22nd August, 2009 - Singstar!

I had my first game of Singstar on the Playstation the other night. It was at my mate The Advisor’s House after the football, and obviously after a fair number of beers. (I am from the West of Scotland after all - singing and saying affectionate stuff to your mates is only permitted after 14 units).

And it was brilliant!

The beauty of Singstar (and Rock Band and Guitar Hero for that matter) is that they are not really computer games at all. Oh yes – they nominally have a scoring system, and they have high scores and so on, but they are not really about competition any more than a game of charades is a competition. These are party games. They are a return to Victorian traditions of an after dinner game.

These are modern versions of Ludo and Concentration and Snakes and Ladders. They are about fun and conviviality. And listening to my pal Parcelforce Pete, doing a very passable Errol Brown imitation to “I Believe in Miracles”. Who knew a white man from Lanarkshire could be so convincing whilst crooning “You sexy thing....”