StrickenBiged's Epic Quest for another Platinum and Rock-Godhood

[StrickenBiged]

My husband's like that, too except I can't play in the evenings during the weekdays (not that I could anyway). I'm glad you haven't lost too much progress. So what about Gone Wailin'? Do you think you'll get to that soon?

 

I dunno. I'm not very good at it.. (I suppose that's what practice is for!) Even at level 4 (I think), I'm yet to break past 3M (I think) points in a single game. 

 

I need to give the guitarcade a proper play again. Been having so much fun with the songs that I've almost forgotten about it really!

 

I made my wife sound worse than she is there. It was my decision to stop playing because she was trying to concentrate on something very important and was feeling ill anyway. She didn't have to say anything to me. 

[StrickenBiged]

Day 74: 7 Mar 2016

 

Had a another session without any clear aim. Basically just played through a number of songs once each, just to get my fingers used to the instrument again, and clear a few Missions, many of which asked me to "Play X new songs". Didn't do too badly on I Want You Bad and Basket Case, in both of those I was able to increase my mastery scores by a couple of % points. Overall, I was playing for about 50 minutes.

[Hemiak]

I feel you man. I played about 2 hrs 5 days ago, it had been about 4 before that. I really need to get my priorities straight. 

[StrickenBiged]

Day 75: 9 Mar 2016

 

Not even sure if I should bother to update you with this one!

 

Basically, only had a really quick session today. Basically played through Learn to Fly once, improved my mastery and got the chorus to 100% difficulty, went into riff repeater to practice the verse, played it through again and improved my mastery by a bit more. 

 

And that's all folks... practice is practice, I guess!

[StrickenBiged]

Day 76: 12 Mar 2016

 

Quite a decent session today. Decided I was going to play bass for a bit, so dusted off my T'Bird and jacked it in.

 

So I started out by going and buying the latest "Women Who Rock" DLC pack after watching it on the dev's weekly stream on Thursday 10 March. Some seriously great tunes in there. Here's a trailer if you want to see them. 

 

 

So I played through each track once to get a feel for them and start levelling them up. Take It Off is probably the simplest (there's only 5 different notes to worry about!) and I'm So Sick is probably the most difficult on account of that stretch up to the 6th fret. 

 

Went in a practiced a few more songs too. A couple of RAtM tracks, that sort of thing. 

 

After I was done with playing songs I went into the guitarcade and played some Scale Racer. Managed to knock off a mission by levelling up, (eventually). Really annoying how sometimes the game will randomly decide that it isn't going to register your notes, especially when those scales start to get really fast. I have found that using a pick helps by giving your playing a bit more of an attack, but the detection still isn't perfect.

 

Day 77: 13 Mar 2016

 

Bum ba da dum ba da dum!

 

... and It Wasn't a Fluke

Clear 15 Songs on Score Attack Master

 

I'd like to thank The Donnas for making this possible with their super easy bass-line. 

 

So yeah, had a bit of an epic bass session today; on account of my wife feeling unwell so our Sunday was going to be spent indoors anyway. Started off with the Women Who Rock pack and practiced Take It Off until I was pretty confident that I knew the arrangement. Played it through on Hard and got a 100% platinum pick score. Nice. Went on to Master and, despite a couple of cock ups, managed to get through it without any strikes at all. Then the trophy popped, which was a pleasant surprise. I knew I was close to 15 cleared tracks, but didn't realise I was this close. 

 

Went back into Learn A Song and practiced the other WWR songs a bit more before turning my attention back to the guitarcade. First thing on the agenda was levelling up String Skip Saloon to get another mission out of the way, which I managed relatively quickly. 

 

The next mission wanted me to level up Scale Racers again, but after spending some time with it yesterday I didn't really feel like it. So I went into Harmonic Heist instead and played a few rounds. Got a new high score and a few stars. 

 

Popped out to the supermarket to get some provisions for my wife, (and to get a little bit of fresh air - the weather was lovely yesterday), before returning to the guitarcade. 

 

Jumped into Scale Racers and got that mission out of the way by levelling up. Still having issues with the game deciding randomly that it doesn't like me and isn't going to detect my notes 100% of the time, but eventually managed to get enough stars to level it. 

