Dance Dance Revolution SuperNOVA is the latest arcade game in the Dance Dance Revolution series of music video games. It was produced by Konami and released through Betson Enterprises. The game was released in Europe on April 28, 2006, followed shortly by the North American release on May 15. Unlike previous DDR arcade releases, the versions for Japan, North America and Europe will have the same features and song list.

The Japanese version will be its ninth traditional arcade release, and the first since Dance Dance Revolution EXTREME in 2002. The North American version will be its fourth arcade release, and the first since Dance Dance Revolution USA in 2000. The European version will be its eighth arcade release, and the first since Dancing Stage Fusion in 2004.

The release contains 301 songs. Of those, 63 are completely new to DDR (at least three of which will be hidden and unlockable; more may be hidden in the final release), and a total of 57 songs are from home versions of DDR and are appearing on an arcade machine for the first time. Of the songs that are new to DDR, 19 are licensed.

The general premise of DDR Supernova is the same as the previous Dance Dance Revolution games. One player can play using one dance pad (Single play style), Two players can play using one dance pad each (Versus play style), or one player can play using both dance pads (Double play style).

A player must step to the beat, matching the beat to the arrows presented to them on screen by stepping on arrows on a dance stage. Depending on the timing of each step, the step is scored "PERFECT," "GREAT," "GOOD," "ALMOST" or "BOO". A health bar is on the screen, and starts half-full at the beginning of the routine. PERFECT and GREAT steps increase the health bar until it is full. Almost and Boo steps diminish it. GOOD steps have no effect either way. If a player accumulates too many Almosts or Boos in rapid succession, and the health bar drops to zero, then the song is failed and the game ends. If one player depletes their life bar in a two-player game, they can continue playing if the other player passes.

Freeze Arrows appear on the screen as long green arrows, and require the player to hold the corresponding arrow on the dance stage as long as the arrow remains on the screen (instead of just stepping on the arrow). A player who hits the arrow and keeps it held until the arrow disappears from the screen scores an "OK", which increases the health bar. A player who hits the arrow but does not hold it long enough scores an "NG", which decreases the health bar.

A player may play anywhere from one to five songs in one game (not including extra stages); the maximum number of songs can be changed in a game menu. At the end of each song, the game displays a Results Screen, which shows the score, the total number of PERFECTs, GREATs, GOODs, ALMOSTs, BOOs and OKs, as well as a letter grade, for each player. The letter grade ranges from E (which means that the player failed due to a depleted life bar) to AAA (all steps PERFECT). At the end of the game, the game displays each player's score, step breakdown and letter grade based on all stages, including Extra Stage.

The scoring system has been greatly simplified from prior DDR versions. All steps in the song are now valued equally; no longer will later steps in the song be worth more than earlier steps. All songs are worth a maximum of 10,000,000 points. Each Perfect step is worth 10M/n (where n is the number of steps in the song), and each Great is worth 10M/2n. Pre-release versions had a maximum base score of 7,000,000, with an end-of-song bonus of up to 3,000,000, depending on the player's maximum combo. Also interesting to note is that jumps no longer add 2 to the combo counter, as it has in DDR MAX and later versions.