“Can you snap your fingers in with music?”

When I saw those words printed on the side of slipcase, my first thought was, “Well, I’m screwed.” Luckily, rather than going with my initial instinct to just give up right then and there, I decided to try the game out before actually declaring defeat.

Rhythm Heaven is divided up into a series of musical mini-games that task the player with such duties as singing in time with a choir, assembling machine parts and filling robots with fuel. Using the stylus on the bottom screen, the player must attempt to stay in time with the music to ensure that all the tasks are accomplished successful on the top screen. Although the game employs an adorable minimalist art style that’s very engaging to look at, you’re usually better off trying to catch the rhythm of the music rather than watching the animations.

At its best, Rhythm Heaven will have you nodding your head in time to the music as you beat out a rhythm with your stylus on the DS’ touchpad. At worst, if you’re generally a rhythmless white boy like myself, you’re going to find several of the mini-games an exercise in frustration. Luckily, fail a particular mini-game enough times and you’ll be provided with the option to skip it. I’ve only recently come across a mini-game that I can’t stop failing at so I’m not sure how many games you can actually skip.

Overall, I’m very pleased with Rhythm Heaven so far and that’s saying a lot considering how very bad I am at it. I absolutely love the music and I would probably buy the soundtrack if it was ever released domestically. As for the game itself, I’m definitely going to be adding this title to my collection after I return my rental copy to Gamefly. As to when I’ll actually be able to complete it and write a full review…well, my appalling lack of musical talent may insure that never happens… =^_^;;=

-LC1