Grease Is the Word: The Grease Dance Review

Before there was High School Musical, there was Grease, a sing a long story of a tough high school motorcycle gang member who falls in love all over again with the girl he’d met over the summer that just happens to wind up at his school in the fall. The melodic tale is one of the most beloved Broadway productions and films of all time, being brought back year after year in some form or another, introducing itself to a new audience. And since it’s a dance film, with plenty of signature moves, it seemed a good choice for the next dance oriented game. But does it live up to the fun of the film that starred John Travolta and Olivia Newton John?


By now, you should be pretty familiar with how dance games work on the Kinect. The motion sensor checks out your moves and grades you on how close you are to the characters on screen and Grease Dance is no exception. But the game relies too much on people being familiar with the dances of the 32 year old film, which is a pretty big assumption on their part. There is not a training mode (such as Dance Central’s Break Down) where you can learn the signature moves before playing the game for real. Instead, you are basically forced to try and mimic the guy or gal on the screen with no clue as to what you are doing until you actually do it. Then you are expected to learn 20 songs of choreography if you hope to master the game. The good news, though, is that the game’s grading system is very tolerant, much more than it’s competition, and so even sloppy versions of the dance are rewarded kindly, which for some will make the game too easy, while it will frustrate others.


Songs are broken up into three levels of difficulty, easy, medium, and hard. The game starts you at the easy ones and you work your way up through the six levels of easy, six levels of medium and 3 levels of hard, unlocking new songs as you go along. That is why the grading is so important, because failing to unlock the new ones and having to keep repeating earlier rounds can be pretty annoying, especially if you aren’t good at remembering choreography.

The biggest draw to this game, one where fans will certainly find true delight, especially at those 70’s parties is the nostalgic soundtrack, for which you get to sing a long. That’s right boys and girls, it’s not all about dancing, but singing too in the game’s Karaoke mode. Like the dance portion, it’s not very caring of whether you are a forceful singer or even one who keeps up with all the lyrics. So as a challenge, it’s not that challenging. But it is fun to sing along with the over 20 songs from the musical. But a word to the parents. The songs are not censored at all, and there are some words, especially in the tune Greased Lightning that you may not want your kids to be singing, words we shouldn’t repeat here.


Multiplayer can take the form of cooperative play, competition, or even switching duties of singing and dancing back and forth, something that the Kinect did have a bit of trouble in recognizing the changeups quickly, which was a bit tedious. There is even a mode where two players and six back up singers can participate.

There is a camera mode to take pictures, but there is no way to share them or keep them, so that really takes away from the joy and prosperity of that perfect dance move, which is a shame…

All in all, this game could have been a lot more fun and will definitely not please hardcore dance game players, but for those who want some casual fun, an ice breaker at a party or just soaking in some of nostalgia from the past, the game provides enough entertainment to give fans something to enjoy. On that note, we give the game a 3.5/5 stars.