Rhythm Doctor
Rhythm Doctor is a rhythm game currently being developed in early access by 7th Beat Games and published by Indienova. It was initially released as an online flash demo back in 2012, but due to flash having been discontinued, it is no longer playable directly on Itch.io where it was released. This is 7th Beat Games' second fully fledged game, with the first one being A Dance of Fire and Ice (ADOFAI).
Gameplay
Rhythm Doctor has a similar control scheme to ADOFAI, with both typically only needing one key. The game is programmed to register any input from the mouse or keyboard, so there's no strict key binds. Unlike most rhythm games, Rhythm Doctor's main mechanic is that each beat comes on the seventh beat. Despite this seven beat rule, there's a set of note types that do break it known as oneshots[2].
Oneshots typically come with a cue announced through a voice line, though they can also come with an audio cue. For normal oneshots, the voice cue is "Get, set, go!" and ending with a "And stop!" cue. For square and triangle oneshots, this audio cue is instead the number of notes there are in a row. There are other mechanics that can affect timing called freezeshots and burnshots. Freezeshots require the player to wait a duration indicated by how long an audio cue is, while burnshots require a player to press earlier based on the same principle.
There are also custom levels available through the Steam Workshop[3] or though sites such as rhythm.cafe as external files that must be imported into the game. If the player were to access their Steam copy of the game on a different computer, only the Workshop levels will transfer over as the imported levels are local to a single computer.
Gameplay Video
Releases
| Date | Title | Platform |
|---|---|---|
| 2012 [1] | Rhythm Doctor (online demo) | Flash (Itch.io) |
| February 26, 2021 | Rhythm Doctor | PC (Steam, Itch.io) |
Trivia
- This game has had several collaborations with other games such as with Muse Dash, Unbeatable, Bits and Bops, Vivid Stasis, and Circle of Sparks. All collabs have had only one level added each except for Muse Dash which has three levels in its collab.