Say the words “video game” to parents, and most are likely to shudder: You mean that thing that sucks my kids’ time and interferes with their ability to acknowledge visitors?

But what if these games could inspire these same kids to pick up and learn a real musical instrument? A British study suggests just that. In 2008, Youth Music, one of Britain’s largest music charities, released a report that found video games such as Guitar Hero and Rock Band encouraged up to 2.5 million children to learn the guitar and drums.

Here in the states, no such study yet exists, but many parents see these rock video games as less objectionable than many other options in the gaming kingdom.

Learning to Love Music

“I am not a big fan of kids playing video games, but Guitar Hero seems to be much more than that,” says San Francisco mom Stephanie Belfiore. “I feel the kids are learning the rhythm and beat.”

Belfiore’s two children, ages 6 and 8, play violin and piano respectively, but both have indicated an interest in learning guitar and drums as well.

Guitar Hero, which first emerged in 2005, and Rock Band, which came out in 2007, both allow multiple players to mimic a song performance through the use of controllers in the shape of simple guitars and drums. Scores are determined by each player’s effort to keep up and hit the right notes and beats.

Since the advent of these video games, music instructors have, indeed, seen an increase in the number of kids who’ve come to them seeking to learn the real thing.

“If kids really have this thing inside them to lead to music, they’re going to get there one way or another, and, if they’re using Guitar Hero as a stepping stone, that’s great,” says Jeremy Steinkoler, co-founder and co-director of BandWorks, which offers eight-week workshops in Oakland showing kids how to play instruments and jam and perform with other kids using professional studio equipment.

That was the experience of San Francisco mom Ellen Hathaway and her 11-year-old son, Isaac, who plays guitar.

“My own son was, let’s just say, ‘rhythmically challenged.’ As he got more hooked by Guitar Hero, it really did teach him this sense of rhythm that he hadn’t had before,” she says, explaining that it helped him to see the notes being played on the TV screen. “His picking up the guitar was really fast because he had developed a sense of the timing, and he had an ear that knew what to do. He just needed to teach his fingers how to do it.”

Plus, the game’s vast song library exposed him a wide range of styles, at an age where he hadn’t yet developed his own music passion. Today, he plays with the San Francisco Rock Project, a performance-oriented music instruction nonprofit for youth.

At first, however, Hathaway’s son was more interested in playing the video game, primarily because it was easier than learning the guitar. It’s a common frustration that many students find when first learning the real instrument.

“They find that it’s not as easy to learn instruments as it is on the video game,” says Rachel Sager, general manager of School of Rock, which provides music instruction for kids ages 7 to 18 in San Mateo. “If they could apply that work and practice (of video games) into playing guitar, they’d probably be really good.”

Games Don’t Help Talent

True rockers are even quicker to scoff at the video games. Former Rolling Stones bass player Bill Wyman was one of the first professional musicians to criticize the games, claiming they would discourage kids from putting in the effort to learn an instrument.

Other local – and younger – musicians say the games can even make learning instruments more difficult and confusing.

“If you’re a musician, these games do not help at all,” says 14-year-old Philip DeLuca, a Danville resident who plays drums in the Devil’s Angels, which beat 25 other bands in June to reign supreme during the San Mateo County Fair’s second annual Battle of the Bands. With a real instrument, he says, “you get the feel for it, and with Rock Band, it’s like playing any old video game.”

Band mate Kyle Tom, 13, of San Ramon, agrees.

“It’s not nearly as fun as playing real instruments,” says the guitarist, who met his fellow musicians through a kids’ music program offered through Red House Studios in Walnut Creek. “There are five buttons on the (video game) guitar, and it doesn’t teach you how to play it.”

Both kids were inspired to play music by their parents. While they have Rock Band or Guitar Hero at home, they rarely play the games, which, instead, have attracted the interest of other siblings who do not play instruments but are wicked good at the games.

Harmonix, the company that created Rock Band, hopes a new version of the game will help bridge the distance between the limits of the video controllers and the look and feel of real instruments.

Due out by the end of the year, Rock Band 3 will include add-on controllers made to look like the real thing, three-part voice harmonies and support for real keyboard instruments.

Despite the modifications, Bay Area musicians are fairly certain that a music video game will never be able to simulate the feeling of rocking out under hot stage lights, with hundreds of adoring fans shouting your name.

“You can’t distill an art form down to zeros and ones,” says Steinkoler, who plays in a number of bands around the Bay Area.

Or, as Sager simply points out, “You can’t sit around the campfire and play Rock Band.”