The era of music games relied heavily upon popular song selections and selling peripherals. Now at the end of the craze, we have seen some more detailed and disciplined approaches to the melding of musician and gamer. Enter BandFuse: Rock Legends – game, tool, and instrument all in one. How does it manage to distinguish itself from other games of its genre? It is tailored to the mind of a musician.

The game’s accessibility begins at set up, where the player is offered many options. Included with The Band Pack for $79.99 is a microphone, two 1/4″ jack to USB cables, an audio adapter, a four port USB hub, and an acoustic guitar adapter that clips on to the headstock. This allows compatibility with acoustic guitars with no input jack. The game is not limited to guitar or bass, allowing vocals both on their own and with guitar. Vocals can also be subject to a grading mode, or they can be enjoyed karaoke style. But microphone set up is not solely for vocals. If you happen to have a set up you like, hook up a microphone and you can use that instead of a direct input for your instrument. If you decide to get The Artist Pack, you still receive a 1/4″ jack to USB cable, an audio adapter, and a headphone extension. You can still play acoustic using a microphone, and nearly any USB microphone should work with the game.

Digital audio effects are pretty slick and mimic the feel of playing on your amp and pedal, should you decide to forgo your normal sound setup and plug in directly. Latency, tone, and note precision are stellar in BandFuse. This can be a little unforgiving in the vocals, given that harder modes of vocal challenges grade you better if you sing the exact notes rather than an octave higher or lower. However, there are five levels of difficulty for instruments, which allows for people at any and all skill levels to rock out. Pay attention to the level descriptions, because higher levels can be vastly more difficult than the level preceding them. For beginners, Shred U offers assistance and gets you up to speed with how to play. The game has great features that assist in teaching, such as the ability to loop and slow selections. However, the game does not carry itself specifically as a teaching tool. BandFuse is more the result of mixing Guitar Hero and Rocksmith, and it does a great job of focusing on what works in each instance.

Gameplay follows the format of hitting notes at the correct times to learn how to play songs. In Guitar Hero, since notes were not actually a factor, the gameplay proved difficult for those who knew how to play guitar. The approach to pressing colored buttons at the right time was enitrely different from knowing actual chords and tablatures. Also, the way the notes on the screen rush directly at the player was about as far as you can get from reading music. Band Fuse remedies this by using the same format as guitar tablature. This way, veteran players are able to jump right in with less of a learning curve, and beginners are also learning how to read tabs. There are video tutorials from the likes of Slash, Zakk Wylde and other guitarists. It’s important to note that any single game for learning an instrument is never an all encompassing lesson. These games are wonderful as a way to help those learning to play, but you will be able to learn techniques not included in games by seeking out instruction from a musician in person.

Multiplayer is a huge draw for this title. The game allows up to four players to connect and play at once, given you have as many instruments and hook ups. Want to record a jam session? Sure, BandFuse will do that. It records your performance each time and asks if you’d like to hear it and/or save it, allowing you to save up to 500 recordings. The game walks the line between party game and band practice, and it does it well. As the name suggests, the song choices are all within the rock genre, ranging from bands like Blur and The Pixies to Grateful Dead and Rush. Further tracks can be purchased as DLC if you need some additional variety.

BandFuse: Rock Legends is a game worth a spin for beginners and pros alike. While sharing similarities to other games on the market, it succeeds in being just different enough. This is due to its ability to adapt gaming to fit musicianship rather than finding a way to cram music into a game. I’d love to see this game expand further to include songs from other genres and maybe even, fingers crossed, drums as well.

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