Though limited in scope, MTV Music Generator is a unique and entertaining music mixer, if not exactly a "game."
User Rating: 8 | Music 2000 PS
Most games are easy to classify, neatly falling into a subcategory of a genre alongside contemporary peer titles. With a given play style, point of view, and control structuring, most games are of one easy to identify type or another. It's rarely even up for discussion. A game falls under a genre that a hundred games before it helped define. MTV Music Generator is not one of these games. More of a guided creation interface than a "game", per se, the player starts off simply with a blank slate. Using samples that range from voice clips to beats to riffs of many different styles to piece together songs, the player uses existing portions of music, ties them together, and comes away with their own creations. The game uses a spreadsheet-like interface, with music taking up a various number of blocks on the grid, both vertically (for the amount of music that can be played at one time) and horizontally (for the length of a given sample). Using the samples available, players piece together the blocks moving horizontally to extend song lenght and vertically to add sounds to a given moment in the song, and after the player is done creating the song, or at any point in between, they can listen to it from and to any point within to check their work. The premise sounds both staggeringly shallow and hopelessly complex, but it's actually a lot of fun. Creating songs from the ground up may seem difficult for the average layman or music fan, but since no one is being asked to create actual music, instead just arranging it, all the player has to do to, really, is put things together and follow what sounds good. The process of taking a blank slate and turning it into an actual song is very satisfying, and although there is no game-set challenge put forth, the task of making something from nothing can be quite engaging, as making a song can take as little as ten minutes or as long as a few hours, the satisfaction of finishing a song that took several hours to fine-tune is immense. It's not all freedom to create, however. The PlayStation's memory is very limited, and more detailed songs cannot run longer than three-four minutes long. Most players who really work on the minutiae of their tracks will find they are hemmed in dramatically by this limitation, and would-be epic anthems get cut down rather quickly. There won't be any ten-minute trance tracks worth listening to here; it's all about the two to four minute pieces of music the player can come up with. Also, though game is very free-form about letting the player mix and match samples as they like, there really isn't much of a variety with the musical stylings. Whereas some folk will undoubtedly consider trance, techno, beat, and house to be very different types of music, the average fan will only find minor differences between these styles. And although a few other genres remain, the game is somewhat set within the realm of techno and its offshoots. No one will be making a hard rock song with MTV Music Generator. The interface is clean and color-coded, and considering how much has to be done with just a simple PlayStation controller, it's quite admirable. The player has access to altering riff length, riff volume, the sample library, and more all at the touch of a button or few. Without a fast and easy to use interface, the game would be a chore more than anything else. Thanks to the fine folks at Codemasters, however, it's not difficult at all to get a handle on the basics. While some of the more advanced elements, like key changes, can take some time to wrap one's mind around and use effectively within the scope of the game, the activities of grabbing samples, making small alterations to duration and placement, cutting others out, and pasting new ones in is a breeze. The audio quality is decent, but it's certainly nothing to write home about. With so many samples, there is some definite compression, and even looping samples aren't always cleanly cut between beats. Some are very easy to hear the breaks in, and it's a bit deflating to work something in and find that it sounds anything but smooth. Generally, however, it's not too noticeable, and it works well enough, especially when other samples are playing alongside each other. MTV Music Generator is a wholly singular experience in an entertainment field that often seems too easy to categorize, and its uniqueness takes it a long way. It's not really a game in that there isn't a challenge with puzzles, bosses, or hand-eye coordination, but it's fun in a totally different way that many gamers haven't experienced before. Creative gamers may very well find that this game takes up more time than it has any right to. It's not real pretty and it's not even all that flexible once a player has used their favorite samples and hit the memory limit, but it's a great entry-level music mixer that many a gamer will find themselves playing for hours on end, just to make the perfect track. Those tired of doing the same old thing over and over again should find Music Generator a blast of fresh air, but those not into non-linear gameplay or creative tasks may not find a whole lot to gain from a title that throws a bunch of parts at the player and expects them to have fun with these disparate components of music.
