Around the same time of 9-11 incident, there are gossips among DDR players in the home front concerning the next DDR mix. Konami had decided to put forth another DDR o the music game community. It was known that the new DDR mix will not follow the nth mix pattern, and will be known as DDR MAX with exclusively new songs and artists with several remixes from older DDR versions.

To be honest, I did not expect much from DDR MAX, since the only place in Toronto (and probably in Ontario) to get this DDR MAX thingy is Lovegetty Station ¡V of which getting there by public transit is next to impossible and people in Team Gwai Lo do not like the place ¡V and Orbit in Pacific Mall. However, people agreed that the probability of getting DDR MAX is much lower since they have failed to persuade the management to upgrade when the 5th mix came out. Pity me for studying in Waterloo and what we got was a pathetic DDR USA!

Apart from DDR music, I had been listening to music from other Bemani games, especially from Beatmania IIDX. Some songs are very good, like DJ TAKA¡¦s Abyss and Absolute. (Both songs appeared in DDR 5th mix) I also started listening to music outside Bemani. One day, out of curiously, I downloaded the legendary anti-war protest song Imagine by John Lennon while I chatted with Emi over the internet.
¡¨So Kenny, what music have you been listening recently?¡¨
¡¨I am still listening to Bemani stuff and some also other songs. I am currently downloading Imagine by John Lennon.¡¨
¡¨This song seems to be disappeared from air since September 11.¡¨ Emi said.
¡¨Is it? I read something about censorship on music in post-911 era several days ago. Maybe Imagine is a victim of this.¡¨
¡¨You know what? People are crying for revenge for World Trade Centre attacks. What will people think when they hear this:
Imagine there's no countries,
It isn¡¦t hard to do,
Nothing to kill or die for,
No religion too,
Imagine all the people
living life in peace...
¡¨
¡¨This is nothing new at all. The so called patriotism and what the president said about either you are with us or with the terrorists are going to haunt us for a long time.¡¨ I wrote.
¡¨Even in Bemani, do we hear the word ¡¥bitch¡¦ a lot? And will we see more E-Rotic songs in later mixes? I highly doubt it because as this game grows popularity someone is going to complain. Also, DDR and drugs does not mix.
¡¨And this is actually Rage typing this, sitting beside Emi.¡¨
¡¨Forget about sex, drugs, and whatnot. I hope the music industry today does not just talk about what so-called ¡¥love¡¦. We need more songs promoting peace and just peace.¡¨ I typed. ¡§But we need more than loud protests to do that. Also, I do not think that anything controversial related to such process, like drugs or gay/lesbian, should be involved. Another Woodstock is not quite the answer we need. Well, this is not the 60s after all.¡¨

¡§Woodstock? I think I heard it somewhere.¡¨

¡¨Sometime in 1969 there was a concert in the United States ¡V Woodstock. (Note: I later found out that the actual date was in August 15-17, 1969, in a town called Bethel in New York, for those interested to know) It was believed that four hundred thousand rock fan attended the concert, although this figure was being doubted by many.
¡¨You know, a lot happened in the 60s. It was the decade when the younger generation revolted against their parents, or precisely, the traditional values. This rage was fuelled by the Vietnam War, which ended up as complete failure in terms of military operation and public relation. The image of napalm bombs stunned people across the globe and America was blamed for using this. Furthermore, conscription was still in effect in the 60s, and tens of thousands of young men were sent to Vietnam to ¡¥fight the communists¡¦. America lost 68,000 soldiers during the Vietnam War approximately. The teens got the true feeling of defeat.
On the home front, the space race, especially the Apollo Program, gave the younger generation a vision of courage and challenge. Also, the civil right movement was slowly changing the way people think. You probably know Martin Luther King and his ¡¥I Have a Dream¡¦ speech already and so I am not going into detail it here. The effect of civil right movement was that the younger generation challenged the view on coloured races.
¡¨The Woodstock concert was held under such social atmosphere. It was a rock concert and well, chaos. Condoms, marijuana, mushrooms, hallucinations (but no ecstasy ¡V it was not invented yet).¡¨ I typed.
¡¨You know so many things, Kenny.¡¨ Emi typed.
¡¨People call me a walking encyclopaedia.¡¨
¡¨It is a rather sad thing that those politicians were not learning from the history. I do not hear the subject of peace often, even in video games. Do you count DDR as an exception?¡¨
¡¨Even though IGN¡¦s review describe DDR as a perfect solution since it feature no violence, I do not think DDR can believe enough blow to the industry at this moment. Let¡¦s see what DDR MAX will offer us first.¡¨ I typed.