Rocksmith Review

Rocking out to Unnatural Selection by Muse for the fifth consecutive time, my fingers were beginning to feel the strain. Perhaps I should take a break and do something else? No, I told myself, I have a big show coming up and I want to play to the best of my ability, to make a name for myself in the musical world, to be the next Angus Young or Jimmy Page.

So, did I find myself in a recording studio, or back stage at some low-level downtown venue? No, I was in my bedroom, stood in front of my TV, PS3 humming quietly in the background. This was Rocksmith, an ingenious new IP in the rhythm/musical game genre created by Ubisoft.

Arguably, Rocksmith could be viewed by some almost more as a learning tool than a video game, but to me it is a healthy mix of both. It pushes away from the likes of the Guitar Hero and Rock Band franchise, in that rather than sitting clicking plastic buttons, it incorporates the use of a real guitar. ANY real guitar, might I add, in that any guitar with a 1/4" jack can be connected to the console using the RealTone cable provided.

The game can be bought by itself, for those like me who already own an electric or electro-acoustic guitar, or in a bundle that comes with an entry level guitar, aimed more towards the gamer who isn't already a guitar player. Aimed at those that have a low-mid level of musical skill, this game crosses a mix of a fun and thoroughly enjoyable gaming experience with a high quality learning tool that endeavors to enhance and progress the abilities of the player.

To start off with, then, is what is called the 'Journey', the core of the game. This mode is the predominant part of Rocksmith, in which the budding Hendrix begins by learning single notes of songs, and eventually progresses to playing them note for note, chord for chord. This is achieved through a dynamic and flexible difficulty curve, but more on that later. Along with reccomending songs for you to rehearse and perform at a venue, the game also offers up suggested techniques lessons or, if you are struggling at a specific point of a song, a rehearsal in slow-time, slowly building up your competence until you can play the given section flawlessly.

This difficulty curve makes each song progressively harder as you improve your mastery of the song, and is an integral part of the Rocksmith experience. Through Journey Mode, the player is given a 'set-list' of songs that should be rehearsed, and can then be played at venues once a certain score is racked up on each song. Sound pretty simple? To begin with, it is, although due to the difficulty autonomously increasing to constantly push you that little bit further, you will find that your favourite (and therefore most played) songs soon become more and more challenging, while songs you have never played before start off pretty lethargic and simple. This means you quite regularly hit barriers on songs that can only be pushed through by practicing certain aspects of it, whether this is learning how to perform bends on notes, or taking out the intro riff and playing that over and over until your muscle memory decides to play ball.

Learning the techniques is handled fantastically well, in that there is a small intro to what the technique entails, followed by a 'watch this, now do this' playthrough of a riff or tune created especially for the lesson.
As with the songs, it starts off pretty simplistically  but soon progresses to harder difficulties, awarding the player with a bronze, silver or gold medal to represent accomplishments.
That is the serious side of learning techniques. There is a fun side, however, with the Guitarcade.

The Guitarcade is a mini-game section of Rocksmith, in which, as you complete techniques tutorials, more mini-games are unlocked, all of which help to subconsciously improve muscle memory and  fretboard prowess. These range from learning the fret positions on Ducks, a game similar in nature to space invaders, where the player must play the right note to shoot the retreating duck before it escapes, to Dawn of the Chordead, where zombie attackers are held at bay by playing the corresponding chord, amongst a range of others. While these mini-games seem like a bit of fun, they are actually invaluable tools in terms of practicing new techniques without the worry of ruining your near perfect run through a song, and have provided me with my fair share of laughs, watching comical looking zombies get destroyed by a pair of miniguns because I played a chord.

All of these aspects are brought together nicely into the Journey Mode, and really do give a terrific sense of achievement as you witness your scores increase as you progress. Set-lists are chosen for you at each event, but these can be tailored to your liking, choosing a combo of songs from the 49 available (in addition to some extra secret unlockable songs), including the likes of The Rolling Stones, Lenny Kravitz, Blur and a myriad of others. The full song list of the tracks included on the disc can be found on the official Ubisoft Rocksmith site, http://rocksmith.ubi.com/rocksmith/en-gb/tracklist/index.aspx.
This pretty impressive library has a good number of popular songs, such as Blur's Song 2 and The Rolling Stones' Satisfaction, although these are outweighed by less well know songs, much the same as most music games tend to be. However, DLC is available for purchase if you want to bulk out your musical repertoire, with multiple packs released, including band specific Megadeth and Blink-182, as well as mix-mashes, such as the Classic Rock pack. There are 108 downloadable songs at time of writing, although some are region specific, and all are available to purchase as a pack or as individual songs for a decent fee.

Additionally, Rocksmith includes some other features, such as multiplayer, 'Amp Mode' and even a whole second game setting in which you can learn to play Bass guitar (using a Bass or simply a standard electric guitar).

Multiplayer sees a horizontal split screen mode open up, in which to players can jam together using any combination of guitars, bass and even microphones for singing. This is a perfect opportunity to just kick back with a friend of similar taste, have a few drinks and enjoy a bit of competitive fun. Splitscreen is currently the only multiplayer available however, with it seemingly unlikely that an online experience will ever be introduced on this game. Perhaps in a sequel?

Amp Mode is also particularly good, and in fact is used much more extensively than my actual (poor quality) amp, in that as you progress through the game, you unlock 70 effects pedals, 10 amps and 10 cabs. These are usually quite expensive to buy in the real world, so the fact that you can enter Amp Mode and play what you like using these virtual renditions is definitely, in my opinion, a good way to figure out what you like playing with if you are considering getting one to bolster your rig. It also adds a lot more versatility to learning new songs outside of the game, as you are no longer quite as limited by what equipment you have and haven't got.

Lastly, there is the Bass Guitar section of the game. This essentially uses either a bass guitar or your standard electric guitar and converts the songs in the game to a bass format, meaning you can essentially learn to play bass. Now, I have not played this quite as extensively as the guitar section, and so do not want to comment too heavily, but from what I have played through, I would definitely say it seems pretty strong, again with techniques lessons et all.

All in all, I highly enjoyed Rocksmith, and found it a brilliant tool for advancing my guitar playing skills. It was a lot of fun as a game, trying repeatedly to beat high scores with an addictiveness akin to Pacman or The Pit from Modern Warfare 2, urging myself to perform just that little bit better, that little bit more perfect.
I would highly reccomend this for anyone wishing to learn guitar or who is already playing but wants to improve, although for experts this would realistically be a glorified tab. The mood of the game is arcade-y and fun, with emphasis on enjoyability with the passive learning and muscle memory seemingly coming from nowhere. To conclude, then, a very clever and original idea, well worth the money if you still long deep inside to emulate the rock gods of old.