 

The next mission wanted me to level Gone Whailin', so I dutifully complied. Really find this game difficult. I think the key, with the bass at least, is to ignore the E string. The game's detection of this string seems to be quite binary. Strum it and your whale will spout a full stream of water, but try to dampen the sound slightly to drop the guy by a little bit and it'll comply for a while before it just decides "nope, I can't hear you anymore" and drop him completely. Still, managed to earn enough stars to level up, eventually. Some ridiculously short runs in this session... it's so annoying that you can't skip the score count screens and what have you. 

 

My next mission wants me to start the next set of scales in Scale Warriors, but I didn't really feel like getting into a longer play mode so I went back to Learn a Song and thought I'd knock out some missions there. 

 

Played Learn a Song for about an hour just knocking some really easy missions out of the way. "Complete two Rocksmith Recommends Items" - check. "Earn a Great Performance" - check. "Play 3 new songs" - check, times 2. "Play 2 new songs" - check. etc etc. 

 

Basically just played to the missions until I got the dreaded "Earn 75% mastery in R U Mine?"... I am not a fan of this arrangement, so I usually ignore this mission until the game refreshes it. For some reason it is obsessed that I need to master this track... I suppose it does involve a lot of good shifting work but I just don't find the song, or playing it, all that interesting. I suppose I'll do it one day, but today was not that day. 

 

So yeah, a long session and now my back hurts from holding my fretting arm out for a solid 2-3 hours. Whuf. Still, it felt like progress was made this weekend, and I'm reinvigorated about my bass playing again.

[Edunstar84]

Sounds like you had an amazing session! Keep up the good work.

[StrickenBiged]

Sounds like you had an amazing session! Keep up the good work.

 

Yeah, I think I must have spent about 4 hours with the bass over the weekend. Great fun. I still love those fat strings and the "thrummmmmb" they make. 

 

Guitar is great fun too but there's just something... IDK, a bit more funky about playing bass. 

 

That most of the basslines are easier than the guitar arrangements to actually pull off and sound like a boss doesn't hurt either!

[Hemiak]

Sounds like a really good couple of days man. I got in an hire or special yesterday a couple I'm really going to make an effort to get at least a half hour a day this week. 

 

A tip for guitarcade. I found if I started to totally flub a game it's better to restart early. You don't earn RS points, level up, or get a multiplier for working on the same game over and over, so there's no detriment to this. With 4 or 5 second left on the count I'll reach over, hit pause and then restart. It skips the closing animation,  the results, leaderboard, and splash page, throwing you right back into the game. Hope you find this helpful.  

[StrickenBiged]

Sounds like a really good couple of days man. I got in an hire or special yesterday a couple I'm really going to make an effort to get at least a half hour a day this week.  

 

Good luck with it man. Little and often is much better than nothing! Don't make it a "big thing" or you'll never find the time, like so many things in life. 

 

A tip for guitarcade. I found if I started to totally flub a game it's better to restart early. You don't earn RS points, level up, or get a multiplier for working on the same game over and over, so there's no detriment to this. With 4 or 5 second left on the count I'll reach over, hit pause and then restart. It skips the closing animation,  the results, leaderboard, and splash page, throwing you right back into the game. Hope you find this helpful.  

 

I'm not sure you can do this in RS2014, but I'll have a go. The "flubbing" seems to come fast when it does come in these games, and I'm not sure I'd have the time to grab my controller and hit start in time. There's no "count" either - most of the games play until you fail once. Like in String Skip Saloon, as soon as one outlaw makes it to the bar you're dead. And the speed those buggers get up to when you're deep into a run is pretty nasty. 

 

Like I say, I'll give it a go though. Hopefully you can do it during the closing animation, which lasts for a second or two after you fail.

[Hemiak]

I see. In RS2011 almost all of the games have timers. Super Slider doesn't, but it's pretty easy to tell early on if you've blown it bad enough to warrant a restart. Big swing baseball doesn't have an official timer but the strikes and outs are basically the same thing. 

 

Even ducks and scale Runner are timed, and you get more time for performing well. 

 

I really wish string skip (or something similar) was in the first one. Everything else has an equivalent game but this. I guess quick pick dash is sort of similar, but the focus is definitely more on the tremolo portion. 

