Hexagroove: Tactical DJ

Genre: Music-Rhythm

Players: 1

.

Review:

Hexagroove is a Music-Rhythm game released in 2019 on Nintendo Switch and ported in 2020 to PC and Xbox One. This game attempts to simulate the experience of DJ-ing in a club, mixing tracks on the fly and trying to keep your audience satisfied.

The presentation here is abstract, with the game using neon colors and a lot of geometric shapes with a blend of 3D and 2D elements, all moving lively in time with the beat. And of course the game’s soundtrack combines various electronic genres, though I found most of the selections oddly subdued for a Music-Rhythm game.

The gameplay here feels like juggling various elements at a time. One moment, you’re trying to replace tracks with others as they change color to signify they’re no longer “fresh”, the next you’re tapping in time with a bouncing ball, then you’re keeping a cone pointed toward a line on a Guitaroo-Man-style track, then you’re alternately tapping D-Pad left and A in time with beats on a vaguely Guitar Hero-esque track. Once a song is done, you’re rated on six different criteria based on your performance in the different minigames.

While none of this is terrible, none of it is especially satisfying either. For a game with “tactical” in the title, there doesn’t seem much strategy to replacing tracks – you just use your left analog stick to point to whichever tracks are no longer blue and then you press A, B, X, or Y depending on which version of that track you haven’t used in a while. The various other minigames are all simplified takes on other, deeper Music-Rhythm games. It’s difficult to judge mid-song whether or not you’re doing well, and if you’re not doing well how you could improve things.

Also, while there were times when I felt like I hit on a particularly pleasant combination of tracks, I never really felt like I was directing the flow of music. I was just responding to instructions the game gave me. At no point did I feel “in tune” with the music, like I was all that involved in its creation.

In the end, Music-Rhythm fans may still find Hexagroove to be a worthwhile change of pace in the genre. But for me, I couldn’t help but feel disappointed, as the game just made me want to play all the other better games its various parts were derived from or similar to. The track-changing section? Give me Frequency or Amplitude. The button-timing game? Rhythm Heaven, please. The multi button-tapping game? I’d much rather be jamming on Rock Band (or, again, Frequency or Amplitude). The track-cone section? I’ll take Guitaroo-Man over this any day. Again, nothing here is outright bad, but Hexagroove definitely feels like less than the sum of its parts.

tl;dr – Hexagroove is a Music-Rhythm game that has players in the role of a DJ mixing tracks in a club while trying to satisfy an audience. This game has players juggling multiple different gameplay types, but none of them seems particularly deep or satisfying, and it seems oddly detached from the music at the heart of the game. Music-Rhythm fans may still find this a refreshing change of pace from other games in the genre, but I think most will find this game’s scatterbrained approach to the genre just isn’t as satisfying as other games in the genre.

Grade: C+

^{You can support eShopperReviews on Patreon! Please click HERE to become a Sponsor!}

^{This month’s sponsors are Jamie and His Cats, Ben, Ilya Zverev, Andy Miller, Johannes, Jaka, Jared Wark, Gabriel Coronad-Medina, Francis Obst, Kristoffer Wulff, Seth Christenfeld, and Vince Verrinoldi. Thank you for helping to keep the reviews coming!}