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    Singstar

    Erk. What to say?

    Well, first off, I've only had a couple of quick goes on it, simply because it's so bloody embarrassing to play. If there are other people in the room and you're not pissed, forget it. This isn't Samba de Amigo embarrassment, by the way - waving your arms around is funny, even for those people who haven't got any sense of rhythm. Singstar is more a form of public humiliation. It doesn't even have the (dubious) appeal of pub karaoke - the atmosphere in a pub is significantly different than that in your living room.

    Technically, it's very clever. Pitch, volume and your ability to hold a note are all recognised and displayed on screen. Scores are based on notes hit and phrases completed. A duet mode allows two players to sing together for a combined score, while a battle mode dishes out individual scores.

    In terms of presentation, it's absolutely horrible. I can see others liking it, though. It's cold and clinical, a video game for people who are embarassed about playing video games. It's obviously been designed with an audience of well-off, middle-class late 20s - early 30s in mind. Cosmopolitan chic. There's no sense of enjoyment about proceedings, no bubble or life to the thing. Yuck.

    There's also a problem with the subtitles. It's something that'll be less of an issue if you know the songs, but the way that words are seperated into syllables makes them extremely difficult to decipher in the middle of a song.

    The choice of songs reinforces the idea of the audience it's aimed at. A couple of tracks are fun - reaching for the high notes in Heart of Glass or putting on yr best rock growl for Ace of Spades - but I've no intention of ever going near a lot of them.

    It's my kid sister's game, and even she's too embarrassed to play it in front of anybody. Other bemani titles promote fun, but Singstar seems to have never heard of the concept.

    I'm interested to see what other developers make of the technology, though. Voice recognition in games is still very basic - I'm thinking that this stuff could be put into AI squad-based titles, with your team-mates responding not only to what you say, but the way you say it. Imagine a game where the AI could recognise panic or elation. If the tech doesn't just get recycled into more karaoke games, it could make for some interesting innovations in traditional genres.

    #2
    Sing Sung Sing

    I agree completely. It was a laugh to play my friend's Sing Star after a few tequilas, but there's certainly nothing of the urge to play better next time that you have with Eye Toy etc. In fact, after about 45 minutes, we were all pretty sick of the whole thing. It's funny to watch your friends butcher Like A Virgin and Living La Vida Loca as you stumble over the words to Suspicious Minds, but 9 songs aren't going to last you any time at all. Worse, hearing people try to get the exact pitch of a song means they're trying to sound accurate rather than any good. It becomes like a particularly gruesome version of Pop Idol where you're always the next to be humiliated and no pop career awaits.

    It would be great if there was some karaoke software where you could chuck on your own tunes from CD, and it played them on some kind of time lag, removing vocal frequencies on the fly and measuring their pitch (the technology for that must be there for doing so or Sing Star wouldn't be possible - no?). If you had a marking system like Sing Star's for that, it'd be superb, lasting, amazing fun. Doing karaoke to My Bloody Valentine would finally be a possibility. Then again... maybe not.

    All these new gimmicks and very little fun. It's all getting a bit Dragon's Lair.

    David

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      #3
      Originally posted by E. Randy Dupre

      It's cold and clinical, a video game for people who are embarassed about playing video games. It's obviously been designed with an audience of well-off, middle-class late 20s - early 30s in mind. Cosmopolitan chic.
      I think you should re-read the above "statement" and cringe.

      The line "a video game for people who are embarassed about playing video games" is a classic! Are we talking about the same game here????

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        #4
        I don't know. Are we? Maybe if your post made sense I'd be able to answer.

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          #5
          Originally posted by PaleDavid
          It's funny to watch your friends butcher Like A Virgin and Living La Vida Loca as you stumble over the words to Suspicious Minds...

          ..hearing people try to get the exact pitch of a song means they're trying to sound accurate rather than any good. It becomes like a particularly gruesome version of Pop Idol where you're always the next to be humiliated and no pop career awaits.
          I hadn't thought of that, but you're so right. The appeal of karaoke is the showmanship that it encourages - sing an Elvis track, do the Elvis moves, put on the Elvis voice. I can understand that. Singstar pretty much forbids you from doing this - you have to get every note absolutely perfectly in line with the original version, with no room for personal interpretation. You're asked to become a clone, whereas the whole karaoke thing is built around impersonation.

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            #6
            Originally posted by E. Randy Dupre
            I don't know. Are we? Maybe if your post made sense I'd be able to answer.
            Hurry up and reply teddles. We're all intrigued as to what you meant. Or if teddles isn't about would anyone else like to hazard a guess? Is he hinting that he finds Singstar very good and is questioning the posters critique? Or is he talking in a wider sense, making reference to the press/publisher hype surrounding this title/entertainment model? Perhaps I'm referring to teddles in a male context when in fact the feminine should be applied? Who knows? Only one thing is certain...I can't stop rambling. And I won't be buying the game either. And there are loads of chicks everywhere at the moment. Man I love the sunshine! (Three things I know).