[StrickenBiged]

I see. In RS2011 almost all of the games have timers. Super Slider doesn't, but it's pretty easy to tell early on if you've blown it bad enough to warrant a restart. Big swing baseball doesn't have an official timer but the strikes and outs are basically the same thing. 

 

Even ducks and scale Runner are timed, and you get more time for performing well. 

 

I really wish string skip (or something similar) was in the first one. Everything else has an equivalent game but this. I guess quick pick dash is sort of similar, but the focus is definitely more on the tremolo portion. 

 

Yeah, String Skip Saloon is one of my favourites as my picking is not very accurate at the best of times. I especially get confused between the D and G strings - find it very hard to find those with my pick or my fretting hand. 

 

Cool that the games are timed on RS1. I think I'd prefer that in RS2014, as it's incredibly frustrating to have the game end because of one tiny mistake in an otherwise good run, and even more so when it's because the game has randomly decided that its not going to detect your playing correctly. 

[StrickenBiged]

Day 78: 15 Mar 2016

 

A bit of a unplanned session today. I thought I'd only have a half hour or so before I had to be somewhere, so I decided I'd try and smash out as many Rocksmith missions as possible in that time. As it turned out, I didn't have to go anywhere, so I got quite a few done. Was playing on bass again today.

 

Started with the Learn a Song missions, of which I had "Play 2 new songs" 3 times in a row. Played through a number of things I hadn't tried before, some of them quite difficult. First time playing The Spider and the Fly by the Rolling Stones. Cracking bass-line, really enjoyed playing it. Will have to give this one some more attention. 

 

Eventually got the dreaded "Achieve 75% accuracy in R U Mine?" so decided to switch to the guitarcade. 

 

First mission wanted me to achieve level 9 in String Skip Saloon. About 7 attempts and 3 stars later, mission achieved. Hot a new high score too, 17M and something. Nice. 

 

Then onto Ninja Slide N', where I had to achieve level 3, I think. Getting the hang of this one a bit more - learning to time my slides so that I hit more ghosts and get more bonus points. Only a couple of stars got me to the next level and completed the mission. 

 

Next, it was on to Ducks ReDux. Had a few good runs, shot some quackers, achieved a new high score or two, and leveled it to level 4. 

 

Back to String Skip Saloon which now wanted me to reach the maximum level, level 10. This went a bit quicker this time, just a few attempts got me all the stars I needed to level up. Not sure what missions involving this mini-game will do from now on... maybe they'll just ask me to beat a high score target or achieve a certain number of stars (which are still available after reaching max level, apparently.)

 

Back to Ninja Slide N' again (damn this game's repeating itself a lot today) and got that up to level 4. Mission accomplished. 

 

The game then asked me to go back to Ducks ReDux. Unfortunately, I was getting a bit fed up of repeating myself by this point and had been playing for over an hour, so I switched it off. Wish I'd known I would have had longer to keep playing, I might have gone back to The Spider and the Fly and given that a few more plays.

[StrickenBiged]

Day 79: 17 Mar 2016

 

Just a quick bass session today. 

 

Was a long day at work so decided to play some favourites that I knew well in order to de-stress. 

 

Hit up a few Green Day songs first of all, getting through Oh Love! and American Idiot. Then played a few RAtM songs, Bombtrack and Bulls on Parade. Played through the Rolling Stones' The Spider and the Fly again, and improved my mastery there. Fun track to play. 

 

Then my Missions updated and I had to complete 3 new songs, so I tried a few new ones. Wasn't paying attention to what they were, and they were by bands I don't know, and they were significantly harder than what I'm used to... For some reason Rocksmith seemed to think they were within my capabilities though, and all 3 were fully unlocked from the start... A flavour of how much more work needs to be done I guess. 

 

Carried on doing missions - get a great performance, play a new song - until I got back to "get 75% on R U Mine?" which, again, I didn't attempt. (Maybe I'll try to clear that this weekend, it's getting annoying.)

 

Then closed things out by playing Renegades of Funk again. Good to know that I can still 100% that track without looking at the screen.

[StrickenBiged]

Day 80: 19 Mar 2016

 

Another weekend, another pretty epic bass session. Although, unfortunately, another one that lacked much direction besides "chase those Rocksmith missions".

