Rhythm Heaven Fever

If you’re a fan of lovable characters and fast-paced rhythm games, Rhythm Heaven Fever is a great and classic option for you. The game was first released in Japan in July 2011 and hit the rest of the country in early 2012. Since its release over a decade ago, it has remained beloved by fans all over the globe. The colorful art style and engaging musical games have made Rhythm Heaven Fever one of the most popular games in the franchise.

Rhythmic Moves for The Nintendo Wii

Nintendo and TNX developed this Japanese music video game for the Nintendo Wii. The game isn’t too different from the previous releases in the franchise – a combination of musical minigames and remix challenges that combine gameplay styles of earlier levels.

The controls are simple – just press the A and B buttons to stay in tune with the rhythm and attempt to win charming rhythm-based minigames. Reminiscent of other popular games like WarioWare: Smooth Moves for the Wii, these catchy minigames are a delight to play with friends or by yourself. In fact, the same team of developers worked on both Rhythm Heaven and WarioWare, so it’s no wonder they’re so similar!

Addicting and Charming Gameplay

The gameplay itself is intriguing and challenging yet approachable for new players. The simple button mechanics on the Wii controller are straightforward to pick up on. Additionally, the game is incredibly addicting due to the wide variety of minigame options. This also makes Rhythm Heaven Fever an excellent match for group settings! The lively music keeps you coming back for more, even if the minigames can get a bit frustrating at times. Games like Packing Pests and the Shrimp Shuffle are popular amongst fans, but others can be hard to pick up at first. However, the best part of this game is the music. It’s so catchy that, even though the controls involve simply pressing buttons, you’ll find yourself tapping your feet along to the rhythm in no time.

The Franchise’s Future

Despite the massive nostalgia and popularity of the franchise, Rhythm Heaven games closed in 2015 and had its members absorbed into a new in-house development group. There are no plans for Rhythm Heaven to re-release or come out with a new game on Nintendo Switch, which is disappointing.

Pros:

• Colorful graphics, various fun minigames, engaging game mechanics

Cons:

• Can become a bit repetitive. Some minigames are more intuitive than others

Tap to the beat and obtain the best rating you can in Rhythm Heaven Fever, a wonderful and exciting rhythm game! In this unusual but fun musical adventure, you must complete a variety of short musical mini-games as accurately as possible. Making mistakes is common, but if you want to become the best player around, you'll need to complete everything with perfect timing. Multiplayer modes let you enjoy the game with a friend, but this exciting rhythm game is excellent for solo players as well. Get in the groove and find the beat by trying out Rhythm Heaven Fever!

Main Game Features

• Touch screen rhythm action
• 50 awesome musical mini-games
• Bonus unlockable content and multiplayer

Modes of Play

Rhythm Heaven Fever doesn't have much of a story to follow, but instead, players are tasked with completing a series of vibrant musical mini-games in the main game. While completing these mini-games, you can earn new unlockable content and extra gameplay modes by excelling with your musical taps. In addition to the main set of levels, you can also unlock Endless Games, which will challenge your timing and endurance in nonstop musical madness. Five extra bonus stages can be unlocked, including four levels from the original Rhythm Heaven game, along with an extra challenging final stage.

Additional bonuses can be unlocked through expert play, including interactive toys, full songs, and lyrics. You can also enjoy Rhythm Heaven Fever with one other friend in Dual Mode. In this multiplayer mode, two players enjoy the game simultaneously, working together to achieve the best score they can. Extra points can be achieved by syncing up with your partner's play style. If you do well in Dual Mode, you can even unlock a set of exclusive multiplayer mini-games. There's more than enough modes and levels to keep you tapping to the beat for a long time!

