Gaming Trend

Gaming Trend Review

by Keith Schleicher

When you play Rock Band or Guitar Hero, you feel like you are playing in a band, guitar in hand, rocking out to the music.  Your band has a bad case of multiple personalities though, since all the songs you play are from different bands.  The more songs you can get though, the more variety you’ll find in your game.  Finding a single band that has enough songs and enough diversity is a tough job.  Neversoft and Activision have risen to that challenge and brought us Guitar Hero: Aerosmith.

A reason that Aerosmith could be used for a single Guitar Hero game is their longevity.  Forming back in 1970 and releasing their first album in 1973, they have a repertoire of music going back 35 years.  Changing styles with the times and yet keeping a familiar sound, Aerosmith was a logical choice for a Guitar Hero game.  Does that mean that it’s a good game though?

While playing a Guitar Hero game you concentrate on the note charts sliding down the note chart.  That doesn’t mean that the backgrounds don’t add to the game.  The massive concert arenas you play in with the crowds cheering help give the impression that you are the band.

Graphically the engine very closely resembles the GHIII engine.  This isn’t a bad thing as the game looks crisp.  The cel-shaded graphics look good, making the characters look close to their real-life counterparts and yet still have enough of a cartoonish feel that you are playing a game and living a fantasy.

What Aerosmith has going for it that pervious Guitar Hero games didn’t is the fact that they were able to take a band and use their signature moves during songs.  Neversoft actually had the band fly in and motion capture the band members as if they were actually playing in a concert.  Neversoft put the moves together with the songs and got Aerosmith’s feedback as to which moves should be used in which songs, and what part of the song the move should be used in.  Not only that, but Steve Tyler was motion captured a second time to get his face and mouth movements for each song.  This makes Aerosmith move more fluidly that previous Guitar Hero games and gives it more personality.

Since Aerosmith has been around for a while, they have not only changed their sound, but also their look.  While playing in different eras, the band members wear different outfits that match the era the song is from.  While this might not seem to be a big deal, it definitely helps the feel of the songs.

The collection of songs in Aerosmith not surprisingly features mostly songs from Aerosmith.  The songs date back from their early work in 1975 to songs released last year.    Neversoft has done what they can to include favorites of Aerosmith without making every song sound the same.  That being said, if you absolutely can’t stand Aerosmith, then this obviously isn’t the game for you.

Not every song included is from Aerosmith,  A few songs are from bands that either influenced Aerosmith or were influenced by Aerosmith.  The collaboration of Aerosmith with Run DMC on “Walk This Way” is one of the featured songs, but other songs included are "I Hate Myself for Loving You" by Joan Jett, "All Day and All of the Night" by the Kinks, "King of Rock" by Run DMC, and "Hard to Handle" by the Black Crowes.

There are planty of tracks by Aerosmith including "Back in the Saddle," "Train Kept A-Rollin'," "Dream On," and "Livin' On the Edge."  The tracks used seem to be either from very early in their career or later in their career.  Maybe they had trouble getting the rights for certain albums, but getting more songs spread out through their career would have been nice.

While you can play Aerosmith with a regular controller, the best way to play is with a guitar controller.  The five fret buttons on the neck, the strum bar, and the whammy bar are used for rocking out with the song.  Aerosmith is available with the Les Paul controller, but you can buy it separately or use the plastic guitar you already have laying around.  There might be some concern using a wireless guitar in a game where the timing for the controls are critical, but you don’t have to worry about lag at all between the controller and game.

The sensitiviy of the guitar controller can make or break you depending on how you activate Star Power.  If you tilt the guitar up and it doesn’t activate, then you can be in for a frustrating time.  The Guitar Hero controller tilt sensitivity works very well.  In fact you won’t need to tilt the guitar up much at all to activate Star Power.  Some might think it’s too sensitive, but I didn’t have any issues with it accidentally activating when I didn’t want it to.

Aerosmith came about after the band Aersomith was approached by Neversoft to use a song in Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock.  After being impressed with the work done on the song for GHIII, the idea of creating a single game based on the band formed.  Neversoft and Aerosmith worked together closely to do their part to create as authentic of an experience as they could.

Here is a quick overview of playing a Guitar Hero game.  The note chart has notes that scroll down and hit targets at the bottom.  You need to have the correct fret button held down while strumming the strum bar on the guitar.  The higher the difficulty gets, the more notes appear on the note chart and the faster the notes slide down the note chart.  The more notes you hit, the more the crowd likes your playing.  The more notes you get in a row, the higher your multiplier gets.  Complete a string of notes that are shaped like stars and you gain Star Power.  Star Power doubles your multiplier and wins you favor from the crowd.  If you do badly, then you lose the crowd, and if you miss too many notes they kick you off stage.  Anyone who has played any other incarnation of Guitar Hero will be familiar with the concepts.

