Just Dance 2021 (Nintendo Switch) Review

For the uninitiated, Just Dance is a series of… well, dance games (duh!), which revolves around the very simple concept of copying whatever your digital dance mate is doing on the screen, mainly by waving your Joycon (along with the rest of your body), or, if you want to, by using a smartphone with the necessary app. It is fun, exhilarating, and, if in the company of some friends who are willing to fool around (especially if alcohol is included), one of the best party games ever created. Each game provides a selection of tracks, but there's also a subscription service that unlocks a playlist of over 500 songs to dance to!

Those who know all there is to know about Just Dance, sadly won't get to experience something new. Once again, Just Dance 2021 plays its cards way too safe, although any new addition, good or not, would actually be more than welcome. In other words, apart from a tiny addition here and there, the modes available remain pretty much the same, so don't expect anything fancy. In the end, the only thing that one can talk about in here is the new collection of tunes that can be enjoyed, and the visual treats that accompany them.

Unsurprisingly, the soundtrack of this instalment doesn't innovate either, with the vast majority of the 40 tracks available playing it safe as well, without offering something that feels really fresh, or going to other genres beyond pop, and… well, more pop. That being said, and despite some forgettable, wishy washy borefests (audibly and visually) like Adore You by Harry Styles, among others, and a slightly weird tendency towards Latin-flavoured music, most tracks are great.

In here for the big names? Check out Miss Selena Gomez, Dua Lupa, and a pretty neat Lady Gaga and Ariana Grande combo. Want some oldies from the '90s and beyond? Try the summer-smelling Bailando or In the Navy (don't let grandma see you dancing to it). Want some disco to shake those lardy behinds with? Pump up the volume with Juice by Lizzo. The youngins are pestering you? Let them spend some of their surplus energy in the Kids Mode… and be sure to scare them with the dead eyes of Woody, while he bops along the Toy Story theme.

Part of the Just Dance magic, of course, are the visuals, and while compared to the previous entry this doesn't offer any obvious graphical updates, it remains a feast for the eyes. Live-action, and bored-out-of-their-hairy-behinds cats "dancing" in the background in Kulikitaka; a dark, barren, alien landscape in Billie Eilish's pretty cool All the Good Girls go to Hell; a synthwave-coloured flight with the '80s-esque Blinding Lights; Castlevania meets Blade, meets Mortal Kombat (not kidding) in Lacrimosa; and, finally, the rightfully gender-fluid-friendly, Boy, You Can Keep It by Alex Newell.

These are just a sample, of course, as there's more. Just Dance 2021 includes a little bit of K-Pop by NCT 127 and BLACKPINK, some middle-eastern tunes, plus the almost Bollywood-esque, awesome, and first Persian-language song in the series, Joone Khodet. There's a little bit of samba, some Eurovision-style disco, and more. It also would be a huge omission to not mention Eminem's classic Without Me, which is one of the soundtrack's very best, with the video that plays along it having that quirky superhero theme of the original clip.