Rating: E
Genre: Rhythm Game
Publisher: MTV Games
Developer: Harmonix
Players: 1-4
Release Date: November 3rd, 2009

RENT

I am (almost) a 30 year old gamer, who is also mother to two children. My daughter is 9 and my son is 6. They both game to some extent, and they love to watch me stomp through a new campaign or kill the bad guys on xbox live in multi-player matches. But together we love to play any type of music game.

LEGO Rock Band is what we have been playing as of late. The first thing to mention is the play list. There were plenty of songs that I love from the past and some new ones my daughter loved. All-American Rejects is a favorite of the younger generation, and she was surprised to see it was a song she didn’t know. I believe, “Swing, Swing” was their first hit single. She introduced me to “Check Yes Juliet” by We the Kings, a song she and her friends love to sing on the bus from school. And my son has found some oldies he loves, like “We Will Rock You” by Queen and “Free Falling” by Tom Petty. I should add that he is quite the old soul when it comes to music, he fell in love with Beatles Rock Band immediately! There were a few songs I didn’t know by name but remember hearing when I was younger, like “In Too Deep” by Sum 41 and “Word Up” by Korn.

Here is the list to take a look for yourself:

• All American Rejects, “Swing, Swing”
• The Kooks, “Naïve”
• The Automatic, “Monster”
• KoRn, “Word Up!”
• Blink-182, “Aliens Exist”
• KT Tunstall, “Suddenly I See”
• Blur, “Song 2″
• Lostprophets, “Rooftops”
• Bon Jovi, “You Give Love a Bad Name”
• P!NK, “So What”
• Boys like Girls, “Thunder”
• The Police,”Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic”
• Bryan Adams, “Summer of 69″
• The Primitives, “Crash”
• Carl Douglas, “Kung Fu Fighting”
• Queen, “We Are The Champions”
• The Coral, “Dreaming of You”
• Queen, “We Will Rock You”
• Counting Crows, “Accidentally in Love”
• Rascal Flatts, “Life is a Highway”
• 

  Lego David Bowie

  David Bowie, “Let’s Dance”

• Ray Parker Jr., “Ghostbusters”
• Elton John, “Crocodile Rock”
• Razorlight, “Stumble and Fall”
• Europe, “The Final Countdown”
• Spin Doctors, “Two Princes”
• Everlife, “Real Wild Child”
• Spinal Tap, “Short & Sweet”
• Foo Fighters, “Breakout”
• Steve Harly, “Make Me Smile”
• Good Charlotte, “Girls & Boys”
• Sum 41, “In Too Deep”
• The Hives, “Tick Tick Boom!”
• Supergrass, “Grace”
• Iggy Pop, “The Passenger”
• Tom Petty, “Free Fallin”
• Incubus, “Dig”
• T-Rex, “Ride a White Swan”
• Jackson 5, “I Want You Back”
• Vampire Weekend, “A-Punk”
• Jimi Hendrix, “Fire”
• We the Kings, “Check Yes Juliet”
• Kaiser Chiefs, “Ruby”
• The Zutons, “Valerie”
• Katrina & The Waves, “Walking on Sunshine”

There are some great features about the playlist that I want to mention. It does acknowledge all of your previously purchased DLC. Although, it seems to grab songs that aren’t very kid friendly and remove them from the playlist. We downloaded the new Slipknot track pack, and it doesn’t show those tracks on Lego Rock Band. We noticed a few other more mature titles missing from our DLC, like “Beethoven’s C***” by Serj Tankian. You can port over the playlist from Lego Rock Band to your Rock Band song cache for only $9.99 as well. Another feature is Freestyle, where you can play anything you want without a track playing. The kids can really jam out to this mode. Jumping around doing guitar tricks and not having to worry about what notes they are playing.

A few other new features include: Automatic Kick Pedal and Super Easy difficulty. Neither setting locks achievements, you can still raise your gamer score while playing at your own speed!

The graphics aren’t something really up to debate: it’s LEGO Rock Band! It crisp and clean, but there’s not much to it. Everything possible in the game has been made with LEGOs. The kids think its great. The notes for your instruments are now LEGOs as well as your band, crew, furniture, and pets. They even show you drafts of the vehicles you earn, which are also made entirely of LEGO’s!

The story mode goes through several generic themes. To begin with you earn vehicles to progress to different settings. The settings each have a story. There are short video clips, which my kids liked watching. It still follows the basic Rock Band layout. New place, new venues, setlists within the venues. Earn stars to unlock new playlists. You must progress the game to earn the right to play more songs. Te setlist offered when you play “Make Your Own Setlist” is limited to what you have unlocked. The “Surprise Setlist” will grab songs from your personal DLC as well as the LEGO playlist. If you are just looking to rock out to your favorite songs and skip the others I would forget about story mode.

A bonus in the story mode is there are a lot more make your own setlists and most lists are only 3 songs or less. You can also toggle a shorter version of the songs to be played as a time saver or just to get a taste.

One thing that is completely new and definitely a big hit with the kids is the Rock Den. You earn decorations for your band’s pad while you play story mode. You get to decorate the walls, floors, furniture, etc. The minifigures, (characters), you unlock are a blast! Skeletons, eskimos, tribesman, pirates, and more. This game brings a whole new level of customization to your surroundings.

Achievements are always on my mind, and my kids love earning them as well. This game was made for gamers of all ages to feel accomplished with achievements. They are simple are easily achieved. While 1 million may seem like a big number, in this game it definitely isn’t. I have earned well beyond 50 million and still counting, fans and studs (cash). The stars are easily attainable, it just takes time. Keep playing and you will have no shortage of setlists to fuel that achievement. Earning 100% on each instrument does not require any certain difficulty. The only one I will not be getting myself is the 100% the solo for “Final Countdown” on Expert. That is definitely a challenge. Everything else my kids are earning right alongside me.

There is no multi-player online at all. Again, safe for kids, as I do not allow my children to play online and don’t recommend anyone else to either.

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