Gaming Trend

Gaming Trend Review

by Keith Schleicher

The video game industry was rocked when it was announced that the developer and publisher of Guitar Hero were going their separate ways through buyouts.  Red Octane was bought out by Activision, while developer Harmonix was bought out by MTV Games.  The big question was which developer would develop the next game in the Guitar Hero franchise and what would be coming next from Harmonix.

When Activision announced that Neversoft would be taking up the reigns of Guitar Hero III, many scratched their heads wondering if the Tony Hawk developer would be up to the task.  While they had acquired excellent music tracks for the Tony Hawk games, developing Guitar Hero for several different platforms could be difficult for the design team.  Now Guitar Hero III is out, but does it rock?

When the Guitar Hero games were never graphical powerhouses, they didn’t have to be because of the style of the game.  There isn’t much to having notes scroll down with markers at the bottom of the screen, similar to the way DDR works but in reverse.  Each guitarist has a different background for the scrolling notes, and each one is consistent with their personalities.  The target area looks more like real speakers than the previous games do.

The backgrounds for the stages are more creative than before.  For instance, you actually have a video shoot where you play along instead of the typical stage.  This shows you more how the band is about more than just playing at gigs.  Neversoft has also done a good job in changing the venues for the encore, like when the electronics in the knight goes haywire and causes it to cut off the head of a mechanical dragon, although the pole dancers in one stage are a bit unnecessary.  The crowds at the venues grow as you progress down the career path.  In certain songs they do have animations like throwing their fist into the air in unison.  This does add to the ambiance of the game.  Some of the animations for the bands feel a little stiff though, especially some of the drumming done during the drum solos.  The mouth movements of the lead singer look a bit creepy too when you see them on screen.

The intro and clips between stages are animated in a look that is highly stylized.  The cartoons have a square look to them, with a minimal amount of change between frames.  It looks good and gives you a better idea of how much the band is progressing in making a name for themselves compared to the previous Guitar Hero games.

For Guitar Hero III, Neversoft got the opportunity to use the master tracks for certain tracks, and it really shows.  The songs sound much better than some of the tracks from the previous Guitar Hero games.  There is no doubt that this is the best sounding Guitar Hero game.  Unfortunately, it’s easy to tell which tracks Neversoft wasn’t fortunate enough to get their hands on.  The songs without master tracks don’t have the same quality as those that do.  “I Want To Rock and Roll All Night” in particular suffers from a bad cover.

The tricky part in making a music game like this is that you want to have songs that are familiar to the player and still fun to play.  With Guitar Hero III, the subtitle is “Legends of Rock,” so the focus is on those bands that could be considered the founders of Rock and Roll. These are songs that almost everyone has heard of.  Even if you don’t recognize a particular artist or song title, the song will be familiar.

The biggest draw of Guitar Hero III is the Les Paul guitar.  The style of the guitar is classic and should get fans of those who didn’t care for the modern look of the X-plorer that came with the Xbox 360 version of Guitar Hero II.  The fret keys are shaped similarly to the fret keys in the original Guitar Hero instead of the square keys on the X-plorer.  However, they look much better than the original guitar because the color of the keys is only on the outline instead of solidly over the entire key.

The biggest change between this controller and previously released versions is the fact that it is guitar controller is wireless.  This means you can rock out from a distance without worrying about nasty cord getting in the way of your rock mastery.  The controller still has some heft to it, but it doesn’t feel heavy even though it does have wireless components.  There were times when I first started playing the game I felt that the timing was off.  I’m not sure if that was an issue with how I played the game or if it was an issue with the controller, but as I played with the guitar more, I got better with it, so it is possible that it was more an issue with myself than with the guitar.

Tilting the guitar up to get Star Power was a bit of an issue with previous Guitar Hero games, especially with the X-plorer version of the guitar.  The Les Paul performs admirably with activating Star Power.  It activates quickly that you don’t end up losing your monster combo, but it won’t be activated by accident.

When you boil down the gameplay of the Guitar Hero series, it isn’t much different than the DDR series, except that instead of moving your feet you are using a guitar controller.  As the notes scroll down, you strum the strum bar.  When a note contains a trail, you hold down the button until the trail ends to get the maximum number of points.  You can also use the whammy bar on those long notes.  Sounds simple enough, but if it was that simple, it would be easy enough to get through quickly and wouldn’t be much of a game.

