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Konami may not be making any more DDR games, but it looks like they aren't finished with making "dancing" games:
From Gamespot's article on a recent Japanese Arcade trade show

Dance 86.4, as the title would suggest, has an atmosphere that feels as through you're dancing to the tune of a radio broadcast--with plenty of colorful announcements made by a DJ in between the stages. The game plays similarly to Dance Dance Revolution except it has only three panels to step on; left, center, and right. The game implements a new subsystem where your combo count resets if you have your foot on a panel when a bomb icon displays on the screen.

I'm surprised that they only went with 3 panels for this game, I would have expected Konami to add more than in DDR, either an 8 or 9 panel machine. I guess they're trying to pull in people who thought that a 4 panel machine was too complicated. =P

xK1 wrote: I'm surprised that they only went with 3 panels for this game, I would have expected Konami to add more than in DDR, either an 8 or 9 panel machine. I guess they're trying to pull in people who thought that a 4 panel machine was too complicated. =P

*cough* Techno Motion *cough*
But it would be good to get a music decent mix with 8 or 9 panels.

I think 3 panels is a bad idea, it's much less natural and you'll have to do alot of dumb slides.

depending on how the layout of the panels it will either be really lame or almost cool. Either way the steps will be annoying, especially if they are trying to make this game for people who thought ddr was too hard. With this in mind they might make too easy steps, and it would just be horrible. I guess if they have hard levels, good songs, and steps that aren't that akward and a good layout this could do well. Dont expect me to give up ddr for this.

The machine I saw had them all horizontal, so it's gonna suck.

Hopefully it has good music, that would save it some flaming.

Picture of the machine:



Also, this site has some pictures of the machine, but not the pads.

It looks like it's targeted to a younger crowd than DDR, and will probably be rather stupid.

WhiteDragon wrote:
It looks like it's targeted to a younger crowd than DDR, and will probably be rather stupid.

Thanks for the link, nice to get some more information on it. Keep in mind that Pop'N music is *supposedly* targeted to a younger crowd and I wouldn't call it stupid.

The only thing that would make this game stupid is if all of the step patterns are super simple or if it has too few songs. Right now it looks like they only have 13, but I'm sure that will grow once it gets out of testing.

The preliminary song list that they have right now looks decent, I've heard the Go!Go! 7188 version of Cutey Honey and really like it, and Choo Choo Train isn't a bad song either, if you like J-Pop.

I dunno, I'm kinda looking forward to it.

WhiteDragon wrote:Picture of the machine:



Also, this site has some pictures of the machine, but not the pads.

It looks like it's targeted to a younger crowd than DDR, and will probably be rather stupid.

that is just lame.

Why would konami do this?... 3 buttons? what kind of even half fun steps could you come up with on that?... i could understand some odd steps if the buttons were at like... top middle of the pad and then bottom right and bottom left of it... but just three right across?....

good luck with that konami

I don't think it's all that lame.

They probably went with 3 buttons becaue they already did 4. And 5 and 6 buttons didn't do so hot. And 8 or 9 buttons would be crazy and very difficult to learn, where as 2 buttons would be way too easy. Also, 3 buttons would take up less floorspace in the arcade.

I could also see some interesting freestyles on that thing.

Agreed though, I don't understand why they don't just make another DDR. Extreame 2 or something. It would probably sell better and cost less money to develope.

Either way, I'm not going to insult the game untill I play it. It still might be a good game in it's own right, though I doubt it'll be better than any DDR mix.

Actual old DDR solo machines had a 3 pannel option. up-left, up-right, and down.

This topic is a little old, but I saw one of these machines while in Japan...if you want some better pics of gameplay then consult the how-to-play webpage for it. It looks like it has mines like ITG.

It appears to be disco themed and that's how the scrolling action looks...like you're strutting down the street like Travolta in Saturday Night Fever.

I'm amused by the interface's three feet at the bottom of the scroll. I assume those are similar to the arrows at the top of a DDR scroll, but does it perhaps suggest that players of Dance 86.4 have two left feet?

Gah people mines aren't an ITG original.

Anyway, friend played this, said it wasn't anywhere near as fun as like DDR or anything else and kinda really easy.

BakaOrochi wrote:Gah people mines aren't an ITG original.

Anyway, friend played this, said it wasn't anywhere near as fun as like DDR or anything else and kinda really easy.

mines aren't ITG? o.O were they SM? I always thought that stepmania was what introduced mines...

if they were, that would be an interesting addition to the konami/roxor cases.

I don't see how it could be as fun... or difficult. They have a video of it here... The only thing that looked hard about it was the furious "explosion" of color... which makes it look like a child who heaved after eating a box of crayons.
http://www.gamespot.com/arcade/puzzle/d ... iostation/

hascoolnickname wrote:

WhiteDragon wrote:Picture of the machine:



Also, this site has some pictures of the machine, but not the pads.

It looks like it's targeted to a younger crowd than DDR, and will probably be rather stupid.

that is just lame.

The game might be lame but the demo models sweaty panties prolly sold for 5000 yen in a vending machine afterwards.