Which Dance Pad is Best for Dance Dance Revolution?

Years ago, I was walking past the arcade in the mall when I saw someone playing the video game "Dance Dance Revolution" (also known as "DDR"), and I was immediately mesmerized. I couldn't believe that anyone could actually keep up with the arrows scrolling speedily along with the music, and I knew I wanted to learn how to play the game. I picked up a Dance Dance Revolution disc for my Playstation 2, and a soft, fold-up dance pad was included with the game. For quite a while this soft dance pad sufficed, and slowly but surely I taught myself how to play the game. As I began to get better and move on to harder levels, however, I realized there were some problems with the soft dance pad. 

For starters, the soft pad was made out of extremely lightweight material, so it would slip around on my floor and move out from under my feet. The harder and faster the DDR dance steps got, the more I noticed the problem with the dance pad slipping and moving around. Also, although the soft pad had arrows printed on it to show you where to step, it wasn't necessarily apparent where the sensor was contained in the soft pad, so sometimes I would make a dance step correctly but it wouldn't be registered and Dance Dance Revolution would show that I missed the step. This became very frustrating as I got better at DDR, since often times this problem would cause a long combo to end and would ultimately lower my score and dance rating. 

Frustrated, I began to search the internet for a better Dance Dance Revolution dance pad. It didn't take me long to discover that there are many, many third-party dance pads available for the various game consoles. Many of these pads were simply modified versions of the soft dance pad I already had. But a few of the DDR pads I saw were actually solid, made out of metal or plastic. These hard dance pads had the huge advantage of weighing enough that they wouldn't slip or move from underneath me while I was playing the video game. Also, the hard dance pads had large buttons that you press with your feet as you dance, so there is never any question as to whether or not you're hitting the sensor or whether a step you make will be registered. I knew if I was serious about Dance Dance Revolution I would need a better Dance Pad, so I went ahead and ordered a hard plastic model. 

Once I received my hard dance pad, the difference in my game scores was like night and day. I could do much better on the DDR songs with the hard dance pad, and I found that the super-fast songs became much easier once I had the proper equipment. The hard dance pads don't fold up and are rather large, so they're not the best for traveling with, but if you primarily intend to play Dance Dance Revolution in your own home, I would highly recommend purchasing a hard dance pad. The pads made out of plastic are cheaper than the ones made out of metal, and you should be able to find a good quality hard dance pad for less than $100 if you search the internet for a good deal. I never though that the dance pad I was using could make such a big difference, but if you are a big DDR fan, you'll definitely want to ditch your soft dance pad and replace it with a plastic or metal one.