Las Vegas Arcade London announced today that an official location test of DDR Ace would take place at their location this summer. This will make it the first European Bemani location test sanctioned by Konami in more than 7 years, following UBeat’s trial run in 2008.
According to our sources, the british loctest version of DDRA will feature a new lineup of licenses that are completely independent from the US ones, as well as card readers and eAmusement participation. There’s also rumors of another arcade in London being considered for a parallel location test, but those are still unconfirmed. We’ll keep you up-to-date should more info surface!
Update #1
Apparently, the cabinets will not be distributed under a lease contract, but will be available for sale by individual arcades. This heavily reduces the financial burden on arcade owners as they do not need to pay a 30% share of the revenue generated by the DDR cabinets to Konami, like is custom in Japan and other Asian countries.
Update #2
Furthermore, if the loctest is deemed successful, the cabinets will be available for sale in the entirety of Europe. Distribution will be handled by Electrocoin in the UK.
Update #3
It turns out that we were wrong in one regard – the licensed songs that will be available during the location test will be the exact same as the ones in the U.S. release – sorry!
Good evening,May you please also do it for south Africa, south Africa is dying for one. Regards Malikhoa shikwane 🙂
Meanwhile, in Latin America, we’re praying for have a direct sale distribution channel for the DDR A: https://www.change.org/p/konami-por-favor-trae-dance-dance-revolution-para-latinoam%C3%A9rica
Best of luck to you guys! I know the Bemani community is strong down there as well, and it’d be amazing to see you join the list of eAmusement-enabled areas soon!