Weight Loss through Dance Dance Revolution?

An anonymous reader writes "Looking at the beer gut that's developed over the winter, and the excercise schedule that I haven't kept for more than two days at a time, I realize that I need a new plan. A gym isn't the answer; I can't keep a schedule for working out in my apartment, there's no way I could make it to the gym on any regular basis. I've had multiple people in the last few weeks tell me stories involving weight loss through Dance Dance Revolution, and it sounds like a great idea to me! working out is hard, playing video games is easy, and dancing is fun. But a Google search turned up way too much info, and way too little of it was useful unless I want to spend the next four weeks researching this. Does the Slashdot community have any ideas, suggestions, or personal experience that they cared to relate on any of these topics?" "First, what's the best pad to get? What kind of differences are there between pads? Is it worth spending $100+, or will the cheaper pads do? Second, what software is best to use? Ideally I'd like to have something expandable, which means getting a PC rig rather than a PS2 one. Are there any open source DDR-type programs? How does one acquire songs?"

Comments

DDR is not easy

[cloudless.net]

"working out is hard, playing video games is easy"

DDR is not easy! It took me a lot of practicing to pass the first stage. By the way an hour of playing DDR is much more tiring than working out for an hour. However it is fun and even addictive so you'll keep on playing it.

StepMania

[semaj]

StepMania is fantastic, and is open source. The only tricky thing is finding the songs to play on it, there are a few free ones and people have converted a lot of the (copyrighted) Dance Dance Revolution ones, but they're obviously of dubious legality. There are a few IRC channels around where you can download packs of all the songs.

It's a fantastic program, and there's even an Xbox port! Try it, I think you'll be surprised how polished it feels!

I don't have any experience of losing weight with it though - I kind of have the opposite problem. :-)

Re:StepMania

[Relic of the Future]

There's also PyDance (written in Python, of course, and is available as a Debian package). It's not quite as polished as StepMania (they're, of course, looking for more help), but it runs a hell of a lot smoother on my PII-350 then bloated StepMania does. And you can d/l every DDR song from DDR:UK (well, all but the 2 newest ones available off xbox-live). (You can get them in groups by mix via bittorrent, or d/l them one at a time as .zips.)

As a DDR player...

[Eneff]

Start out on a local DDR machine. http://www.ddrfreak.com/ has a game locator. Play 20 bucks worth, and see if it's worth investing in.

If it is, get a good, durable pad. DDRFreak will have suggestions. You can get the pads for Playstation or PC.

There are also instructions on building your own, but if you have trouble with the motivation to exercise already, just buy a pad. Don't give yourself excuses.

I don't play DDR.

[ForestGrump]

Howewver, what I can tell you is:
1. change your diet. veggies and veggies. Eat healthy, no more double bacon cheeseburger 3 times a day. No more soda. Instead, always have a liter of water on you. Sit down, have a meal, leave. Don't dibble dabble at the table with food infront of you. It will only make you eat more.

2. start moving. If your thinking, pace. Sure you may seem like a nervous wreak to your boss, but atleast your going to look sexy doing it (some day that is).

3. Remember. Energy in > Energy out = weight gain
Energy out > energy in = weight loss.

Laslty. If you feel the urge to swallow something, swallow water.

-Grump

Re:I don't play DDR.

[BladeMelbourne]

Very insightful.

I would like to add:

1. Consume at least 2 litres of water per day. If you exercise during that day, drink an extra 1-2 litres. If it is a hot day - drink an extra 1-2 litres. Water helps keeps the brain 'on task', it flushes impurities from your body, it's energy content is negligible and it is cheap. Remember - if you are feeling thirsty - you are already starting to dehydrate.

2. Consume no more than 20 grams of fat (not FAT32) per day. Even if you rarely exercise (like me) - you will loose weight (like me). Nutritional info can be found on product packaging - keep a daily tally - but dont be obsessive. Do not consume excess carbohydrates - the body can convert this to fat. Oh, and once a week, reward yourself with a decent unhealthy meal.

3. Ensure you get all the protein, vitamins, minerals, etc that your body needs. Dont forget calcium. Dont forget fibre - your bowels will thank you with regularity. If you dont think you are getting everything - take multivitamins. No point looking lean if your body is unhealthy, your bones weak, your intestines full of toxins, etc.

