rhythm posts

Welcome to Freeware Friday, a weekly column showcasing excellent games that you can play free of charge!

We've talked about the amazing (and free!) rhythm games Osu! and Frets on Fire before on Freeware Friday, but never the game that started the trend of music-game reproductions. Where Osu! replicates Ouendan, and Frets on Fire copies Guitar Hero, this game takes a page directly from arguably the most successful rhythm game franchise of all time: Dance Dance Revolution. The game in question is Stepmania, and is a landmark in freeware as well as being an absolutely solid platform for anyone who loves DDR. If you have not played Stepmania, you are doing yourself a disservice, as it belongs on every hard drive.

Welcome to Freeware Friday, a weekly column showcasing excellent games that you can play free of charge!

The PC has a strong tradition of creating freeware remakes of popular rhythm games that allow for user-created content. First came the remake of Dance Dance Revolution in Stepmania, which fueled the creation of the In The Groove series. The came the remake of the Guitar Hero franchise with Frets on Fire. Now, there is osu!, a remake of Ouendan (or Elite Beat Agents, pick your poison) that manages to put both to shame. A flexible built-in editor and player, a thriving community, and a unique online experience propel osu! above its peers in the freeware music game niche.

Welcome to Freeware Friday, a weekly column showcasing excellent games that you can play free of charge!

The rhythm genre is one that seems to be exploding, especially with the advent of Guitar Hero. Everbody loves to wail on plastic guitars and pretend to be a rock god! Just look at the bevy of knock-offs, as well as the war between the Guitar Hero and Rock Band franchises. For the PC, though, there's a great Guitar Hero freeware clone for those who want custom music in their game. That clone is the excellent freeware game Frets on Fire, which also happens to have the most ridiculous logo known to man.

Talk about making a game better on a regular basis. Audiosurf has already received one free, massive update, and now comes another one. This one, though, is interesting. This new update allows the players to make their own game modes by changing the names of the song they are playing. They can do so by adding one or multiple tags after the title of the song. We have to say that this sort of improvements to an already great game just impress us all that much more. An explanation of the system can be found on the Audiosurf forums, and the full list of tags can be found after the break or in the Steam update.