 

So, as is usual, I began with Learn a Song mode. The first few missions switched between "get a great performance", "get a 150 note streak" and "play a new song". For the great performance and note streak ones I'd stick to and, usually, improve on my mastery of the song. New songs are a different beast, obviously, but there were one or two this session that seem like they'd be worth more dedicated practice as they use techniques and moves that I need to work on. 

 

Eventually I got the dreaded "75% accuracy in R U Mine?". Decided to take it on and managed to beat it on my first attempt. I don't want to sound boastful, but it really was much easier than I remember - it's not unlocked to 100% difficulty yet by the way - and shows that the practice is working, however slowly.

 

Then the game asked me to improve my mastery of We are the Champions to 68.5%. This took two attempts, managing to just pip it by getting 68.8% on the second. It has a tonne of shifts in it, John Deacon really knows how to use the whole fretboard - there's none of that heavy metal "let's stick to the E string, and play it fast" going on here. I might give this one a more emphatic effort, as I do like a good bit o'Queen. (In fact, I might go buy the Queen song pack as a little treat...)

 

Moved on to guitarcade. Played a number of rounds of Harmonic Heist in order to get myself to level 6 and complete another mission. Having issues with the game not recognising harmonics played on the E string's 5th or 7th fret. Might get myself to the official forums and find out what's up with that. 

 

Then played Hurtlin' Hurdles for a number of rounds to get myself to level 4. Quite a grind as a number of the star challenges were longer, cumulative ones like "hump 50 hurdles" and "spend 30s leaping in the air". One of the challenges is to cause 2 robots to be crushed at the same time, which is really difficult to pull off, apparently. Couldn't figure out what the game wanted of me, I had plenty of runs where two robots were killed almost simultaneously, so I gave up on that one. 

 

Those two missions out of the way, I went back to learn a song mode and played 3 new songs to clear one more mission. 

 

I then took myself out and bought 2 leather straps from my guitar store. The one for my bass has a wider strap with a napped suede finish on the inside which prevents it from slipping and will make things easier. The guitar one has a padded strap. Looking forward to trying both out properly in the next few sessions.

[StrickenBiged]

Been a while since I've posted here. Ooops.

 

Days 81-82: 26 & 27 Mar 2016

 

Should have updated you earlier - I've almost completely forgotten what I got up to...

 

So I bought another couple of packs during this weekend. I went for Hit Singles 3 and the Sum 41 Song Pack. 

 

Hit Singles 3

 

Sum 41 Song Pack

 

Still playing on bass these days. Need to pick the guitar up again really...

 

Anyway, I played through these songs during this weekend. Closing Time is a really fun one to play on bass. Not too complicated, a nice riff, and a great one to sing along too. Play that Funky Music is also awesome fun. 

 

Sum 41's bass lines are way more complicated than I had anticipated, and many are down tuned which means my fingering has got to be a lot better. Saved a few of these for later - i.e. whenever the game decides to give me a "Play X new song(s)" mission. 

 

Other than that, not much else I can remember about that weekend. I probably spent some time doing missions in the guitarcade too though.

 

Day 83: 6 Apr 2016

 

Been over a week since my last practice. The wife and I have joined a gym lately and that's eating into my evening practice sessions. 

 

Still, managed to get 40 or so minutes today. While I planned to pick up the guitar again on my next session, with only a few minutes available to me I went for the bass and decided to just knock a few missions out. 

 

First two asked me to get some 150 note streaks. Got the first mission done on Closing Time, but getting a second 150 note streak proved harder than I anticipated. Couldn't do it on American Idiot, or the next 3 or 4 songs I attempted - I even got a 149 note streak on one song... grrrr. Eventually managed to get it by going back to Blitzkrieg Bop. Don't laugh.

 

Then was asked to get 75% accuracy on We are the Champions, which I managed, just about (86%).

 

Then had to improve my mastery of Self Tap to 72%. Played through it and managed to get it up to 75%, so got that one out the way.

 

Had to shoot off to dinner and a movie after that.

[StrickenBiged]

Haven't practiced in ages... 

