Frederic: Resurrection of Music

Game Info

The music genre seems to have peaked and dissipated about 3 to 4 years ago.  I remember having Rock Band or Guitar Hero parties, and drinking and playing these titles to the wee hours of the morning.  I thought there were some good off-shoots of these games too such as Rhythm Heaven Fever that took the formula and applied it to a story and it made the concept work.  Forever Entertainment tries to use the same formula but apply it using the piano.

The story is set in the present day, where Frederic Chopin has been long dead.  He is suddenly resurrected and must circumnavigate the globe to discover the reasoning for being brought back from the dead.  The underlying narrative is a satire on what the music industry has become and does a wonderful job stating their point through the use of humorous cut-scenes.

At each location you will meet the most stereotypical character for that area you would expect to find.  You are then cast into battle, fighting game style, with over-the-top announcer and all.  In battle you have to tap the piano on the touch screen when the notes hit the keys.  The coloring of the notes helps to see if you are hits an ivory key or an ebony key.  You will also have to slide and hold notes, similar to Guitar Hero.  If you get a good enough streak you will get bonus notes which would be way easier to hit if the touchscreen was multitouch.  After you fill up your streak gauge you can shake the GamePad to unleash an attack on your opponent.  The overall score is judged by a health meter at the top which works like a tug-of-war battle.  Every time I won a battle and heard Musicality it made me chuckle.

Graphically the game as a really nice cartoon look.  It looks like it could be a Saturday morning cartoon with every nice images.  The backgrounds while you are playing also look very lively with lots of little humor going on for people watching you play to get submerged into.  The soundtrack features remixed Chopin songs in various different styles from around the world which is pretty bad ass and well done.  The script is fully voice-acted too which is impressive for an indie title.

The Recommendation

I enjoyed my time with Fredric: Resurrection of  Music.  The game difficulty gets ramped up quickly on the harder difficulty modes but this is what make the replay value.  Because of the limitations of the hardware and lack of multitouch, the game is harder then it should be.  There aren’t many option for music games on the Wii U but this one is done well with a story to boot. For any music fan looking for a good time, this is a worthy addition to your Wii U library.