Earlier today I got a live demo of Ovelin's WildChords [Free], an edutainment musical game that never really had much reason to be on my radar. But using nothing more than an iPad, any kind of guitar, and some technical wizardry on their end, WildChords can teach you how to play the guitar. There are a number of fairly exhaustive overview videos on YouTube, and something like this is really better to just see in action, so check this out: The crazy thing about WildChords, is that it really works exactly like it shows in the video. Watching someone play a guitar in front of the iPad, along to a game, that is able to recognize what chords you're playing and slowly ramp up to teach you actual songs flat out feels like a mixture of magic and something you'd see in a sci-fi movie. Better yet, it's totally free to Read More

...@FredCavazza: Apprenez la guitare sur votre iPad en vous amusant avec WildChords http://t.co/VO0xau9l... Read More

Wild Chords is a really amazing app -- at its absolute base, it's an excellent and easy-to-use guitar tuner, perfect for kids or adults. But the real magic of Wild Chords is in actually playing the guitar along with the main game; this game will teach you, chord by chord and string by string, how to strum away some really excellent tunes. The app very colorful and well-made -- its simplicity hints that it's for children, but even as a beginner-to-medium guitar player, it was never condescending. The app starts easy, with a quick tune-up and then just an open chord test, and things get harder from there. The basic idea is that you're playing along to tame animals, so you need to play the right chord as your in-game character passes them while walking down a street: Eventually you'll be playing the A chord to tame an Ape, and a Read More

As a long-time rhythm game junkie, Ovelin’s new WildChords app strikes very close to home for me. Part Guitar Hero and part instructional aid, WildChords aims to take players though the basics of playing guitar without all the theory that often scares beginners away. The story — to the extent that it matters — puts you in the shoes of an afro’d guitar player who needs to tame a city full of ornery animals with the power of music. Players progress through the game by doing two things: learning to play chords, and learning to play note patterns on the fretboard. Gameplay is conceptually similar to Guitar Hero, with players strumming chords and hitting notes as they scroll horizontally across the screen. WildChords starts off deceptively easy (you begin by just strumming your guitar), but it isn’t long before the difficulty starts to ramp up at a steady pace. After a Read More

As a long-time rhythm game junkie, Ovelin’s new WildChords app strikes very close to home for me. Part Guitar Hero and part instructional aid, WildChords aims to take players though the basics of playing guitar without all the theory that often scares beginners away. The story — to the extent that it matters — puts you in the shoes of an afro’d guitar player who needs to tame a city full of ornery animals with the power of music. Players progress through the game by doing two things: learning to play chords, and learning to play note patterns on the fretboard. Gameplay is conceptually similar to Guitar Hero, with players strumming chords and hitting notes as they scroll horizontally across the screen. WildChords starts off deceptively easy (you begin by just strumming your guitar), but it isn’t long before the difficulty starts to ramp up at a steady pace. After a Read More