It's always a delight to see two different genres of games mixed together into an enjoyable hybrid. Most recently, we saw the surprise launch of Hi-Fi Rush, a game that expertly blends together third-person brawlers with rhythm game elements and so far is one of this year's biggest delights. So if fighting laced with rhythm game elements works, then clearly rhythm games with righting elements should work just as well, right? Well, it could work if executed properly, so we decided to take a look at Modus Studios' upcoming title God of Rock to see if that would be the case. And so far the result is...well, kind of a mash-up that doesn't exactly provide as pleasant a tune as you'd hope.

The setup is simple for a fighting game, that being one where the titular God of Rock basically just assembles a dozen of the universe's great musicians to duke it out for their own amusement. Ranging from street artists to aliens, the characters don't have much in the way of story at the moment (if only because the extended demo we played lacked the Story mode to be included in the final product), but they do have a nice amount of personality and are well designed and nicely animated as they duke it out while the rhythm flows. Speaking of which, the music is incredible as well, with stellar rock tunes and a lot of variety, with each stage having its own unique setlist to choose tracks from.

Then you begin playing, though. Now, rhythm games with battle elements have been around for a while now, as far back as Bust a Groove and even present in the later Guitar Hero games, to name some examples, and those were extremely fun. Given their success, you would expect God of Rock would follow suit and deliver its moves via elegant simplicity, right? Well, you would be wrong. Instead of say, using simpler button presses for the fighting game style attacks, you have to input actual, more traditional fighting game button combos to attack. As in, moving the left thumbstick in several directions before pushing the right trigger.

Sure, it sounds like makes sense given the concept, and maybe it's just me being a more casual fighting game fan who doesn't have the time to memorize fancier set of moves, but this combo just doesn't seem to work. There's something about trying to pull of hadoukens and sonic booms while playing guitar hero that just feels unnecessarily complex, basically requiring you to be at least a slight expert in two genres. And it does not help that every character has their own unique set of moves, built up over time via various meters. Pulling them off means being able to, say, flood your opponent's chart with extra notes, hindering them as you each try to match the beat and hit the right notes as perfectly as possible to trade blows and get their health to zero. Trying to remember them while also trying to concentrate on a fast-paced set of notes that's coming by feels annoying, and if you pause the game to access the move list from the menu, you'll learn the hard way that God of Rock doesn't have a countdown after unpausing before you begin again, tripping you up all because you needed a refresher.

Going back to that fast-paced set of note mentioned, it also doesn't help things that unlike virtually every other notable rhythm game, songs don't have their difficulty levels revealed at the moment, with the official descriptions just stating that each song gets more complex as it goes along. So there's a huge learning curve here, as you have to experiment with each track outside of a quick preview just to learn what you might be in for. And while playing a rhythm game with a controller's face buttons is nothing new, there's just something off with the way the charts are laid out and how things feel, at least with the Xbox controller used here. There's a reason why playing Guitar Hero games with a controller feels awkward, and that's because it was built in mind for a controller where all the fret buttons are right in a row at multiple fingertips. This is those same charts and style of gameplay, but now expecting a controller to be used.

Maybe with a few more tweaks in a few areas, God of Rock would be an improved experience, and maybe the final game's Story mode will end up being a better way to ease players into the mechanics and get them further used to the gameplay and controller usage, and give us more of the enjoyable world and characters. As is, though, you might want to consider skipping this performance when God of Rock comes out on April 18 for all major platforms, and just consider replaying Hi-Fi Rush instead.