You can hop right away into any of the game's diverse library of 55 songs (view the complete "BandFuse: Rock Legends" track list), and there's five difficulty levels to choose from. Instead of seeing a "highway" of notes falling towards you there's an animated tablature which scrolls from right to left. On the lowest setting you'll be playing single notes on just one or two strings while at the highest level you'll be playing the full song note for note. As you play you're scored based on timing and pitch. Going on a streak will earn you a multiplier that'll help you rack up the points and gain up to five stars. Because the tabs don't take up much real estate on the screen, there's plenty of room for the song's official music video and karaoke style lyrics above it. The music videos make "BandFuse: Rock Legends" visually impressive, and this author's girlfriend immediately wanted to play (more on multiplayer later). Our favorite video was "No Rain" by Blind Melon.
A "Tour" mode boasts concerts (sets of songs to play), challenges (complete a specific song at a certain difficulty and ratings), and festivals (longer set lists) that'll earn you fans and money to unlock more concerts. The campaign is a clever way of making users play songs they might not want to otherwise, and the challenges give a clear goal for those who aren't motivated to improve songs they don't like in the "Quick Play" mode.
"BandFuse: Rock Legends" isn't exactly a tutor, and doesn't continuously recommend what you should do to improve like its competitor does. Instead, you'll have to rely on your common sense. Overwhelmed by the amount of notes that flew past you at breakneck speed on the fifth difficulty? Head to the Practice Mode to slow things down or the Lick Lab in ShredU to hone your skills. Lick Lab breaks down individual parts of a song that you might be having troubles with. It starts at 60% speed and increases up to 110% speed, then has you complete that phrase five more times at normal speed. Practice Mode is a much more robust tool for learning songs. We especially like how the speed can be made faster than the acutal song. If you can master a hard solo faster than it's played in real life then playing it normally should be a piece of cake.
One of the key features that sets "BandFuse: Rock Legends" apart from its competition are the videos by guitar legends. You'll be "instructed" by Slash, along with Zakk Wylde (Black Label Society), Mike Ness (Social Distortion), Bootsy Collins (Parliament-Funkadelic), George Lynch (Dokken, Lynch Mob), Alexi Laiho (Children of Bodom), and Zoltan Bathory and Jason Hook (Five Finger Death Punch). The videos are entertaining to watch and offer some great insights and advice, however to call them "lessons" is a bit of a leap. For example several of the videos are labled as a song "walkthrough," however there's no arrangement of notes to play alongside the video nor does the camera zoom in adequately enough for you to see exactly what's happening with the fretboard or their picking hand. While a few of the videos offer notes for you to try your hand, the vast majority of them don't. Additionally, a few of the videos which introduce new techniques also do not have any accompanying notes for you to test them out.
Hidden within the menus under "Backstage" you'll find "Pro Tips," which gives pointers on how you can get the most out of "BandFuse: Rock Legends." We felt this advice should've been featured right on the main menu or from the pause screen instead of buried within a sub menu. Also hard to find are where the scales are, which are mixed in with the backing tracks in ShredU. There's a wide variety of backing tracks, however they're only a few minutes long each.
Although "BandFuse: Rock Legends" is geared more towards guitar and bass players, singers can have some fun here too. It's important to note that you may choose to play guitar or bass and vocals at the same time or just vocals. There's two vocal modes to choose from: Karaoke and scored. The scored vocals allows you to pick from the same five difficulties and will be very familiar to anyone who's played any of the "Rockband" games. Harmonix actually contributed their vocal engine (and instrument icons) to the game. When singing in the scored mode each word has the corresponding pitch above it. Although you might not be able to hit high notes, you can compensate by singing an octave lower.
A couple unique features to "BandFuse: Rock Legends" are ducking and recording. Ducking is the ability to turn off the guitar from the original track. You can listen to a replay of any song, and if you like what you hear you can save the recording. This works particularly well when you create a custom tone and then head into one of the many backing tracks. Unfortunately there's no easy way to share your saved tracks from the game, which seems like a missed opportunity. We'd love to upload and brag about our accomplishments to YouTube, Facebook, or Twitter without having to use a Hauppague HDPVR, and caught ourselves saying "Xbox, record that!" then realized "BandFuse: Rock Legends" was being played on Xbox 360 and not Xbox One. There's no word on the tittle appearing on "next gen" consoles or PC at the moment.
Where "BandFuse: Rock Legends" really shines is in multiplayer, for up to four people. Realta Entertainment Group offers a separate "Band Pack" which comes with two guitar cables, microphone, a 4-port USB hub, and an acoustic guitar adapter. Our multiplayer games were with spare USB microphones hanging around from "Guitar Hero." You don't need to be drunk in order to have a blast with the Karaoke mode, and it's a lot easier to pass around a microphone at a party than it is a real guitar (although changing the setting to the lowest difficulty helps). Additionally, there's online leaderboards for each song and instrument.
We didn't experience any lag in "BandFuse: Rock Legends," in part thanks to the included hardware. In addition to the game and a 1/4” to USB guitar cable the Xbox 360 version of the "Artist Pack" comes with an audio adapter and headphone extension. The audio adapter plugs into the back of any Xbox 360 and provides three options: An optical audio out, analog red/white, and a headphone out. It's that third option which we find awesome. In fact, we wish that this nifty little adapter was available earlier on in the console's life cycle instead of the tail end. It allows you to use any pair of headphones you may have with your Xbox 360. The headphone extension ensures that you have enough cord length to use a spare iPhone headphone you have laying around. We used a Logitech G430.
While the on-disc song list is diverse, there's currently no way to expand upon it. Earlier today Realta Entertainment Group announced that 15 Jimi Hendrix songs are coming, however not until 2014. In fact, the first DLC won't be available until Jan. 28, 2014. That's more than two months after the game's release. In contrast the competition launched with a day one DLC offering, and has new artist packs added every week. This is really a huge missed opportunity.
If you have the patience and fortitude not to give up on it, playing "BandFuse: Rock Legends" will help increase your guitar and bass skills. Regardless of its shortcomings there's an overwhelming amount of value when you consider the price of traditional music lessons. We definitely recommend "BandFuse: Rock Legends" to aspiring guitarists, even those who've already picked up "Rocksmith 2014." It's cheaper than buying additional DLC for "that other game" however more importantly you'll learn tablature, which will allow you to look up how to play almost any song online for free.
Positives:
- Learn how to read tablature and play a real guitar, bass, and microphone.
- Multiplayer support for up to four players makes "BandFuse: Rock Legends" a blast to play at parties.
- Official music videos accompany each song and exclusive interviews with "Rock Legends."
- Tabs are small and scroll fast.
- No additional songs via DLC until Jan. 28, 2014 (Jimi Hendrix announced).
- "Lessons" are lacking (no note arrangements for so called "walkthroughs").
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