No, Sire, It Is a Revolution (cntd)

The most interesting mode though may very well be the Studio mode. In this mode you are able to record or jam. Recording is where Rock Revolution extends itself from what is on the market today. Featuring an eight track digital recording studio, Rock Revolution will give savvy players who are willing to work with it, the tools to make their own musical creations. Unfortunately players can only take those recordings into the Jam Session portion of the studio and there is no easy way to share them with other players.

Off With Their Heads

Aside from the impressive Studio mode, Rock Revolution feels dated in the audio / visual department. If you were to look at still screen shots of Rock Revolution, you may come to the conclusion that the game looks OK, if a bit generic. The venues look nice and the characters look like they have no souls but it doesn’t look bad. That is until the game starts moving… then things get scary. A lot was said about the Guitar Hero III drummer and how he moved like a robot. Rock Revolution multiplies that by four, as in every member of the band. The animation in this game is atrocious and can be quite distracting at times. Each character seems to only have a handful of animations and they hardly ever match up with what is going on, on the screen.

Things do get a little bit better when you head to the audio front. The music in Rock Revolution sounds clear and crisp, with no blurring of the various tracks. However as good as it sounds on a technical standpoint, the game fails outright in the most important area for a music game, the music itself. Rock Revolution features 40 playable tracks, less then half of what its competitors are offering and worst of all is that all of the songs included in the game are covers. Now covers of songs aren’t necessarily bad things but over the past year the Rock Band and Guitar Hero franchises have advanced to including primarily the original (or in some cases re-recorded) master sources. The covers themselves are hit or miss; Ratt’s “Round and Round” sounds great but System of a Down’s “Chop Suey” is ear splittingly bad.

The Bitter End

I can’t help but feel that Rock Revolution is a desperate stab to try and tap into the lucrative music genre that Konami never quite felt the rest of the world was ready for. They squandered their chance and it seems that they may be the odd man out, as there just doesn’t seem to be enough room for Guitar Hero, Rock Band and Rock Revolution. As a fan of the genre, I really wanted to like Rock Revolution but in the end it ends up just being “meh”, and “meh” is not good enough. Regardless of all the negatives, there is some fun to be had with Rock Revolution and if you are in the mood for another music game you may want to give it a try. However it probably won’t keep you occupied for long, especially not with all the other music games that have hit the market, or will be hitting the market very soon.

Reviewers Note: This review pertains to the standard edition game only version. The drum portions of the game were played on a Rock Band drum kit. A special edition version of the game, which will include the official Rock Revolution drum kit will release in November.