Anyone else having fun with Rocksmith?
Discussion
Ok, long story short; 18 months ago I "lent" my lad one of my guitars (one of 2, pretty much unused for 20 years) and - at his request - gave him a copy of a PC app called Rocksmith. He made (incredibly) rapid progress, bought himself a lovely PRS and has just blown part of his student loan on some mahoosive Orange amp (b
d! Good lad!).
So, as I'd barely touched my guitars since I was about his age, he bought me the PS3 version for Xmas... and I've been playing a couple of hours a day nearly every day since. And really enjoying it.
It's not perfect; the way it adds notes to songs as you repeat them, eventually revealing chords, leads to the occasional FFS moment. But it's got me playing again; guitars are cleaned up, re-stringed and singing again...
Anyone else using it?
I'd be interested to know what else you do to complement it? My lad's also learnt a lot from the freebie lessons on JustinGuitar - any other recommendations?
And - for the more accomplished (that'll be most of you, compared to me!) - anything I'm likely to miss, or should be wary of, while bashing away with RS?
Any songs of particular note that are useful to learn with it?
d!So, as I'd barely touched my guitars since I was about his age, he bought me the PS3 version for Xmas... and I've been playing a couple of hours a day nearly every day since. And really enjoying it.
It's not perfect; the way it adds notes to songs as you repeat them, eventually revealing chords, leads to the occasional FFS moment. But it's got me playing again; guitars are cleaned up, re-stringed and singing again...
Anyone else using it?
I'd be interested to know what else you do to complement it? My lad's also learnt a lot from the freebie lessons on JustinGuitar - any other recommendations?
And - for the more accomplished (that'll be most of you, compared to me!) - anything I'm likely to miss, or should be wary of, while bashing away with RS?
Any songs of particular note that are useful to learn with it?
I play it on xbox. It doesn't form a massive part of my practice more of a diversion when I'm in a rut, but it definitely has value. I like the selection of songs, the quality of the weekly DLC varies a bit though.
Most fun I have with it is playing bass and it's the only reason I have a bass guitar.
I think it's brilliant, but may not so much for a more accomplished guitarist than me (playing 3 years or so).
Most fun I have with it is playing bass and it's the only reason I have a bass guitar.
I think it's brilliant, but may not so much for a more accomplished guitarist than me (playing 3 years or so).
Lefty said:
Ahhhhhh, thanks.
I started learning at Christmas 2014 using Andyguitar on YT and now using a local tutor for an hour a week and some song lessons on justinguitar on YT.
Will investigate this rocksmith thing. Cheers
You want my PC copy, lead etc? not sure if it will let you reactivate the license on Steam, but the software is cheaper without the cable.I started learning at Christmas 2014 using Andyguitar on YT and now using a local tutor for an hour a week and some song lessons on justinguitar on YT.
Will investigate this rocksmith thing. Cheers
I play it on Xbox aswell - absolutely love it as I can learn/enjoy playing songs with the rest of the parts in place rather than endlessly (aimlessly?) jamming riffs or scrolling through pages of tabs without any accompaniment. Recently did a small tribute for Bowie and got Rebel Rebel down in a couple of hours as opposed to slogging through tabs with a metronome for some of the other songs!
I play bass (and have been for 30 years), and mess about on guitar - my ability on both instuments has vastly improved through playing the game. My bass playing outside of the game is more adventurous due to being forced to exploit techniques I wouldn't normally include in my playing (I can be lazy!), and my guitar playing is improved just through more practice and instruction. Being able to set the difficulty and run through riff repeater at a comfortable speed for the hard bits is a real asset. Some of the "games" for technique practice are a nice diversion from the usual boring way of doing repetive things such as scales etc.
They constantly add new downloadable songs so there is a huge (750+) song library and it's not just rock - there's plenty of funky stuff too.
I would definitely recommend to anybody of any level - if you watch the weekly Rocksmith developers stream on Twitch (Thursday evenings 11pm) you'll see the people who actually note track the songs playing them and they only manage to get mid-90% achievement which surprised me as I thought they would get 100% every time - just shows that you don't have to be perfect to pull off an entirely credible performance
@Tom_C76 - If you are serious about giving up and donating your cable, there's a willing recipient here
Happy playing Rocksmithers
I play bass (and have been for 30 years), and mess about on guitar - my ability on both instuments has vastly improved through playing the game. My bass playing outside of the game is more adventurous due to being forced to exploit techniques I wouldn't normally include in my playing (I can be lazy!), and my guitar playing is improved just through more practice and instruction. Being able to set the difficulty and run through riff repeater at a comfortable speed for the hard bits is a real asset. Some of the "games" for technique practice are a nice diversion from the usual boring way of doing repetive things such as scales etc.
They constantly add new downloadable songs so there is a huge (750+) song library and it's not just rock - there's plenty of funky stuff too.
I would definitely recommend to anybody of any level - if you watch the weekly Rocksmith developers stream on Twitch (Thursday evenings 11pm) you'll see the people who actually note track the songs playing them and they only manage to get mid-90% achievement which surprised me as I thought they would get 100% every time - just shows that you don't have to be perfect to pull off an entirely credible performance
@Tom_C76 - If you are serious about giving up and donating your cable, there's a willing recipient here
Happy playing Rocksmithers
Interesting about the lag; I have read plenty of reports of it being an issue but my lad's PC plays it fine without being massively specced. Not sure if it's sound-cards that cause issues, or just PCs with lots of software running...
Certainly, for the console versions it's worthwhile doing what RS recommends (to minimize lag) and lining the console sound output to a sound system rather than through the TV.
Certainly, for the console versions it's worthwhile doing what RS recommends (to minimize lag) and lining the console sound output to a sound system rather than through the TV.
ehonda said:
It doesn't form a massive part of my practice
I'd be interested to know what else you do to practice? I'm *playing* lots with Rocksmith but feel I probably need a bit of structure to cover all the bases with the technique side. Tom_C76 said:
Very serious about parting with it. I guess Lefty has first refusal but if he doesn't claim it by the end of the weekend I'll stick it in the post.
Thanks a lot, very kind offer but I don't have a PC so will pass. Cheers though! PH is great for this kind of thing, very friendly place. I'll investigate the iPad option.
Dave2P said:
I'd be interested to know what else you do to practice? I'm *playing* lots with Rocksmith but feel I probably need a bit of structure to cover all the bases with the technique side.
I have weekly lessons, So I'm doing 'homework' on the back of those, scales, songs etc. I also have a boss eband, so jam along to the backing tracks on that. Plus I have joined jamplay so am currently following a seried of lessons on there.Dave2P said:
Thanks for the pointer; how are you finding jamplay? Looks like an amazing amount of material on there, but I'll go and have a trawl around.
OK, not as good as a flesh and blood tutor but still useful. It's given me other aspects of technique and theory to consider and I've been able to take these back to my tutor and get him to expand on them. I've only been using it for 4 weeks or so, though.I've been trying to get this acceptably working on PC without too much success. I have it on PS3, and that was setup with a bit of a faff with our old TV and sound system with latency being acceptable. I just can't get the same low latency numbers as I did on my PS3. Last nights effort was an attempt to run from the line out socket from the onboard sound direct to the the phono aux in on the sound board, but the lag was still noticeably offputting to my ears.
Next step is to try headphones and see if the front socket on the PC is any better than the rear, and have it pumped direct to my ears rather than through the sound board which could be adding processing layers. The line out to phono was certainly better than HDMI.
I've tried tweaking the ini file, but just end up with crackling sound with a latency level of 1, so have to drop that to 2, and then for the sample rate, I think the lowest I can achieve is 144. Any lower and I get no sound at all
Upstairs I've got a laptop connected to a focusrite scarlet which plumbs in to reaper, and with the ASIO4ALL driver, that has a latency of around 7-8ms, which works fine for my ears. I'd love to get this working for PC, but I want it setup so that I don't have to faff too much with different audio profiles when switching between watching films/TV and using the PC. That became too much of a hindrance with the PS3 to the point that I stopped using Rocksmith. How are other people getting on lag wise?
Next step is to try headphones and see if the front socket on the PC is any better than the rear, and have it pumped direct to my ears rather than through the sound board which could be adding processing layers. The line out to phono was certainly better than HDMI.
I've tried tweaking the ini file, but just end up with crackling sound with a latency level of 1, so have to drop that to 2, and then for the sample rate, I think the lowest I can achieve is 144. Any lower and I get no sound at all
Upstairs I've got a laptop connected to a focusrite scarlet which plumbs in to reaper, and with the ASIO4ALL driver, that has a latency of around 7-8ms, which works fine for my ears. I'd love to get this working for PC, but I want it setup so that I don't have to faff too much with different audio profiles when switching between watching films/TV and using the PC. That became too much of a hindrance with the PS3 to the point that I stopped using Rocksmith. How are other people getting on lag wise?
Edited by Hanslow on Wednesday 2nd March 14:18
I've been using it for about 9 months, and love it.
It does have its annoyances (auto difficulty, bend/slide recognition, not always showing the fret number), but I have to give it 8.5/10.
For those that dont know - there are a lot of free custom songs available if you are a tiny bit tech savvy - google customsforge.
It does have its annoyances (auto difficulty, bend/slide recognition, not always showing the fret number), but I have to give it 8.5/10.
For those that dont know - there are a lot of free custom songs available if you are a tiny bit tech savvy - google customsforge.
You can start at whatever level you want (just set the difficulty in the riff repeater section) or you can let it increase the difficulty as you play through. It will increase the difficulty mid-song if you are nailing it! It really is customisable so that whatever level you are at on your instrument you can play at a challenging or easy difficulty setting.
Can't say about the PS4 but on any console if you pass the sound through HDMI you get unacceptable lag - you need to be able to pass the sound directly through an external sound system (I put the video through HDMI and sound through an old computer surround system via a splitter cable, readily available to purchase from amazon for example, out of the back of my Xbox).
Can't say about the PS4 but on any console if you pass the sound through HDMI you get unacceptable lag - you need to be able to pass the sound directly through an external sound system (I put the video through HDMI and sound through an old computer surround system via a splitter cable, readily available to purchase from amazon for example, out of the back of my Xbox).
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