Music games are becoming more popular by the day, and I'm sure many of you have already got a living room full of plastic instruments. What began as something unique and exciting has turned into a genre all its own, but it's one that's quickly being diluted by too many releases and too few new ideas.

Guitar Hero: Metallica began the trend of releasing special editions of big name music games that focus solely on a single artist. This example in particular felt like nothing more than a big money grab for Activision and the band, however, as it's essentially the exact same software but with mostly Metallica songs. The Beatles: Rock Band has taken the concept a step farther, and Harmonix has created something that allows players to experience music (and the artists who created it) in a way that no other video game does.

I'm not a huge Beatles fan. I don't dislike them, it's just that I was never really exposed to them all that much. I've done a lot of reading on The Beatles in the last few days, the little tidbits of history in the game making me hungry for more. I even found a few songs that I was familiar with, but never knew The Beatles had performed. That's really the beauty of this game.

It's not just Rock Band with Beatles songs in it. It's a sweeping grand tour of their entire career, from Beatlemania hitting the United States to their hallucinogenic Abbey Road days, and everything else, too. You'll play on the Ed Sullivan Show. You'll witness the hordes of screaming fans at Shea Stadium. You'll see The Beatles themselves grow older over time, and watch them as they record right there in a near-perfect rendition of the Abbey Road studio.

Stunningly beautiful cinematics and psychedelic imagery combine with video clips and photographs of the fab four to enrich the experience even further, making the whole package feel like one gigantic Beatles tribute in video game form. The love and respect that the developers have for the subject matter really shines through, and it makes for a highly polished final product.

The core mechanics that Rock Band fans are used to have been tweaked a bit, but in all the right ways. Overall, the difficulty feels a touch lower. I can see high end, expert players possibly having a problem with this, but as someone who struggles along on hard it's nice to be able to play on a setting tougher than medium for a change.

Overdrive has been comically renamed to Beatlemania, but it works in all the same ways. Other tweaks include removing the custom drum fills and distortion effects during Beatlemania, a change I assume was done to keep the music true to the way it was really performed. Once I got started I never noticed they were gone.

Perhaps the best new feature in the game, The Beatles: Rock Band allows up to three people to sing (each with their own mic) at once. These additional singers can harmonize with the person singing the main melody, scoring additional points depending on their performance. These harmonies are represented in much the same way as the main vocal track, by colored lines that follow the scrolling lyrics at the top of the screen. Some intuitive visual touches make the new mechanics easy to see and comprehend, but teaching yourself to harmonize with other singers is pretty tricky at first.

Playing through the game's career mode not only moves you along to later periods in the Beatles' timeline, but also unlocks various material that tells the story behind the music. This sort of stuff tends to bore me in these kinds of games, but every last picture and video contained something I found interesting or entertaining. It's a glimpse into the lives of four men who changed the course of our culture, and it gives some amount of insight and meaning to the sights and sounds you'll experience.

With at least one downloadable track already online and more surely on the way, the game is only going to expand with time. Harmonix has shown consistent competency with how they handle online content for Rock Band, and I see nothing that makes me doubt their ability to continue with business as usual.

Out now for all the current generation consoles, The Beatles: Rock Band has to be the next best thing to actually growing up in the 60's. It's surely a treat for any Beatles fan, and for people like myself who aren't terribly familiar with the band, perhaps it'll give you a greater appreciation for some truly great music. It's another hit from Harmonix.

Title: The Beatles: Rock Band
Price: $59.99 (Game only) $99.99 (Game + Guitar)
Platform: Xbox 360, Playstation 3, Nintendo Wii
ESRB Rating: T for Teen
Score: A+