1. #1

    Just Dance World Cup Feedback

    I've been following the Just Dance World Cup since I learned about it with the 2017 version of the game.

    There have been some positive developments:
    1. For two years, the JDWC online qualifications have come at a consistent time (in the summer). The year prior to that had started in the fall and run through January. A consistent time definitely helps to spread awareness of the event.
    2. For two years, the JDWC online qualifications have occurred during the summer and on or near the weekend. These seem to be times when many players are able to compete. I think this is a good choice.
    3. For two years, the JDWC online qualifications started after we had several months to learn the dances. This is great and helps ensure that everyone has ample time to prepare. Many players receive the game during Christmas (or later). (Prior to that, the qualifiers had started in the fall, when many people didn't even have the game yet.)
    4. Last year, the online qualifiers came at three different times each week, giving good chances for players to find at least one slot that worked. This was nice. Although it was originally advertised that each slot was for a different region, it was later announced online that players could dance on any or all of the days, regardless of their region. (It would have been nice to make this clear to players who didn't know about the website.)
    5. I love that national qualifiers were added to several countries, especially the late addition to the USA last time. These national qualifiers give more players opportunities to compete beyond the online qualifications, they spread added awareness of Just Dance, and they give each country a chance to cheer their own dancers before the world cup. Hopefully a few more countries will add national qualifiers. (It must be hard when there are excellent players using different platforms, but there isn't a national qualifier.)
    6. The JDWC website accommodates different languages and countries, and notably if you visit the website in the USA it doesn't currently default for Great Britain like it had previously.
    7. One of my favorite improvements is that Just Dance 2019 lets Ubisoft include announcements in the game. I saw the announcement about the previous champion's Unlimited dance, and hope to see more news about the JDWC in these announcements, especially when the online qualifications roll around.

    I believe there is still some room for improvement.
    1. The national qualifiers and the world cup appear to use a camera system; I'm guessing it's Xbox Kinect. But the online qualifications take in dancers using Xbox, PS4, Switch, and Wii U. It seems like the Kinect players have a significant advantage here, since they are used to the demands of the Kinect sensor. In some cases, there are judges, but even when there are judges, it seems that the Kinect score still matters in many cases (especially some of the national qualifiers that I watched). Some consideration should be given to players who didn't qualify using Xbox Kinect, but who need to compete against Kinect (and other platform players) on Kinect in the higher stages of the competition.
    2. Last year, there seemed to be a steep curve that seemed to favor other platforms over Xbox Kinect to some extent, while the years prior to that seemed not to have a big enough curve and seemed to favor Xbox Kinect players to some extent. It must be difficult to compare platforms, especially since the comparison can't be consistent across all levels (that is, it might be easier to hit 13,000 on one platform than another for a given song, yet it might be about equally difficult to hit 12,000 on the same song). In my experience on the World Dance Floor throughout a given year, it always seems obvious that certain songs favor Xbox Kinect, certain songs favor a remote, and other songs seem more equal, at least in terms of the top of the leaderboard. It seems like if the song selection were wiser, it wouldn't be necessary to adopt a substantial curve across the different platforms. Last year, Side to Side, Instruction, and 24K Magic Extreme seemed to be much easier with Kinect, such that if other songs not favoring Kinect as much had been chosen, the leaderboard may have only slightly favored Kinect. (Ideally, if you could tweak the scoring to produce fairly similar scores across all platforms, this would not only alleviate the scoring considerations for the JDWC, but it would also result in a fairer World Dance Floor experience across the platforms.)
    3. I watched the world finals last year. One concern that I had was that a couple of dancers were getting very physical dances in the song selection, and seemed rather worn out for the dances that followed. Imagine getting Another One Bites the Dust Alternate and Footloose back to back (or in a very short time period), and then having to come back out and compete against a different dancer who is more fresh on some other dance. I would like to see the best dancers always dancing their best. Maybe they need a bigger break between dances. Or maybe the song selection needs to be more fair so that everyone is equally worn out. For one of the national qualifiers, I saw a player hit a great score on Footloose, and the same dancer had to dance to Footloose a short while later and did much worse on it the second time, which seemed to show how important song selection can be. On a different national qualifier, it seemed like all the dancers were doing the same 3 songs in the first round, which makes for a more equitable work load. At least, if you could properly rate the physical toll that each dance takes, you could prepare a more equitable song selection.
    4. The online qualifications sometimes feel like a demanding marathon. These usually include a few very physical, fast-paced dances (like Footloose). There are 6 to 8 dances back to back with no breaks. I usually feel worn out at the end, trying to catch my breath, pushing myself through the last dance. But dancing isn't just exercise, it's also about gracefulness and smoothness, isn't it, at least to some extent? I realize that fitness may be an important challenge, but I wish there were a breather after physical dances to catch your breath. If using the PS4 camera, a short intermission between dances would also let you close the game and reopen the game to refresh the camera (which seems to be more likely to develop issues the longer you dance). And what if you need a bathroom break, or realized that you forgot your towel or water bottle at the other end of the house? Maybe there could be 3 songs, a break, and 3 songs...
    5. When watching the world finals, I wish there were a commentator who would review the dance after the dance was done, making a few comments, maybe using a telestrator, perhaps pointing out one or two technical issues. I would like to see a little analysis, perhaps learn a thing or two (without giving away all the secrets of the game), much like analysts do with virtually every sport. The judges do make comments now, but you don't see a replay of specific moves while the specific comments are being made.
    6. I often wonder if the background may be an issue during the national and world qualifiers. I see two dancers with a screen behind them. At home, many of the top camera players have a solid green, white, or black background, and wear contrasting clothes. On stage, the background is a screen with changing colors (assuming this shows live to the audience), showing the dance while they dance to it. This is great for the audience (except that it appears reversed compared to the dancers, which also probably causes confusion for some audience members about which score is which). But does it affect the gameplay experience? Not all of the images on the screen are symmetric, and the players aren't always placed symmetrically relative to the screen (inevitable with their left/right motions, since they don't just dance in one spot). At a critical move, one player might happen to have a better background at a given moment. I see that often everyone wears the same shirt, which may help to some extent. And in the US finals, for the third dance players appeared to switch places (but the third dance was only scored by the game, if I understood correctly, so if there was any advantage to the position of the dancer, it was most significant for the third dance). In my experience, Xbox Kinect is very good at handling background issues, but it isn't perfect, right? This is something to consider.
    7. On the last day of the world finals, it would be cool to see one freestyle dance from each player. The best dancer shouldn't just be the best to mimic moves from the game, but should also be able to add a little creativity to dancing, or at least be able to demonstrate a unique style. Maybe there would have to be some rules for going about this, or maybe they would need to work with a Just Dance team member to develop a freestyle dance. But it would add a dimension to the competition.
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  2. #2
    Ubi-Lucipus's Avatar Community Manager
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    I am always astounded by the level and detail of your feedback, and as always I want to let you know how much we appreciate you sharing your thoughts and ideas

    These things are always important to us and we would encourage you to continue giving us these detailed reports.

    I hope you have an amazing day!
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