Frequency is up against some stiff competition this season. With major game releases like Grand Theft Auto 3 and Metal Gear Solid 2, as well as the overshadowing launch of two new systems, this innovative title has flown in under the radar and with minimal advertising. Even hands-on impressions have be scarce due to the fact that besides a few QA testers and those who played the demo at E3, where it was tucked away in a dark corner, nobody has really played it. On top of all this, it's up against recent underground buzz about SEGA's upcoming psychadelic music/shooter game, Rez, for the Playstation 2, which is supposedly hitting shelves in January 2002.

In fact, Frequency shares a lot in common with Rez, such as its colorful, rave-like graphics and shooter/music creation hybrid gameplay. However, that is by no means saying the two aren't unique and they're both worth the purchase.

Frequency brings a lot of new things to the music/rhythm genre, one that has been dominated mostly by the aforemnentioned Konami games or cheap knock-offs. The devloper, Harmonix, has a long history of music-themed products including interactive experiences at music/science museums and PC programs that are more like toys than games. This is their first stab at producing an actual game for the mass-market and their past experience shows through. Not only is it a fantastic title in and of itself, but the gameplay itself blends in elements of real-time remixing, allowing the player not only to have a whole lot of fun, but help create the music at the same time.

Frequency is played on a octagonal grid-like tunnel remniscent of the arcade classic Tempest. Each side of the octagon represents a certain instrument or element of the song and beats in the forms of small, blue hexagons come flying at as you traverse the tunnel. The basic idea of the game is to punch out a series of these beats as they pass by your green "activator" at the front of the screen. Using the square/triangle/circle or L1/R1/R2 setup, successfully completing two bars on a track will lock it down so that it will play by itself unless it resets during the next section of the song you're playing (each song is divided up into a certain number of different sectors). Thus, by locking down these tracks, you're actually remixing in real-time, adding new instruments to the basic back-beat so that it becomes a full-fledged song by the time you're finished.

It gets even deeper than that, though, as each sequence of beats that is completed can be directly linked into another track by quickly rotating the octagon and playing non-stop through the song. This increases your score multiplier, which can quadruple the score for each track you lock down at max. Scores are very important to the game, though, as they're necessary to unlock new songs. If you lock down all the tracks in one section of the song, it'll go into freestyle mode where you can play the axe and scratch and earn some bonus points. In addition to all of this, though, are two powerups gained by capturing beats on special tracks. One will allow you to autoplay one track through to the next section of the song (you'll get the points for the track, as well) and the other will give you a score multiplier of x3 for a few bars which can be used in conjunction with your regular muliplier for a maximum of x6. The multiplier is absolutely necessary to rack up enough points to unlock songs at higher diffculties.

Of course, though, there are penalties for missing a beat in a sequence. If you continually fail to lock down tracks, your life meter will keep decreasing until it empties out, at which time you'll get a Game Over. This isn't so much of a problem for the first half of the game, but part of the way through Medium difficulty, as sequences get more complex, it'll be harder to keep your life meter at a safe level.

In addition to the regular game mode, which features a total of 25 different songs, different "arenas" are unlocked throughout the game, as well. These are essentially the graphically-rich backgrounds you'll play on, which feature lots of psychadellic, flashing colors and Tron-like geometric structures. While it's not the most advanced game as far as graphics go on the Playstation 2, it *is* graphically rich. It makes nice use of various special effects and never slows down, but those with epillepsy problems will probably want to stay away. However, if you're familiar with raves, you'll feel right at home.

You can also play through the remix mode, which allows you to lay down your own beats to any of the songs you've unlocked in any manner you please. There's really a lot of freedom in this mode and you can even save them and play the tracks in the regular games. Frequency does feature multiplayer options for up to four players, but unfortunately, it seems that the internet features found in the demo did not make it into the final game.

There are a couple flaws in the game, but they aren't major, and once again, are due mainly to personal preference. The control setup makes it hard to complete some sequences on the higher difficulty levels, leading to frustration, but with a little practice, this should become no real problem. And like I said before, if you like the music, then it's a very worthy purpose. If you don't, chances are the gameplay will wear out very quickly, no matter how innovative it is. It's really a package deal. Perhaps Harmonix should have added more variety to the playlist, but that's what expansion discs are for. Hopefully, much like Konami's regular updates to their Bemani games, the developers will improve the music selection in a future release for those that can't get into the hard rock/ambient/techno/drum&bass styles found in the game.

If you're going to get SEGA's Rez, get Rez. But please don't overlook this title, an above-average, and in fact, great game which brings something unique to the genre. Here's hoping to a sleeper hit. The guys at Harmonix deserve it.