Aerosmith has the modes you are probably familiar with on the other systems.  The Career mode has you move through your career, gaining fame and fortune, playing new songs and getting new gigs, working from the bottom to the top.  There is a bit of a difference compared to other Guitar Hero games.  In each set you play as your original band for two songs.  Once you complete those songs you play as Aerosmith for two songs, and then you play an encore song.

When you unlock a new set you get interviews with the members of Aerosmith about their experiences as a band.  It’s kind of neat to hear them talk about their career and then go through the locations that are described in the interviews.  Going from a high school prom to Russia to the Big Game (you can’t use Super Bowl because of the NFL license, THANKS EA!), you get to experience a little bit of Aerosmith’s major breaks in the business. 

While Aersomith doesn’t reach the difficulty of Guitar Hero III, it is still a technically demanding game.  Medium has some challenging areas, but is fairly playable the first time though.  Once you enter Hard, that fifth button can wreak havoc, but it’s fairly manageable until you get to the later songs.  If you think you’re good at guitar because of Rock Band, Aerosmith on Expert will give you plenty of challenge.

The Battle Mode is back, but they take a back seat in Aerosmith.  Most of the time all you are doing is actually playing the note charts.  That will be a huge relief to those who didn’t care for the Battle Mode in Guitar Hero III.

The biggest issue with this collection of songs is how repetitive they can get.  While most songs do have some kind of repetition in them, the repetition gets to be so bad that they get a bit boring.  While some of this is understandable, you would have thought that a bit more variety would have shown up in the songs.

There is also the big difference between the Medium and Hard difficulties.  A lot of my friends who are casual players are pretty good at Guitar Hero on Medium, but once they try to do a song on Hard they fail badly.  A smoother transition in the difficulty level would have been appreciated.  Experienced Guitar Hero experts shouldn’t have any problems with the note charts though.

This is still a Guitar Hero game.  The career has you scroll through the songs as you progress.  There are outfits, characters, songs, and guitars to unlock.  It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but hopefully we’ll see a bit more originality with Guitar Hero: World Tour.

Aerosmith feels a lot like Guitar Hero III.  The tutorial feels like it’s the same one from Guitar Hero III, the characters from your band are reused from Guitar Hero III, and a lot of the characters are the same ones you see in Guitar Hero III.    It almost feels like Aerosmith is more of an expansion pack than a new full-fledged game.  This game would have been more enticing at a lower price point.  Still, you get thirty-one songs from the beginning, and you can unlock more for a total of forty.  There isn’t a bad song in the bunch either, although some of the non-Aerosmith songs are less recognizable and some favorites are noticeably missing.  It feels like it could have been a nice expansion.

There are four different multiplayer options.  Face-off has players alternating playing on the same note chart.  Pro face-off has both players playing at the same time instead of alternating.  Co-op lets two people play at the same time together.  The Battle Mode is back, but it’s mostly relegated to the multiplayer mode.

If you purchase the Aerosmith bundle you get an Aerosmith faceplace for your guitar.  While it’s only a simple piece of plastic, it is actually pretty cool for an Aerosmith fan.  If you don’t have a non-standard black faceplace already, it’s a nice addition.  Don’t go and buy the bundle just for the faceplate though.  If you already have two Guitar Hero guitars, then you really don’t need the bundle unless you are craving a second wireless guitar.

While these songs could have been made as downloadable content, placing them all together gives them a more cohesive feel, and you are paying less than $1.50 per song.  A lot of work went into this package, with new environments, new characters, and more animations.

It mostly comes down to this: How much you enjoy Guitar Hero: Aerosmith will mostly depend on how much of a fan of Aerosmith you are.  If you hate Aerosmith, chances are good you won’t enjoy this game.  If you are their biggest fan, then you have probably been anxiously awaiting for its release.  If you are somewhere in between, you’ll probably want to at least give it a rent.  The infusion of Aerosmith gives the game much more personality and really adds to the overall experience. There really isn’t a whole lot more to say other than it’s still a Guitar Hero game.  The delivery is tried and true, but it is starting to feel a bit old.

Gaming Trend Score

79

1. Graphics: 82
2. Audio: 78
3. Controls: 88
4. Gameplay: 74
5. Value/Replay: 76
6. OVERALL:79