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While the game's interface has changed as new versions were released, the basic remains: you have a pad composed of 5 buttons (two red ones on the corners closest to the cabinet, two blue ones on the corners farthest to the cabinet, and a yellow one in the middle of them). These are normally called arrows because of their drawings and representation on screen – the middle button shows a drawing of two feet, but for simplicity is also called an arrow by players –. On the screen you'll see a fixed line on the top of the screen, with gray arrows on the same shape as those drawn in the pad. As the song plays, colored arrows will appear on the bottom of the screen and go up under the same column of their gray counterparts. When a colored arrow reaches the fixed arrows on the top, you must hit its corresponding button on the pad.
When you hit an arrow, a small word pops on screen, depending on your accuracy: from best to worst, the ratings are PERFECT, GREAT, GOOD and BAD. If you miss an arrow entirely or press it earlier or later than the threshold for a BAD, you get a MISS. The threshold for each of these ratings varies across different versions.
Songs are ranked by difficulty levels, and a song often has more than one difficulty (one for each game mode it is listed).
Before Exceed — more information about game versions is available in the Releases section — was released, the difficulty for all game modes ranged from 1 to 10 (though they are not related – a level 4 Crazy song is way harder than a level 5 Normal song), with the exception of "Vook", a song introduced on The Premiere 2, on Double mode, which was level 12. With Exceed's debut, all levels were reworked, in a unified range from 1 to 20.
The way the difficulty rating appears on screen also varies a bit, depending on the version's interface: on The Premiere, The PREX, The Premiere 2 and Exceed, the difficulty is indicated by a natural number, like "3" or "8"; on all other versions, they are indicated by a line of circles, with as many circles as the level of the song.
Even the easiest PIU steps are considerably more difficult than those used in the beginner mode of Dance Dance Revolution, and the hardest PIU steps are also considerably more difficult than the hardest DDR steps.
When you successfully hit several consecutive arrows, you get a combo. If you get 4 or more consecutive arrows, the game will display, right below the accuracy rating, a counter informing how many consecutive steps you've hit.
Only PERFECTs and GREATs count for combos. Any other ratings will stop your combo. On some newer versions, though, a GOOD won't break your combo (but won't increase it either).
The greatest combo you make in a song is called max combo, and when you keep your combo going for the whole song it is called a full combo.
Sometimes two arrows may go up side-by-side. When that happens, you must hit both of them at the same time, or you'll get a MISS. Because of the movement players most often make to hit those arrows, they are called jumps.
On the harder songs, three arrows or more may go up at once. In such cases, players normally try to hit two pad buttons with a single foot, or stoop and use their hands and/or knees to help.
Unlike in newer versions of DDR, jumps do not count as several points for the combo counter.
The versions up to The O.B.G. SE, however, worked on jumps differently: each arrow was independent, meaning hitting only one arrow of a two-arrow jump would count as a non-MISS (a PERFECT, for example) followed by a MISS, and hitting both could increase your combo by two. This behavior resembles Beatmania and other rhythm games.
The Extra, Exceed, and Premiere 3 versions as well as the Prex series also feature another kind of arrow on screen, normally called hold note, freeze note or long note. These arrows look like streched versions of the common arrows. Their corresponding button must be held until the whole arrow passes through the gray arrows on the top.
For each half- beat or quarter-beat — the duration depends on the game version and song — a hold note is held, a PERFECT is scored; if it is not held, a MISS is counted.
Since the first release, all game modes accept modifiers which are enabled by using special codes. The effects vary from speeding arrows up to making them fade as they go up, or making they appear in random places instead of their pre-defined column (while still being on the same beat).
Most players, after a starting period, get used to applying the modifiers to make arrows faster, which makes them more spaced. This is a matter of personal preferences, but the Pump It Up culture generally favors speedy arrows (requiring faster recognition of movements) over DDR's no-speed tradition (which requires better understanding of compact sequences). Each way of playing has its own challenges.
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