REVIEW – There is probably not a person in the world that doesn’t like to sing from time to time, or hum their favorite tunes. Sony would like to help in this regards, whether they be stars in their own living room or actual famous singers. Last year on the 13^th of November Sony released the Singstar Ultimate Party for the PlayStation 3 and 4 exclusively.

The series was on only on the PlayStation 2 for a long time, it had 27 episodes, and then 13 were released for the PS3 (that makes this the 14^th for the PS3), however this is the first Singstar game that is was released for PS4. Those who never played one of these games, or never been to a karaoke party, it won’t be much of a problem figuring out what to do. Sing as best as you can…. hopefully. The difficulty scale determines the speed of the lyrics, and the technique required to sing the songs. We’ll get the music, and the lyrics, and it is up to us and our vocal cords to complete a song verse by verse.

High notes, deep pockets

In the base game there are thirty songs included, with these songs however Sony decided to target the mainstream audience. Which means that there are only songs that were on the top 10 list of their respective era. It’s an advantage if the person likes those specific hits, but for those with more refined taste will be left at a disadvantage. The main genres are here of course, but the main backbone of the list are pop songs, which to be frank is not such a good choice since the lyric writes don’t really sweat once they finish writing such a song.

After the initial shock due to the lack of choice came the next one: downloadable track list. Okay there are pretty neat, and old hits, but even here there are huge gaps in terms of solo artists / bands. At the same time I was surprised to see Bon Jovi’s You give love a bad name, or It’s my life, and three other mostly unknown songs, but no Livin’ on a prayer, which was also a smash hit as much as the two songs mentioned. If we don’t find our favorites well then comes another deep wound to our pockets.

We can pay for additional songs, it’s not much around two or three dollars a song. However show me someone who is enough of a fool to buy the base game, and if they want to add 23 more songs they’ll end up paying the base game’s price again. I know there are licencee fees, and to actual create the karaoke version of a song, but this is baffling, especially if we consider only 30 songs are included in the initial price point.

Social experinces

Regardless of the above issue, Sony was still able to create a game that a group that likes to sing will have a lot of fun nights. However even if we’re alone, we’ll never be alone as we are in the digital age, and London Studio has created the social network. Which we can only truly use with the PlayStation 4’s camera, and without we’ll just be able to browse other performances and pictures. There are some funny performances like the father singing Beastie Boys while his daughter is sleeping and etc etc.

The other neat idea was even though there is a steep entry point, there is no need for the trademarked SingStar microphone. You can just use your smartphone whether it is iOS or Apple, a microphone app is on the store that can be used for the game’s PS4 version. Of course if the phone rings while singing you’ll lose points so it’s best to switch that function off on your phone.

What’s the final decision?

One eye cries the other is laughing. I’m not happy too much to be honest, the tracklist is limited, and there are such legends missing as Frank Sinatra, Bob Marley, Phil Collins or a System Of a Dawn, Linkin Park, Metallica etc. Yes, anyone who had the previous Singstar can upgrade those songs to this version if they had it there.

It’s nice Sony wants people to sing and have fun, where they even include the music video, and if it is not included it has neat montages. The iOS app is a great idea to use the smartphones as a microphone. Hopefully the limited track list will be updated, and we won’t have to pay our pants off for it. After that Singstar will be truly great.

– Dazo911 –

Publisher:Sony

Developer:London Studio

Genres:sing simulator

Released:November 13th, 2014