Yes, of course the story is idiotic. It is Nintendo, for God's sake. But though I shake my head at the sheer corniness of the Music Keys idea, I love how they carry off even the silliest stories with a good dash of humor, clearly poking fun of themselves. The dialogue between the characters is very similar to what you find in other Mario games, such as Mario Party Advance. Plus, if you really find the story heinous, don't worry - it takes less than two hours to play through.

   In this case, Nintendo also upped the ante with some absolutely masterful graphics. The worlds they create for the Mario Bros. and Toad are wonderfully crafted, with a feel to them that's extremely similar to the boards in the Mario Party games. You don't control the characters as they follow their predestined paths, but you watch them jump on flowers and cause them to bloom, and your transportation is provided by the adorable SS Brass.

Replay being the key word here

   Given the mere two-hour span of the story mode, I was a little disappointed by this the first time, thinking that I'd have no motivation to replay this game ever. Turns out that beating the game on Normal unlocks the Hard mode, of course (why I didn't see this coming from a mile away, I'm not sure). In the end, you'll most likely have to play through the game about three times in order to unlock all of the songs. Which gets incredibly annoying. Even though the story is less than two hours, by the third time it's completely [and by that we mean completely completely completely! - ed.] boring, and for some reason [can you say 'gleeful malice?' - ed.] you can't skip through any of the scenes.

   Once you've beaten a song in one of the story modes, you can play it individually, thank God. But you'll still have to replay each individual song in order to get the more difficult modes for each one. This is a lot less tedious than redoing the story mode, though, since it only takes a few minutes and does provide a bit of a challenge as you get to the higher levels. And after you've beaten story mode a few times, replaying the individual songs is basically the only part of the game left. With twenty-some songs, this will keep you occupied for some time, but not long enough. Nintendo would've done well to include more.

You did pretty good, baby, but I just know it wasn't your best effort

   That pretty much sums up this version of DDR - what it accomplishes, it does extremely well, but there could've just been so much more. The songs that are included are great, such as remastered versions of Nintendo classics and digitalized classical music that anybody would recognize [who was that deaf guy who was named after a dog again? - ed.]. But with so few songs, the game gets old unless you enjoy repetitiveness (which, I can't lie, I kind of do, but I recognize I'm peculiar in this aspect, among others). And there's no reason that Nintendo couldn't have included more protagonists besides Mario and Luigi, or further individualized the characters. In its current state, choosing a hero is basically just a change in avatar, whereas Nintendo could've made it much more in-depth of a role-playing game by adding some facets of personality or different dancing styles to each brother.

   But I'm still giving this game a high rating, because its graphics, its world design, and just the simple fact that it finally brought DDR to the GameCube all warm my heart. It can't be denied that Nintendo copped out a little bit, but the game is so fun that I don't really give a damn. As I mentioned above, this game is perfect for beginning DDR enthusiasts, and children [as well as heroin junkies - ed.] will enjoy the easier levels and bright colors without getting frustrated.

   Besides. Any game that suggests you escape a tight spot by "dancing your way out," and lets you determine who the winner is with a "dance-off," wins in my book.

       ... Ellix