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Rock Band - Is the game educationally useful?
By kevin | April 30, 2008
Have you seen the latest craze going around?
Its these computer games which simulate playing musical instruments, and you have to play the music as it scrolls down the screen. You get awarded points if you hit the correct drum at the right time - and like any game it is of course highly addictive and great fun!i
I’ve been aware of these kind of games for quite a few years - I first discovered an acade game quite a few years back where it had an electric drum kit, and the music would scroll down the screen. I thought at the time that if they released that sort of game for playstation it would go really well.
Well, these games are now available for most of the major game consoles - Ps3, XBox360 and the like.
The major one is called “Rock Band” and you get a guitar controller, drum kit and microphone in the full package.
I’m not a huge fan of game consoles - so I dont own any of them - and thats why I havn’t had the opportunity to test out the latest stuff.
I’ve read lots of reviews of Rock Band saying that the drums are a little bit weak and “dont stand up to the punishment”… Well.. if you take a look at it you’ll easily see why!
Its a plastic drum kit with a few sensors built in - its hardly a real musical instrument! It must be pretty difficult to build a plastic drum kit which would stand up to being hit really hard many many times!
What my question is.. have people found the Rock Band drums to be actually useful in a real situation?
In the past I might have bought the thing and tried it out - at least so I could understand how it works for students who might be playing with it.
Anyway, if youre interested in checking it out - you can click on the link below to have a look at it (and order it if you wish) from Musicians Friend.
Check out the Rock Band Game Bundle »
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Topics: Classroom Percussion, Drum Kit, Drum Set, Music Education, Percussion in Schools, general music |
April 30th, 2008 at 1:22 pm
I’m addicted to Rock Band.
I have no formal training on a real drum set, but the drums in Rock Band are by far the most exciting instrument. I found the trickiest part is coordinating your feet with your hands, which I would imagine is the same on a real drum set.
I feel like I’m really playing the drums with the Rock Band set, and on the expert level, you are playing everything you hear in the music. Of course the elaborate drum setups of the real drummers have to be modified to a four pad plastic drum set with one bass pedal. Which can be tricky when you swear the real drummer is playing with two bass pedals and you’re expected to do it all on one.
We have a metal plate to cover our bass pedal and there are other after-market modifications to make your drums feel more “real.” To be honest, I was just thrilled with the rink-a-dink plastic set that it came with. I’m not a drummer, but I can pretend to be one in my basement.
May 1st, 2008 at 5:48 am
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May 1st, 2008 at 5:54 am
I, as well, really like rock band. I’m a beginner to medium level drummer, and I’m in percussion in school band. Personally, I think playing the drums on rock band has helped my hand speed. When playing on the rock band drums, I don’t get the same bounce back that I do when playing on a real kit. Because of this, I have to change my grip a bit, but not too much. I definitely think that playing rock band would help people who are just starting out to develop coordination and a general feel for drumming.
May 2nd, 2008 at 11:06 am
Hi there, good question and interesting comments. I never tried rock band drums by myself. I think it’s because i have 3 real drum kits, so why should i use that toy?
Don’t get me wrong, i like rock star drums anyway. Yes, for me it’s a toy and i can hardly imagine to use it on stage or so… But on the other hand it seems to be great fun to play with it.
I think rock star drums can help people to get into music, discover some feelings and make good experiences. So i think rock star can really be educational useful.
The only problem is that people could confuse rock star with real drumming. That’s, believe me, completely different: Rock star can be switched off - but real drums are always on your mind.