The ultimate goal is to make it to the end of the song.  As you hit notes you find favor with the crowd and your Rock Meter goes up.  Start to mess up and the Rock Meter goes down.  The Rock Meter has three levels.  Green means you are rocking out the crowd, yellow means you are doing alright, and red means the crowd thinks you suck and tries to boo you off the stage.  Keeping the Rock Meter up until the end of the song will make you pass.

The best way to increase your score is by stringing a combo of notes.  Getting ten notes in a row gives you a 2X multiplier.  Another ten notes in a row gives you a 3X multiplier.  Nailing another ten notes in a row gives you a 4X multiplier and will really rev up the crowd in your favor.  Miss one note though, and you have to start all over.

Specific notes are indicated with a star.  Hitting these notes give you Star Power.  Once you fill up your Star Power Meter, you can activate your Star Power and double your multiplier.  Star Power helps get the crowd to rock out.  Activating your Star Power does take some strategy because doing it during a period when few notes are played effectively wastes the multiplier.  Unfortunately, the animations for your character don’t do much except have little icons come out from the guitar.  This is disappointing compared to the previous games where your character would spin the guitar around or do other amazing things.

The hammer-ons and pull-offs are essential to scoring points in the game.  These notes are played without the need for a new strum on the strum bar.  They take practice to get right, but once you start to get them they come naturally.  They do seem to be a bit easier to perform in Guitar Hero III than the previous games, but they still take skill to perform.

There has been a lot of noise made about the inclusion of boss battles, especially by those who haven’t played the game.  In the boss battle you must play a song and “defeat” your opponent by the end of the song.  You do this by playing well and earning Power Ups.  Doing this is similar to acquiring Star Power.  By using the Power Ups you can mess up the boss you are battling.  However, the boss you are fighting against can send Power Ups against you.  One Power Up increases the difficulty one level, while another forces a player to hit a specific button until the opponent can score notes again, while another shakes the on-screen fret board.  If you can’t finish a boss battle, it’s not a big deal because after a couple of failures you can skip past it.  While some have claimed that the rest of the game requires skill to advance, the boss battles require a different kind of skill and strategy.  I actually found these quite a bit of fun, and Neversoft should be commended for trying something different in Guitar Hero III instead of just creating another game with a new set of songs. Those who don’t care about them can skip them, so a lot of the bellyaching is much ado about nothing.

There are four difficulties of the game, and each difficulty level increases the challenge by adding a few new items to challenge the player.  Those who have felt the previous games were too challenging should have a little easier time to get through the higher levels.  That being said, you still will have quite a challenge to get through the Expert difficulty.

After each song you complete in Career Mode, you gain cash for the store.  Here you can purchase new characters, new songs, and new outfits.  It will take a while to unlock everything available in the game.

Online you can challenge others to see who rocks harder in competition.  Each player plays a couple of strains and the Rock Meter sways between who is playing better.  At the end of the song the one with the Rock Meter on their side wins.  You can also play cooperatively where one person plays lead and the other plays bass.  This is a great way to play together.

What really brings down the score is the backwards compatibility.  Since the PS3 is backwards compatible with PS2 games (unless you recently purchased the castrated 40 GB version), I figured I would put my original Guitar Hero game into the PS3 and see how it played.  Unfortunately I couldn’t even get the PS3 to recognize the controller once the game was in.  It looks like the only way to play Guitar Hero and Guitar Hero II for the PS2 is on the PS2.  This is especially disappointing considering the cost of the game.

Guitar Hero III does what it sets out to do.  It makes you feel like you can play real guitar for a real band, working your way through the ranks and paying your dues.  I really wish I had Guitar Hero III available when I had some friends over, because when I pulled out Guitar Hero II, they complained about the song selection available.  Guitar Hero III definitely fixes that issue and makes the game more friendly for the casual gamer scene.  Don’t let the boss battles scare you, and if you approach it with an open mind you’ll probably find that you enjoy them.  It’s still unfortunate that you can’t play the previous Guitar Hero games on your backwards-compatible PS3, but if you don’t have an Xbox 360 and have enjoyed the previous Guitar Hero games, then Guitar Hero III is a great addition to your collection.

Gaming Trend Score

85

1. Graphics: 78
2. Audio: 92
3. Controls: 85
4. Gameplay: 90
5. Value/Replay: 77
6. OVERALL:85