2009. Humana Games4Health was looking for healthy game designs. Michelle Obama was starting an initiative to get kids moving at school. And, XBox was demonstrating what "Project Natal" could do.
Dance Class took first place honors in HG4H's InsertCoin. The concept drew on the popularity of Dance Dance Revolution and how enamored we all were with playing real songs in Guitar Hero. It meshed this with our love of mimicking the choreography of music videos on MTV in the 80's. Players would get to learn real choreography and perform real dances from Michael and Janet Jackson, Paula Abdul, MC Hammer, Britney Spears, and more, moving up in ranks and difficulty just like you would in Guitar Hero. It played on the full-body functionality of the Kinect. Unfortunately, while I earned First Place honors, HG4H had the right to sit on the game design for three years and they did so without developing it, while other dance games came out and gained in popularity. Such is the nature of the games industry.
Dance Class took first place honors in HG4H's InsertCoin. The concept drew on the popularity of Dance Dance Revolution and how enamored we all were with playing real songs in Guitar Hero. It meshed this with our love of mimicking the choreography of music videos on MTV in the 80's. Players would get to learn real choreography and perform real dances from Michael and Janet Jackson, Paula Abdul, MC Hammer, Britney Spears, and more, moving up in ranks and difficulty just like you would in Guitar Hero. It played on the full-body functionality of the Kinect. Unfortunately, while I earned First Place honors, HG4H had the right to sit on the game design for three years and they did so without developing it, while other dance games came out and gained in popularity. Such is the nature of the games industry.
