RB Karaoke?

[ShaleDirk]

So, I've had this idea brewing in the back of my head for about a year now:

I work at a karaoke bar part-time, that for a while had weekly RB competitions that I hosted. It made alot of sense, what; with there being a projection screen behind the stage and ample room for drunken RB. They haven't run it for about a year now (after a drop in numbers during the summer [people that go to university in Victoria never stay for the summer]), and I've had some people trying to push to get RB nights started up again.

Now, some of the people are interested in playing Rock Band, and some of them just want the option to be able to sing most of the songs in Rock Band, because as alot of us hopefully know, karaoke tracks are garbage in comparison to singing along to the original recording, and not all karaoke bars have a great song selection for rock.

So my idea is this: If I record an audio track from vocal practice mode, and then lay that on top of a video of vocal quick-play, would it be a good substitute? I'm worried about the problem of the score bar dwindling, not having pitch recognition, words turning red, etc. Secondarily, I'm also worried about the legality of playing a video of Rock Band in an establishment. I think that would be less of an issue.

Any ideas? Performance mode is an option, but I'm fairly sure that means there wouldn't be words on the screen, which somewhat defeats the purpose of karaoke.

[NormanCoxwell]

I see how that could work. Try it.

Oh wait couldn't you just turn on no fail and easy?

[Flawless]

Easy, Static, Vocal Track at 0 in quickplay?

Like seriously, I'd be sad for anyone who sees flashing red on Easy. Even drunk people.

[ShaleDirk]

Easy, Static, Vocal Track at 0 in quickplay?

Like seriously, I'd be sad for anyone who sees flashing red on Easy. Even drunk people.

The issue is that they wouldn't actually be playing the game, but singing along to a video.

[whypick1]

Yes, performance mode would remove the game interface, including words.

Look here regarding legality. I'd imagine ASCAP (or whatever the Canadian equivalent is) would crop up.

I don't think this is quite what you're looking for. The interface might get in the way (as you said, crowd meter would drop, track would start flashing red) and the pitch bar could also confuse people, especially since it's not an absolute pitch bar.

[craven_trio]

Why not just stick to RB nights? Even if nobody wants to play the instruments, someone can sing. You can even advertise it as Rock Karaoke and not even have the instruments as an option if you prefer.

Just recording the song over line out with vocals turned down to 1 (they don't even go down to 0) and no fail turned on while nobody is playing would result in some crowd booing being recorded (again, the crowd volume only goes down to 1, not 0). Plus that sounds dodgier legally than just playing the game for some reason... definitely check the pro thread linked above.

[war_lord]

If nobody wants to play the RB instruments, you could also consider a straight-up karaoke game (like SingStar on the PlayStation or Lips on the 360).