Rocksmith+ looks like a neat way to learn the guitar or bass

At Ubisoft's E3 event, the publisher revealed Rocksmith+, which it's calling "the next evolution of music learning." The original Rocksmith was a genuinely great way to learn guitar/bass, but it's starting to feel pretty old—and if you don't have the official Real Tone adapter, you miss out on a bunch of features.

The good news is, Rocksmith+ doesn't need any extra hardware: just an amp, which you probably already have if you own a guitar or bass, and a phone. You can connect via cable too, according to the slightly twee trailer, but it doesn't go into the specifics of how that'll work.

Unlike the original, which you'd buy like a regular game, Rocksmith+ is a subscription service. And rather than have to buy extra songs as DLC, your subscription gets you access to a whole library of licensed music from all genres.

That all sounds pretty generous, but Ubisoft has yet to reveal just how much a sub will cost. Here's hoping it's reasonably priced. Fender Play, a similar service, is $9.99 a month, which may give us some idea of how much Ubisoft will expect us to fork out every month for its interactive lessons.

As someone who's been learning how to play bass for a year or so, I'm looking forward to giving this a spin. You can register for a closed beta right now.

To catch the rest of E3, check out our full E3 2021 schedule.

Andy Kelly

If it’s set in space, Andy will probably write about it. He loves sci-fi, adventure games, taking screenshots, Twin Peaks, weird sims, Alien: Isolation, and anything with a good story.