In the Groove Review

By now, anyone who’s a serious gamer has heard of Dance Dance Revolution, or DDR for the hardcore crowd. If not, then here’s a short description: by using a special 4-arrow pad, you step on the arrows as the game gives them to you in rhythm with the music. Sounds easy, huh? Well, a group of DDR players thought so and defected from Konami’s game to make their own, In the Groove. The game is similar in concept to DDR and has now migrated from the arcades exclusively onto the PS2.

In The Groove

Gameplay

Basically, the arrows scroll up the screen and you step on them when they reach the stationary arrows. It has to be simple, right? Wrong. If you have no timing or you’re off by a hair, you’re not going to get a good letter grade or score. That’s the In the Groove gameplay. You can’t blame the game for any frustrations. Oh, you can try, but the 1st step of a 12 step program is admitting you have a problem. ITG has a varied difficulty system ranging from 1 (novice) to 12 (expert). While I found the steps enjoyable and sensible, I didn’t like the learning curve. Sometimes a song jumped from a 4 (medium) to a 9 (hard). There’s a big difference in the number of steps and how hard the sequences got. I would prefer a natural progression of difficulty on some of the songs by adding another rating in between.

Modes and Multiplayer

Don’t worry, it may seem like you’ll get bored, but you won’t. Dance Mode is a one or two player game. The single player mode also lets you choose one mat or two mats, for that extra challenge. In the Groove also has Battle Mode, where two players (or one player versus computer) dance to control the most space on a bar with random modifiers trying to screw you up. This mode is extremely fun because it only matters who controls the most at the end of the song. There’s also Marathon Mode. This is when you try to clear courses with a set number of predetermined songs on certain difficulties. Much like Vegas, there’s plenty to do in In the Groove.

A couple other notes on gameplay. One is that there is a song progress bar available at the top of the screen. I mention this because the songs in ITG are a lot longer than DDR. Anywhere from 2 ½ minutes to 4 minutes…normal radio edit song length. In this case, it is nice to see where you’re at in the song in case you’re ready to keel over. Second, there are over 50 modifiers included in the game. They are there to affect your arrows in a number of ways. They can disappear, rotate, bounce, speed up or slow down at random times, bunch up: the options seem endless.

Graphics

The graphics are pretty normal for a game like this. You don’t need fancy animations, or detailed environments to bog your gameplay down. As long as you can see the arrows and the score, then you should be fine. And In the Groove gets to the fundamentals so you can concentrate on dancing. One thing I loved over DDR was the arrows. ITG’s arrows are solid and default to a metallic look, which makes them easy to ready. Even the middle and quarter steps are simple to interpret. Sure you can change few settings and make them look different to your taste, but I guarantee that the default colors will more than serve you.

Soundtrack

What makes or breaks a game in this genre are the songs. I’m happy to say that In the Groove has given us the goods. There is a good range of songs from many different styles. Rock, hip-hop, Techno, Electronic, Dance Metal, and remixes of popular favorites like ‘Torn’, and ‘My Favorite Game’. There are slow songs, fast songs, and songs that vary in their Beats Per Minute. And believe me when I say you better know these songs inside and out if you are going to play the Hard or Expert levels because the sequence of the arrows will usually follow the verses, the chorus, or some bass groove or melody. At least you won’t get tired of listening to some of the songs because there are a lot of catchy tunes in ITG.

Dance the Night Away

If you’re a fan of dancing games and want to break away from DDR, In the Groove is a fine way to try something new. With a good selection of songs and unique Battle Mode, you’ll stay busy and active while getting your Groove on.