A lot people people are wondering if the Piano Wizard software is as good as it is supposed to be. It definitely has a lofty goal: a video piano game that teaches people how to play the piano. Is this possible?
When piano wizard first arrived in my mailbox, I wasn't sure. I took it out of the box and installed the software, which was pretty painless process (I happen to be installing it on one of the newer Apple Macintosh computers). I then took the special little colored stickers that come with the piano wizard software, and put them on my midi keyboard.
The first thing I noticed was that I felt a little relieved. I could tell pretty quickly that, at the very least, the whole thing was not a scam - that somebody had put a lot of time, energy and money into making this piano wizard software into whatever it was. Strange as it may sound, that was a relief in and of itself! If it weren't for all the awards that the game had won (I had seen all the medals and badges for toy and educational software awards on their website
I found the setup pretty easy and self-explanatory and I played a few piano games right away. The first few games took a little getting used to, but I started on the most basic level and worked my way up from there. It really did remind my of two games that I had played before: Dance Revolution (which is a game you find at some arcades - it was an arcade sensation that began in Japan - it had you looking at a screen and putting your feet in certain places on the floor at very specific times) and Guitar Hero (this game is a huge craze right now on PS2, PS3, XBox, and Wii - you play guitar on a little controller and you have to press a specific button and at a specific time according to what is on the screen).
The thing that always bothered me about Guitar Hero was that it didn't actually teach you to play anything - there are only 5 buttons and the sequence you have to push the buttons in is pretty arbitrary. But with piano wizard, you're using a real keyboard - you are using a real instrument and you are pressing the actual keys in the song, so you are truly playing the instrument while you are playing the game. When the piano game first begins, it is a little more lenient and allows for more flaws in your musical timing.
It really does teach you, but it does it in stages, and the game gets really advanced by the end. One of the great things about it is that even if you think you can master this game, you can always download new songs. It even works with standard midi files, which amazed me! I found myself loading in all kinds of old hits into piano wizard - I would just go and download them from the internet, and then it even lets you choose what part you want to play - you can play pretty much any instrument that exists!
I'm not saying I've totally mastering the piano by playing this game - but if I had more time to play the game, I'm sure I would! It's really fun, and it's totally addictive. I've already purchased some additional copies of piano wizard for some of the young kids in my life - and they love it! It's a great pleasure to see them having so much fun, and knowing that this is doing something positive for their brains - what a healthy influence on a child's brain in those formative years!
Piano Wizard | New York Times | Apple | Wikipedia | Piano.com | Piano World