Declaration of Independence reading gets perfect vocal score in Rock Band 2

by Kyle Orland { Sep 16th 2008 at 8:30AM }

Back in July, a GameSpy preview for Rock Band 2 claimed "the phoneme detection system used for the 'talkie' parts [in Rock Band] has been completely stripped and a new one has been put in place [for Rock Band 2]." Well, Harmonix definitely stripped out the old system, but it seems to have forgotten to put a new one in its place, as the new game seems to award perfect vocal points if it detects any noise during the "talkie" parts.

We first became aware of this problem when we saw this video of a singer using a bunch of gibberish to pass the Beastie Boys' "So Whatcha Want" with a 100% rating on Expert difficulty. It's an impressive illustration of the faulty phoneme detection, but it's not wholly satisfying -- the singer is occasionally on rhythm and his voice occasionally does kind of match with the on-screen words. We wondered: how bad would a vocal performance have to be to fail this song?

The answer, apparently, is "worse than a monotone recitation of the U.S. Declaration of Independence." As shown in the above video we've put together, even a dry reading of a 200+-year-old political treatise can be victorious in a Rock Band 2 vocal battle. Rest assured, there's no computer trickery going on here -- this video was taken as a direct feed from the Xbox 360 and has not been edited in any way. Now we only have one more question: when will Harmonix put in that improved phoneme detection system it's long been promising.

Tags: beastie boys, BeastieBoys, declaration-of-independence, EA, electronic-arts, harmonix, microphone, phoneme, rock band 2, rock-band-2, RockBand2, singing, So Whatcha Want, SoWhatchaWant, talking, vocal

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

jsn @ Sep 16th 2008 8:38AM

LOL...

George @ Sep 16th 2008 8:38AM

Go America! lol

Kizzle @ Sep 16th 2008 12:27PM

Go banana!

George @ Sep 16th 2008 8:39AM

Go America! lol

Young_Nastyman @ Sep 16th 2008 8:39AM

Yes but the real question is: will it work with the Magna Carta?

[.sm0ke.] @ Sep 16th 2008 10:05AM

And what about the Emancipation Proclamation?

Tiptup300 @ Sep 16th 2008 1:17PM

No smoke, we're naming important documents, not rap songs, stupid!

FailedNinja @ Sep 16th 2008 9:03AM

Out of curiousity, how well would this have done in RB1?

Kyle Orland @ Sep 16th 2008 9:52AM

Good question. I don't think there are any purely "spoken" songs in RB1, so any test would have to be on only a part of a song... not nearly as satisfying...

[.sm0ke.] @ Sep 16th 2008 10:03AM

Yeah there was. Sabotage.

chrysee @ Sep 16th 2008 10:11AM

I always hummed my way through Sabotage and generally got much better scores than I did on other songs that I bothered to sing.

Keith @ Sep 16th 2008 7:30PM

there was also Debaser, which is the song I got my 100% on. I actually sung it accurately, though.

HadoKEN @ Sep 16th 2008 9:04AM

hehe...manly firmness...hehe

Temidien @ Sep 16th 2008 9:06AM

One more reason I'm glad I'm waiting for GH:WT...

Kizzle @ Sep 16th 2008 9:42AM

That's a pretty dumb reason. RB2 is awesome. Songs that are mostly "talk" are the vast minority anyway.

Ignatius @ Sep 16th 2008 10:25AM

This is why when I transfer the RB songs over to RB2, I'm deleting all of the crappy songs and avoiding the hell out of the Beastie Boys.

That and Faith. God, if a song could be described as useless noise, that would be one of them.

Haggard (Free Mr.ESC!) @ Sep 16th 2008 11:28AM

Dude, Sabotage is awesome.

*breaks into rap*

Tiptup300 @ Sep 16th 2008 1:18PM

Actually, after reading a preview of GH:WT, they said that the talky parts, you just have to make noise. :X

Haggard (Free Mr.ESC!) @ Sep 16th 2008 6:19PM

Oh dear. This just happened while drumming to And Justice For All:

http://img205.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dsc00188zh6.jpg

I imported my copy and instruments.. how am I meant to get them replaced? -_-

Ricksta @ Sep 16th 2008 9:11AM

That song is considered spoken not sung, notice how there is no pitch lines whatsoever. So you can say anything you want and get a good score.

Kyle Orland @ Sep 16th 2008 9:52AM

Er, yes, that's exactly the problem, especially considering Harmonix talked up the "phoneme detection" that would make it possible to detect whether or not players were speaking the right words.