4. Try not to eat large meals close to bed-time - the body will not metabolise the energy content from the food and store it as fat. If you are really keen, have 5 (healthy) snacks during the day instead of 3 meals.

5. Limit alcohol consumption to one occasion per week - but get blotto if you feel the need.

6. If you are out on the street - try not to carry cash - it will be harder to get junk food.

Re:I don't play DDR.

[hankwang]

Water helps keeps the brain 'on task', it flushes impurities from your body

Myth. There is no scientific evidence supporting

• that humans need to drink large amounts of water
• that the thirst response of your body has a fundamental misadjustment. (An exception may be extremely intensive sporting, but not normal day-to-day life)
• that impurities are flushed from the body more effectively if you drink more. That is not how the kidneys work.

Drink water or products with a large water content when you feel thirsty. Excessive water intake can lead to loss of minerals.

Consume no more than 20 grams of fat (not FAT32) per day

This is a modern belief, especially prevalent in the USA, which is quite disputable. All experts agree in any case that saturated fats and trans-unsaturated fats are unhealthy. However, cis-unsaturated and polyunsaturated fats (roughly the ones that are liquid at room temperature) are not unhealthy per se. Fats are digested much more slowly than carbohydrates, which makes you feel saturated for a longer time after a meal.

Limit alcohol consumption to one occasion per week.

Moderate intake of alcohol has been proven to have a positive effect on heart and blood vessels. The negative effects of alcohol on the liver start only at higher intakes. Moderate here means up to 2 standard glasses (e.g. 100 ml wine or 250 ml beer) per day for males and 1 for females. Essential here is that there is a small amount of alcohol in the body most of the time, so spread out the alcohol intake as much as possible over the days. If you drink red wine, you'll get the additional benefits of the flavonoid anti-oxidants as well.

Of course, it's true that alcohol carries a lot of calories.

Re:I don't play DDR.

[Anonymous Coward]

Consume no more than 20 grams of fat (not FAT32) per day

If you can keep track of stuff then you should figure out your total calories per day first. After that set macronutrients by percentage. For example, 30/30/40 percent(by calorie, not weight) for protein/fat/carbohydrate is "zone" diet range but there is plenty of room for modification here depending on how you feel. Dropping fat intake below 20 or 15 percent is probably not good though. Fat should come from fish, nuts, avocado, olive oil, and other so-called "good fats". Carbs should come from high fiber sources as much as possible to keep things moving. Eat a variety of foods.
If you can't or don't want to keep track of every calorie, just make food choices while trying to approximate the above. For example, eat a sandwich with whole grain bread(4g fiber per slice) instead of white bread(0g fiber per slice). If you want a hamburger, make it out of beef that has 10% fat instead beef with 20% fat, or use ostrich or some other lean meat and get the fat from a handful of almonds.

Try not to eat large meals close to bed-time - the body will not metabolise the energy content from the food and store it as fat.

First of all, you probably shouldn't really eat large meals at any time. That said, it is a myth that calories you eat before bed get stored as fat. There are numerous studies which indicate that the time of day that you consume calories has little impact on fat loss or gain overall. It is total calories and the overall macronutrient breakdown which counts most. Also, your body continues to function while you are asleep, and to burn calories. It does not all of a sudden start converting everything into fat just becuase you are sleeping.

Re:I don't play DDR.

[drinkypoo]

All experts agree in any case that saturated fats and trans-unsaturated fats are unhealthy.

The problem with making blanket statements is that they are nearly always false. Whether or not it's true, whether or not you think Taubes has an agenda, not everyone believes that it particularly matters what kind of fat you take in.

From the article I linked:

But it gets even weirder than that. Foods considered more or less deadly under the low-fat dogma turn out to be comparatively benign if you actually look at their fat content. More than two-thirds of the fat in a porterhouse steak, for instance, will definitively improve your cholesterol profile (at least in comparison with the baked potato next to it); it's true that the remainder will raise your L.D.L., the bad stuff, but it will also boost your H.D.L. The same is true for lard. If you work out the numbers, you come to the surreal conclusion that you can eat lard straight from the can and conceivably reduce your risk of heart disease.

