➤ Dancing in the living room 🎮

Of the boom period of "casual" games, which coincided with Wii's heyday, little remains (thankfully, you might say). Among the survivors, actually in excellent health, there is undoubtedly Just Dance by Ubisoft, a franchise that between the main series and spin-off has collected more than 40 million copies sold all over the world. And given that up to now there have been no drops in the public's affection for the formula studied by the French company, we might as well continue along the same path; Consequently, Just Dance 2014 arrives on the market, the new chapter coming out on Wii, Wii U, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, and soon also on next gen consoles. If you are not tired of dancing, keep reading ...

Want to dance

As per tradition now consolidated throughout the life of the series, Just Dance has always collected the best results at Nintendo; exactly for this reason, also this year the reference version is the one for the home console of the Kyoto house, but although a Wii edition is also strategically planned, the greatest resources have been spent this time for the more modern Wii U. Given the not very brilliant sales of the new hardware of the Iwata president, Just Dance 2014 therefore also becomes a sort of test bench to verify the stability of this "marriage", and more generally of the effectiveness of a formula that - as anticipated a few lines ago - in fact it does not bring with it even on this occasion any substantial novelty, limiting itself to enriching what is the "side dish" of the main dish.

If you have lived on Mars so far, know that basically in the Ubisoft title you simply need to hold a Wiimote and try to replicate as closely as possible the dance choreography that appears on the screen, possibly keeping an eye on the pictograms at the bottom that summarily indicate the subsequent dance steps. Basically that's all. If described in words it is certainly not the most exciting situation in the world, in reality in practice Just Dance has always managed to establish itself as one of the best party games in circulation; first of all because it is very accessible and anything but severe in judging users, and secondly because of the quality and variety of the choreographies enriched by a graphic design that is certainly not elaborate, but colorful and full of personality. We have already said in all the reviews of the previous episodes that the detection of the movements is far from precise, but in the specific case of Just Dance it is not a factor that can be attributed as a defect; those who want to engage in rigid and severe dance simulations must necessarily turn elsewhere, because the philosophy behind the Ubisoft production rests on a very different concept, party and carefree, light years away from frustration and performance anxiety. Framed in this precise interpretation, the effort of the French company therefore remains an authentic point of reference for the entire genre.

Just Dance 2014 is once again one of the best party games around

A bit of everything'

Obviously the nerve center for a title of this type is represented by the tracklist, an element that is certainly not easily judged for a product so transversal in its target audience. Just Dance 2014 basically offers about fifty songs of very different genres and eras, and for this reason it is quite natural to notice contrasts and to foresee that it is difficult for a player to appreciate all the songs available. Along with the nightmare of all wedding parties or YMCA and classics like I Will Survive and Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! there are modern performers like Lady Gaga, PSY, Nicki Minaj, Robin Thicke and Ke $ ha, but also questionable inclusions like George Michael's Careless Whisper, Prince Ali from Disney's Aladdin, or simply songs that in our latitudes are little or not at all popular.

The online store allows (or rather will allow, given the few tracks present so far) certainly to expand the tracklist according to one's tastes, but going to draw on the wallet again. Closed the parenthesis, instead, the different game modes present deserve a separate discussion, which try with good results to give greater variety to the basic gameplay by exploiting in this specific case also the Wii U GamePad with exclusive modes. Among these, for example, the possibility of singing as a sort of karaoke using the microphone, or - with the Party Master option - building piece by piece the choreography that friends will have to perform by choosing the next step to propose via touch screen. To add further load to the public ludibrio, you can also record short sequences of your performances via the camera, to be shared online with the rest of the community. The online element, however, is more deeply exploited, for the first time in the series, by a real multiplayer that allows a maximum of 8 users to challenge each other at the last step even without having to be in the same living room. The novelty of the On Stage is very nice, which in practice places a player in the role of the Star and two others to perform a support choreography, thus replicating a real live performance.

Comment

Tested version: Wii U Resources4Gaming.com

8.0

Readers (10)

5.9

Your vote

Just Dance 2014 is, as expected, a more of the same that follows the formula that made the Ubisoft series popular by adding some new modes and options. The varied, robust yet not fully convincing tracklist is a great starting point to spice up any party or gathering of friends, while the new online multiplayer mode makes even the single player approach more convincing and sustainable. In short, if the basic formula hasn't bored you yet, and if you often have a house full of people, Just Dance 2014 is a more than advisable purchase.