News and Industry Happenings

Teacher Sets DanceDanceRevolution World Record

Carrie Swidecki, a 35 year old public school teacher from Bakersfield, CA, got her exergaming groove on and broke the Guinness World Record for Longest Marathon on a Dance / Rhythm Game playing DanceDanceRevolution (SuperNova 2 arcade game) in Charleston, West Virginia yesterday at 12:30 a.m. EDT. Ms. Swidecki broke the previously held record of 13 hours 33 minutes 56 seconds, set in the United Kingdom in October, 2010, with a time of 15 hours, 17 minutes and 44 seconds.

"I couldn’t be more excited to have broken the Guinness World Record playing DanceDanceRevolution," said Carrie Swidecki, Physical Education teacher at Sandrini Elementary School in Bakersfield, CA. "I started playing DanceDanceRevolution 10 years ago and when I saw that it was helping me become more physically fit, I integrated it into my physical education program at school and the students love it. Since then, I’ve become more active, lost 75 pounds and won the Guinness World Record!"

Carrie’s record breaking attempt took place in Charleston, West Virginia in conjunction with Konami Digital Entertainment, Inc.’s second annual DanceDanceRevolution West Virginia State Championship Tournament and the inaugural Childhood Obesity Summit, the second stop in a national campaign to promote more active lifestyles among children and raise awareness around the issue of childhood obesity.

After having trained nonstop for six months, Ms. Swidecki showed the kids at the tournament how it’s done, dancing the day away on DanceDanceRevolution for over 15 hours straight. Then, always a physical education teacher, she spent the rest of her time at the tournament encouraging the children to keep going, sharing tips and talking to them about the benefits of exergaming as a fun and healthy alternative to exercising and playing sports.

"We are extremely proud of Carrie for having set a new world record playing DanceDanceRevolution," said Shinji Hirano, President of KONAMI. "Her determination and prowess are truly admirable and we encourage everyone to take a cue from Carrie and enjoy DanceDanceRevolution and other active games to have fun and achieve a more healthy lifestyle.And we thought that our own Todd Hargosh would win this!

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John Breeden II

As a journalist John has covered everything from rural town meetings to the U.S. Congress and even done time as a crime reporter and photographer.|His first venture into writing about the game industry came in the form of a computer column called "On the Chip Side," which grew to have over 1 million circulation and was published in newspapers in several states. From there he did several "ask the computer guy" columns in magazines such as Up Front! in New Mexico and Who Cares? in Washington D.C. When the Internet started to become popular, he began writing guided Web tours for the newly launched Washington Post online section as well as reviews for the weekend section of the paper, something he still does from time to time. His experience in trade publications came as a writer and reviewer for Government Computer News. As the editor of GiN, he demands strict editorial standards from all the writers and reviewers. Breeden feels the industry needs a weekly, reliable trade publication covering the games industry and works tirelessly to accomplish that goal.