Pittsburgh sees so much new dance from Attack Theatre that we really don't get to see the finished product. For example, the company's 2003 Japanese collaboration, "No to: memory fades," took off around the Eastern United States after its U.S. premiere here and, by all accounts, changed considerably.

Therefore it is often difficult to compare local groups like Attack Theatre with touring companies who bring their best and brightest works, enhanced by a patina that only occurs after rigorous touring.

So it was with the return of Attack Theatre's "Games of Steel," loosely constructed on a game format where three contestants vie to see not who wins, but who loses the least.

The action revolved around The Host, Peter Kope, and his three contestants, Jeff Davis, Michele de la Reza and newcomer to the Attack fold, Angela Essler. But the band was heavily involved as well, as evidenced by their new monikers: The Oddsmaker, Dave Eggar (cello/piano/vocals), Mistress of Ceremonies Dina Fanai (vocals), The Prosecutor, Tom Pirozzi (bass/guitar) and The Conscience, Matt Zebroski (percussion).

That wasn't the only change in the production, which debuted in 2005 and subsequently won a National Touring Project award. As a group that never rests on its laurels, Attack not only grew within the structure of the production but outside it.

The 75-minute "Games of Steel" always had an openly electric connection with the audience from the start, but Friday night's performance at the Kelly Strayhorn Theater had a slam bang finish to it.

Where the previous "Games" had a number of duets, particularly between de la Reza and Kope, the dancers parlayed off one another in a more integrated fashion, so that the shifting alliances between the contestants gave a riskier air to the business at hand.

With a revolving seesaw, the action took on devil-may-care charge in a hellish setting.

The band had become players of their own both theatrically and musically. You haven't heard the cello until you've heard Eggar morph through his cadenzas. Fanai contributed a clarion call of a voice, with Petrozzi modulating between finesse and funk and Zebroski performing a "Stomp"-like turn aimed at the steel cages.

If anything, there was almost too much of a sensory overload, where the primary action wasn't always well-defined. But that just means taking a trip back to let the "Games" begin again, which isn't such a bad idea.

"Games of Steel" will be repeated tonight at 8 p.m Call 412-394-3353 or go online at www.proarts.com.