game gets an N-Philes score of B-.

Ultimately, Mario Mix is a lot of fun. While the Easy and Normal difficulties are a cakewalk even for the novice Dance Dancer, the Very Hard and Super Hard settings sufficiently up the challenge level. Veterans of the series, however, shouldn't have too much trouble scoring As and Bs across the board regardless of the difficulty setting. While the song selection is limited, the addictive nature of the game will make Mario Mix a fun and accessible party game. A decent selection of minigames further extends the lasting appeal of the game. The relative difficulty in getting additional dance mats might discourage those wanting a proper multiplayer experience, but the upcoming Karaoke Revolution Party from Konami (as well as trying to play Tetris Worlds with the dance pad) will help to extend the life of yet another GameCube peripheral. Dance Dance Revolution: Mario Mix is a must for hardcore Mario buffs, as well as those GameCube owners dying to get on the Dance Dance bandwagon.

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