Gameplay

Similar to games like WarioWare Gold, Rhythm Heaven Fever is light on the story but big on action and gameplay. The game is separated into ten sets of levels, each with four normal mini-games and one super exciting “remix” mini-game. Each mini-game is slightly different and tasks you with completing ridiculous and comedic tasks, like putting a perfect hole-in-one, putting together robots on an assembly line, slicing fruits as a samurai, and much more. The controls are simple, only requiring one or two button presses, so players of any skill can get in the groove. Once you've completed four mini-games in a set, the “remix” mini-games challenge your abilities, mixing up all four of the previous levels into one crazy experience.

Better yet, Rhythm Heaven Fever has a joyous animated art style that is perfect for both kids and adults. Each mini-game feels like a toy box has come to life, with solid animations, colorful characters, and a positive attitude. The music for each mini-game follows this formula, leading to upbeat melodies, exciting percussion, and more. Your gameplay also influences the timing and quality of the music, so if you want things to sound perfect, you'll have to play as best as you can.

Conclusion

Rhythm Heaven Fever is an excellent game for fans of music and bite-sized gameplay. This joyful experience can be played by yourself or with one other friend and contains enough gameplay modes to suit your style. At times, Rhythm Heaven Fever can be quite challenging, but if you've got a good musical sense, achieving success is only a matter of practice.

Pros

• Pleasant and catchy music
• Great graphics with lots of color
• Supports up to two players
• Just the right amount of difficulty

Cons

• No story to follow
• Getting a “perfect” rating can be tough
• Unlockable toys are only fun for a bit

Released for the Nintendo Wii, Rhythm Heaven Fever may actually be the greatest console rhythm game that has ever been created! I am not over selling this, this game is honestly fantastic and one of the best games that the Wii has to offer. It features a ton of music based mini-games that are all charming in their own way. If I had to do my own top ten Nintendo Wii game list, without a shadow of a doubt this game would be on that list. I would wager that there is not a single person who has played this that did not love it.

Third Time Is The Charm

If you are getting a bit of a familiar feeling with Rhythm Heaven Fever the reason for that is this is the third game in its series. Before this, we had a game for the Game Boy Advance and also Rhythm Heaven which was released for the Nintendo DS. Confusingly, the game has a different title in Japan and Europe, which is always annoying when they do that. This was followed by a fourth game for the Nintendo 3DS, but I feel they really perfected the series with this third entry.

Going From A To B

I would bet that a few of you saw Nintendo Wii along with the title of Rhythm Heaven Fever and thought for sure that the game was going to be full of unresponsive motion controls that make the game a chore after five minutes! Thankfully, the developer resisted the temptation to use motion controls. Instead, you only use the A and B buttons on the Wii Remote to control the games. It is all about keeping in time with the beat, the fewer mistakes you make, the better you do, if you make too many mistakes, you fail and the game is over. It is simple, but some levels can be super challenging and there is a very addictive quality about the game too.

Candy, Samurais, Bugs, Fishing And More

The variety of the mini-games in Rhythm Heaven Fever is just insane. You can be a samurai slashing away at evil spirits. You can be packaging up candy, but have to swat away bugs, you can even put together little robots. The first time you play this game, you never know what the heck it is going to throw your way next! Each of the mini-games is brought to life in a fun and colorful style that makes the game just as much fun for those watching as it is for the person playing. The music is something that I feel they got like 95 percent right, there are just a couple of songs where I found that finding the beat was hard due to me not liking them.

Superb!

The game feels like it always has you moving forward. Rhythm Heaven Fever has a system where the best you can do on a level is getting a superb ranking. If you get this, you earn medals and with these, you can buy stuff like toys you can play with, more levels, and even a few more other fun things. The single-player offering here is great, but it does also offer two player action where you can compete against a buddy to see who has the best rhythm. When I would host game nights, this was always a firm favorite, it is very competitive, but the whole zany style and awesome soundtrack make it a game that even those not playing can get invested in.

Pros:

• How can you not love the funky style this game has
• The majority of the songs are fun and fit their mini-game perfectly
• It has simple but addictive gameplay
• This is so much fun to play with friends

Cons:

• There are a couple of songs that I really do not like
• It sucks they never made a physical version of the Wii U release