One of the best games I’ve ever played on Kinect in my honest opinion is Dance Central, which is perhaps no surprise given that its developer, Harmonix, is the king of the music genre. Now that the sequel is here I’m expecting big things, although more of the same would also be welcome. So what’s new in Dance Central 2?

Those who have not played Dance Central before will probably not be surprised to know that it’s much like other dance games. Basically you do your best to mimic the on-screen characters by following the cue cards which show the current and upcoming moves or if you are slightly more confident you can always ignore these and just follow the character who is dancing on-screen. Not being an expert dancer I spent most of my time following the on-screen prompts in easy mode, however I found the choreography in Dance Central 2 both easy to follow and more importantly, a whole lot of fun to dance along to.

Of all the new additions to Dance Central, perhaps the one that sticks out the most is Crew Challenge. This is a brand new story mode which sees you hitting the road and dancing along the way, all while trying to impress the Riptide crew, earning as many stars as you can on each song along the way. I guess this is similar in a way to the career mode in Rock Band, in that you are trying to progress as best you can and as a reward, you can unlock new crews and outfits for your dancers.

The main improvements in Dance Central 2 come in the form of multiplayer, with two players now able to jump into the action simultaneously. What this means is that you can now have two players dancing with each other, side by side, which is obviously great news and also great for parties. Perhaps the greatest part of being able to have two players side by side is the new Dance Battle mode, this basically allows you to dance against a friend, with each of you representing different crews and trying to win the day in order to become the victorious one and more importantly have boasting rights over your friend.

Dance Battle is really good fun, as games usually are when you are trying to get one over on someone you know. One of the parts that highlights the competitive nature of Dance Battle more than most is the Free-4-All which sees you trying perform the moves which flash up on the screen better than your friend, with the first person pulling off the move getting some bonus points for their trouble.

As well as the Dance Battle mode, Harmonix have also made other additions to the game, for example, you can now create a playlist in Dance Mode, allowing you to string together as many songs as you like – one after another – to dance too, rather than having to go in and out of the menu’s each time you want to change song. The Fitness Mode has also been improved, allowing you to track the calories you burn while dancing or for a continuous workout, select one of the playlists based on whichever workout suits your needs.

Being Scottish I was a bit worried about the Voice Commands which the game now boasts about; anyone with an accent like mine will know immediately what I mean. To my surprise, Kinect’s voice controls actually work well, even though ‘proper’ English usually doesn’t come from my mouth. Of course it still has its moments, especially when trying to select more complicated song titles, especially with my accent, however for the most part it was a fairly seamless experience.

Speaking to Kinect comes in various forms, you can say ‘song’ and then the title to select a song. You can also change difficulty, select the mode you’d like to play and also ask the camera to start the dance, all by using your voice. You can also use voice controls in the Break It Down mode, which is a mode used to help you learn the dance moves from the various songs. Personally I’m still happier using the motion controls; this way Kinect understands me, well at least most of the time.

One of the stand out things about Rock Band was it’s wide range and diversity of songs and Dance Central 2 is just the same. There are 44 songs included on the disc, which range from tracks such as Lady Gaga’s ‘Born This Way’ and David Guetta’s ‘Club Can’t Handle Me,’ to more old school tracks such as Bananarama’s ‘Venice.’ There are no rock tracks to bang your head or sit down and chill out too (now that’s my type of dancing), so yeah, you will be working up a sweat, whether you want to or not. As well as the 44 songs included on the disc, you can also download new songs and if you wish, import the songs from the previous disc, although it will cost you 400 MS Points to do so.

As you can see from most of the words above, my Dance Central 2 experience has been a very positive one, in fact the only disappointment is that it doesn’t really include any form of online functionality. How good would it be to be able to upload videos to allow other to view your dance techniques or even to be able to take on someone over Xbox LIVE? Perhaps this is for the future, or perhaps it was just too complicated to implement this functionality, it would have been good if the option was there though.

Dance Central 2 is a standout Kinect game, it really is the only title so far which feels comfortable to play for both adults and children. Coming from Harmonix the presentation is top notch, the song choice varied and most importantly, the overall design means that learning and pulling off the on-screen dance moves is possible, even if you have no skills in this department whatsoever. This really is an excellent Kinect game which makes use of the motion camera’s features and plays to its strengths.