Kindrik @ Sep 16th 2008 9:19AM

I remember when my friends and I were playing the Beastie Boys song in the original Rock Band and I was on vocals. During a break I had some of my drink but I sort of choked on it and started coughing. The thing is I was coughing into the mic and was hitting everything perfectly.

iconmaster @ Sep 16th 2008 9:49AM

Er... there's no singing in that song. I'd say it's a non-issue.

(Doesn't bode well for Rap Band, of course.)

Burritoclock @ Sep 16th 2008 10:04AM

I hate the talky parts anyway so Id rather just be able to pass it trying then to fail miserably no matter what I try (looking at you "Hey" by the Pixies)

Besides, everyone knows you can score good on singing songs by make noises or humming, but it's not as fun.

Holly @ Sep 16th 2008 10:06AM

This was true in Rock Band 1 as well. It's just that in RB1, the talkies were harder because you had to be precisely on rhythm, and making an enunciated sound (which is why coughing worked) at the moments that the note chart required a word. You could beat the Beastie Boys talkies in RB1 just by going "dah-dah-dah-dah-dah" to the rhythm of the original rap. It could never tell whether you were saying the right words or the right "kind of phonemes" and from what they said after the development of RB1, using that kind of speech recognition technology made the whole thing even more impossible to do accurately.

It seems like in Rock Band 2, the window for when you're supposed to talk has been opened way up, so you can say pretty much anything as long as you're making words during the general section where words are spoken.

So yeah, I don't know what they ever meant by phoneme detection except that it detects whether you are saying "dah" (or any other "phoneme") at the right moment. They just made the timing window a lot less strict, which is easier but not necessarily improved unless you mean "now people can gold star the songs and not get so frustrated" as an improvement, which I suppose from a certain experiential point of view it is.

CyberKnight @ Sep 16th 2008 10:22AM

Maybe Harmonix is just *really* patriotic?

brad77 @ Sep 16th 2008 3:25PM

I bet if you recited the Pledge of Allegiance during Eye of the Tiger, Apollo Creed would appear and punch your character in the face.

superklye @ Sep 16th 2008 10:25AM

I sing Fall Out Boy - Dead on Arrival using just one word in various lengths and pitches:

Derp.

Derp derp derpderp deeeerp deeeeerp Derp derpderpderp derp
derp
derp
derp derp derpderp

And so forth. I usually get around 94% on Hard. :)

dark_inchworm @ Sep 16th 2008 11:59AM

Those are better lyrics than the original ones, for sure.

Seroth @ Sep 16th 2008 10:32AM

In Rock Band 1, you could pretty much get all "Awesomes" on Expert talkies by just rubbing the microphone against your pants.

Tiptup300 @ Sep 16th 2008 2:40PM

Win Win for everyone!

Bouille @ Sep 16th 2008 12:57PM

But will the system Blend?

zombiejesus @ Sep 16th 2008 10:53AM

For lump I sang gump instead.

Travis @ Sep 16th 2008 11:16AM

easiest achievement ever

Vegnagun bwf @ Sep 16th 2008 11:45AM

This song is god awful... The reason he was able to do this because the beastie boys aren't singing in this, and neither is he. If he were to sing the declaration of independence he would lose.

Travis @ Sep 16th 2008 11:53AM

this song is great
the beastie boys are great
just not in rock band

RavenPaul @ Sep 16th 2008 11:51AM

Sounds good to me. I hate those parts of the songs on RB. Especially songs like Sabatoge. Anyway, this is ROCK BAND, the songs are performed in front of an "AUDIENCE" so it's "LIVE". You should be able to say those parts any way you want to, or not at all. Ever been to a live show. The singer sings different from the recorded track all the time.

343 Guilty Fart @ Sep 16th 2008 12:49PM

That was absolutely hilarious.

Kyouryuu @ Sep 16th 2008 3:45PM

I don't see the lack of "grading" on these segments as a bad thing. It's not like the player has any guide to follow.

If anything, I had more than a few frustrations in RB1 where the game would dock points for these parts and I'd have no idea what I was doing wrong.

Dash @ Sep 16th 2008 1:49PM

Does this means I can just improvise vocals? Well, it sure would be funny to sing "Never gonna give you up" during a song even if just to anoy everyone playing with me (it would be like a Rock Rick Band Roll thing).

And also, the Declaration of Independence rocks.