Gameitall A long time ago, back in 2006, there was a game released to the mass public involving a little plastic controller that inspired many people to learn how to rock. That game of course was brought by Activision and then the over saturation of music based games filled the market until 2011, all while filling our closets with a large amount of plastic instruments.
Many people who played this game went out and bought themselves a guitar to learn to play for real… Only to realize, that it’s nothing like the game, Thus forcing them to learn or give up. Ubisoft realized there is a huge market here despite over saturation for a Educational game that can rock our socks off and annoy our neighbors. This is a game called RockSmith.
Rocksmith is entirely different beast then Guitar Hero and Rock Band. The reason behind this is, simple enough, your not using a toy. Your controller is any guitar with an amp pick-up. Using your real guitar, RockSmith allows you to plug in, play a cord and turn your speaker system to a giant amp.
What amazes me about the gameplay is how simple they made it, your six strings are oriented by colour, Red, Yellow, Blue, Orange, Green, and Purple. while your frets are marked off with number, 1 being the furthest away from your body, following down the guitar. It is done in a way that is perfect. RockSmith is solely about the Guitar, with nothing else cluttering your play area, it allows it to zoom to show where to slide your hand.
Now what RockSmith does while you play is truly great, as the game is set up to play at your own pace, while starting out, the game will give you only a few notes until you can prove yourself. Once this is done, it will give you different techniques such as suspend cords, Power Cords, Bends, double stops, and palm mutes. The more you play a song, and the better you get, the more notes and more you learn, which can be both blessing and a curse.
When it comes down to a music game, the big question is the music. While all based on personal taste, RockSmith has a decent amount of songs from different eras and styles, Metal-Heads may be disappointed that there are not many metal songs, which can be changed by picking up the Megadeth DLC pack. As a tool to get more people into playing guitar and not the style of music itself (like Guitar Hero and Rock Band) it’s a great set list.
There are plenty of extra features with the game as well, an Amp mode which allows you to use unlocked petals to change up your tune, an arcade mode which allows you do blast zombies while learning cords or shoot ducks (Duck Hunt Style) while learning how to slide along the frets, and up and coming DLC to help learn more songs.
All and All, RockSmith is an Educational game done right, this is the game that my music teacher would have loved to have because it makes learning guitar simple, and most importantly, fun. If your interested in learning Guitar, this is the tool you’ll need.
Rating: 9 out of 10
Pros: Learn real guitar, great set of music, a lot of content for your money
Cons: You need a real guitar to play (if you don’t have one you can pick up a $200 bundle with an estimated $300 dollar guitar.)
