Harmonix, the creative geniuses behind Rock Band, have let loose their next big innovation that could change the music game genre forever.

Dance Central is exclusive to Xbox 360 for now because it relies on the Xbox Kinect to get the party started. As the name would imply, this is a dance game where you are graded on how well you perform the moves in tune with the music. This isn’t like Dance Dance Revolution or any other game that requires a mat to step on a button when it tells you. This is more like a dance instructor because it rates you on how well you are doing and shows you ways to improve.

The motion-controlled Kinect camera is required to play Dance Central, so that means it can look at your body and your movements to tell if you are performing the moves correctly in accordance with your fly on-screen dance partner. For first time players, Dance Central teaches a whole new gaming vocabulary with a huge library of real life choreographed moves like hip swings, leans, shuffles, and lunges. Don’t worry though, because there are various difficulty settings and a new “Break it Down” Mode where you can take each dance move one at a time to get the feel of the dance floor before auditioning for America’s Best Dance Crew.

Since the Kinect sensor can recognize anyone in the room, joining in on a game is as simple as standing up and dancing along to a soundtrack that includes hits from hip-hop, pop, and R & B. One of the songs they demoed during last week’s E3 event was “Poison” from Bell Biv Devoe which included parts of the actual choreography from the video and band. I think the idea of potentially dancing along to Vanilla Ice's “Ice Ice Baby” (either on the disc or as downloadable content) makes this a day one purchase for me.

Harmonix has a pedigree of amazing music-based games and it seems only fitting that they are the ones to step in and get the dancing games back on track with an all new way to teach players how to dance at their pace and still maintain a fun party game environment.

Dance Central will be taking over your free time and living room space this holiday season for Xbox 360 with Kinect.