 

Still, I've already bought this week's song pack, a pack of 5 songs by Disturbed. One of my favourite bands, and this pack includes some of my favourite songs from them; Stricken, The Night; Ten Thousand Fists; Inside the Fire; and the incredible Indestructible. 

 

Hopefully I'll get some time with the guitar/bass soon to try them out. 

 

 

Low tunings though... going to be a bitch to get the game to register my playing!

[Hemiak]

I jammed  the hell out of my finger last week playing basketball. I hadn't touched the guitar for a week before that though,  I've just been really lazy. 

[StrickenBiged]

Yeah, me too. My "music time" has been replaced with "gym time" with the wife, and I haven't found another slot in my day where I can fit it in yet. 

 

And now with DS3 having arrived on my doormat, I don't know what I'm going to do...

[skateak]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I personally hate it when my picks start to get dull but I just came across this video on Youtube that is amazing and I figured I would share it with you guys. It works really well and I was pretty surprised because it sounds like someone trolling you until you try it for yourself. I am not very fourm savy so I don't know how to actually embed the video but go ahead and check out the link.

Edited April 27, 2016 by skateak

[StrickenBiged]

I personally hate it when my picks start to get dull but I just came across this video on Youtube that is amazing and I figured I would share it with you guys. It works really well and I was pretty surprised because it sounds like someone trolling you until you try it for yourself. I am not very fourm savy so I don't know how to actually embed the video but go ahead and check out the link.

http://youtu.be/zyYKT0SzrBo

 

Thanks man. I have a pretty big bag of picks (spent pennies on them on Amazon) and they seem to work fine. Spent a little more on a couple of higher gauge ones for my bass. 

 

To embed a YT video, all you need to do is paste the URL to the video, it's automatic. I think what happened with you is that you posted in the format http://youtu.be/[videocode] whereas you need to post the link in the full URL, i.e.: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=[video code]

 

Anyway, on with the business:

 

Day 84: 24 Apr 2016

 

Managed to get an hour with my bass today. 

 

Played through the songs in the Disturbed Song Pack. Frigging love this band. 

 

Low tuning is causing me issues. It's so much harder to play when the strings are all floppy and loose - if money wasn't a thing, I might go out and get a second bass just to have it set up for low tunings. Unfortunately, I'll just have to deal with it. Oh yeah, they're all in D drop C tuning, so a whole step below E standard and then another whole step for the lowest string, making it floppier than... no, I'm not going there. Floppy, anyway. 

 

And Disturbed love that C string...

 

Anyway, these songs seem harder to play on a first run through than the other Disturbed songs released so far. Will have to give them more attention to get them fully unlocked. 

 

Playing these songs got a mission (play 3 new songs) to pop, which also popped Mission 214. So, just about 43% of the way through the mission grind... after only about 8 months... Boy this is a long plat!

 

After playing through Disturbed, I jumped into the guitarcade for a bit. Levelled up Ninja Slide 'N to level 5 for a mission, and obtained a new high score of 6M and change. This is the easiest this game has ever felt. I'm getting much faster at recognising where on the fretboard I need to be, and being able to stop my slides there. Maybe another level or two and I should be able to get the 10M trophy in this game. 

 

Went back to Learn a Song and played through Woman by Wolfmother, We are the Champions by Queen, Losing My Religion by REM and capped it off with Closing Time by Semisonic. 

 

After such a long break from bass, my back, shoulder and fingers were feeling the strain of playing. I'd only been at it an hour! Anyway, decided to call it a day there.

[skateak]

 

Thanks for the heads up. I got it fixed. I used the address URL when I had to use the Share URL.

[StrickenBiged]

Day 85: 30 April 2016

 

Just a quick session on the bass today, approximately 40 mins or so. 

 

Essentially just wanted to get my fingers and hands limbered up and re-accustomed to the instrument. Spent the time in Learn a Song mode, knocking off a few missions.

 

I still need to look at the fretboard to check my shifts, but I am finding that occasionally, just very occasionally, my hand knows where it's going without me having to look. Improvement!

 

Day 86: 2 May 2016

 

Just got back from a wedding the day before. Hungover as ****, but having seen a live band at the wedding party I was feeling inspired and decided to practice for a bit.

