Konami singing American Idol's tune

A few weeks back, The Onion ran a hilarious headline that read "Tokyo Police quell Dance Dance Revolution." This week, however, there was no stopping Konami's ever-popular series, as Dance Dance Revolution Extreme was nominated for a MTV Video Music Award. The game is up for the "Best Video Game Soundtrack" VMA, alongside Def Jam: Fight for NY, Midnight Club 3: DUB Edition, Tony Hawk's Underground 2, and Madden NFL 2005.

However, the Dance Dance Revolution franchise may soon be eclipsed by an even bigger property. This week, Konami also announced that it has acquired the game rights to American Idol. The deal was struck not with Fox, the television network that airs the mind-bogglingly popular show, but with the US division of FremantleMedia, the creator of the British show Pop Idol, on which American Idol is based.

Under the terms of the deal, Konami now has the right to "to develop games for current and next-generation video game systems" based on American Idol. No specific titles, platforms, or release dates were divulged. The only territories mentioned in the announcement were the US, Canada, and Latin America.

"With Konami's leadership and expertise in music video games and American Idol's popularity and strength as a recognized franchise, this is a powerful synergy that will greatly benefit the consumer," said Konami Digital Entertainment chairman and CEO Kazumi Kitaue in a statement.

When Konami's game does come out, it won't have the distinction of being the first American Idol game. In late 2003, Codemasters released a version of the game for the PC, PlayStation 2, and Game Boy Advance. Read its full review to see how it fared with GameSpot's panel of judges.