In the process of learning music, we often hear this sentence: Music is like the human body, melody is flesh and blood, and rhythm is the skeleton. It can be seen that rhythm occupies a very important position in music. Music without rhythm is like a person losing their soul…
Hey, I said’Tingting ‘, we came to your place to read game reviews, why did we talk about music?
Ahem, don’t worry, everyone. The reason why we’re talking about “music” is not because I’m a novice and can’t come up with a fresh opening line, but because the game we’re going to talk about today – “Rhythm Doctor” – has too much to do with “rhythm”…
The music game “Rhythm Doctor” was developed by 7th Beat Games, a small studio composed of more than a dozen young guys. The game was just launched on the Steam platform on February 26th and is still in the early access stage. It has already received a 98% positive rating from 2113 users, indicating the recognition of its quality by players.
The production team clearly stated in the developer’s message that ” Part of the inspiration for this work comes from’Rhythm Heaven ‘ “, which means that “Rhythm Doctor” also adopts a simple single-key rhythm mode in the core gameplay, and the whole process can be completed with just one button.
The heart on the right side of the screen represents the amount of blood, and when the heart is broken, it will hatch into a chicken
But compared to the more child-oriented art style of “Rhythm Heaven”, this work can be said to be better than the blue Excellent narrative performance effect, seamless plot with almost perfect music, and flawless integration of various elements make the immersive experience brought by the game beyond imagination.
Complex games often only require the most basic operation methods
In the world of “Rhythm Doctor”, hospitals have developed a new diagnostic and treatment method called the “Rhythm System”. As long as the appropriate rhythm vibration instrument is used, it can relieve a series of difficult diseases such as chest tightness, headaches, work pressure, and even heartbreak for patients. It is simply “fun” to cure the disease (don’t ask, it’s magic).
How do you guys listen to music and hear about outer space?
And as a rotating intern, what you need to do is to seize the perfect opportunity, press the space bar at the seventh beat of the music, and present a perfectly rhythmic “medical music” to the patients. These patients include armored warriors dancing in nightclubs, decapitated swordsmen , and all kinds of strange little animals…
Don’t worry, it’s not your monitor that’s messed up
Perhaps it sounds simple, but the music rhythm in the later stage of the game is complex and diverse, including multi-threaded operations, sudden variations, skip beats, second beats and other advanced operations. There may even be various “bug screens” that interfere with your sense of rhythm. If you have no previous experience in rhythm games or music theory, experiencing the “high-speed battle” of “Rhythm Doctor” right away may make you collapse and smash your keyboard.
In the game, there is also a nonsensical explanation of the “bug screen” – network lag bacteria
If RPG games can suppress experience levels, ACT games can use more drug bottles, and even Dark Souls can increase blood points to 40 + to increase fault tolerance.
So for the author who has never learned music theory knowledge after primary school music class, sings off-key, and “opens the mouth” to death, some levels of “Rhythm Doctor” (yes, it’s you 2-3) have made me feel firsthand what is called “talent gap”. Being flustered (although I don’t need to use my feet) is the most common state in the game.
Three threads + jump shot is ridiculous
Due to the existence of visual interference, I recommend that when playing this game, you can “close your eyes” and silently count the beats “one, two, three, four, five, six, seven” in your mind along with the rhythm of the music. This way, while avoiding interference, you can also let your mood be driven by the music, thus bringing a stronger sense of immersion.
Therefore, “Rhythm Doctor” can be considered a game that can be completed with eyes closed, even suitable for blind people to play. In this regard, the rhythm mode is quite meaningful.
By the way, the game also supports two-player mode, you can find a buddy to enjoy this double happiness (torture) with you, or like me, operate p1 and p2 at the same time, pretending to have friends, hahaha (strange, how to code The keyboard is wet).
When you can’t find an excuse to break up, just invite your boyfriend/girlfriend to play together
JoJo, I’m not making rhythm games anymore!
As mentioned earlier, the main reason why “Rhythm Doctor” is called “surpassing the blue and surpassing the blue” is that “Rhythm Doctor” itself is a rhythm game, but it can combine music with narrative performance, thus showing a plot performance that greatly surpasses rhythm games.
It is surprising that “Rhythm Doctor” itself is produced by an overseas team, but a large number of localized songs have been added to the game, such as the Spring Festival special edition Easter egg song “Congratulations”, supplemented by a heartfelt Chinese translation level (at first, I even thought it was a domestic game), which can clearly feel the sincerity of the creators towards domestic players.
