A video game for the feet

[Times photo: Kinfay Moroti] Matt Witte, 14, and his sister Danielle, 15, try their feet on the video game Dance Dance Revolution at Aladdin’s Castle in Clearwater’s Countryside mall. “It’s good exercise,” Matt says.

By JEANNE MALMGREN, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published August 31, 2002

Dance Dance Revolution gives kids a chance to get their hearts pumping - and to show off for each other.

CLEARWATER -- "He's God," someone says.

God probably isn't what you had pictured. He's a young man with royal blue hair, a black T-shirt and baggy jeans. He climbs onto the platform.

Beneath his feet are lighted squares, each with an arrow. Up. Down. Right. Left. Those arrows are about to take a beating.

Oversize speakers pump out a techno beat, and a 30-inch screen flashes a message: "Here We Go!!!" A dozen spectators, most of them young and sweaty, lean forward like gamblers waiting for the opening bell of a horse race.

Suddenly the young man's feet begin to fly.

Right.

Left.

RightRight.

Up.

Down.

UpUp.

LeftRight.

He stares intently at the screen, where arrows are scrolling up from the bottom, each one commanding a split-second dance step. His tennis shoes squeak against the Plexiglas.

With arms hanging loosely, he looks like a cross between a clogger and an Irish step dancer. He wears a Zenlike smile.

"Look at him," one of the spectators mutters reverently. "No one can do this song."

“When you get up to ‘Maniac’ level, it’s really intense.” -- Richard Fischbach, 20, of Palm Harbor

Afterwards, God -- a.k.a Richard Fischbach, 20, of Palm Harbor -- cools down in front of a box fan and talks about Dance Dance Revolution, the newest craze in the formerly sedentary world of video games.

"There's a real good performance element to it," Fischbach says. "And when you get up to 'Maniac' level, it's really intense."

Maniac might be a good word to describe the young people who quickly grow obsessed with DDR, as it's called by the faithful.

"The first day we had it here, they just jumped all over it," Fischbach says. "Out of nowhere, the crowd started pouring in."

"Here" is Aladdin's Castle, a video arcade on the second floor of the Countryside mall in Clearwater. DDR arrived there about four months ago, says Fischbach, who is the arcade's manager. (Note to Fischbach's boss: Don't worry. He clocks out before he gets up on the dance platform.)

What is the lure of DDR? For a generation that has grown up honing its hand-eye coordination in front of blinking screens, this is a refreshing change. Now it's the feet that challenge the machine. And that means a heart-pumping workout, an admiring audience of friends and the flat-out fun of gyrating to loud music, which never gets old.

In the Tampa Bay area, DDR machines can be found at entertainment complexes such as Celebration Station in Clearwater and Brandon, and Malibu Grand Prix in Tampa; movie theaters such as Veterans AMC in Tampa; bowling alleys such as Tampa Lanes, and the Museum of Science and Industry in Tampa.

DDR is also at Florida theme parks, including Sea World; Universal Studios; Disney's MGM, Epcot, Magic Kingdom and Pleasure Island, and Busch Gardens. They love it in Miami. At least one Orlando bar sponsors DDR tournaments.

At GameWorks in Ybor City, DDR "is extremely popular," general manager Patrick Spiddle said. "We have some people, mostly college-age, that come in just for that game. And they come in every day. They finish, and their whole head is wet."

Pop City, in Tampa's Channelside mall, has had DDR for a year and a half. "It's one of our top five games," general manager Paul Bullard said. "Sometimes we'll have 50 people standing around watching, especially on Friday and Saturday nights."

A Japanese import

The fancy footwork began in late 1998 in Japan, where DDR was introduced to liven up karaoke bars. The machines are manufactured by Konami, a successful maker of video games. Over the next two years, DDR spread to Korea, Europe, South America and the United States.

By 2001, the game that requires foot-eye coordination had become a video cult. Self-named "DDR freaks" poured into arcades and shopped for used machines on eBay. Sony PlayStation and Nintendo introduced home versions.

Most of the people who play are young enough to be blessed with the stamina needed for a DDR workout. But some older players take the challenge, too. Fischbach said his mother and stepfather play the game at home. "We had one woman in here, she had to have been in her 50s." If you can imagine the decrepitude.

On a recent Saturday night, the DDR crowd at Aladdin's Castle was decidedly young.

"I played it, like, one time, and I was obsessed," said Gwen Hamilton, 12, a student at Tarpon Springs Middle School. Hamilton, like most of the others, spent her summer in front of the DDR machine at Aladdin's.

"This is like our family," Cassandra Cruz, 18, said. "We spend all day here."

Alex Smart, 17, is a senior at Tarpon High. "I come straight from school to here," he said.

Several praised the game's calorie-burning effect.

"I lost 24 pounds this summer doing this," Holly Pietras, 18, said.

For others, it's an alternative to the bar scene.

"I like music, and I like to dance, but I don't drink," Kelly Creighton, 22, said. "I tried Ybor, and that really wasn't for me." Creighton wore a tank top with the DDR creed: If you see me Stepping, you're not Tripping. I'm just Playing DDR.

Most outlets charge about $1.75 to play DDR for four or five minutes. At Aladdin's Castle, a single token (50 cents) will buy you four songs -- or until you miss a step and the screen chides, "Are You a Monkey? You S--!"

The way to avoid that fate is to have a veteran on the dance platform beside you. As long as he or she keeps up with the arrows, you both get to keep playing.

"It's called 'keeping you alive,' " said Tara Wasserman, 18, of Palm Harbor. "We all did it for each other in the beginning."

Players mark their places in line by propping their driver's license or tokens on a ledge on the front of the machine. While they wait, they mop sweat off their faces and swig PowerAde.

The next time Fischbach returned to play, he was joined by Will Perez, 17. To the throbbing beat of a remix called AfroNova, they stomped, twirled, even jumped off the platform and sprinted in a frantic circle around the arcade before leaping back onto the lighted arrows.

"Awesome," Pietras said, shaking her head.

"Insane, man," someone else agreed.

God's feet kept flying.

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