Fun for (mostly) everyone!

I sing sometimes in the shower. I sing softly to myself sometimes as I walk through my dorm. I whistle when I'm walking to class. Am I any good? My mom told me once I'm better than Damon Albarn (of Blur and Gorillaz), but of course, she also thinks I'm the handsomest young man in the world (her words, not mine) and the smartest, etc. I'm almost completely positive that she's wrong about the last two things, so basically she's no objective judge of my singing capability. That's where karaoke came in for me. You might think that I copped out by buying a video game that I only really play with my friends instead of doing it in front of strangers, but hey! At least this way, I get judged by a computer.

I got Karaoke Revolution Party for only $20 from walmart.com and it even came with the mic! That's nice and cheap. The mic plugs into the memory card slot in the controller, which I found out after 10 minuts of trying to fit it into any holes in my Xbox. The game shows a band and a singer on some kind of stage while you sing the song. The important thing is at the bottom, bars show up giving you an idea of how high/low to sing and how long you should hold each note. An arrow shows what pitch you're singing at. The words to the song are on the bottom, but the game can't recognize words from your singing, so you can fudge the songs if you want. Just know that you're lame though.

The bars make up segments. Do well enough in a particular segment, and you get a "Great" score on that segment. This gets the crowd pumped up (as your crowd meter goes down, it'll start raining if you're at an outdoors venue and stuff like that, until you fail the song. It's a neat touch.) and gets you closer to the coveted "Diamond" Record, which is a perfect score of 50,000. Gold and Platinum are the other benchmarks.

The game works pretty well with the supplied mic (though it's fragile!) but not with Xbox Live headsets. Sure, there's the occasional hiccup, but overall, the mic's precision impressed me.

The heart of the game is a quick play type mode, where you just pick a song, character, difficulty, and do that song. This is what I play most of the time, because my friends and I will just sing whatever song we feel like. And it's fun! We got one of the shyer kids in the dorm to open up a bit and sing a few songs, had a few laughs at other people's and our own expenses, and were impressed by others.

Duets are possible, but only some songs are "true duets" with different lead and background parts. For the others, you and a pal just sing the lead part of the song at the same time.

There are other modes...a more rigid competition mode with rounds and stuff (but I'm never that organized with recreation), regular karaoke mode (no scoring), a medley mode, and some stupid minigames. But the main attraction is the quick play. Get some friends, maybe some booze, and have fun!

Oh and try to get the PS2 version if you can find a bundle for $20 too. It's easier to find extra mics for the PS2 (because they're USB, I believe) than ones for the Xbox.

xo,

underdawg

p.s. I know you want the song list. Here:

Ain't Nothing Like the Real Thing - Marvin Gaye
Ain't Too Proud to Beg - The Temptations
Always - Atlantic Starr
American Woman - Lenny Kravitz
Brick House - The Commodores
Call Me - Blondie
Crazy - Aerosmith
Crazy in Love - Beyonce
Do You Really Want To Hurt Me - Culture Club
Drive - Incubus
Dust in the Wind - Kansas
Endless Love - Lionel Richie & Diana Ross
Every Little Thing She Does is Magic - The Police
Everybody Wants to Rule the World - Tears for Fears
Everywhere - Michelle Branch & Santana
Fame - Irene Cara
Fly - Hilary Duff
For You I Will - Monica
Greatest Love of All - Whitney Houston
Headstrong - Trapt
Here I Go Again - Whitesnake
I Don't Want to be - Gavin DeGraw
(I've Had) The Time of My Life - Bill Medley & Jennifer Warnes
I Left My Heart in San Francisco - Tony Bennett
I Love Rock and Roll - Joan Jett
I Will Always Love You - Whitney Houston
If You Could Only See - Tonic
I'll Be - Edwin McCain
Material Girl - Madonna
Me and Bobby McGee - Janis Joplin
Pain - Jimmy Eat World
Pieces of Me - Ashley Simpson
Play That Funky Music - Wild Cherry
Start Me Up - The Rolling Stones
Superstition - Stevie Wonder
Sweet Caroline - Neil Diamond
Takin' Care of Business - Bachman-Turner
Take On Me - A-Ha
That's Amore - Dean Martin
The Game of Love - Michelle Branch
Time After Time - Cyndi Lauper
Truth Is - Fantasia Barrino
Turn the Beat Around - Gloria Estefan
Unforgettable - Nat King Cole
Uptown Girl - Billy Joel
Waiting for a Girl Like You - Foreigner
What I Like About You - Romantics
Who Can It Be Now - Men at Work
You're My Best Friend - Queen
(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman - Aretha Franklin

As far as I can tell, some of the songs are originals while others are decent covers.