Then stop dancing dammit!
The only real difference between the Singstar titles is the tracklist. Pop Hits features thirty tracks that could all be classified as pop music. As is the problem with every Singstar tracklist there are brilliant songs and poor songs. Disappointingly, the tracklist that Australians have received is a carbon copy of the UK release, which is unusual. Usually, the time is taken to localise tracks and provide songs Australians are familiar with, but because Studio London took shortcuts there are songs on this compilation we've never heard of. Bands like Girls Aloud and All Saints are about as popular in Australia as mandatory voting. All in all Singstar Pop Hits has one of the worst tracklists of any Singstar title to date, which is disappointing.
It is the tracklist which will either encourage of discourage consumers from purchasing Singstar Pop Hits and the full tracklist can be found below.
- Akon - Lonely
- All Saints - Black Coffee
- Ashlee Simpson - Boyfriend
- Avril Lavigne - My Happy Ending
- Britney Spears - Baby One More Time
- Cascada - Everytime We Touch
- Corinne Baily Rae - Put Your Records On
- Daniel Powter - Bad Day
- Dannii Minogue - I Begin To Wonder
- Evanesence - Bring Me To Life
- Fall Out Boy - Dance Dance
- Girls Aloud - No Good Advice
- Goldfrapp - Oh La La
- Jamelia - Beware Of The Dog
- James Morrison - You Give Me Something
- Jennifer Lopez - Jenny From The Block
- JoJo - Leave (Get Out)
- Lemar - It's Not That Easy
- Lily Allen - Littlest Things
- My Chemical Romance - Helena
- Nelly Furtado - Promiscuous
- Norah Jones - Don't Know Why
- Orson - Bright Idea
- Razorlight - Golden Touch
- Rihanna - SOS
- Scissor Sisters - I Don't Feel Like Dancing
- Sugababes - Push The Button
- Travis - Sing
- U2 - Beautiful Day
- Will Young - Switch It On
The gameplay modes are once again exactly the same as the previous titles. So you can plays solo, team up in a duet with a friend or battle against friends. There is still no central single player mode so if you're singing on your lonesome all you can do is try and get a high score. There hasn't been a single player career mode since the very first Singstar title and we feel a good single player mode would be a good addition to the Singstar games.
The same could be said for the tracklist.
Our complaints about the Singstar titles remain the same. The USB microphones do an okay job of "judging" a player and rating their singing but your score is all based on your tone. For example, rather than singing "It's A Beautiful Day" you can actually sing something along the lines of "I'm going away" and as long as your tone and pitch are similar to U2's then you'll get a high rating. This means that if players are losing they'll often just start being silly and it's quite possible for them to catch up.
There are advantages of owning every Singstar title or owning a lot of them. When choosing a song to sing you can press the select button and change the disk without turning off the PlayStation 2 or resetting the console. A few seconds later the tracklist for the selected Singstar disk will pop up with another thirty songs to choose from. None of the songs have doubled up, so if you own every Singstar title you've got a choice of over 200 songs, making your PlayStation 2 a brilliant karaoke machine.
I'm putting on the guess it's a mirror.
The video quality for the songs is generally pretty good. On every Singstar title the older clips don't look as good as the newer ones, but as most of the songs on this compilation are newer titles the video clips look good. In terms of the lifespan, the lack of single player mode is again, disappointing. Singstar isn't the type of title you play for a week straight and then never return to again, it's the type of game that will consistently be dragged out at parties and drunken nights in.
Overall Singstar Pop Hits is a run of the mill compilation. It's the tracklist which really differentiates the Singstar titles from one another and Pop Hits will go down as a title with a very average soundtrack. With a new Singstar title coming out every few months it won't be long before the next Singstar title is out, hopefully with a better soundtrack.
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