With Guitar Hero and Rock band taking a huge command over the market, one would expect Konami’s first stab at the U.S. market with a Band music game would be successful. Hell, they are the creators of the genre in the first place, and have always done it right. Unfortunately with Rock Revolution, this is not the case. Konami fails to take their success at Rhythm games to the next plateau or even the same level as its competitors.
The multiple missteps in Rock Revolution range in various capacities. All the tracks in the game are only covers, and it just doesn’t hold up when everyone else now has fully licensed and originally recordings by the artists. Most of the covers in Revolution are also poorly done, with some that will make you cringe as you’re playing. Another fault was the fact that Konami left it up to you to have the instruments. While this may not be a bother to some, as they don’t need more plastic instruments cluttering up their room, it just adds to the fact that Konami half-assed the game.
The graphics in game aren’t too bad, as they decided to go for a less cartoonish feel compared to Guitar Hero and Rock Band. But the character selection feels limited without having a Create-A-Character mode, which should be mandatory at this point. The other issue with the game is the way the notes come down the screen. I understand Konami has always had notes come straight down on the screen for the gamer to time their steps or button presses in other games, but for this game it just fails to work. It started to bother my eyes when staring at the notes for too long, and I was forced to take a break.
There are some bright spots to the game. Instead of just playing a venue and then moving on, you play live shows which count as you recording an album. Depending on how much you complete for each album, it will go gold or platinum, and lends a nice change of pace. I also liked the variety of challenges and definitely found this game a bit more challenging even on medium compared to other games.
The game is definitely playable, and some may enjoy this break from the normal design that Guitar Hero and Rock Band have mastered. It is hard for me to recommend this title to anyone with much better products on the market, and would suggest picking this up as a rental or bargain bin find. Rock Revolution is very disappointing considering how much experience Konami has in the genre, and hopefully in the next installment, if there is one, they will bring their “A” game.