Rock Band
Reviewed by Protag
You're stood on a stage, with a guitar hung across your stomach. The crowd stretches on for miles, a pulsing, throbbing mass of bodies, all focused on you. They chant your name. You turn up the volume and step up to the microphone, the drumbeat kicks in and the crowd goes wild. You're a rockstar.
Or, at least, you can pretend to be.
Enter Harmonix Music System's seminal Rock Band. The answer to one of humanity's most primal needs, to be somebody. And now you can, while simultaneously slamming deep fried cakes into your face. Rock Band is the overweight under achievers wet dream, a way to imagine your cool, even if you have about as much charisma as one of Enya's gallstones.
Despite the inevitable hesitation you will feel, you will end up playing Rock Band at some point, and despite its faults its actually very good fun. It is a basic, cardinal premise, and one that should have been thought of years ago.
I bought the full version that includes all the 'instruments' - Drum Kit, Guitar and Microphone. Lets get one thing straight, no one will buy this version to play the guitar or use the microphone. The Drum Kit is the main source of underlying curiosity, and its surprisingly easy to set up, making jumping straight into the game a simple procedure. Once you get there, you have to set upon creating your virtual band.
First you have to choose a band name. I originally went for something subtle and unenterprising, but eventually settled on 'The Cornhole Explosions'.
Next you have to 'Create your Rocker'. I created a tye-dyed midget, something that looked like a cross between Orville and Alan Titchmarsh. Then I had to name it. I threw around a few names, such as 'Axel' and 'Rocky' before settling on 'Mr.Piss'.
Once the drummer was sorted, I had to create the rest of the band. This was the line up:
Drums - Mr. Piss
Guitar - Zombie Hendrix
Bass Guitar - Bruce Campbell
The vocalist I thought should be female, so I dont come across as a chauvinistic sexist pig. I like her. I called her 'Tits'.
Now that my band was complete, I was ready to embark on an epic adventure into the lifestyle of a rockstar. But one thing stood in my way - my complete inability to convince my arms and legs to work together. During the first few songs I resembled an octopus suffering from Parkinsons disease, flailing wildly in the hopes of hitting the right pads to correspond with the colours on the screen. This remained a problem throughout my experience with the game, and despite my talent for drumming on tables and bars in real life, I still had trouble hitting sticks against badly made plastic plates.
As infuriating as it was, it still remained blissfully entertaining throughout. There is a killer track list to make irritang click-clack noises to, including the likes of Metallica, Muse and the Foo Fighters. It even has a Freezepop song up for download, and also the song from the end credits of Portal.
It seemed like a pretty good deal.
Then I realised that I couldnt quite settle into it. Not because I was shit, or because the calibration was out, or because the dog had suddenly started barking and subsequently been greeted with my size ten up its arse. It was because I was painfully aware of what I looked like while playing it. In layman's terms, a twat. Even if you are sure your alone in the house and your curtains are drawn shut, you cant quite shake the feeling off that someone, somewhere, is watching you.
So, Is it Shit?
In the context of single player, yes. Multiplayer? Hell no.
There is nothing more tragic than sitting in your room, straddled over a drum-chair made of anything drum-chair-sized around you, pretending to be part of a band that doesnt exist, pretending to be cooler than you could ever hope to be. But the simple fact remains that if you get a few friends around, slam a few beers back, crank up the volume and let rip, you could no doubt be in heaven.
Rock Band could be the perfect solution to those family barbeque situations, where the 'oldies' want to break out the karaoke machine. Now the younger generations have something better than fucking Buzz! to save our souls.
Thank you Harmonix.
Reviewed by Protag
You're stood on a stage, with a guitar hung across your stomach. The crowd stretches on for miles, a pulsing, throbbing mass of bodies, all focused on you. They chant your name. You turn up the volume and step up to the microphone, the drumbeat kicks in and the crowd goes wild. You're a rockstar.
Or, at least, you can pretend to be.
Enter Harmonix Music System's seminal Rock Band. The answer to one of humanity's most primal needs, to be somebody. And now you can, while simultaneously slamming deep fried cakes into your face. Rock Band is the overweight under achievers wet dream, a way to imagine your cool, even if you have about as much charisma as one of Enya's gallstones.
Despite the inevitable hesitation you will feel, you will end up playing Rock Band at some point, and despite its faults its actually very good fun. It is a basic, cardinal premise, and one that should have been thought of years ago.
I bought the full version that includes all the 'instruments' - Drum Kit, Guitar and Microphone. Lets get one thing straight, no one will buy this version to play the guitar or use the microphone. The Drum Kit is the main source of underlying curiosity, and its surprisingly easy to set up, making jumping straight into the game a simple procedure. Once you get there, you have to set upon creating your virtual band.
First you have to choose a band name. I originally went for something subtle and unenterprising, but eventually settled on 'The Cornhole Explosions'.
Next you have to 'Create your Rocker'. I created a tye-dyed midget, something that looked like a cross between Orville and Alan Titchmarsh. Then I had to name it. I threw around a few names, such as 'Axel' and 'Rocky' before settling on 'Mr.Piss'.
Once the drummer was sorted, I had to create the rest of the band. This was the line up:
Drums - Mr. Piss
Guitar - Zombie Hendrix
Bass Guitar - Bruce Campbell
The vocalist I thought should be female, so I dont come across as a chauvinistic sexist pig. I like her. I called her 'Tits'.
Now that my band was complete, I was ready to embark on an epic adventure into the lifestyle of a rockstar. But one thing stood in my way - my complete inability to convince my arms and legs to work together. During the first few songs I resembled an octopus suffering from Parkinsons disease, flailing wildly in the hopes of hitting the right pads to correspond with the colours on the screen. This remained a problem throughout my experience with the game, and despite my talent for drumming on tables and bars in real life, I still had trouble hitting sticks against badly made plastic plates.
As infuriating as it was, it still remained blissfully entertaining throughout. There is a killer track list to make irritang click-clack noises to, including the likes of Metallica, Muse and the Foo Fighters. It even has a Freezepop song up for download, and also the song from the end credits of Portal.
It seemed like a pretty good deal.
Then I realised that I couldnt quite settle into it. Not because I was shit, or because the calibration was out, or because the dog had suddenly started barking and subsequently been greeted with my size ten up its arse. It was because I was painfully aware of what I looked like while playing it. In layman's terms, a twat. Even if you are sure your alone in the house and your curtains are drawn shut, you cant quite shake the feeling off that someone, somewhere, is watching you.
So, Is it Shit?
In the context of single player, yes. Multiplayer? Hell no.
There is nothing more tragic than sitting in your room, straddled over a drum-chair made of anything drum-chair-sized around you, pretending to be part of a band that doesnt exist, pretending to be cooler than you could ever hope to be. But the simple fact remains that if you get a few friends around, slam a few beers back, crank up the volume and let rip, you could no doubt be in heaven.
Rock Band could be the perfect solution to those family barbeque situations, where the 'oldies' want to break out the karaoke machine. Now the younger generations have something better than fucking Buzz! to save our souls.
Thank you Harmonix.
