Folk Mass Hero
Friday was a noteworthy day at Day Job and included — among other things — a lunchtime round of Guitar Hero. (Don’t ask.) I was very kindly asked to participate but
<li>the music associated with the game is very much what I call Straight Boy Rock, and I don't care for it. (Had there been <em>Synth Pop Hero</em>, I might have been game.)</li>
<li>an episode of South Park skewering Guitar Hero kinda ruined it for me.</li>
<li>I'm getting to be enough of a free software/free and open culture geek that I'm not keen on giving brainspace to proprietary software <em>and</em> music.</li>
Then an Office Mate — the same one who sold me his Asus Eee PC — told me about Frets on Fire, an open-source clone of Guitar Hero. (You use your keyboard upended for the controller.) At least that covers my third concern.
Then I noted your can — really, must — upload your own favorite songs, in the open OGG format or as a MIDI. MIDI, really? Because most of the MIDIs I know of are hymns. And while that doesn’t exactly address by first concern, it does mitigate it. (And it’s a goofy enough idea to minimize the second concern.)
A pretend-guitar playing game, on open-source software, pretending to rock out, Folk Mass-style. First, I think that helps establish my geek cred. And it does make the mind wonder and wander.
For Linux of course, but also Windows and Mac OS X (wonky): Frets on Fire
3 March 2008 at 10:10 am
All work and no play makes Jack and Jill dull folks. :) I am very much for gaming as entertainment: it’s interactive, and makes you use your brain in a way that television doesn’t. It’s actively engaging rather than passively so. :)