On Thursday, 12 December 2013 at 12:57:42 UTC, Manu wrote:
> the
> drums on hardest difficulty is an accurate representation of the recording
> artist's skills.

Well apart from dynamic control* and any real sense of groove/feel. There a lot more to being a drummer than just hitting the drums like a metronome with arms.
Nevertheless, it's a lot more representative than the guitars and it does teach some of the necessary skills.

*or did that get included later in the franchise?

>> Have you heard of Frets on Fire? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
>> Frets_on_Fire
>> I remember trying this out several years ago, though it didn't really have
>> that smoothe Guitar Hero feel.
>
>
> Yes, it's fucking terrible. It's also written in Java, which might partly
> explain the first bit...

I'm pretty sure it has been written in python (to prove one could write games using python), also there is FoFix a (better?) clone also python.

My kids do play FoFix from time to time. But nothing beats minecraft.

On Thursday, 12 December 2013 at 14:38:54 UTC, Arjan wrote:
> My kids do play FoFix from time to time. But nothing beats minecraft.
In terms of resource hog? Sure thing! :D

On 13 December 2013 00:19, John Colvin <john.loughran.colvin@gmail.com>wrote:

> On Thursday, 12 December 2013 at 12:57:42 UTC, Manu wrote:
>
>> the
>> drums on hardest difficulty is an accurate representation of the recording
>> artist's skills.
>>
>
> Well apart from dynamic control* and any real sense of groove/feel. There
> a lot more to being a drummer than just hitting the drums like a metronome
> with arms.
> Nevertheless, it's a lot more representative than the guitars and it does
> teach some of the necessary skills.
>
> *or did that get included later in the franchise?
>

Sure. But you can still work on those things while playing the game, those aspects of your performance just won't be accurately recorded or scored. My drums (from 'band hero', typically considered the best ones they ever made) do report impact sensitivity, although it's not used by the game for some reason.

For me, I never played drums, and there's a lot of motor skills required to
tightly synchronise all those limbs that are perfectly applicable skills I
developed while playing those games.
I was so sloppy synchronising hands and feet at first, and my left hand was
kinda gump, would never keep up with my right hand in rolls, and when i
tried to synchronise fast double kicks with hand rolls... keeping all those
motions tight is stuff I wouldn't have if I didn't play those games.

On 13 December 2013 00:38, Arjan <arjan@ask.me.to> wrote:

> Have you heard of Frets on Fire? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
>>> Frets_on_Fire
>>> I remember trying this out several years ago, though it didn't really
>>> have
>>> that smoothe Guitar Hero feel.
>>>
>>
>>
>> Yes, it's fucking terrible. It's also written in Java, which might partly explain the first bit...
>>
>
> I'm pretty sure it has been written in python (to prove one could write
> games using python), also there is FoFix a (better?) clone also python.
>
> My kids do play FoFix from time to time. But nothing beats minecraft.
>

Oh yeah, you're probably right. I just remembered that it wasn't written in
a real language ;)
It doesn't feel very tight, and the synchronisation window is super wide. I
suspect this is because the libraries they use aren't really meant for
low-latency real-time use, and they have no access to the hardware/drivers
directly, so they have to allow for a huge margin of error.

On 13 December 2013 00:18, Francesco Cattoglio < francesco.cattoglio@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Thursday, 12 December 2013 at 10:43:24 UTC, Manu wrote:
>
>> I'm very keen to resurrect the project (well, start a new one, with clean
>> code, in D).
>> Are there any music game nerds hanging around here who would be interested
>> in joining a side project like this? It's a lot more motivating, and much
>> more fun to work in a small team.
>>
>
> I absolutely agree, small teams keep you motivated and discussing ideas
> makes the work so much faster.
> I can tell you I am interested. I have been thinking about music-based
> games for quite a long time, and even took part of the team that produced a
> music-based game in a Videogame Design and Programming class in University.
> Unfortunately the group leader was... well... a bad leader in my opinion,
> and the tool used was Unity.
>
> This said, if you plan on starting your code from scratch, you might actually want to do something different from Guitar Hero. EG: Have you ever played Synaesthete? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lp0Gasls0Sg
>
> I find it both amazing and ADDICTING AS HELL, every time I listen to the songs I feel like playing it over and over and over again.
>

It looks like Beatmania meets Geometry Wars meets... something that I can't
quite recall what it is.
It still has the element of a timed sequences against a music track, so
that maps perfectly. The presentation of that game is a project in itself,
but I don't see why such an extensible system shouldn't be supported.

For me, the entire point is to make a GH/RB engine. I want to play those
games, but I'm sick of swapping disc's all the time, and I also want to
open it up to a proper custom song community.
I like to make projects like that as extensible and customisable as
possible. You could add a Synaesthete plugin for instance, or probably more
universally, add support for any other instruments or presentation modes
people like. Bring back dance pad mode! ;)
The core of the work is an extensible frontend, and a good input
recognition system combined with tight synchronisation.

The frontend, UI, presentation, etc is probably 80% of the work. I can
probably knock the GAME part together in a weekend.
It needs a good extensible theme system where the front-end experience can
be scripted to mimic existing games, or evolved to do new and interesting
things that people can tinker with.
StepMania did this well. There were community skins for the official Dance
Dance Revolution games, but the default one extended the game in ways
Konami never did. People also added other game modes/styles on top of it
which made it an interesting game in its own right, even though it stated
as an engine/emulator for an existing game.
I think the starting point is important though to gain initial
users/contributors, who all agree on initial goals, ie, to accurately
emulate the GH/RB experience.

