DDRMAX Dance Dance Revolution 6thMix

DDRMAX Dance Dance Revolution 6thMix
Developer(s) Konami
Publisher(s) Konami
Series Dance Dance Revolution
Bemani
Engine 6thMix, 6thMix PlayStation
Platform(s) Arcade, PlayStation 2
Release

Arcade

  • JP: October 19, 2001

PlayStation 2

  • JP: May 16, 2002
  • NA: October 28, 2002
Genre(s) Music, Exercise
Mode(s) Single-player, Multiplayer
Cabinet Custom
Arcade system Bemani System 573 Digital
CPU R3000A 32 bit RISC processor
Sound PlayStation SPU
Display 29" CRT (Raster, 256x224 & 740x480)

DDRMAX Dance Dance Revolution 6thMix (DDRMAXダンスダンスレボリューションシックスミックス, Dī Dī Ā Makkusu Dansu Dansu Reboryūshon ShikkusuMikkusu), sometimes abbreviated as 6thMix (シックスミックス, ShikkusuMikkusu), is the 6th game in the Dance Dance Revolution series of music video games. It was released in the arcades by Konami on October 19, 2001 and for the PlayStation 2 on May 16, 2002 in Japan. 6thMix contains a total of 42 songs, all which made their first arcade appearance on this release. 11 of these songs were previewed in various console releases prior to 6thMix. It was the first in the series to feature Freeze Arrows.

The interface used is a recoloring and smoothing of the song wheel interface first introduced in Dance Dance Revolution 5thMix, with the addition of changeable sort settings and a longer time limit.

DDRMAX was intended to be the Next Generation of Dance Dance Revolution. As such, there are many changes. First, the difficulty levels were renamed. 'Basic' was renamed 'Light', 'Trick' was named 'Standard', and 'Maniac' was named 'Heavy'. They are also given Japanese difficulty names in conjunction: 楽 (raku), 踊 (you), and 激 (geki), respectively. Their color codes—orange, fuchsia and green, respectively—remain the same. Also, all songs from previous versions have been scrapped in 6thMix (although the prototype version of this game had some songs from previous DDR versions), intending the game to start from scratch. Many past songs do return on 7thMix and later releases, however.

Gameplay

Core gameplay remained mostly the same on 6thMix and 7thMix, with the addition of Freeze Arrows and a new scoring system:

Freeze Arrows appear as green arrows with a long extension. If they are held for the entire length successfully, a O.K. is scored. If it is not held down for the entire length, a N.G. (no good) is scored. Freezes affect the life bar. Scores are calculated with 2 distinct scoring systems, the long-score system used to determine rankings, and an independent dance point system now used to determine the grade.

All songs have a long-score ceiling of 50 million points, and a bonus score is tacked onto it based on the difficulty of the song and other factors. Rankings are given for the highest long-score accumulations a round. If a player plays more than three songs, then it only counts the last three played. If a song is played repeatedly among the three songs used for ranking, then the repeated songs carry no bonus score.

The dance-point system uses raw step values to determine the grade. A 'perfect' step adds two points, a 'great' step adds one point, a 'good' step is worth nothing, a 'boo' step takes away four points, and a 'miss' step takes away eight points. An 'O.K.' freeze adds six points, and an 'N.G.' freeze is worth nothing. The dance points are also tied to the life bar. As always, if a player takes too many bad steps and depletes the life bar, they will fail, and the game will end immediately. If the first song is in Light mode, then the game will allow a player to fail that song and continue, but will fail the player out if they fail a second song. In two-player games, if one player fails, they can continue dancing, but it ceases to accumulate dance points for the failed player, accumulates score points at only 10 points per step, and automatically gives the failed player an 'E' for the song.

The grade is dependent on the number of dance points accumulated: 100% dance points is 'AAA', at least 93% is 'AA', at least 80% is 'A', at least 65% is 'B', at least 45% is 'C' and anything below 45% is a 'D'. If a net dance-point total of zero is obtained without depleting the life bar and, thus, failing, an 'E' is awarded. The final grade for the entire game is an average of the grades from the last three songs and not derived from the actual dance points scored.

This 2-tiered scoring system is still utilized on DDRMax2, though the long-score system is reformed. For the long-score system in DDRMax2, it now has a maximum for each song of 10,000,000 multiplied by the foot rating for the routine. Maximum scores can range from 10 million to 100 million for individual songs. Bonus scores are abolished, though the new long-score system tends to be weighted so that errors early in a routine are not as costly as errors late. The dance point system, which determines grade, remains unchanged. This scoring system would be kept for Dance Dance Revolution Extreme.

