Let's Sing! Review

Like Draw Something done karaoke style, Let’s Sing! is a social asynchronous multiplayer game that's a hybrid of Name That Tune and Wheel of Fortune. The game is fun and familiar, and all but the truly tone deaf can become virtuosos.

Gameplay is familiar. Players start by selecting a friend or random opponent, and are presented with a choice of three songs with different point values. I was a concerned that I might on the too-old side of hip when the first three were by artists I had to Google, but new options are available – five for free and more for in-game currency. In my nine other games there was a mix of pop, classic rock, traditional songs, and even Sesame Street.

Once a song is selected it’s time to make music. But remember: no lyrics allowed. Players can hum, whistle, croak, even burp the melody to a friend by tapping the microphone. There’s 30 seconds in which to create a recognizable arrangement and that’s it. For a while anyway.

Like all games of this type, players don’t have to be logged in together to play. A push notification and musical tone sound an alert when it’s time to go back and finish the round. If the other player guesses correctly both parties win coins. Then it’s on to guessing, and back and forth it goes. Coins are used to buy clues. Players can buy not one, but all the vowels, or reveal the artist. Of course, coins are available for in-app purchase.

Let’s Sing! requires a sign-in, never something I like to see, and oddly still necessary when I linked my Facebook account. Games can be played with Facebook friends, with friends whose usernames are known, or an invitation can be sent by email.

Right now there doesn’t seem to be much action, at least not amongst my peers, so auto-matching seems like a great idea. But because players can’t opt-out, unwanted stranger requests are a concern. They are intrusive and kind of stalkerish. I don’t want to see random matching go, but the system needs refinement.

The early sound quality issues seem resolved in version 1.1. It’s hardly high-definition audio, but more than adequate to make out the caterwauling on the other end.

I don’t see Let’s Sing! equalling the success of similar offerings. While, as a shower-crooner, I find it fun, replay is hard to incentivize without purchaseables. The social element is there, but it’s not promoted, the unwanted game requests are annoying, and the interface is bland. Also, the ad-free version is overpriced at $4.99.

But, with some fine-tuning and a price drop, I’ll be rooting for legions of Gleeks to “fa-la-la” Let’s Sing! up the charts.