Know Your Game - Rocksmith 2014

[VinsCool]

This new session starts with @Taleweaver. Our friendly friend will receive questions related to Rocksmith 2014!
Can this really help me improve my skills?!

RULES and info:
These are done in the same fashion as KYT. The public asks the questions, the questioned answers.
You may ask questions about the game, the persons experiences with the game, and generally topics relating to said game.
Interviews last 3 days.
NO HENTAI games.
NO QUICK TEMPLATES (I see any and you're kicked).
And lastly NO HATERS.

Sign up for KYG here (CLOSED):
https://gbatemp.net/threads/know-your-game-signups.448911/

and without further ado, ask away.

 

[Taleweaver]

Oh...that's me.
Do note that I'm not a musician. I hadn't touched a guitar before getting this game, so I can't go in depth on that field. But I started playing it in february, and though it lessened from "over an hour a day" to "a couple of hours per week", I still love it as much (if not more) as the first time playing. I've updated my steam review a couple times and also rambled a bit on it in this blog.

But that said...I'm all open for any questions whatsoever.

 

[WeedZ]

This game is alot easier if you already play. A friend of mine got it thinking he was going to learn guitar with it and gave up rather quickly, which made it pointless. But it's pretty cool. The songs I already knew I got through rather easily, easier when I didn't look at the screen which made the game even more pointless. I guess if you're dedicated enough though, you could use this to make learning more fun. But it's no substitute for actually learning and practicing. This is my expertise on music and not necessarily the game..

 

[Taleweaver]

This game is alot easier if you already play. A friend of mine got it thinking he was going to learn guitar with it and gave up rather quickly, which made it pointless. But it's pretty cool. The songs I already knew I got through rather easily, easier when I didn't look at the screen which made the game even more pointless. I guess if you're dedicated enough though, you could use this to make learning more fun. But it's no substitute for actually learning and practicing. This is my expertise on music and not necessarily the game..

That speaks for itself: you can't get out of the game what you don't want to put in. And the game being easier if you already know guitar is either obvious, or a compliment to the game.

I don't agree the game is pointless when you don't look at the screen, though. For many reasons, even: you've got a backup band, the game serves as an amplifier (it even has a whole gamma of sound effects you can create), you can skip to or loop certain parts of the song, slow down or speed up, and even then: at the end of the song it may be interesting to know how well you actually played the song.

EDIT: almost forgot: the game also has an expert mode. Basically, if you play parts of a song at 100% difficulty and speed well enough, those notes will start to fade or even vanish entirely, thus forcing you to play "without looking at the screen". I've got it switched off (meaning: the game won't try to increase my notes to above 100% if I'm doing well*), but you can leave it on, or probably even play the entire song that way.



*to those unaware: the game comes with a fairly good learning algorithm: play part of a song well, and the part (and similar ones) will slowly increase in difficulty next time.

 

[VinsCool]

Would you recommend this game for guitar noobs like me?

 

[Taleweaver]

Would you recommend this game for guitar noobs like me?

Absolutely. I got this game on steam (at 75% discount), got the cable for 30 bucks, a cheap electric guitar for 70, spare strings and a plectrum. That's below 150 total. It's obviously far from the best guitar ever, but if it turns out you don't like it (it is hard at first) you haven't lost a fortune.
For that money you get (in the game) a whole bunch of lessons, practice tracks with most lessons, guitar games and of course the songs. Said songs are broken into 10-20 second segments, each with a bunch of difficulty settings (often about a dozen). The game is pretty good at giving you settings that are just at or slightly above your skill level, so things seldomly become frustrating. There are off course lots of songs, there's plenty of dlc* and it's not hard to get custom songs for free (though it's a bit hit and miss on that one, especially as a beginner).

While i don't think it can replace a guitar teacher, I'm not really one to judge (playing this game got me wanting to learn it in a class, but this far i haven't found time for it). But it's certainly a good starting point.


*I've bought more dlc on this game than any other game. And considering songs take far longer to master, the price is actually very decent

 

[Plstic]

Whats your opinion on the difficulty scaling? I've heard that it gets easier if you mess up a bunch. As a musician I don't think that's a good way to learn.

 

[Taleweaver]

Whats your opinion on the difficulty scaling? I've heard that it gets easier if you mess up a bunch. As a musician I don't think that's a good way to learn.

I think it's decent. The game notices the distinction between accidentally missing a few notes (or being on the wrong get number) and simply not being able to cope with the current difficulty. Likewise, it slowly ups the skill if you play parts very well.
Of course that's the default setting. You can also disable level ups and/or level downs, and to a degree how much difference a level up/down really is.
And if you really want to be the control freak, you can manually set the difficulty on each part of the song.

That said: as a still beginning guitar player, playing a song for the very first one or two times can be a bit annoying: the game keeps track on how you play and still has to adjust it to your level. So simple songs (like pink Floyd's wish you were here) can be pretty boring for the first half where you do pretty much nothing whereas iron maiden songs start out above my skill and get notched down during the playthrough).