Interface & graphics

Dancing characters have been removed in 6thMix, 7thMix and Extreme. Instead, the arrows scroll over clips of full motion video, hence the game does not render any polygons. The screen refreshes at a full speed of 60 frames per second. In addition, the arrows themselves have been tweaked too, now having a rounded edge on their outer tip rather than the V-shaped cut used in all previous games.

These games retain the Song Wheel interface introduced in 5thMix, but add an easier method to enter modifiers. In previous versions, modifiers like "Sudden" or "Shuffle" required a combination of dance steps. Beginning in 6thMix, a player only needs to hold the Start button when they select a song to bring up a full menu of available modifiers, including the ability to speed up or slow down the scrolling of arrows, and a final chance to select the song difficulty they wish to play.

Groove Radar

The "foot rating" system used in previous versions to identify a song's difficulty has been replaced in DDRMAX by the Groove Radar. The Groove Radar is a graphical representation of the difficulty of a song which debuted on DDRMAX Dance Dance Revolution 6thMix which exclusively used the system to represent difficulty instead of foot ratings, the only version to do this. Due to this, the only songs that have no known foot ratings are "Follow Me" and "Flash in the Night", because both songs have yet to appear on a different mix.

The radar uses 5 categories to represent the difficulty:

The Groove Radar displays up to two graphs, one for each player, depending on the difficulty they select.

Modifiers

A new options menu accessed by holding down the Start button when selecting a song debuted on 6thMix, and is retained on future mixes.

Some of the available modifiers include Speed mods, which change the arrow speed. Boost, which causes the arrows to accelerate as they near the step zone, Appearance, which changes the appearance of the arrows. Turn mods modify the stepchart itself, Other affects the difficulty of the steps, Scroll changes the scroll direction of the arrows, and Freeze Arrows can also be turned off.

Extra Stage

New to 6thMix is the "Extra Stage", where players are rewarded for meeting conditions set by the game. If a AA is scored on the final stage on Heavy mode, a message inviting the player to "Try Extra Stage" is shown instead of the Cleared graphic. For the Extra Stage, the song wheel is locked on "MAX 300", and the song is played with several forced modifiers, including 1.5x speed and Reverse. The song is also played in Pressure mode, where the dance gauge starts filled, and can only go down.

If the player scores a AA or higher on the Extra Stage the game again rewards them with "One More Extra Stage". This time, the song wheel is locked to "CANDY☆", an easier song but with more difficult Modifiers. The exact same modifiers are used, but the song is played in Sudden Death mode, where any step judgment which breaks a combo immediately ends the game. If the player clears the song with a full combo (which is the only way to do so in Sudden Death mode), a special credits movie is shown. When this second Boss Song is passed for the first time it too will be unlocked for normal play, also displayed on the Song Wheel in red.

Some machines have the ports to insert PlayStation memory cards. Such memory cards have to be original PlayStation (not PS2) memory cards with Link Data from the home version of DDR 5th Mix (the home version of 6thMix cannot create arcade-compatible Link Data). 5thMix can create two different kinds of arcade link data; the Link Data file for 6thMix is known as "New Version" Link Data and is forward-compatible with 7thMix arcade machines as well. Link Data serves two primary purposes: Score-saving and Internet Ranking. The user can save his or her scores from arcade performances, and whenever the game is played in the future, the arcade game will load the scores for each user and show them on the song-selection screen to show the player's best performances. These scores can also be viewed at home with 5thMix. 6thMix also provides Internet Ranking codes based on the user's performance in a given set of songs. As with all of Konami's Internet Ranking events, the website for the game would allow users to enter in a generated password which contains their initials and scores for that session, and the website would display the rankings for those who have submitted codes. Link Data saves these passwords so that they may be entered much more conveniently.

The arcade game can exchange custom stepchart data with 6thMix, as well as any earlier version that has songs that are in 6thMix, though this requires special steps to be taken in 6thMix to write a PlayStation-formatted save file, which must then be copied to the PlayStation memory card by the user.

Home versions

The home version of DDRMAX Dance Dance Revolution 6thMix was released in Japan on May 16, 2002, for the Sony PlayStation 2 video game console. It featured all 42 songs from the arcade version as well as two additional console-exclusive songs "Kind Lady" and "So In Love". 6thMix's hidden songs can be unlocked automatically, without additional play, by accessing its save data on home versions of DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution 7thMix or Dance Dance Revolution Extreme.

DDRMAX Dance Dance Revolution, with the mix number omitted, is the home version released in North America for the PlayStation 2 video game console. The North American version is considerably different from the Japanese version. It displays song difficulties using the traditional foot-rating system and the Groove Radar in tandem.

