Having only ever played the demo for Just Dance (yes the very first one) and boasting to everyone how good it was on the Kinect everytime any visitors came home, I jumped at the opportunity to review the latest version of this popular game. Now that doesn’t mean that I can dance. And let me make it clear that I haven’t bought any of the other versions out previously. I still get the feeling that I have missed out on a good game though.
If you don’t know already, Just Dance 4 is developed and published by Ubisoft .
So here is a question for you? Do you know your Music? I’ll tell you what, this game will certainly test your skills as well as stamina and memory. Not only with the variety of songs that it has ranging from a tune dating back from 1957 all the way to the modern times of 2012. Oh how music has changed along the years. You don’t need to be that old to enjoy abit of Elvis Presley, Stevie Wonder, The Blues Brothers and to be honest, you cant even be too old to enjoy the beats offered by Punjabi MC or the more modern tunes by Flo Rida, Nicki Minaj and many others.
Up to 50 songs have been carefully selected and they range in difficulty. It seems like the older songs carry a less difficulty than the newer ones. However, every gamer will find the difficulty as different and this will be purely based on fitness and ability to move
However, Dancing to these tunes? Now that’s a whole other story!
So before playing this game, I strongly recommend you ask yourself one question. “AM I READY?” If the answer to that is yes then be prepared to get winded! And I mean that literally!
Yes, the game has tunes dating back quite abit. Well, to before I was born that’s for sure and even before the word game console was even thought! However, its always a good inclusion to have a bit of retro in any game. Be it a racing game with cars or in this case a dancing game with age old tunes.
It has various was for you to enjoy it which include a “Just Sweat” mode. Which basically does as it says. Makes you sweat.
There is a Battle Mode which I didnt have a go as I didn’t have anyone to play against, however, I understand that 2 playes face off. Each will have a health bar and the better dancers health bar will last longer while the others depletes. The loser will be the one whose health bar becomes empty.
JD4 also has a Dance Mash Up Mode. Basically, this is where multiple songs with different difficulties are mixed up and integrated to one song. Confused? Get the game! Then you will not only understand, but you will also enjoy! Yes, I did run out of breath pretty quickly as I am totally unfit! This made me re-think and I have actually told my boss that I will set up a gym in the office! Time to make myself ready to take this game DOWN!!
It was rather embarrassing that after a mere 5 minutes of playing the game I was puffing, panting and wheezing! I didn’t think I was that unfit but this game surely opened my eyes!
Moving on to Kinect! Yes, every single time I pick a game to review that has Kinect Compatibility (ofcourse this one would be pretty useless without it) I really scrutinize how the Kinect sensor responds to the movement of the player and the overall performance. If you have read some of my reviews of the other games that I have done, you will see that I have not been that impressed with the attempts at using whats supposed to be the invention of the latest generation of games consoles!
So, the does the sensor hit the spot and get a +1 from me this time? I have to say… ABSOLUTELY! It sees your every movement and keeps track of you! Make a wrong move and it will notice it. Sure it doesn’t penalise you heavily, however it will give you the average instead of the Perfect score that you are looking for. Being a Novice at dancing games I wasn’t expecting to get perfect scores all the way. But I was pretty happy with my first attempt! No I will certainly not share it! Perhaps if you let your friends know and we could put up a score comparison on absolutegaming.co.uk, I may be tempted.
There is only 1 thing that I would say that kind of annoyed me with this game. When trying to select options, theres what I can describe as "point and stick" sort of way to browse the menus. So you wave your hand from left to right to scroll or right to left, and when you want to select something, you gesture in a pointing or poking motion. This didnt work particularly well and I simply could not get a hold of using it. Hence caused abit of frustration.
Overall, the game has been very well made, and you would expect that as well considering it’s the 4th instalment. Many times, games lose the flavour and many developers like to keep things similar to a strategy that they know works well in the market out there. Just Dance 4 doesn’t need that at all! Regardless of who stands infront of that sensor, they will still enjoy a great game which has some great tunes (my pick of the lot was Moves Like Jagger by Maroon 5 featuring C.Aguilera) which will appeal to many generations!
To give a game a rating is simply an opinion based on what I thought. I thought the game was really enjoyable and would play it again even if it was to try and improve my fitness levels. Therefore 8/10 is perfectly deserved. More songs is always a good thing.
Now the question remains, Will you show your friends your Moves Like Jagger? Or will you Dance with Mr Saxobeat!