Before I jump into this, let me say for those of you who don’t know me that I’m not what you might call athletic. I’m about 6’1″, 230 pounds, and I spend more time brushing my teeth each day than I do going outside or performing physical activities. So it probably goes without saying that I’m not a dancer… or even a person in good shape. Did Dance Central teach me how to own the dance floor? Not really. But is it a blast to play with friends? Abso-friggin’-lutely.

Dance Central is the first Xbox 360 Kinect game from Harmonix. You might remember them as the developers behind such titles as the first couple of Guitar Hero games and all things Rock Band. If you think that their skills at simulating musical instruments wouldn’t translate into simulating dance moves, you’re fooling yourself. This game is exactly what you hoped for when you first heard about it. In Dance Central you mirror the movements of a dancing avatar on-screen. Each move is accompanied by a flashcard telling you what move you’re supposed to be doing and a queue displaying which moves are coming up next. You get rated up to five stars based on your performance — sound familiar?

What fascinates me most as I play through the game is how you really feel like you’re learning. On your first pass through a song you might completely bomb (though, unlike Guitar Hero and Rock Band, you still finish the song no matter how well or poorly you do). But on subsequent passes you’ll improve naturally, until you get each move right. If you need extra assistance, the “Break it Down” mode teaches you each step at your own pace: if you nail a move in the first attempt you’ll continue to the next, but if you need a hand things will slow down and the game will give you verbal encouragement. As an example, I have a Bachelor’s degree in theatre, but never quite mastered the Jazz Square, a basic dance move. Ten minutes of “Cross, back, right, front… Good!” taught it to me. Seriously.

The game can track two players simultaneously and score your group at the end. Along the course of each song is a Freestyle section, in which you dance your heart out then watch a slideshow replay of you track across the screen. This effect never fails to disappoint. I suppose I should also throw out the idea that the game’s whole “this body part glows red to tell you you’re making a mistake” concept doesn’t really work when playing with someone else, but then, multiplayer is much more about goofing off with your friends than it is about mastering each move, isn’t it?

The difficulty level is perfectly paced. Songs are grouped by the complexity of their choreography, and each song has an easy, medium, and hard mode. What I love about this game is that each difficulty mode builds on the ones below it: medium adds new moves on top of easy, etc. Spend an afternoon going through any given song and you will be able to master it on hard. At least until you get to the harder tiers… but then, that’s what practice is for!

Dance Central throws in a few extra modes for your buck. “Dance Battle” pits two players head-to-head, each taking turns to rack up the highest score. “Workout Mode” keeps track of how many calories you’ve burned, encouraging you to get some exercise. Somehow this mode makes it feel like a better exercise game than Wii Fit or EA Sports Active, but I’m not a gym trainer so I won’t advise you there. All I can tell you for sure is that you will sweat. Oh yes, you will sweat.

A couple quick words about the tech, since we here at CFD! have yet to discuss Kinect in any hands-on manner: Kinect works. Period. When playing with a group of people, any two can jump in or out and the sensor simply picks the players up. No hand-waving, no resetting, no calibrating. It just works. If you don’t have enough room for two players, you might have some trouble, but I didn’t. And the sensor tracks you perfectly as well: any time I failed a move it was because I made a mistake, not because the tech failed me. At least not in this game (see my upcoming review of Kinect Adventures for more on that). I’ll also mention that this game’s user interface is better than Kinect Adventures or the Kinect Hub for that matter.

So do I think this game will make me King of the Dance Floor? No (although I can’t say it’s out of the question for someone to learn serious skills in this game). But my friends and I had a fantastic time playing this game. It’s perfect for any small group of buddies, or for the beginning of a Rock Band party before you get enough people together to fill out a full band. Now, if you’ll excuse me, it’s my turn to dance.

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Things We Liked: Fantastic song selection, choreography, and gameplay. Perfect user interface. Proof that the Kinect sensor works. The game plays the way you hope that it would.

Things We Disliked: I don’t know. If you don’t have room in your house, you might have trouble with it?

Target Audience: Wannabe dancers. People who need to justify their Kinect purchase. Pretty much anybody with a few friends and 8-10 square feet of space.

(Dance Central – Developers: Harmonix. Publisher: MTV Games. Available for Xbox 360 – Kinect required. Unfamiliar with CFD!’s review system? Read our newly revised explanation here.)