SingStar: A Forgotten Icon

The icon for the SingStar launcher is still present on my PS3 dashboard. A reminder of a time past, a series long since discontinued, and a developer, PlayStation London Studio, that is now no more.

That SingStar icon probably isn't going anywhere. Back in 2012, it was made a permanent feature of the PS3 XMB for all European users, when the base game went free-to-play. Try as they might, joyless PS3 owners could not delete it - SingStar and PlayStation, together forever.

A series of competitive karaoke games, featuring real music videos, SingStar debuted on PS2 and would later come to PS3 and PS4. Released across dozens of instalments, covering a wide range of artists and genres, it was a huge part of Sony's success in PAL markets, while barely making a dent in other territories, most notably North America. For some, it was a core part of the PlayStation experience in the 2000s - early-2010s, and it appealed to a diverse group of gamers and non-gamers alike.

I hadn't thought about SingStar for ages. That changed last week, when it was announced that its original developer, PlayStation London Studio, is being shuttered. Yet another victim of an industry that cannot be trusted to look after its employees. London Studio was known for developing titles for the Eye Toy, as well as being behind The Getaway and Wonderbook, and it had been active in recent years in the VR space. However, it was best known for SingStar. And now it's gone. Shitty news, but it did get me reminiscing about at-home karaoke sessions with family and friends.

From 2010-2011, SingStar was a Saturday night staple in our house. We'd not long moved back to the UK from Japan, and we desperately missed Saturday night karaoke. SingStar wasn't quite the same - it was several thousand tracks short of your average karaoke machine library, didn't feature badly acted videos starring handsome loners with guitars, and people didn't hand me beers when I was singing - but it was the next best thing. SingStar was a great way to wind down at the end of the week, and it successfully implemented a competitive element above and beyond what's present in normal karaoke.

There were some decent tracks on the standard PS3 disc, including The Cardigans "Love Fool", The Killers "Mr Brightside", Gorillaz "Feel Good inc.", OutKast "Hey Ya!" and Weezer "Buddy Holly",  all of which we rinsed, because we're basic. We also had copies of the Guitar and Dance variants, which further bolstered our library. But we soon grew tired of singing the same handful of tunes over and over, and started downloading DLC tracks from the well-stocked PS Store, at 1.15 GBP a pop. Of course, none of those tracks are now available, as the SingStar servers shut down in 2020. Brilliant.

The other day, with SingStar on my mind, I decided to access my PS Store purchase history from 2011 so that I could piece together our library in spirit, if not in any tangible way. This list is a true artifact of its time, one which exposes my wife and I as people who had a really good time circa. 2005-2010. Get a load of these:

Amy Winehouse - Back to Black

Amy Winehouse - Tears Dry on Their Own

Bloc Party - Banquet

Empire of the Sun - Walking on a Dream

Friendly Fires - Paris

Hard-Fi - Hard to Beat

MGMT - Electric Feel

Morrissey - Suedehead

Outkast - Roses

Klaxons - Gravity's Rainbow

The Clash - Rock the Casbah

The Drums - Let's Go Surfing

The Killers - When You Were Young

That's twenty quid I'll never see again.

I played SingStar with family, friends, and even on my own. And you absolutely "played it". It was far more than just karaoke software, thanks to a clear and colourful interface which showed you the desired pitch and timing in a way that was easy to understand, satisfying, and encouraged high-score chasing. It even inspired other, similar purchases, including the equally excellent Def Jam Rapstar - I could nail A Tribe Called Quest's "Scenario", even on hard mode - and eventually the karaoke-simulation JoySound for Wii. 

It's a shame that we don't talk about SingStar more when we discuss that era of gaming. I get it, though. We all want to chat about PlayStation cult classics, curios, or AAA bangers; no one wants to bring up SingStar over drinks with a group of hardcore computer game-likers. But that doesn't change the fact that it was vitally important, for PlayStation and the industry at-large, as it successfully appealed to the wider audience before the Wii normalized that, and racked up sales that most franchises would kill for. 

And it has all but vanished without a trace. It's been seven years since the last new title, though it was winding down long before that, the servers are turned off, and its developer is being shut down. But for those of us who enjoyed drunken karaoke parties with our mates, duets with loved ones, and countless solo sessions struggling to improve our scores, it'll never be truly forgotten.

Anyone up for karaoke this weekend?