Music

Notes

^ This song is the only DDRMAX song that was removed from DDRMAX2 but revived on Extreme.
^ This song's title contains an in-game typo. The correct name is "Little Boy (Boy Oh Boy Mix)".
^ This song's artist name contains an in-game typo. The correct artist is Scooch.

Variants

DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution 7thMix

DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution 7thMix|DDRMAX2ダンスダンスレボリューションセブンスミックス|Dī Dī Ā Makkusu Tsū Dansu Dansu Reboryūshon SebunsuMikkusu}}, sometimes abbreviated as 7thMix (セブンスミックス, SebunsuMikkusu), is the 7th game in the Dance Dance Revolution series of music video games. It was released in the arcades by Konami on April 17, 2002. Although only officially released in Japan, arcade units exist worldwide. DDRMAX2 contains a total of 135 songs, 53 of which are new to Dance Dance Revolution.


Dancing Stage EuroMix 2

Dancing Stage EuroMix 2 is the third game in the Dancing Stage series of music video games. It was released in September 2002 in Europe. It includes 68 tracks, of which 52 are new and 16 are Konami originals from EuroMix. EuroMix 2 requires a PC Card and omits the Internet Ranking feature.

Dance Dance Revolution Extreme

Dance Dance Revolution Extreme improves upon the engine used in DDRMAX.

Reception

DDRMAX Dance Dance Revolution reception
Aggregate score
AggregatorScore
Metacritic85%[10]
Review scores
PublicationScore
GameSpot7 / 10[11]
IGN9.3 / 10[12]
DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution reception
Aggregate scores
AggregatorScore
GameRankings82.35%[13]
Metacritic82/100[14]
Review scores
PublicationScore
EGM7.67/10
GameSpot7.2/10
GameSpy4/5
IGN8.5/10
OPM (US)4/5

The PlayStation 2 release of DDRMAX Dance Dance Revolution received favourable reviews. GameSpot gave it a 7 out of 10 rating. IGN gave it a 9.3 out of 10.

Its sequel, DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution, also received "generally positive" reviews according to video game review aggregator Metacritic.[14]

After a series of low selling expansion titles of the first game, DDRMAX2: Dance Dance Revolution surprisingly stood out compared to other games in the series in terms of sales, selling 1.09 million units in the US. It is one of only three titles to have sold over a million units, the other two being the first game, Dance Dance Revolution and possibly either Dance Dance Revolution Extreme or Dance Dance Revolution SuperNOVA, and is the first and only game in the series to have sold over a million units in the United States alone.

References

  1. ↑ Neko Neko. "DDRMAX Dance Dance Revolution 6thMIX for Arcade" (in Japanese). Retrieved 7 September 2009.
  2. ↑ Konami. DDRMAX2 DanceDanceRevolution 6thMIX (in Japanese). arcade. Konami. Level/area: Song select screen.
  3. 1 2 Neko Neko. "DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution 7th MIX for Arcade" (in Japanese). Retrieved 7 September 2009.
  4. ↑ Konami. DDRMAX2 DanceDanceRevolution 7thMIX (in Japanese). arcade. Konami. Level/area: Song select screen.
  5. ↑ Konami. DDRMAX2 DanceDanceRevolution 7thMIX (in Japanese). arcade. Konami. Level/area: Course select screen.
  6. 1 2 Neko Neko. "DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution 7th MIX for Play Station 2" (in Japanese). Retrieved 9 September 2009.
  7. ↑ Konami. DDRMAX2 DanceDanceRevolution 7thMIX (in Japanese). PlayStation 2. Konami. Level/area: Song select screen.
  8. ↑ Konami. DDRMAX2 DanceDanceRevolution 7thMIX (in Japanese). PlayStation 2. Konami. Level/area: Course select screen.
  9. ↑ Konami - DDR MAX2
  10. ↑ "DDRMAX: Dance Dance Revolution for PlayStation 2 Reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved 2016-06-16.
  11. ↑ Davis, Ryan (2002-10-28). "DDRMAX Review". GameSpot. Retrieved 2016-06-16.
  12. ↑ Smith, David (2002-10-11). "DDRMAX: Dance Dance Revolution". IGN. Retrieved 2016-06-16.
  13. ↑ "DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution for PlayStation 2". GameRankings. Retrieved 2011-10-21.
  14. 1 2 "DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution for PlayStation 2 Reviews, Ratings, Credits, and More - Metacritic". Retrieved 2011-10-21.
Preceded by
Dance Dance Revolution 5thMix		 DDRMAX Dance Dance Revolution 6thMix
2001 		Succeeded by
DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution 7thMix
Preceded by
DDRMAX Dance Dance Revolution 6thMix		 DDRMAX2 Dance Dance Revolution 7thMix
2001 		Succeeded by
Dance Dance Revolution Extreme
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