The real issue is that you have to eat appropriately for your activity, and one thing that dieticians DO agree upon is that we are eating too many processed carbohydrates and too many carbs in general as a nation.

Cut out saturated fats if you must, but mostly you should consider that if you're not burning what you take in, you're going to get fatter. Also you should realize that the more highly processed carbohydrates are (or the simpler they are, some of them start that way, like sugars) the faster they will metabolize and if you're not burning them as fast as they're converted they're probably going to be stored as fat.

Some alcohol carries a lot of calories, some doesn't. Scotch, vodka, gin, and similar alcohols have nearly no sugar in them, it's all been converted to alcohol. HOWEVER, your body turns to alcohol first so you are not burning fat or even carbohydrates you've taken in while there is alcohol in your system.

The Hacker's Diet free, online book & spreadsh

[ivi]

It's been around for a while, but may be worth
a fresh mention:

www.fourmilab.ch/hackdiet/www/hackdiet.html

Exercise AND Diet

[bakes]

Together a good exercise program AND a good diet will help you lose weight. Playing DDR for 30-60 mins per day is a good start, but only half the battle.

BTW, when I say diet I mean eating PROPERLY, not necessarily eating less. Just eating less doesn't help that much if it's still all junk.

The best way to go is to get up an hour earlier than you do now and exercise first thing in the morning, rather than trying to squeeze it in at night when you are tired and really don't feel like it. You might find you are a little tired (especially mid-afternoon) for the first few days, but once you are used to it it's a great way to get the blood pumping and get you started for the day.

After a while your body will become accustomed to your exercise pattern, and your weight loss might plateau. If this happens you should look at occasionally doing something different, such as swimming, cycling, running, or a sport like ultimate.

First, you need a rig...

[jaybird144]

All right, first off, I would like to say that I have lost weight by playing DDR - not much, mind you, but some. Enough for me. (I do other things too, but primarily DDR.) As far as equipment goes, it sounds like what you are looking for is very similar to my own setup. I use an open-source DDR emulator called Stepmania that runs under Windows, Linux and Mac OSX. (Note, I run it under Windows, personally, and cannot vouch for how well the other versions work.) I use a pair of pads that I bought off eBay for about $40 (similar to these), which I like a lot better than the really thin ones that tend to be more common. Finally, I have an adapter to hook the Playstation gamepads to my PC through USB. As for songs, there are several places around the Net to find them...I'm sure someone else will mention them, but just know that it's illegal to have them unless you own a copy of them (which sometimes means having a machine). As such, I'll leave that as an exercise for you to find, if you so wish.

Try something fun and sociable

[CompVisGuy]

Try and find a form of exercise that you enjoy and which also has a sociable element.

I do Taekwondo twice a week. It's easy to keep going regularly because:

1. The classes are fun, so I look forward to going.
2. The people are very friendly, and TKD is usually very inclusive (ages, sexes etc.). This social aspect helps you keep going.
3. There are regular gradings (when you test for a new belt), usually every three months, so there is regular positive reinforcement.
4. Not only do you learn an effective form of self-defence, lose weight, gain strength, flexibility and self-confidence, but you will get regular opportunities to put your day-to-day worries to one side -- if you have a stressful job, this is very rewarding.

I'm not saying TKD if the way for you, but the above qualities make it a good way to get and stay fit, without dropping out.

pydance

[Sailor Coruscant]

pydance is another open source DDR clone, with support for all sorts of different mats and dance games.

They also have a good faq with information on what mats to buy, and how to convert a soft mat into a proper hard mat.

Priorities and how to make it easier

[SilentJ_PDX]

Until you make losing weight a real priority in your life, you're never going to achieve much. (I don't really get the sense that the poster is ready to make it a priority)

Making it a priority inevitably means giving up other things... giving up time for exercise and/or giving up food to diet. I chose to go the time route because I love food too much. I give up about 10 hours a week to run now, which means I sometimes miss going out with friends, TV shows, reading time, etc.

However, it's not all bad news. When I finally decided to get off my ass, I joined a running club. Believe it or not, this group is almost more social than exercise ("a drinking club with a running problem") and there are runners of all abilities. Having a group of people sharing the pain really helps and we all encourage each other. These days, I actually look forward to the group runs and I'm constantly challenging myself to go faster.

Good luck... but the first step is really deciding to make health/weight loss a priority.

