What is DDR?

Dance Dance Revolution (DDR) is a music video game that you play with your feet. Music plays, arrows march up the screen in time with the music, and the goal is to step on the right arrows at the exact right time. It starts out simple and slow, but as the difficulty increases, it starts to look less like dancing and more like an Old West shootout where the bad guy is shooting at the deputy’s feet and the deputy is frenetically hopping around for a minute and a half.

Why do I love DDR?

It’s the only form of exercise that’s actually fun for me. I love the music, I love the movement, and I love the competitive aspect. I used to be really good; I won statewide competitions in 3 states. I’ve fallen out of practice the past few years, but I’m still pretty good.

So what is AAAing a cata?

DDR songs have a difficulty level between 1 and 10. I’m currently focusing on difficulty 9 songs, which are called “catas” (short for “catastrophic”).

On each song, you get a grade depending on how accurately you step on the arrows. Your grade can be failure, C, B, A, AA, AAA, or AAAA. AAA, also known as “perfect combo”, is when you hit every step within 45 milliseconds (about a twentieth of a second) of exact timing.

My current project is to AAA every cata. Here’s my list so far:

  1. 2008-07-18 No Limit
  2. 200?-??-?? Freedom
  3. 200?-??-?? Hypnotic Crisis
  4. 200?-??-?? My Summer Love
  5. 2009-09-06 Resurrection
  6. 2009-12-05 This Is My DJ
  7. 2010-08-02 We Belong To The Sea
  8. 2011-01-24 Oasis
  9. 2011-02-15 Frozen Ray
  10. 2011-04-09 Kiss Me Red (Interlude)
  11. 2011-04-30 Not Available
  12. 2011-06-27 Flying High
  13. 2011-06-27 Furi Furi ’60
  14. 2011-07-10 Got To Be Real (Love to Infinity Mix)
  15. 2011-07-25 Gotta Let You Go
  16. 2011-07-30 Birdie
  17. 2011-09-25 Dreaming
  18. 2011-11-25 Baby Boy
  19. 2012-01-23 Spacy Crazy Girl
  20. 2012-01-28 Psalm Pilot
  21. 2012-03-18 Viva L’Amor
  22. 2012-04-30 Let Mom Sleep
  23. 2012-05-21 Orion.78
  24. 2012-06-16 Freedom (the other one)
  25. 2012-09-17 Irresistablement
  26. 2012-11-06 Road To You
  27. 2012-11-10 Star Festival Story
  28. 2012-11-10 #56
  29. 2012-11-12 Little Kitty Mine
  30. 2012-11-13 Visible Noise
  31. 2013-06-18 Remember December
  32. 2013-06-29 Must Be Dreaming
  33. 2013-07-25 Euphoria
  34. 2013-07-25 Disconnected Hyper
  35. 2013-08-09 Silvan Tales
  36. 2013-08-09 Stoic (for EXTREME)
  37. 2013-08-11 Tears
  38. 2013-08-12 Colors (for EXTREME)
  39. 2013-08-12 Collapsed Heaven
  40. 2013-08-15 sync (for EXTREME)
  41. 2013-08-19 The Message
  42. 2013-08-24 We Know What To Do
  43. 2013-10-28 Whenever, Wherever (The Last Unicorn Radio Mix)
  44. 2014-01-08 Trip Machine Survivor
  45. 2014-03-01 Godspel ver2.0
  46. 2014-03-15 Electro Tuned
  47. 2014-04-15 Xenon
  48. 2014-04-23 Broken My Heart
  49. 2014-04-24 B4U Glorious Style
  50. 2014-05-08 A
  51. 2014-09-07 Furuhata’s Theme
  52. 2014-09-10 Happy Theme
  53. 2014-09-11 Highly Strung
  54. 2014-09-12 Ray at midsummer
  55. 2014-09-14 Bumble Bee
  56. 2014-09-16 Da Roots
  57. 2014-12-04 Kiss Me Red
  58. 2014-12-09 Naughty Girl
  59. 2015-01-17 Afronova Primeval
  60. 2016-05-04 Bubble Bobble
  61. 2016-05-?? Sonic Carnival Zone Act 1
  62. 2017-01-28 Panic Puppet Zone
  63. 2017-02-01 Ghosts N Stuff
  64. 2017-02-13 Labyrinth Zone
  65. 2017-03-07 Creed by Sanxion 7

I’m also working on building my stamina back up by playing a lot of difficult songs in a row. My current stamina goal is 100 random endless catas, and my current record is:

  • 85 random endless catas (2:35:36) on 2013-07-13

“random” means random, and “endless” means no breaks between the songs. Man, you really appreciate those breaks once they’re gone!

3 Comments

  1. Karl Staib
    November 25, 2011 @ 11:47 am

    I didn’t know you were so good. Wow! I’m lucky to get an A on a song. Most of the time I’m a C or B. I’m impressed. I haven’t played in awhile. You are making me want to bring it out again.

    Reply

  2. Scintilla
    April 24, 2015 @ 12:52 pm

    Mad props for keeping this up after 6+ years!
    I’m just curious: your list of 157 catas, is that just all the 9s from all the DDR (and ITG — I noticed “Da Roots” on the list) games up until DDRX when they changed the rating scale?

    Reply

    • Pace
      April 24, 2015 @ 4:30 pm

      It’s everything that’s rated a 9 in my Stepmania library, so it’s kind of a hodgepodge.

      And thanks for the props!

      Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *