It's fairly safe to say that without the Wii, the rhythmic Wii remote wanging of Just Dance, and the karaoke smash series We Sing, would never have gone on to have quite as much success as it did. Although the Wii didn't create either of these types of games, it certainly propelled them to heights even they likely thought they'd never reach. And with the fourth instalment in the Just Dance series recently announced to be making its way to the Wii U, it looks like it's a trend that's set to continue on the console's successor. What's never been done before, though, is a game that blends the two genres together seamlessly - a game that lets you both dance and sing. The recently announced SiNG, from Leamington Spa based developers FreeStyle Games, however, is a contender to both We Sing and Just Dance's crowns, looking to blend Karaoke and dancing games into one, mega party game, where any number of people can join in the fun. Which at least sounds like an interesting concept.
In Party mode, one player becomes the lead singer, with their lyrics displayed on the Wii U GamePad, letting them face their audience rather than the TV. Luckily for the rest of your friends, SiNG mostly revolves around audience participation, and during their performance, cues will pop up on the screen of the Wii U GamePad, telling the singer to instruct their friends to clap along, dance or join in with the singing. They can also pick up a Wii Remote and use it to play instrumental sounds to accompany your performance too.
He's not even looking at the lyrics... Tut tut...
The standard SiNG mode lets up to two singers croon away together, and it rates their overall performance on the TV, for everyone to see and mock/congratulate, depending on the sort of friends you have. The overlord wielding the Wii U GamePad is also able to create a playlist for everyone to play through, whether they like their choice of music or not - it does promise a wide variety of music from the '60s to current pop hits though, so in theory there should be something for everyone.
However, the biggest problem we have is that, from what we've seen so far, it doesn't seem like much of a game. Sure, you can sing with two people together, but We Sing lets you play with four, and we're not convinced it'll be easy to encourage our friends to get up and clap/dance along if there's nothing scoring them, and therefore nothing to aim for, and no competition? Admittedly, there's little known about the dancing side of things at the moment, and there's every chance the press release, or trailer, could just be giving us the wrong end of the stick - but we're probably only lukewarm about this one. Sadly, there's no sign of a song list yet either, but at least the trailer tells us more about the game that Microsoft's trailers for Matter and LocoCycle. If SiNG sounds like your cup of tea, it may be worth popping back in the coming weeks for some more info. Until then, check the trailer below:
