Brikar

I just got this Saturday, and there's a lot to go through, but here are my initial impressions after a few hours of play spread across three days. Oh, and also, I'm playing on my nifty new Playstation3 which I bought at the beginning of October for the express purpose of sinking tons and tons of money into Rock Band, Guitar Hero and blu-ray movies.

Firstly, I should say that in order to save money and space, I did not opt for the full band kit. Instead, I'll continue to get use out of my Rock Band drum kit and microphone, with the Guitar Hero WT guitar to fill out the set (so, two guitars whereas before I only had the one RB guitar).

The guitar itself feels very sturdy. It's larger and heavier than any previous Guitar Hero or Rock Band instrument. The strum bar feels great, but still clicks - so it's about even with the Rock Band guitar, which strums silently but feels mushy as hell.

While RB goes for the "solo buttons" on the neck of the guitar, GHWT adds a "slider-bar", which is a touch-sensitive strip. During certain songs there are sections of notes joined by a purple line. To play these notes, no need to strum, just slide your fingers along the touch-bar in time with the notes on the screen. It's nifty, but takes a lot of practice. Not every song uses it, either, which is fine for some songs, but overall the application of it seems rather haphazard. There's no rhyme or reason as to which songs have it and which don't, unless there's something I'm missing.

The guitar also features a "Star Power" button which is located vertically next to the strum bar, so you can simply press down on it with the heel of your hand while playing if you find that tilting the guitar throws you off (which it often does for me).

On to the gameplay: The World Tour is similar to the tour mode in Rock Band 2 in that you'll play gigs at certain venues. The difference here is that you're given the option to "Play entire gig" which has you play every song in the set without returning to the menu to choose the next one (much like the set lists in RB2). As in previous GH games, the better you do on a song, the more money you get which allows you to buy clothes and guitars and such. Interestingly, in order to play the Tool gig (three songs: "Vicarious", "Schism" and "Parabola" in a unique venue based upon the band's album art style - it's got this creepy eye that blinks around and shit, very cool) you must purchase it for $8000. I had to play several gigs past my current progress once Tool was unlocked before I could purchase the opportunity to play it. A little strange.

However, the Tour mode is essentially the same as GH has always been - I'm not playing to gain or lose fans, I don't hire staff or purchase things like vans or jets to play other, far away venues. I simply move from gig to gig, collecting money (with the occasional sponsor throwing me some extra cash) just like in all the other GH games. There's some choice of the order in which I play the gigs - completing one gig seems to unlock the next two or three in the list, but it's still very linear.

Playing the actual songs... It's been a while since I devoted time to a Guitar Hero title, having been so dedicated to Rock Band for the last year. The differences between the two are so striking to me now. Guitar Hero is much more forgiving and generous with it's hammer-ons and pull-offs. At this point, World Tour seems much easier to me than Rock Band 2 because I feel like the window for hitting notes is just huge. But I think I'm only about a third or halfway through the Tour, so I'm sure it'll get far more challenging soon enough.

Quickplay allows you to choose a single song, or to create a set list of up to six songs before you play.

The music store is decent, but compared to Rock Band's, the offerings are utterly anemic. I can't fault them, though, since the RB store has been up and running for a year now with new tracks every week. Currently, GH only offers a "classic rock" pack featuring "Rock'n'Roll Band" by Boston, "Hot Blooded" by Foreigner and "Jessie's Girl" by Rick Springfield, a couple of tracks by Neversoft employee bands, original guitar battle songs by Ted Nugent and Zack Wylde, and Metallica's "Death Magnetic" album. There's already more scheduled in the upcoming weeks, including a Jimi Hendrix pack, REM and Oasis.

I got the Boston, Foreigner and Metallica tracks. Metallica is, obviously, fucking difficult as hell. I played on Hard instead of Expert, and could muddle through a few songs with three star ratings. "The End of the Line" broke my fingers, and I failed out, but "Unforgiven III" and "Broken, Beat and Scarred" were okay.

Tomorrow I'll try a few vocals and drum songs and see how that goes.

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"A million monkeys typing until the end of time will produce the complete works of William Shakespeare. Ten thousand monkeys typing for ten thousand years will write a Hemingway. Ten monkeys typing over Columbus Day weekend will give you a Dan Brown."

http://olympusmans.blogspot.com
http://benforrealz.blogspot.com

Bean

So the GH store.. in particular the Metallica tracks, it costs you money beyond what you pay for the game to get these? Am I misunderstanding?

__________________
"I haven't faced death. I've cheated death. I've tricked my way out of death and patted myself on the back for my ingenuity. I know nothing."

--James T. Kirk

Brikar

That's correct - you pay for extra music that doesn't come on the disc. It's $1.99 per track, unless you get it in a pack, which is discounted. The classic rock 3-pack is $5.49, and "Death Magnetic" is $17.99. Some songs are free, like the Guitar Duel pack (these songs are already on the disc, but only as guitar duels. If you want to play them by yourself or as a band in quickplay, you have to download those versions).

The songs that users make in the Music Editor and then upload are also free.

I should also note that "Death Magnetic" is 11 tracks - there are two versions of "Suicide and Redemption", one with a James solo and one with a Kirk solo.

__________________
"A million monkeys typing until the end of time will produce the complete works of William Shakespeare. Ten thousand monkeys typing for ten thousand years will write a Hemingway. Ten monkeys typing over Columbus Day weekend will give you a Dan Brown."

http://olympusmans.blogspot.com
http://benforrealz.blogspot.com