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Let Your Lips Do The Talking
Let Your Lips Do The Talking
Posted by Dekko on Jan 24th 2009 21:10
Now before we begin I just have to say that I have the greatest singing voice in the world and my rendition of Radiohead’s ‘Fake Plastic Trees’ brings grown men to tears.
OK, now you know that & have the image in your head we can talk about ‘Lips’.
No not those two limp fish flapping loosely from beneath your nose rather the karaoke game from Microsoft Game Studios, developed by iNiS a Japanese company who have made a few Gundam love fests & who also specialise in rhythm games, which is handy as that’s what ‘Lips’ essentially is, baby.
Their name stands for ‘infinite noise of the inner soul’ which is what you’ll be hearing if you hear Smelly Moss singing after a few beers, hahahahahahaha!! I know; I have a million of ‘em!
Anyway, on to the game which is of course inspired by Sony’s ‘Sing Star’ series which has been entertaining housewives and embarrassing the uncool kids at parties for yonks now, well Microsoft saw this action and declared in a loud & clear voice; “We want a slice of that pie!” and thus ‘Lips’ was born out of Billy Bob Gates’ gaming womb.
I’m sure a large section of you will have played ‘Sing Star’ and thus will be instantly familiar with this game, for those of you who haven’t we (the initiated & enlightened) will give you a quick whirl about the idea.
You take a microphone in hand, you choose a song from the menu and the words come up upon thy TV and hark the herald gamers SING! Simple as that my friend.
‘Lips’ comes packaged with two wireless microphones and is cheaper than the PS3’s main singy word game plus their mics are wired (the wireless mics not being ready in time for launch).
‘Lips’ mics are not only wireless they also have flashy lights built in to them! I know, how cool is that? Flashy things as well as singing, all in one package!
‘Lips’ is presented in a clean style, uncluttered and unfussy but then too complicated as a lot of its core audience may switch off and watch the shiny lights instead (I jest of course).
I know some people take these games seriously and think that a high score means a career in music beckons, well it doesn’t. Admittedly these people usually look like Gareth Bale and can be seen sitting in the park drinking a weak orange drink from a flash while feeding pigeons, of course this is when God (looking like William Shatner) isn’t commanding them to exercising their vocal cords.
Back to the game, well it does what you’d want it to do, the inclusion of the motion sensors in the mics is a good touch, allowing you to unleash the games version of ‘Star Power’ with an Elvis like move, throwing your hands out before you or whatever position the on screen indicator points too.
However, I think the mics could be utilised more. When you tap the head or shake the mic it becomes a percussion instrument, either a tambourine or a maraca, it would be cool for this to have an affect on score if the player hit the instrument in time between verses. Alas it seems to be just a distraction from the singing.
You inevitability have to compare the game with ‘Sing Star’ and you have to say that ‘Lips’ does this sort of thing well, the mics are indeed better than on the rival consoles game and the menus are simple (the versus options could be better laid out though rather than just in the bottom left of the screen as you go into a song), just shaking a mic to join is both easy and, well, easy. What more do you need?
The main downfall for ‘Lips’ compared to the ‘Star’ at this point in time is the song selection. ‘Sing Star’ has been out for a while on the PS3 and has a wide catalogue of songs for download where as ‘Lips’ is currently quite limited, although the big M are shipping out song packages at a decent rate.
The other factor between the two is that ‘Sing Star’ has the lure of some online options, if you have an Eye Toy then there is the You Tube-esque video feature which allows you to upload video clips of you singing to be viewed by all, thus allowing many moments of gawping at the world as they try to sing Mariah Carey tunes (disco, disco!) but if you don’t own a PS3 & need to sing at your TV then ‘Lips’ is for you.
Overall: 4 out of 10 (add 2 if you like ‘Sing Star’ or ‘Karaoke Revolution’.)
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