Have you ever been leaving a great concert/rave/club/show with some amazing riff, or fantastic beat stuck in your head, thinking,
"I wish I could do that." Well, now you can. With Codemasters' MTV Music Generator 2, any beat you have stuck in your head, great riff you've been playing on the air guitar, or just any desire to write your own songs can now become a reality. With some time and patience, even you can write that next big hit song, that is if you can figure out how to sell a song created with a video game.

Which brings me to my first point, that this isn't really a video game. Not in the classic sense. There is no competition whatsoever, no winners or losers, no timeless evil to banish from the land, really no goal at all except to compose pieces of music. Even the multiplayer game is just an excuse to jam. The main portion of this game consists of stringing together different riffs in four categories -bass, rhythm, melody and vocals. Search the massive library of literally hundreds of riffs, which are little blocks of music, to piece together that magnum opus you've been humming since you were ten, or just make some crazy party music to play using the Jukebox feature, which continuously plays all your saved songs. And after you've created a song, you can edit your own video to play alongside, using 3-D animated shapes and tweaking the lighting, camera angles and various effects. But that's about it.

I'm not saying that this game isn't deep or can't be enormously time consuming. It most certainly can be both. But unless you're very interested in this sort of creative exploit and prepared to spend a lot of time playing with all the little details, you may find yourself getting bored after creating a few songs and diddling with the many customizable effects. And just about everything in this game can be customized. From the basic look of the menu, to the pointer and the power of the pointer gravity - a nifty little feature that automatically attracts your pointer to the nearest button (why can't it be turned off!?!). If you are bored with the many riffs included in the library, why not edit them instead, or better yet, make your own riffs, note by note. Basically everything you could want in a game like this is there, but you don't need to use most of it to create great songs. Heck, you can even go to the Codemasters web site (www.codemasters.com/shop) and purchase the Sampler Kit for about $24.00 and you can sample your own voice via the microphone, or even sample your favorite CD. And if your friends get bored of watching you cut and paste the title track for your next album, plug in one or two multitaps, assign different riffs to each button and have yourselves an eight man electrical jam.

Overall, this is an interesting game, and hard to categorize. At a time when many companies are coming out with just another racing game or Tomb Raider knock-off, its nice to see at least someone is trying something different. A far cry from its PSX roots, this next generation version is pretty to look at, contains an unbelievable amount of detail, both musically and in the options department, and will have you playing around for months to come, if you are into that sort of thing. And that's the most glaring problem - unless you have a big interest in music, you might be better off renting before you buy.
 

Install: None

Gameplay: 8
Not much of a challenge in cutting and pasting blocks of music, but it is all very easy to use and fairly intuitive. There is a large selection of music to choose from, with the ability to customize just about everything. Creating a good song is simple and fun to do, even though it can get fairly tedious after a few hours of the same few actions.

Graphics: 7
Nothing earth shattering here. Unless you use the default menu skin, it can be a little hard to see all the buttons. Good use of clean, crisp and colorful graphics. The only disappointment is the video editor, which only allows the use of basic 3-D objects, pretty textures and lighting and camera control. The graphics are definitely secondary to the music, which is as it should be.

Sound: 9
Of course, there is great sound - hey, its a music generator. Tons of great samples in many different styles and genres, with the ability to tweak everything, from the timing and pitch, to the amount of fade or reverb. You can even use the Auto Chord feature to create chords from a single set of notes. Its all there and will have you playing around for a while.

Difficulty: 9
Very easy to pick up and learn, you will be creating masterpieces in under an hour. But it will take a long time for you to really master all the intricacies in this game, if you have the patience.

Concept: 9
Original idea, especially in the console arena (if you don't count its predecessor on the PSX), this is definitely a niche product, but what it does, it does well. If this sort of thing turns you on, you will be in heaven.

Multiplayer: 6
Its great to see more games that make use of the multitap, but unless you have two of them, in order for more than two people to play, you had better not be shy about sharing your controller, and your personal space, with your peers. Although an interesting concept, the execution kind of got lost. Unless you and your friends have long attention spans, it will probably take more time to set up than you will actually spend playing.

Overall: 8
With a unique concept and great execution, for the most part this game delivers the goods. Unfortunately, not everyone will want what this game has to offer. If you are a big music fan, and are willing to spend countless hours customizing your music, you should definitely check this game out. Otherwise, a rental will probably do.