The age of reclusive video gamers hiding in dark rooms, surrounded by greasy potato chip bags and empty cans of Mountain Dew has come to an end. Today, gamers can get up and move to high-energy techno music instead of wearing their thumbs to the bone pressing buttons.

Dance Dance Revolution, or DDR to insiders, is a new type of video game. Formerly found only in mall arcades or Lazer Quest, it is now available for home use and has quickly become popular among males and females alike. DDR is a physically demanding game that makes the player step on a four-arrow mat on the floor instead of constantly mashing buttons.

Originally, players used only one hand-held controller, but then the game expanded to the dance pad and the arcade game.

Junior Tim Brenner prefers this form of the game.

"At arcades it is the best, because if you're good at it, you can attract a crowd," he said.

The game involves a screen and a platform with four arrows: up, down, left and right. Four stationary arrows are at the top of the screen, in addition to scrolling arrows. A song plays, and when the scrolling arrows overlap the stationary arrows, players hit the corresponding arrow on the platform.

"It's hard to do at first because you lose your balance," Brenner said, "but if you keep playing, you'll get better."

Junior Danny Daykin has played DDR for over six months and works to maintain his talents.

"I try to do Dance Dance every day to keep my skills at a peak," he said.

Junior Kyle Riggenbach said he plays DDR at least once a week.

"Dance Dance is so easy anyone can do it, and it's fun for everyone," he said. "If you're good, it's really fun, and if you're bad, your friends have fun laughing at you."

Sophomore Jessica Sullivan recently tried DDR for the first time.

"It's hard to do at first," she said. "I didn't know I had to wait till the arrow was in the spot."

Brenner enjoys the game because of its uniqueness.

"DDR is not like other video games," he said. "It's very physical and active."