Today's strummiest video: Wii remote strumming interface

by Kevin Kelly { Apr 20th 2007 at 1:32AM }

It's a tranquil day, you're laying by the banks of a babbling brook, nearby some sort of livestock feeds, off in the distance come the gentle lulling sounds of buzzing insects, and then suddenly! Startling your reverie! Chasing away the imagination! Poking holes in your dreamtime! It's ... !

A dork with a guitar. "Here," he says "let me play you my rendition of "Are Young Going To Scarborough Faire?" Give us a break, where's Jon Belushi when you need him? (No, "He's dead. Did he drop any good loot?" jokes please).

Nowadays, with Guitar Hero and other rocking games, any man can be a thrashing monster of the metal. The Wii is playing 3rd place catchup in the sheer rockability arena, and this homebrew strumming interface and whatever Nintendo proper might be working on give us hope.

If only the song weren't so ... Ren Faire-ish.

Tags: Guitar Herol rhythm, music, Nintendo Wii, NintendoWii

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

enzo @ Apr 20th 2007 1:47AM

Definitely impressive for a demo, and something like that could really work, especially if someone made a nunchuck-replacing attachment that mimic'd a fretboard.
Way too laggy to be useful right now though.

Loki @ Apr 20th 2007 2:09AM

No thanks.

mo @ Apr 20th 2007 2:54AM

between this and a regular guitar hero controller i would choose this

seriously how can people play guitar hero, its so dull,

OFF TOPIC, BUT RELATED
and i hate those little brats that are like " oh im good at guitar hero so im gonna get a real guitar, because it will be so easy for me to learn after guitar hero"

going from 5 buttons to 132 pressure sensitive millimeter thick buttons is a large leap

Brandon @ Apr 20th 2007 3:02AM

Looks cool, and for all the geeks they should be pretty fast. :P

#3 Don't knock someone picking up guitar its not cool. Makes you look like a complete jerk. I picked up guitar after I played guitar hero... Not my only motivator but it helped me want to learn so I could play any song I wanted.

Purple Haze @ Apr 20th 2007 3:14AM

@3

It's a game!

Paul Gale @ Apr 20th 2007 4:09AM

Very cool find Joystiq. I've been enjoying these fan made Wii Remote strumming clips, and yes, this one is perhaps the strummiest one I've seen today too, lol. This type of creativity is great; please continue to post these types of articles. It's a very nice addition to the usual videogame news out there.

Rubang B @ Apr 20th 2007 5:22AM

Ok so I've already got Daigassou! Band Bros., and I'll get this. Somebody bring over Jam Sessions, somebody else bring over that WiiJ DJ thing, and somebody else bring over that robot arm with the sword, and then we'll have a band and a kickass robot with a sword.

And then we can get that Wii-mote controlled car, that Wii-mote controlled vacuum, and that Lego bowling robot, and take over the world.

serotoninzero @ Apr 20th 2007 5:31AM

Cool. Where can I get this? Then I'll be able to jam along with my friends who actually have musical talent. Ouch.

Pedro @ Apr 20th 2007 7:53AM

This is actually really sweet. I think that it has tremendous potential. While it is a bit different than using a prop guitar like in GH, the mechanic of "strumming" is very cool and very unique. I could see a GH-like game that has a totally different emphasis (namely, strumming and "plucking") and could be more relaxing and, frankly, more elegant and sophisticated than the button-pressing fests that we know and love.

David @ Apr 20th 2007 9:01AM

I'm not complaining, this is pretty cool! Now if you can actually pick individual strings with it, that's even cooler!

Britt @ Apr 20th 2007 10:03AM

I'm totally impressed... I like how he played the chord progression from "While My Guitar gently Weeps" at the end of the clip. It doesn't look like it is super responsive just yet, as it sounds like it clips the midi tone when switching chords, but if he overlapped the tones when changing, he could rock that thing.

Next up would be to replace the midi tones with real guitar samples; then he'd be ready to rock some Cat Stevens and make all the chicks swoon.

jabbertrack @ Apr 20th 2007 10:39AM

That is less guitar-like than guitar hero...

you know... the Wii controllers are not the solution to everything

arrrgh @ Apr 20th 2007 11:24AM

and bashing the wii is?

Doug Kaplan @ Apr 20th 2007 11:35AM

Ugh can't people just appreciate the homebrew community seeing the Wiimote and Nunchuck and thinking it would be a cool idea to simulate playing a guitar with it? And can't we just appreciate the effort for doing it?

I think it's a great idea and if it only serves one purpose, it's to show out of the box thinking with the Wiimote that developers might not have thought of.

Don't act like this video or posters on this thread are saying this will replace guitars or Guitar Hero, it's just a great homebrew app which shows the potential of the Wii, that's all.