Re:Stop procrasti-planning and Start Sweating.

[duggy_92127]

Grabble is correct in all respoects, including his attitude. Particularly: it doesn't matter, at all, WHAT you do, as long as you're sweating. In one sense, you're on track: you've possibly identified something fun (DDR) that should get you moving, so on that note, follow through and get a pad and start.

But on the other side, you ARE looking for a "quick way out". Going to the gym only sucks because what you've been doing there is not fun. My gym has racquetball courts, which I randomly tried one day and BY GOD, how much fun was THAT?? I'm in there 1-2 times a week now, and sweatin' all over the place.

Or get a sub-$100 hybrid bike from Target and start riding around. It's insanely easy to spend 2-3 hours on a bike, especially once you find the "good trails" which, I assure you, are VERY close to your house. That's hundreds of calories burned and hours of healthy elevated heartrate with no perceived effort, because it's just fun to ride around.

Personally, I do the above, and I also took up swimming about six months ago. Talk about low-impact but all-body workout! I've had pulled muscles from other activities, but didn't feel any pain at all while swimming; but for such a low-impact activity, it sure does work EVERYTHING. Strong legs, strong arms and back, abs... and once you get into a rhythm, your mind can wander and you think about what you like, and suddenly you're finishing up a mile. An hour of swimming is great all-around exercise.

In addition, Grabble's comments on food intake are spot-on. Stop eating "meals", and start eating smaller, balanced "mini-meals" throughout the day, snacks, almost. Almost immediately, you'll start being less hungry, and you'll be amazed at how LITTLE food you need to remain not hungry. In fact, once you do that, you'll have to be careful not to eat too LITTLE, because that can slow the metabolism. If you're very overweight, I'd cut the intake by more that 5% off of weight*15 calories, at least at the beginning.

My personal success story? On Thanksgiving of last year, 2003, I was 250lbs and just decided, forget it, I'm going to change this. I picked swimming, and jumped in a pool and taught myself to swim laps. I did that every day for four months, while also adjusting my eating, as per the above. In the last two months, I've eased off the swimming a little and added the cycling, and recently the racquetball, and some weight lifting for tone.

The result? I'm just about to break the 200lb barrier, and if I do say do myself, I'm looking great. Strong shoulders and back from swimming, and legs from that and cycling; chest and even abs are firm and VISIBLE, which is a new thing. It's absolutely amazing, and I wasn't out there killing myself every day, we're talking 30-45min in a pool, just getting the heartrate up. That's all it takes.

Losing weight and toning up doesn't have to be a painful chore; just pick something remotely fun and start doing it every day, ever for a tiny amount of time. DDR, just buy a pad and start up. Get a bike and ride around. Jump in a pool and "swim laps", even if you suck at it. Tennis and racquetball are great fun, even alone against a wall. Get the heartrate up doing something fun, ANYTHING fun, and keep at it; since it's FUN, it won't be a chore, right? :)

Best of luck to you. Feel free to contact me, anybody, if you like, to talk about this topic. I'm pretty passionate about it, since I've lost 20% of my body weight in six months and just feel great! :)

Doug

Pads

[Xepo]

Everyone else is pretty much correct, it doesn't matter what you do, just do it, and stop procrastinating. But noone has really answered the ddr pads question, and you don't wanna waste money. I don't know how overweight you are, but that can really affect your enjoyment of the ddr pads. The flat pads (incredibly thin ones, as opposed to the 1-inch thick ones) will fail within 5 months if you play much, the thicker pads...there are all different kind of varieties of them. Anywhere from $30 - $150. Most people will be perfectly fine with $30 pads from ebay, but one of my friends (whose like 7 foot and is massive), can't play on it at all, cause the pad bunches up. Red Octane pads (~$90) are widely known as the best soft thick pads, and the foam inside is quite a bit more firm than the $30 ones. Plus they're more sensitive, which won't really matter unless you're planning on stepping extremely lightly. If you're going to go with soft pads, I'd suggest either Red Octane thick pads, or the flat pads.

Oh, it also depends on what you're planning to play on. The flat pads are mostly unplayable on carpet, unless you take the time to tape them over some hard wood to make them into hard pads. You'll see all sorts of tutorials if you google for it on how to mod flat pads.

