Gameplay
From Performous
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[edit] Singing
[edit] How does it work?
The game records your voice via a microphone, attached to your computer. The audio is recorded and realtime FFT analysis is done on it. This analysis reveals which frequency bands contain audio (peaks). Further analysis is used to find out the exact audio frequencies inside each band, and to combine base frequencies and their harmonics into single tones. Finally, some temporal (over time) filtering is applied to the detected tones to smooth out the output.
It doesn't matter if you didn't take university courses on acoustics and mathematics, and none of that makes any sense: you will get a wave on screen, displaying your singing pitch.
[edit] Scoring and note types
Regular notes: displayed in light blue (1x points) Golden notes: displayed in gold (2x points) Freestyle notes: displayed with text "FREESTYLE", pitch does not matter (1x points) The singing octave does not matter, so as long as you get the right note in any octave, you will get full points. Singing near the correct note also gives some points, but the amount of points per second decreases as you get farther from the right tone. Singing within the right semitone always gives full points, so you may actually be off by a quarter tone and still get the points.
The maximum number of points is always 10000, but it is practically unreachable in real songs, usual scores being in the range of 2000-9000, depending mostly on the skills of the singer, but also on the song: even though the maximum is the same, slower songs are generally easier to sing.
Oh, and in case you were wondering: you will not get full points by placing the microphone near a speaker, because it will also pick up other instruments, which usually have incorrect pitch. Expect to get about 3000 points with this method :)
Any connected Guitar Hero and Rock Band instruments are detected automatically. By default the keyboard can also be used to control every instrument type (guitar/drums/dance pad), but this can be disabled in the config menu.
[edit] Instruments
[edit] Joining
Before a song starts, you have a few seconds to choose your difficulty level. Do this by tapping a fret or by beating a drum pad. The leftmost fret/pad is for easy, the one next to that is medium and so on. If the song has multiple guitar tracks (e.g. guitar and bass), picking the orange fret (with one of the others to choose difficulty) switches between tracks. If you select anything incorrectly, you will get to play, but the difficulty will default to easy.
You can also join in the middle of a game by pressing a button in your controller. You'll again have a few seconds to make your pick about difficulty and track.
[edit] Basic gameplay
Colored notes, corresponding to the colored frets on your guitar or to the colored pads on your drums, scroll towards you. An orange line in drum notes is for the bass drum (foot pedal).
Drummers need to hit the corresponding drums when the notes pass the black line.
Guitarists can already hold down the frets before the notes reach the black line, hitting the the strum bar to play the note at the right time. Chords (combinations of multiple frets) must be played entirely. The fret does not need to be released when the note ends or before playing the next note (unless the note does not allow that fret).
[edit] Hold notes (guitars only)
After playing a note you need to keep holding the fret(s) as long as the line continues. If you release early, you will stop receiving points for the hold. Additionally, for long notes you need to use the whammy bar to do a pitch bend or otherwise no points will be awarded after a while.
Pressing or releasing other frets has no effect, as long as the note being played is held correctly.
[edit] Fret masking (guitars only)
As with a real guitar, it does not matter what you do with lower frets while holding a higher fret (a fret closer to the strum bar). Take advantage of this when playing difficult passages where you would otherwise only briefly release a fret to play another note in between.
Masking can only be used when playing solo notes, it does not work for chords.
[edit] Hammer-ons and pull-offs (guitars only)
Hammerable notes are denoted by a little white ball (if using 3d notes) or a white figure (if using 2d notes) on the head of the note. If the note is active, the symbol is bright white, otherwise it is grey. Hammerable notes are active when you are playing correctly, but they will deactivate as soon as you make a mistake. So, if you miss the previous note, you cannot hammer the next one either.
When a note is hammerable and active, you can play it without the strum bar, by simply pressing the fret (hammer on) or by releasing a higher fret so that the correct fret becomes the highest fret (pull-off).
[edit] Solo
When there is a solo part in the song, the coloring of all frets turn uniform and a "Solo!" text blinks on the screen. (Version 0.5.2 onwards.)
[edit] God mode
Playing correctly increases your star power so that eventually you will be able to invoke GOD MODE where all your mistakes will be ignored and hammerable notes stay active all the time. The mode only lasts for a few seconds, so use it wisely. When "God mode ready!" is displayed, you can activate the mode by raising your guitar to a vertical position or by pressing Start. For drums, see drum fills below.
[edit] Drum fills (drums only)
When the God mode is ready, you start to encounter drum fills - long notes on all four frets. During them, you can play whatever you want. If you hit the special note that comes in the end and have scored enough hits, God Mode is activated.
Note: Available in development version and 0.5.2 onwards. Also, some songs might not have drum fills marked in the song file, in which case God mode is not available.
[edit] Big Rock Endings
BREs occur at the end of songs where the band rocks out before a final hit. They are normally used when a part is too difficult to be authored and played in a way that feels good. Similar to drum fills (but for all instruments), you can play whatever you want. You get points if you hit the final chord that comes afterwards, but you need to have enough hits during the BRE.
Note: Available in development version and 0.5.2 onwards.
[edit] Scoring
The maximum number of points is always 10000. Hitting all the notes correctly is not enough to reach this, your timing must also be very good. Using masking or hammering does not affect the scoring.
Picking or drumming incorrectly will reduce your points slightly, but the score cannot go below 0.
[edit] Dancing
[edit] Joining
Press a button to join (can also be done in the middle of a game). You'll have a few seconds to select difficulty and track (up/down/left/right arrows).
[edit] Basic gameplay
When a moving arrow is exactly on top of the stationary arrow, hit the corresponding button. When a long note comes, you need to hold the button down to the end of the note. Avoid mines.
[edit] Scoring
Maximum score is always 10000. You'll get points depending on the accuracy of the hit. Mines will reduce points if hit.
