Most karaoke is probably best left forgotten, but that's not "SingStar"'s philosophy. Sony wants you to remember your performance and share it.
Sony has clearly gone to great lengths to develop a proprietary YouTube-like service for the PlayStation 3 debut of the "SingStar" franchise. The depth of the community features is phenomenal and sometimes more fun than "SingStar" itself.
I can't help but feel these features are stuck in the wrong game -- "Guitar Hero," "Rock Band," are you listening? -- but that doesn't make them any less impressive.
In order to take full advantage of what "SingStar" has to offer, you not only need the "SingStar"-branded mic (unfortunately, your "Rock Band" microphone won't work, nor will any other USB or Bluetooth-based mic) and a PlayStation Eye. The latter allows you to make a virtual record of looking and sounding like a fool.
Plug in those devices and hop into My SingStar, the game's online community. You start by creating a personal profile, which allows you to upload high scores, screen captures and entire videos of your "performance." I attached quotes because I would hardly call my cat-like screeching and wanna-be Mick Jagger moves to be labeled a "performance." If you want, you can check out my "performances" under the name Mechamothra.
Your profile acts as the portal to the rest of the "SingStar" online world. You can check out the latest uploads to the service, vote in a poll, check out your friends list to see what they've been singing lately or rate other videos on a five-star scale. I had Jason Cipriano capture video of My SingStar for you:
Sometimes videos won't buffer properly, but it works most of the time. My girlfriend and I spend almost 30 minutes just watching other people's videos. The videos run the gamut: wacky, funny, strange, sad and even slightly disturbing. If you could find "SingStar" on the cheap, browsing the shared videos is a meta game of its own.
But that's also one of "SingStar"'s biggest faults. There's no way to view any community contributions outside the game. Sony hasn't developed -- not yet, at least -- a widget or online portal where videos are available to someone who doesn't own "SingStar." I wish I didn't have to load my PS3 to view video, and hopefully Sony still sees the potential in a "SingStar" portal, even if it's late.
[UPDATE: As pointed out in the comments below, there is a YouTube-like site for "SingStar," but it doesn't appear to be up and running for US gamers yet. I've asked Sony whether this will be rolled out over here soon. Stay tuned!]
I'm more concerned with other games noticing "SingStar"'s accomplishments. Its community features are far beyond what's available elsewhere. There are countless "Guitar Hero" and "Rock Band" videos on YouTube already; why not make that part of the game experience? So far, it doesn't appear "Guitar Hero: World Tour" will have a feature and a rumored "Rock Band 2" remains unannounced.
There's still plenty of time for that to change, though. Harmonix and Neversoft, this comes from someone who wants to publicly make themselves look like an idiot on the internet. Please, make it happen.
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