Next, if you're okay with spending like $150 per pad, you can get hard plastic, or metal pads. I don't really have much experience with those, as I don't have the cash to afford that. The top of the line hard pad is widely known as cobalt flux. They're absolutely beautiful pads, but they're $300 a pop, a little insane pricing for most players. But, unless you've played the game before, and know that it'll help you, I wouldn't suggest spending much. Actually, I'd suggest buying two flat pads for $12 from ebay and duct taping them down and playing on some concrete or hard wood, until you know you enjoy it.

Elliptical machines are the best

[Paladine97]

I bought an elliptical machine for my house and I have lost over 20 lbs now. I like ellipticals better than treadmills because they have much less impact which helps your knees.

You have to make exercising a priority or else you will get nowhere. I used to be about 10 lbs over my ideal weight, and now I'm 10 under and am in the maintenance mode (I don't want to lose anymore!). I have increased energy and feel great. I don't feel like such a sack of shit when I haul up loads of stairs.

Here are some things that helped me that might help you.
1) Drink only 0 calorie things. No pop, No juices. Just water or diet pops (I've actually developed a taste for Diet Pepsi after having hated the stuff all my life).
2) My workout routine is simply 25 minutes at max, 5 minutes cooldown. The machine tells me I'm doing about 200-240 watts. Equals about 400 calories burned when I'm done (though I think the calculation is a little off because other machines rate it higher, like 500). I work out every other day, usually at night when I get back from work. DO NOT SKIP A DAY. If you do, make it up by doing two in a row. I tend to eat at 6 o'clock or so, then I let my system digest and then I workout in the 8-9 hour. Throw in a DVD or charge up the iPod, and I'm kept busy.
3) Avoid high-calorie foods. Basically, eat whatever you want. No restrictions on fat or anything. But avoid super high-calorie foods. For example, don't buy an apple pie from McDonalds (they are like 500 calories!!).

Easy to lose weight w/ DDR

[DroopyStonx]

First, you need a good pad. There's a Red Octane foam mat you can get for $100 that's pretty decent, or you can shell out $300 and get a Cobalt Flux/a pad which is pretty much indestructible (someone tested it by running it over with an SUV and it still worked perfectly).

Second, if you want to lose weight, you need to eat properly. A good gague is your body weight x 10 in calories per day. 40% of which must come from protein and carbs while 20% come from fats (you can change up numbers to suit your own body). Eat good fats found in Salmon/Flaxseed Oil and eat carbs low on the Glycemic Index (brown rice, natural oatmeal, vegetables, etc..)

Third, you need to workout. DDR is considered HIIT (high intensitiy interval training) which means you go through small bursts of aerobic activity. For example, you do a song on standard mode, your heart rate could get up to 90% of its max. When you're done, rest for a minute or two till your heart rate goes back down to 60-65% then start again. This cycle will cause your body to burn more fat than a steady cardio session.

I've actually compared 30 minutes of DDR vs. 45 minutes of aerobic exercise and DDR is by far the best. For me, I burned around 600 calories in 30 minutes as opposed to burning 600 over 45-60 minutes with regular cardio. On top of that, it's fun. Running on a treadmill is boring as hell and the time goes by so slow, but when you play the game and workout, time flies and before you know it, it's done.

As long as you eat properly and workout so that you have a 1000 calorie deficit a day, you should be able to lose 2 lbs of fat per week.

Re:"just do it"

[sartin]

Your answer isn't coming up with a "schedule for working out" in your apartment, or even a gym membership. Just go outside, and run. Just go

Actually for some people, a schedule helps a lot. Knowing the plan creates opportunity for reinforcement; there's the habit of the plan and the guilt of not following it to help.

For some of us, a plan is really required. With a job, a 3 month old, a wife on disability from a difficult delivery, and a 4 year old, pretty much anything I want to do has to either be scheduled or done between midnight and 2 (which is really another way of saying I've scheduled those two hours for personal time/sleep, whichever seems more imporatnt). Thanks to scheduling, I did a 40 mile bicycle ride on Sunday averaging a not overly pathetic 16.4 miles per hour. I managed to do that even though I hadn't been out on my road bike in six months. I scheduled in mountain biking time, some health club time, hikes with the 4 year old (I'm just guessing the occasional need to carry him a mile with 250 foot climb probably helped my endurance a little).

