Recently, Gaminglives was invited to the London launch for “We Sing Encore”, the latest game by developers Le Cortex and publishers Nordic Games.  I was lucky enough to be chosen to attend on behalf of the site and to check out the game before launch, as well as rub shoulders with other people in the gaming world.  Well, after a sore throat and a bunch of shoulder-rubbing-related restraining orders, I can conclude that it was an amazing night.

The event was held at “Punk” in Soho, with everyone invited several hours before the club opened up to everyone else for public use.  There, we gamers were given a night involving a free bar, karaoke, live music, and We Sing Encore.  The live music and backing for the Karaoke was provided by ‘Lucas’ (www.lucasrock.co.uk), an amazing covers band who gave it their all for every song, giving a sensational energy to the Karaoke for several hours with a large and varied set list of rock covers throughout, with over 50 prepared songs.  Sadly, by the time I eventually plucked up the courage to try my hand at it, the opportunity had passed; still, the few songs that I saw them perform sounded fantastic and gave a great energy to the evening.

On the other side of the club, We Sing Encore was set up with four microphones where everyone attending was able to choose to play the game or not.  It turned out that checking out the game before the background music got too loud was actually the best way to try out how the game played as, later on, when bands were playing and the stand’s assistant left, it became very difficult for anyone trying it to figure out who was who and how anyone was doing, especially as the microphones are activated after song selection by shaking them (which happened a bit too easily in a club with loud music being played constantly).

My last real experience with singing games was the original Singstar back on the Playstation 2 and, while games like Rock Band have consistently tempted me back, they’ve only been fleeting affairs with friends who normally don’t have the microphones, so I haven’t spent any time with singing games since the original Singstar (which admittedly took up a lot of my time when I originally bought it).  It seems like the genre hasn’t changed at all since I left it.

There’s a film I’ve been told about (as everyone at GamingLives knows by now, I’ve never seen any films, and probably don’t even know what they really are) called “Single White Female”, where a woman gets a roommate who slowly begins to copy her to the point that the protagonist’s boyfriend struggles to tell the difference and the room-mate eventually tries to kill and replace the protagonist.  Imagine the protagonist is Singstar and the copying room-mate is We Sing Encore.  That’s pretty much the best and most concise way I could sum up We Sing Encore from what I played at the launch event; of course, whether you consider that a good thing or not is entirely up to you. If you liked Singstar, this is basically the closest you can get to playing Singstar on a Nintendo console, albeit with some small changes and additions. If you didn’t like Singstar, then there may be nothing for you here and you better run before your new room-mate throws your dog out of the window.

For the uninformed, what happens is that the song’s music video plays while the lyrics appear at the bottom and the tune and pitch at which you have to sing, appear in the middle; get your singing within the boundaries of what the game wants you to get and you score more points, getting a better rating at the end.  While the game claims to have anti-cheating technology built in to prevent the player from just humming or whistling to get points, I don’t think it worked as well as they thought in practice, seeing as the inactive microphones were still picking up a lot of points just by lying on the ground while the club’s music blasted into them.

The game has a bunch of modes which didn’t see much playtime, since the main mode being played was ‘four player versus’.  Sadly, it was difficult to tell who was doing the best as the shaking microphone problem cropped up again, preventing us from being able to tell who was who without a lot of guesswork.  There also wasn’t enough feedback for the player; even when I sung deliberately terribly (on purpose), I wasn’t able to tell how much I was out by from what the game wanted me to hit.  Another problem was that in several songs, the lyrics and song charting would be out of sync with the song itself, meaning that you were singing behind the rest of the action.  In terms of flaws, it’s a pretty big one that should have been ironed out during testing, especially since it raises the possibility of breaking the flow which, in games like this, is a worst case scenario.

The song selection is obviously geared towards more casual players and for parties:

• B52s – Love Shack
• Black Eyed Peas – Shut Up
• Bonnie Tyler – Total Eclipse Of The Heart
• Cheryl Cole – Fight For This Love
• Coldplay  – Yellow
• Elton John – Tiny Dancer
• Gloria Gaynor – I Will Survive
• Gwen Stefani featuring Akon – The Sweet Escape
• Jamiroquai – Virtual Insanity
• Jimmy Ruffin – What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted
• Kaiser Chiefs – Ruby
• Katrina & The Waves – Walking On Sunshine
• Lady GaGa feat. Colby O’Donis & Akon – Just Dance
• Lily Allen – Smile
• Lou Bega – Mambo No 5
• Lynyrd Skynrd – Sweet Home Alabama
• Mika – Grace Kelly
• Natasha Bedingfield – Unwritten
• Pixie Lott – Mama Do (Uh Oh, Uh Oh)
• Plain White Ts – Hey There Delilah
• Right Said Fred – I’m Too Sexy
• Rihanna – Umbrella
• Robyn feat. Kleerup – With Every Heartbeat
• Simply Red – Holding Back The Years
• Soft Cell – Tainted Love
• Spandau Ballet – Gold
• The Supremes – Baby Love
• Taio Cruz – Break Your Heart
• The Veronicas – Untouched
• Westlife – Flying Without Wings
• Girls Aloud – The Promise
• Florence & The Machine – Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up)
• The Saturdays – Up
• Will Young – Leave Right Now
• Kasabian – Fire
• S Club 7 – Don’t Stop Moving
• Stereophonics – Dakota
• The Proclaimers – I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)
• N Dubz – I Need You
• Baddiel and Skinner & The Lightning Seeds – Three Lions

There were only a few songs on the track list I would particularly feel like singing, which may have been the case for the other people at the event as some songs would see repeated plays while some didn’t see one.  As is the case for a lot of games like this, the soundtrack is obviously a massive buying factor for this genre because it’s not one you’d particularly play for the mechanics; it’s one you buy to have a laugh with friends and party and, on that front, it seems to be doing a great job.

No one at the event really cared who they were after a while or how they were doing, they were just happy to enjoy themselves by singing along.  While the casual scene isn’t something I’m altogether massively educated on, if a bunch of possibly jaded and cynical gamers (I know I am!) can have fun playing the game, then despite its flaws, something’s gone right for We Sing Encore, hasn’t it?  Basically, if you’re a fan of singing games, need a party game, and don’t have Singstar, Rock Band, Guitar Hero, or any of the like, then you can’t do much wrong with We Sing Encore.

I’d also like to say a big thanks to the people I met that night for being so pleasant, talkative, and helping to make the evening awesome as well as a massive laugh, especially the people at Gamingunion.net, zoegriffin.co.uk, Spong, Gamestyle.com, the folks at Game Face (their new series is broadcasting on Bravo in the first week of September), Alan from vvvgamer.com, Kerri from Sony, and Rupert Loman from www.eurogamer.net

We Sing Encore is out now for the Nintendo Wii and comes with 2 USB microphones or is available as standalone software.

Last five articles by Edward

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