On Thursday, 12 December 2013 at 14:52:10 UTC, Manu wrote:
> On 13 December 2013 00:38, Arjan <arjan@ask.me.to> wrote:
>
>> Have you heard of Frets on Fire? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
>>>> Frets_on_Fire
>>>> I remember trying this out several years ago, though it didn't really
>>>> have
>>>> that smoothe Guitar Hero feel.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Yes, it's fucking terrible. It's also written in Java, which might partly
>>> explain the first bit...
>>>
>>
>> I'm pretty sure it has been written in python (to prove one could write
>> games using python), also there is FoFix a (better?) clone also python.
>>
>> My kids do play FoFix from time to time. But nothing beats minecraft.
>>
>
> Oh yeah, you're probably right. I just remembered that it wasn't written in
> a real language ;)
> It doesn't feel very tight, and the synchronisation window is super wide. I
> suspect this is because the libraries they use aren't really meant for
> low-latency real-time use, and they have no access to the hardware/drivers
> directly, so they have to allow for a huge margin of error.

I have no idea what is required for a game like that, but I've been on a project where python is used in machine control (wafer handling) at control frequencies / sampling rates up to 100Hz. Although 100Hz was not achieved easily. Indeed no direct access to hw/drivers from python it usually goes through c-wrappers.

On 2013-12-12 11:43, Manu wrote:
> So, I'm a massive fan of music games. I'll shamefully admit that I was
> tragically addicted to Dance Dance Revolution about 10 years ago.
> Recently, it's Guitar Hero and Rock Band.
>
> I quite like the band ensemble games, they're good party games, and
> great rhythm practise that's actually applicable to real instrument
> skills too.

I wouldn't agree with that, at least not for Guitar Hero. I had issues with the timing. When I played I tried to time the music, but that didn't work. Instead I had to time the screen to get any points.

> The problem is though, that Neversoft and Harmonix completely fucked up
> the GH and RB franchises. Licensing problems, fragmented tracklists.
> It's annoying that all the songs you want to play are spread across
> literally 10 or so different games, and you need to constantly change
> disc's if you want to play the songs you like.
>
> I've been meaning to kick off a guitar hero clone since GH2 came out. I
> started one years ago as a fork of my Guitar Hero song editor for PS2,
> and I added support for drums before GH4 or RB were conceived, but then
> when they announced those games they stole my thunder and it went into
> hibernation.
>
> I'm very keen to resurrect the project (well, start a new one, with
> clean code, in D).
> Are there any music game nerds hanging around here who would be
> interested in joining a side project like this? It's a lot more
> motivating, and much more fun to work in a small team.

Cool idea.

-- 
/Jacob Carlborg

On 13 December 2013 01:47, Jacob Carlborg <doob@me.com> wrote:

> On 2013-12-12 11:43, Manu wrote:
>
>> So, I'm a massive fan of music games. I'll shamefully admit that I was tragically addicted to Dance Dance Revolution about 10 years ago. Recently, it's Guitar Hero and Rock Band.
>>
>> I quite like the band ensemble games, they're good party games, and great rhythm practise that's actually applicable to real instrument skills too.
>>
>
> I wouldn't agree with that, at least not for Guitar Hero. I had issues with the timing. When I played I tried to time the music, but that didn't work. Instead I had to time the screen to get any points.
>

Sounds like your system was calibrated poorly, or there is latency in your
AV setup, or your TV/stereo is cheap. There's lots of sources of latency
that can affect those games. You just have to make sure to eliminate them
before you can play it properly.
I can easily play those games without looking at the screen at all. But I
did need to do some fiddling to get it properly synchronised. I felt about
30-40ms latency when I first switched to the 360 versions.
The old PS2 games were much better since they had no digital outputs,
there's no buffering anywhere along the chain. Still depends on your TV
displaying the signal it receives immediately though.

 The problem is though, that Neversoft and Harmonix completely fucked up
>> the GH and RB franchises. Licensing problems, fragmented tracklists. It's annoying that all the songs you want to play are spread across literally 10 or so different games, and you need to constantly change disc's if you want to play the songs you like.
>>
>> I've been meaning to kick off a guitar hero clone since GH2 came out. I started one years ago as a fork of my Guitar Hero song editor for PS2, and I added support for drums before GH4 or RB were conceived, but then when they announced those games they stole my thunder and it went into hibernation.
>>
>> I'm very keen to resurrect the project (well, start a new one, with
>> clean code, in D).
>> Are there any music game nerds hanging around here who would be
>> interested in joining a side project like this? It's a lot more
>> motivating, and much more fun to work in a small team.
>>
>
> Cool idea.
>
> --
> /Jacob Carlborg
>

On Thursday, 12 December 2013 at 15:47:48 UTC, Jacob Carlborg wrote:
> On 2013-12-12 11:43, Manu wrote:
>> So, I'm a massive fan of music games. I'll shamefully admit that I was
>> tragically addicted to Dance Dance Revolution about 10 years ago.
>> Recently, it's Guitar Hero and Rock Band.
>>
>> I quite like the band ensemble games, they're good party games, and
>> great rhythm practise that's actually applicable to real instrument
>> skills too.
>
> I wouldn't agree with that, at least not for Guitar Hero. I had issues with the timing. When I played I tried to time the music, but that didn't work. Instead I had to time the screen to get any points.

As a lifelong musician this annoyed the hell out of me. The whole experience ends up like reading annoying flashy sheet music. Low latency is critical.