Doesn't matter much what you do, just about any physical activity is better than nothing. A plan might help if your personality or circumstances dictate. The important thing, plan or not, is to get out and be active.

Re:"just do it"

[Ertman]

Great advice, if you want to be a cripple by the time you are 40 years old. Running is possibly the worst thing you could do for your health. Stay at home in front of the PC and you are likely to have a healthier life.

Sure, running will give you great cardio fitness, but at the expense of arthritic ankles and knees.

If you REALLY want to get in shape, and be able to walk past your 50th birthday, take up swimming or cycling.

If you are going to spend the money to get a treadmill, get an elliptical machine instead. The good ones do a pretty good simulation of running uphill, but don't place much stress on the joints.

General advice (mats, program, song choices)

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you should ignore those people who are saying you "need to get out and sweat". I played DDR before I pretty much mastered it (B on most 10-footers on normal settings, for DDR freaks). I could happily play for hours because it genuinly is fun.

OK: for mats, I have here two Ignition mats in a wooden frame, with rubber mats from our car nailed on the bottom to reduce friction on our wooden floor. That's my recommendation. If you want a hard mat, get the best - especially if you're overweight. Don't get a flimsy sort of hard mat; my one only lasted a month or so.

Don't get some pathetic plastic mat - they crumple, slide around, and have a too-smooth surface. If you do get one for some reason, fix it onto the floor with bricks. If you have a wooden floor. put something under the bricks to avoid scratching the floor.

Get a proper mat with a foam mattress.

Use StepMania (DWI if SM runs too slow), and use BitTorrent to get song files. I suggest you screw with the whole "legal thing" and go leech at ddruk.com. Start from 1st mix and go up to 8th mix. Then pick other stuff slowly, if at all - they tend to have lower quality songs.

Turn off the lyrics in the StepMania options, they're a distraction.

Progress quickly: Just skip all the one-footers and go straight to 2. 3 isn't such a big step. From 4-6, you will probably have to redo your style (I won't detail it here) and then you can progress nicely. Be aware that completing a 9-footer from 3rd Mix (the earliest mix to have them) is considerably easier then the 9-footers from 8th Mix. Always play a few songs you know you will pass and always play a few songs you know you will fail. Vary your training style - sometimes, play easy songs intending to AA them, sometimes play hard songs intending to C them, sometimes pick songs 5 in advance, sometimes set up a course, sometimes add modifiers, sometimes play facing sideways, etc. etc. etc. There's a certain level where playing is the most fun, and you should enjoy it while you can (but don't be scared to progress!)

Run easy, run often

[Anonymous Coward]

My method:

1. Run 100 feet, walk back home
2. skip a day
3. Run 110 feet, walk back home
4. skip a day
5. Run 120 feet, walk back home ...
6. Run 1 mile, walk back home ...

I did this over a 4 month period and went from being out of breath after 100 feet to being able to run 7 miles continuously.

The Key is to always run a little more than the last time. Sometimes, when you have the right weather, food intake, and your body cooperates, you can run more than 10 extra feet.

Excessive Water is Lethal!

[Anonymous Coward]

Excessive water intake is lethal. It takes about 3 gallons according to the alt.suicide faq. Not a very pleasant way to go...

Re:Advice from a DDR-aholic.

[odaen]

Few pad ideas

You can get a 'Logic Pro dance mat' which is ignition style from Logics own website. The previous logic pad I had (black backed) has only ever had a split in it and still works pretty much perfectly.

Try to avoid 'plasticy' style mats, like the plague. These don't last long at all, and tend to break after 2 weeks use.

If you are going to go for a metal pad, try red-octanes or the ones off play-asia.com, these seem to be the popular picks. AVOID the pads on ebay as these are all cheaper metal pads which bend like hell.

Finally if you want to go all out, cobaltflux is the way to go. www.cobaltflux.com These last forever!

In terms of getting a program to use them, I recommend either stepmania or dwi, and an EMS2 USB converter, which works on both windows and linux. The ems2 usb, comes complete with 2 sockets, so you can play doubles mode if you are so inclined.

In fact I'd be very tempted just to ignore getting an official console version and get all the songs you need from ddruk.com .