Lips

This game is very fun, the only downfall is the short list of songs it ships with and the downloadable content engine seems to be really glitchy. I was also promised new songs every week for the first 8 weeks because I pre-ordered it through amazon. However, the first track i tried to download via zune said it was "free" and then charged me 240 microsoft points with out warning. It took me about 3 hours of being passed back and forth between microsoft, zune and xbox - all the same company - because none of them wanted to give my points back. I finally got them back, however, i still didn't receive any of the "free" downloads for the promotion. Even though the game itself deserves 5 stars because we had a blast playing it... the support behind it is LOUSY!

The game itself is a great game, once you figure out the setup. All that is given for setup is a picture diagram and a paragraph... the main problem is connecting the wireless microphones to the xbox because each microphone also needs a controller connected, but it doesn't say this anywhere... anyways, the game is great, lots of fun.

*NOTE: For those of you having connection issues:
YOU MUST UNPLUG ALL USB MICROPHONES BEFORE STARTING LIPS!

One of the better gifts I gave this Christmas was Lips, though I have to admit I was hesitant to buy it after reading a couple mediocre reviews from gamespot and kotaku. Most of the negativity seems to revolve around the music import tool, allowing you to import your own MP3's, WMA's and M4A's from a connected thumb drive, music player (haven't tried the iPod yet, sorry), and even through a wireless connected media center! It sounds like a good idea, but one reviewer pointed out "importing thousands of my own songs was...largely useless. You don't get lyrics..." Not so. Forget proper karaoke for a moment - if you love just singing along with your favorite tunes but lack a legitimate excuse to grab a mic and rock out, Lips offers exactly that. Matching the music's waveform earns you the same points and fills the mic-gesture-gauge just as though the song were part of the game. It's a blast and we love it! Even if you decide not to import your own music, there's plenty to purchase online with full lyrics and music videos. Unfortunately, with only 40 tracks on disc, you'll find that if you DON'T add to the library at all, you'll quickly tire of repeating yourself.

Besides the library, the game itself offers a lot over its sing-along competition. The interface alone is super-slick, displaying album art for each song during music selection, and overall the whole experience is tailored for group play. Players can sing simultaneously in versus mode, or take turns with phrases and harmonies in duet mode. There's even a few party game modes (vocal fighters, Kiss, and Time Bomb) which can be activated by selecting them as the songs background video. Spectators can even use the standard controllers to make a verity of percussive sounds (ie "noise makers"), and the motion-sensitive mics can be used to activate a star/point bonus when the gesture gauge fills (much like star power in RockBand / Guitar Hero). And to answer your question, yes, Harmonix has promised a patch which will make the wireless mics compatible with RockBand in the near future. Woo!

My only complaint is an incompatibility that isn't documented in the instructions:
YOU MUST UNPLUG ALL USB MICROPHONES BEFORE STARTING LIPS.

I'll explain. First, don't listen to what other people have said -- the process of syncing both mics is just as easy as syncing a normal wireless controller. We ran into no problems here what so ever. The problem was that, though everything was working fine in single player mode, as soon as I tried to join in with the 2nd microphone, BOTH mics stopped working. Then, when starting over, the first mic, which was working fine before, started having timing and static issues. Additionally, the lights on the 2nd mic never light up, making me think it was either broken or not synced properly. No matter which order I connected everything, connecting a 2nd mic broke the connection with the first. Almost ready to take it all back, I ran across this thread on Gamespot, revealing the following observation:

"It turns out that all my issues stem from the fact I have a USB microphone connected to my Xbox 360. Somehow microphone registration gets all screwy because of that. In my case, I have my Rock Band microphone plugged into the Xbox 360 at all times. The fix is to unplug the USB microphone when you're playing Lips. Apparently this will fix both the 2nd microphone lighting issues as well as the static noise, video and audio out of sync issues, as well as the freezing issues."

My problem EXACTLY. I hope someone out there finds this useful. Happy new year!

i bought this game because our Christmas party was coming up and because my lil sister and friends love to sing. it comes with 40 songs and you can download more if you want. one drawback is that when your singing you can just mumble and points will still go up but not that fast as if you were trying to sound good. the words show up on screen just like karaoke and the video of the song plays in the background while your singing. theres a battle mode where you try to steal the spotlight from the other singer and knock them off stage there's also a kiss mode and bomb mode. you can download your own songs and sing to them. one drawback is online. when i tried online it only gives me choices to sing with people in my own friend list which is a drawback cause no one else i know had the game. wish you could sing with people around the world that had the game and not just ones in your friend list.(correct me if i'm wrong). this game is a must buy for your game collection.

We got this game for my 18 year old son for Christmas and we have all had a great time using it as a family. The song selection is good for both the younger and the older and the ability to use your own songs makes it better.