The first rhythm game to feature an unbeatable soundtrack. Yours.
Although Rock Band is efficient in giving us loads of new material through downloadable content, their musical library can only go so far. Fortunately for those who haven’t seen many of their favourite bands getting much time on stage in the electronic musical spectacular, Phase has strolled in to give them all a chance to shine.
Plastic guitars, multi-coloured pads and tangled up microphones aren’t welcome here. The only expensive piece of kit you’ll need is your iPod, and Phase uses the hardware to its advantage. By simply moving songs from the iTunes Library and into its specialised folder, Phase utilises the players music library and incorporates it into the game. Because of this, you have absolutely no reason to complain about the soundtrack…unless you own no music. If that’s the (odd) case, Phase includes seven songs from Harmonix faves such as Bang Camaro and Freezepop.
Anyone who’s ever come across the genre will see this as a familiar set up. Notes pass to the bottom of the screen and players must hit them in time with…well…the beat. Tracks are unable to focus on one instrument, so note sequences often follow the general pulse of the song being played. This presents both good and bad points in terms of gameplay. The good being the aspect that once you get a chain of successful notes going, the beat begins to become incredibly catchy and manages to make songs even more enjoyable. The bad being the difficulty of getting a successful chain going. Due to the fact that none of the player’s songs have gone through an official development process, some rhythms and beats can sound out of place with the music or may suddenly alter with no warning. It’s neither the player’s or the games fault, yet can still lead to some unfair losses.
Casual gamers will see Phase as a masterpiece in killing time.
Due to the lack of buttons on an iPod, notes pass down on just three tracks and proves to make the game a simple and easily accessible experience. However, the addition of ‘Slider Notes’ take advantage of the use of the click wheels’ rotation feature. At intervals, small dotted lines make a path across all tracks and players must slide their finger around the click wheel to cross these paths and collect the notes. Although a tad gimmicky, it serves to break up the constant flow of rhythmic button bashing well.
Of course, due to the amount of attention you’ll be paying towards annihilating musical circles, you’d be forgiven for missing anything that’s happening in the background. However, with the outlandish unique artistic style, Phase does a fantastic job creating unique environments that it’s hard to tear your eyes away from. Bright colours and zany cartoon characters surround you as you pelt down your rhythmic road like you’re driving through a Spongebob Squarepants themed rave. With its unique style, Phase manages to gain its own identity in a genre where it’s becoming difficult to stand out from the crowd.
It’s nigh on impossible to knock the soundtrack, seeing as you’re in complete control of it, yet the pre-loaded tracks succeed in easing you into the game. Nice little touches such as the volume decreasing to a bare minimum when you lose a chain and then gradually rises again also do well to punish you when you screw up. This may not sound like much, but when parts of your favourite songs become almost mute, you can become progressively angrier at yourself for making mistakes.
Phase does incredibly well in standing out from the crowd with its unique design and user interactivity. High score junkies may grow weary of this due to some slight technical flaws that will hinder them from perfection, yet casual gamers will see Phase as a masterpiece in killing time. Sure, you’ll look like an indecisive nut-case at the bus stop, bashing all your iPod buttons in seemingly random motions, but at least you’re taking a more pro-active approach in listening to music.
Phase is compatible with the 3rd and 4th generation iPod Nano, iPod 5th Generation and iPod Classic
The Bad: Some of the notes don’t essentially fit to the songs, Hard to judge when to time some beats
Silver Y Award