Just Dance Kids 2.
Just Dance Kids 2 – tested on Nintendo Wii, also available on Kinect for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 using PlayStation Move. $30.
Last up is Just Dance Kids 2, an offering for the boundless-energy set. It only seemed appropriate to play this on the Wii, so that’s what we did. The songs are all kid-appropriate, including post-toddler favorites like “The Itsy Bitsy Spider” and tween-friendly hits like “Burnin’ Up” by the Jonas Brothers. An unexpected fun time was had because the nursery songs could be played in English, Spanish, French or German.
It was fun until my daughter announced, “This game is for kids.” Ahh, the boundless wisdom that nine long years of age brings.
Just Dance Kids 2 also supports four players on both the Wii and the PlayStation 3 (but only two players on Kinect). But as with the PlayStation Move, the Wii controller only tracks one hand’s movement. This left us with a little bit of an empty feeling. The interface is bright and cheery in a way you associate with a lot of kid things and creates the right atmosphere. On the Wii, there’s a special “balloon mode” where kids can compete against each other to earn points by shaking their Wiimotes to pop balloons.
Gameplay is similar to the elder versions of Just Dance, except that the on-screen dance models are all kids — generally a main dancer with two backups. This title seems to be below my kids these days, but I loved the song list, which is very geek-friendly with songs from Yo Gabba Gabba, TMBG and the Muppets. Unfortunately, a good number of these songs are covers performed by studio artists.
Conclusions
For us, the best console for these dance games was the Xbox 360 with Kinect, mostly because it felt the most natural and we liked dancing without having to hold a controller. At the same time, we thought the Kinect was the most forgiving — but probably least accurate in reading our movements.
We really liked the interface in Everybody Dance and recognized that Just Dance Kids 2 was a pretty great game for younger kids. Ultimately, we enjoyed playing on all systems, and the games were similar enough that there wasn’t one thing that forced one to rise to the top.
But our big conclusion was this: As long as you’re getting up off the couch once in a while to shake your booty, it’s gotta be a good thing — because it sure is fun.
Disclosure: GeekDad was sent review copies of these games. Furthermore, you should be thankful that this was not a video review.
