You don’t have to be smooth on the dance floor to bust a move in Dance Central 2.  But if you’re looking to master its routines, your best buddy, the career mode’s final challenge, or just your own health, we’ve put together a few tips that should help you out — whether you’re new to Dance Central all together, or just to the sequel that released this past Tuesday.

Break It Down

Sounds pretty straightforward, and you’re probably already using this mode to figure out how to do trickier moves. But if you really want to master a routine, you’ll need to get it into muscle memory. In other words, you’ll have to understand the movement so well that it happens instinctively; you’re no longer thinking about what it is you need to do next, but how on-time or how perfectly it’s being done.  It’s one step beyond memorization.

First, slow it down.  If you’re still not getting it (or when you switch back to normal speed, it’s not working), use the video playback feature. If you’re anything like us, you’ll wince the first few times you see yourself onscreen, but seeing how you’re moving (and comparing that to what your character’s doing) will tell you volumes about what you need to work on.  Maybe your foot’s angled wrong.  Or your elbow’s slightly too high.  This is why the video playback was one of our favorite new additions to Break It Down: it mercilessly assists in improving your dancing, if not your ego.

Second, if you’re determined to wow everyone with your routine run-throughs, don’t be in a rush to speed up.  The more you do a movement slowly, the more time you give your brain and body to communicate on what it is you’re trying to work into muscle memory.  You’ll have plenty of time to speed up later as you play through the song. If you’re feeling bored, start asking yourself about the particulars of the move: are you matching the exact same posture? Feet placement? Wrist angle? Dance Central 2’s choreography, especially at the higher difficulties, has a much stronger emphasis on what seems like little niggling details.

This tip might sound like it’s for only the most hardcore of Dance Central 2 fans, but trust us: breaking things down will make the rest of the game easier, especially if you’re looking to own someone in a Dance Battle.

Skip the Freestyle Segments

We’ve previously suggested turning off the freestyle segements in songs if you want a better workout — you’ll get far fewer breaks as you work the cardio angle. (And we really do recommend it: doing twenty minutes of dancing continuously left us panting.)

But turning off the freestyle segments will also challenge you to keep going when you’re first starting out, which means you’ll be pushing your body to get accustomed to unfamiliar movement.  It’s an accelerated way to develop better body coordination.  Practice it in very slow pieces first, then run through it all at once to get yourself accustomed to the speed.  Eventually, everything will gel together.

Added bonuses: being able to hit Crew Challenge (career mode)’s final boss showdown and its 5-song marathon without wheezing; doing your heart a favor.