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              #7
              Sorry, E.Randy Dupre I was just baffled by your initial post. If you think the choice of tracks reflects the target audience of "middle-class late 20s - early 30s" then you are way off the mark. The majority of the tracks are current pop-chart fodder ie aimed towards a far younger age target than you suggest. Sure there is the odd track which would cater for the demographic you suggest, but not many.
              I am also confused as to how you find playing this game embarassing, when later on you bemoan the fact that you cannot "sing an Elvis track, do the Elvis moves, put on the Elvis voice". I would find doing the latter far more damaging to my (admittedly crap) reputation, than singing badly along to Heart of Glass.

              Shurely shome consishtency please....hic???

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                #8
                Personally, I think it's fantastic. We had a great laugh on this on Saturday night. Take on Me rocks my world, as do the Darkness, Heart of Glass, Sugababes... It's just class. Listening back at the end is just hilarious. You really shouldn't be embarrassed playing this. At the end of the day, if you're with a bunch of mates, who gives a ****. Nothing like hitting the falsetto on I Believe in a thing Called Love, then shouting along to Livin La Vida Loca to get things going. It's fantastic. And whoever moaned about the design of it all - well, me and you have very different tastes. I found it all very slick and well designed.

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                  #9
                  Totally agree Squirtle - esp the comment about the design. Nowt wrong with the presentation as far as I'm concerned.
                  Methinks some people just need to lighten up.

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                    #10
                    Originally posted by E. Randy Dupre
                    I hadn't thought of that, but you're so right. The appeal of karaoke is the showmanship that it encourages - sing an Elvis track, do the Elvis moves, put on the Elvis voice. I can understand that. Singstar pretty much forbids you from doing this - you have to get every note absolutely perfectly in line with the original version, with no room for personal interpretation. You're asked to become a clone, whereas the whole karaoke thing is built around impersonation.
                    Then hook the eye toy up as well, and watch yourself becoming Elvis at the end of the track. The only limitation is your own inhibitions and imagination.

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                      #11
                      Originally posted by teddles
                      The majority of the tracks are current pop-chart fodder ie aimed towards a far younger age target than you suggest. Sure there is the odd track which would cater for the demographic you suggest, but not many.
                      I'd agree, but for the rest of the design. I can see yr professional, Camden-living, suit-wearing yuppie scum being attracted to the choice of music on an 'ironic' (eurgh) level, and others who seriously believe it's representative of decent pop music. Which, imo, it isn't. That certainly seems to be who the graphical design has been created with in mind - while I can see kids getting something out of the musical selection too, the way that the rest of the package has been put together suggests that the developers purposefully *didn't* want it to appeal to that younger audience.

                      Where's the Timberlake, y'know? Beyonce? Outkast? Any music that's got a bit of bounce and life to it? The musical selection's just indicative of the no-nonsense, no-fun outlook of the entire game. It's got a career mode, fer crying out loud! It's a training exercise for cruise ship crooners!

                      As far as embarrassment goes, we're talking about different types of embarrassment. Shaking yr maraccas to Love Lease in Samba may initially cause red faces, but then you realise that you can reduce the embarrassment factor by making James Bond shapes to the music and totally overdoing it. The thing with stuff like Samba is that you can do that and still score well in the game. Any attempt to try and do something similar in Singstar - and this ties in with your suggestion, Squirtle - drags your score down. You want to go over the top and sing the songs as a charicature of the original artist, just as you want to chuck ridiculous poses into the mix in Samba, but the fact that the game marks you on precision and precision alone means that you're actively discouraged from doing so. Which I personally think makes the experience utterly pointless.

                      I mean, yes, you can definitely have a laugh with it. *If* you forget that the developers want you to play it totally serious. Ignore the scoring and just get your mates to vote. But then, you might as well stick a CD on and sing along to that.
                      Last edited by E. Randy Dupre; 25-05-2004, 16:49.

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                        #12
                        How you can say that the "developers purposefully didnt want it to appeal to a younger audience" is astounding!! Are you saying they intentionally planned the game NOT to appeal to its core audience???!?? Wouldnt that be some kind of commercial suicide?
                        I also dont believe that the choice of acts you have quoted (Timberlake Beyonce Outkast) are really that different to what are in the game.
                        Also saying "they want you to play it totally serious" is competely ignoring the eyetoy compatibility plus the voice effect options.

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                          #13
                          But you and I have differing views on what the core audience actually is. As I just explained. And my saying "they want you to play it totally serious" is a comment based on the core experience, the main point of the title, not the incidental options or the use of a peripheral which costs another ?40.

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                            #14
                            I also think it's really simplistic to suggest that because a title's a music game, based around a certain type of chart music, the projected audience must be kids. Kids don't have the disposable income of older age groups and they're far from the only people buying pop singles.

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                              #15
                              I saw a group of German students (I think) playing this today in HMV, one of them was singing to Jamelia and Superstar, I have never seen or heard such a funny thing in my life,
                              'Sooopaa staaaar no matter where you arrrrre'
                              he sounded like Arnold Scwarzenneggers tone deaf illegitemate offspring

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