DDR Zen

Where audio-visual memorization meets agility you get one of the most noble of all video game pursuits: DDR Zen.


If you haven't figured it out yet, I am a huge rhythm game junkie. Everything from Elite Beat Agents to Audiosurf to Taiko: Drum Master to Harmonix's older games like Amplitude. But the grandfather of them all is Dance Dance Revolution.

It was freshman year of high school when I first played DDR, it was during a swim team get together when I first set foot upon the plastic mat. I had seen it played before, but never had the urge to try it. While I tripped along on 'Light' mode, keeping my feet centered beneath me, hitting one arrow at a time, my opponent next to me was flying. He put on a mystifying performance of unfathomable foot-flying fury. Between his act, the hypnotic J-Pop, and the cheering of the onlookers - I was tranced. Hooked into the effect of it all. This person was a god among men.

DDR became the last half of my freshman year, and most of my summer. It was the reason that I ended up purchasing a PS2 (which was good for my dad since now he could play finish playing his Metal Gear Solid series). I wanted to get my chance in the light, to be a Master in the Art of DDR.



It was a long and uphill grind. After about a month I began to get comfortable with moving both of my feet and not coming back to the center of the pad after every beat, and that led to unlocking the next level of difficulty: Standard. Oh, the joy that there was when I started to learn the pattern to the cover of Phil Collins' "Against All Odds" From there it all started, as if in a Rocky-esque montage, I kept getting better and better running through all of the Standard level songs. Playing until my legs were butter, getting stronger, moving faster, memorizing the step pattern and working through the best way to hit all the buttons as if it were as natural as breathing. I was finding that Zen. People could watch me dance and say, "Wow, that is great!" (As long as I wasn't playing someone better than me.)








<--- Optimal physique for DDR.
<--- What I do not look like...
<--- :'(





It became that time. I had beaten almost all of the Standard level songs and was ready to transcend into the depths of the final difficulty tier: HEAVY. The sacred land where the notes no longer follow the rhythm but the melody as well. Where we separate the elite from the meat. "If you can learn heavy then you are the master." - was what I told myself. This was my Dolph Lundgren. I attempted to dance my way through the easier songs on the game: Genie In A Bottle, Get Busy, I Will Survive, Oops!... I Did It Again. Those simple pop songs that they put on the disc to advertise the game with their distracting music videos. But this was a different level, I limped my way through these so-called "easy" songs and called my E rating a victory. I won the fight, but I was losing the war. And the war was never meant to be won.

I had hit that wall. That evil wall that all athletes understand as the make-it or break-it point. However, there is a difference between sports and video games. Video Games change. Here enters Guitar Hero, the newest peripheral to entertain my fingers giving my legs the rest they deserve. My mats now rest in the corner of the room, shredded and taped up like a heavily loved pair of shoes. Dolph was left undefeated but my mind was elsewhere, my mind was more on Ozzy Osbourne then it was on the late Captain Jack and Smile.dk.

Heavy was left for Frankenstein on Expert but I still came back once in a while for later generations of DDR. When I look back now, I realize that I had found that DDR Zen the whole time. I was in good shape, had a ridiculous amount of fun, and I can still always go back to it if I want to impress friends. (Which I do sometimes since Guitar Hero no longer impresses people) In the end I got everything I wanted from it, and someday I might finish what I started, especially since I do want to get back in shape.




College knows how to make a kid fat...

Finally, for your entertainment: Meet Stepmania.