Become a Drum King with We Rock

"Miyamoto tried to promote [Wii Music] as a perfect way of discovering music without going as hardcore about it"

That's a very misleading way of putting it, depending on the crucial interpretation of the word "hardcore." If you are implying that Wii Music either is or has been marketed as a less involved and less complex version of Rock Band styles games, then you are sorely mistaken.

Wii Music is actually far more complex musically than other games on the market; in Guitar Hero et al., al you do is hit buttons as they scroll by on the screen -- there's nothing even vaguely musical about the gameplay, and you can, in fact, perform just as well with the sound turned off, if that is any indication. Wii Music is uniquely challenging, and confused traditional game reviewers, for it actually requires you to have a good musical ear and creativity in order to perform anything that sounds remotely good; briefly stated, the game challenges you to come up with your own 6-part arrangements of songs using any combination of instruments out of 60+ available, and even lets you play any particular part as you see fit, using different phrasing, sectional variations, complex rhythms, etc.

Wii Music is, however, less "hardcore" in one sense; there is a subset of the video game market ( although recently diminishing in importance as games are now played by demographics other than adolescent males), who call themselves "hardcore" gamers, and try to create an identity and subculture out of playing video games. That's pretty laughable, but unfortunately these people were largely the only group that video game creators catered to until recently. Wii Music runs sharply counter to the vision of video gaming that these 'hardcore' gamers have, by encouraging creativity, downplaying traditional scoring, and forgoing the kind of imagery and tracklist that appeals to this demographic.

For music lovers, however, Wii Music is very deep and enjoyable, and lets you experiment with real musical arrangements and ideas -- what a novelty amidst a million "music"' games that are nothing more than variations on Dance Dance Revolution, or even Simon Says, if you want to go back far enough.

Your article also seems to be lacking a bit in research, as you failed to mention the fact that Wii Music already includes a complete drum mode, where you can play entire drumsets using the Wii remote and nunchuck, by using movements and buttons to hit particular drums. You also use the balance board for the pedals, so in total you have an entire drumset at your disposal: 2 cymbals, 3 toms, snare, hi-hat, bass drum. It also comes with drum lessons that teach the basics of drumming patterns, and then lets you record your own drum parts over the 50 songs included in the game.

A good article might have: (1) avoided the usual gamer nonsense when dealing with a very different subset of games, (2) done a little research to see what similar features may already exist in Wii titles, and (3) compared something like what is offered in Wii Music's drum mode to what has been announced for this new title, so that we might understand the new game's intentions in relation to the current market.