Move Over, Rock Band, Power Gig is on the Way

GDC got underway yesterday in San Francisco, and the developers started coming right out with the news. The earliest big announcement in the day was from Seven45 Studios, a game called Power Gig: Rise of the SixString. Seven45 Studios is a new developer and a sister company to First Act, the music instrument manufacturer. This partnership is what allows them to bring something new to the rhythm genre: a guitar controller that is also a functioning six string electric guitar.

The standard controller (pictured below) features "all the guts of an electric guitar so players can plug their SixString guitars into any standard amp" and play as normal. Seven45 Studios has said that there will be several different guitars sold for the game, though the band bundle will ship with a standard 3/4 size guitar. That said, they also mentioned that they were developing a full size guitar/controller, which is a welcome improvement over the practically tiny plastic instruments we get now. Not only that, but Seven45 confirmed that these guitars will work with current rhythm games on the market.



The most interesting feature that Power Gig offers, though, is called chord play, or chording. Basically, players can choose to turn on this mode, and play the actual chords for whatever song it is they are playing. This offers something that current games can only delude us with: real, actual improvement or development of skill in playing guitar.

I remember hearing rumblings of a game like this one sometime early last year, but after hearing the announcement and seeing a trailer, nothing else came of it. I found the idea really promising and was disappointed when it seemed to have died without really getting off the ground. Now Seven45 has taken on the same challenge, but something tells me they're going to find some real success with a genre that is in dire need of innovation.

Power Gig: Rise of the SixString is set to be released this fall for the PS3 and Xbox 360. There are talks of a Wii version coming, but no kind of time table or anything.