Imagine my surprise when I heard strains of “In the hall of the Mountain King“, albeit a badly played one coming from my wife’s iPad 2 last night. It turned out that she was playing a game from Smule Inc called Magic Piano. It’s a little bit like Guitar Hero but this time, the instrument of choice is the piano.
Depending on the difficulty level selected, players follow the beams of light that appear on the screen and tap with their finger tips to play the correct notes. The beauty of the game is that the player controls the note, rhythm and tempo…so if you want to play “In the hall of the Mountain King” at a really crazy tempo, you can do so!
The game comes with a number of free songs, and the developers have made it a point to release one new free song a day. Players can purchase additional songs through in-app purchases and what sets Magic Piano apart from the competition is a huge catalogue of music, with plenty of contemporary songs to choose from as well.
I has a lot of fun playing Fur Elise and In the hall of the Mountain King, having played both as a teenager on the electronic organ. It was a case of practice makes perfect as I noticed my scores going higher and higher with each new attempt. The difficulty level can also be adjusted so that players can go from single finger tapping to using four fingers simultaneously.
There are few niggles in the game, I noticed a certain clunkiness in the way ads are implemented in the game, it actually leads to longer loading times. In any case, the gameplay is not affected by this. Nine Over Ten 9/10 rates Magic Piano at a 4.5 out of 5. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. The game is available for free on the iTunes App Store, check it out over here: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/magic-piano/id421254504?mt=8