 

Hit a few missions in Learn a Song mode. Then a mission came up that asked me to increase my mastery on We are the Champions to 75%. Played through it a couple of times, got the mission, and remembered that I had intended to buy the other Queen songs to learn. A short foray into the PSN store and I had added a nice selection of 7 Queen tracks to my playlist. 

 

Tried my hand at Fat Bottomed Girls, which was very difficult. Lots of slides up and down the E string throwing me off - I find it hard to slide, watch the screen to know where I need to be next, and look at the fretboard to stop the slide in the right place, all at once. Will want to practice this one thought because its one of my favourite Queen tracks. 

 

Another One Bites the Dust was much easier though. Played it a couple of times and I'm already close to 100% mastery. Bloody great, simple-but-effective bassline, loads of fun to play. Made sure to practice choking off the notes to get those nice, distinct "DuM, DuM, DuM" notes. 

 

Was going to try out Bohemian Rhapsody but my wife had woken up from her alcohol induced "powernap" and wanted to use the TV.

 

Still need to figure out the best time in the regular workday to practice, but feeling more motivated again.

[Edunstar84]

Day 85: 30 April 2016

 

Just a quick session on the bass today, approximately 40 mins or so. 

 

Essentially just wanted to get my fingers and hands limbered up and re-accustomed to the instrument. Spent the time in Learn a Song mode, knocking off a few missions.

 

I still need to look at the fretboard to check my shifts, but I am finding that occasionally, just very occasionally, my hand knows where it's going without me having to look. Improvement!

 

Day 86: 2 May 2016

 

Just got back from a wedding the day before. Hungover as ****, but having seen a live band at the wedding party I was feeling inspired and decided to practice for a bit.

 

Hit a few missions in Learn a Song mode. Then a mission came up that asked me to increase my mastery on We are the Champions to 75%. Played through it a couple of times, got the mission, and remembered that I had intended to buy the other Queen songs to learn. A short foray into the PSN store and I had added a nice selection of 7 Queen tracks to my playlist. 

 

Tried my hand at Fat Bottomed Girls, which was very difficult. Lots of slides up and down the E string throwing me off - I find it hard to slide, watch the screen to know where I need to be next, and look at the fretboard to stop the slide in the right place, all at once. Will want to practice this one thought because its one of my favourite Queen tracks. 

 

Another One Bites the Dust was much easier though. Played it a couple of times and I'm already close to 100% mastery. Bloody great, simple-but-effective bassline, loads of fun to play. Made sure to practice choking off the notes to get those nice, distinct "DuM, DuM, DuM" notes. 

 

Was going to try out Bohemian Rhapsody but my wife had woken up from her alcohol induced "powernap" and wanted to use the TV.

 

Still need to figure out the best time in the regular workday to practice, but feeling more motivated again.

 

 

Have you tried playing that sliding ninja game on the gamer arcade? Maybe that will help strengthen your sliding skills.  

 

I've been trying to find time as well on the weekdays - I'm just so darn tired! You're making really great progress! I'm not that close to 100% Mastery on a song after a few goes, but I guess that will come later.

[StrickenBiged]

Have you tried playing that sliding ninja game on the gamer arcade? Maybe that will help strengthen your sliding skills.  

 

I've been trying to find time as well on the weekdays - I'm just so darn tired! You're making really great progress! I'm not that close to 100% Mastery on a song after a few goes, but I guess that will come later.

 

Bass can be a lot bloody easier to play than guitar in most tracks. Another One Bites the Dust is a well known bassline, but it is bloody simple to play. I wouldn't worry about it being a reflection on your progress. 

 

Depends on the song and technique though. Some of the advanced bass techniques like slap/pop, four-finger strumming, two-handed tapping and double-thumb slapping are bloody hard to do well. I've tried to practice a bit of slap/pop without the game, and I just can't make it sound like anything approaching passable. 

 

Yeah, Ninja Slide 'N is a good training game. The problem is that I'm still having to look at my fretboard to see where to stop - I haven't got an intuitive sense of where on the neck I need to be for each fret. 

[Bezenko]

Seems like you have made som nice progress with your guitar skills, keep it up! I just started the PS4 version today and I'm really struggling with audio input lag, lag from the TV is understandable (HDMI), but I even get lag when I use headphones directly in my controller, which for me is not understandable, what setup are you using?