The music in the game, although not as “amazing the world with a single brilliant feat” in my personal opinion, fits well with the plot atmosphere of each sub-level and plays a good role in rhythm games. Of course, limited by the theme of the article (and I don’t know much about songs as a beginner), it is a bit pale to describe the elegance of the song with words. Therefore, we will focus on the expressive power of the game’s plot.
For example, our second patient, well, let’s call him the crybaby boy, he claimed to have a heart problem, but in fact he just suffered from paranoia due to a misunderstanding between young lovers (preparation).
During the process of healing (familiarizing with the rhythm), the girlfriend will also join, and the P2 player/NPC will be responsible for controlling the rhythm. However, in the early stage of the two-person healing, due to misunderstandings and estrangement between the two, the rhythms of the two lines are different, and the sound and rhyme interfere with each other, making it difficult for either party to control the perfect rhythm.
Under the soothing romantic background music, as the melody continues to advance, the rhythm line of the two tends to be harmonious and unified. At this time, the collaboration between the two is no longer as difficult as before, but is filled with the joy of working together (Colleagues who have seen EVA can recall the plot of Zhensi and Ming Rixiang’s two-person battle).
A three-and-a-half-minute level, with only a few lines of dialogue, depicts the romantic love between lovers who resolve misunderstandings and reconcile through the special technique of “merging rhythm lines” in music melody. Through real “hands-on experience”, it makes people “burst into tears” and exclaim: It’s great to have a girlfriend, no wonder they like to sing K so much… Ah, no, it’s the importance of cooperation between people (serious face).
Although the game graphics are only in the simplest pixel style and there are no exaggerated animation performances, as long as you feel the level atmosphere of “Rhythm Doctor” with your heart, its performance effect is no less than watching an excellent plot MV.
In a certain level, the game will automatically window and shrink, and then flash hide and seek everywhere (the last time I played with my monitor like this was a desktop game I played when I was a child). The first impression was very deep.
After experiencing several highly expressive levels, besides admiring the imagination of the creators, I am speechless. Even more exaggeratedly, I would call it the ultimate expression of rhythm game plot.
The plot also implies satire on social issues
It’s good, but not necessarily suitable for everyone
If you browse the Steam comment section, you will find that the few negative reviews about ” Rhythm Doctor ” are mainly focused on the difficulty of the game.
Certainly, if you want to play this rhythm game smoothly, it is best to have a certain sense of rhythm, which invisibly raises the threshold for players to play; but on the other hand, more importantly, the design of the difficulty curve in “Rhythm Doctor” is indeed somewhat awkward.
In the second chapter, when players have just adapted to the rhythm of seven beats, the game suddenly switches to the more difficult second beat, and subsequent levels add various variations and jazz music, which easily confuses first-time players.
And when the player finally overcomes the difficulty with the patient, the game switches back to the simpler seven-beat in the third chapter. This back-and-forth operation seems a bit “meaningless”. Personally, I think it would be smoother to swap the content of these two chapters.
Perhaps they are aware of the “music-obsessed” players, and the game has specially designed a “hit” difficulty level (as the name suggests, even if you knock randomly, you can pass the level), but this way of passing will cause a devastating blow to the game’s aesthetics (equivalent to buying the game for free), so it is not the best solution.
In addition, for experts who like challenges, “Rhythm Doctor” has also prepared a simple but comprehensive level editor with over 50 preset visual effects and backgrounds, allowing them to freely create their own desired song stages.
The game also supports sharing and downloading levels made by others directly from the creative workshop for customizing the game. Although the author did not have much understanding and experience due to time constraints (to the point where the plot was not even completed), I believe that the editor mode will bring stronger vitality to the game.
Summary
Although it is still in the EA testing stage, compared to some games that “hang the early access sign and sell work in progress”, “Rhythm Doctor” vividly shows what “early access” should look like.
It’s not that the four words “early access” are a free gold medal, allowing players to tolerate all its shortcomings and imperfections; it’s that the skin of the game may be slightly simple, but the filling inside is delicious and tasty, able to show the charm and shining points of the creator’s ideas.
On the one hand, “Rhythm Doctor” is popular among the general public. As a music game (or more accurately, a “sub-music game”), it goes beyond the simple music carrier. Its unique “beat narrative” shows a strong plot performance effect. On the other hand, it is also niche, which creates a certain threshold for players’ objective musical needs.
But whether it’s popular or not, the most important thing is that it’s a game with ideas, and I just love this kind of work that can bring surprises to people.
