Are You Ready To Rock? (Guitar Hero (PS2))

Member Name: Stunt 101

Product:	Guitar Hero (PS2)
Date:	01/11/06 (291 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Awesome Soundtrack, Long Career Mode, Lots Of Replayability and Can Be Played By Beginners.

Disadvantages: Cost A Heck Of A Lot!

-(Game Information)-
Name:Guitar Hero
Publisher:RedOctane
Developer:Harmonix Music
Genre:Rhythm Game
Release Date:Apr 7, 2006
Age Rating:12+ for Mild Lyrics
Number Of Players:1-2
Online:No
Developer Site:www.redoctane.com
Product Site:www.guitarherogame.co.uk
Memory Card Usage:204kb minimum

-(History)-
Harmonix Music have mainly made rhythm games like Dance Dance Revolution, Amplitude and Frequency. They have collaborated with companies like 'Konami', 'Sony Computer Entertainment' and 'RedOctane'.

-(The Controls)-
The controls are not the same as usual, then again your controller won't be the same as usual. Instead of using your usual PS2 controller, you use a plastic guitar made by RedOctane themselves. To play you basically need to push down on of the five coloured fret buttons on the neck of the guitar and, instead of plucking strings, you push the strum bar to hit the notes. There's also a whammy bar just for some special fun. If you're worried about going into the game with no clue on what to do, don't as there are tutorials on how to play. There are also tutorials for experts to help them become better. The controller is very well-made and very responsive.

-(The Gameplay)-
Perhaps the best thing about Guitar Hero is it's learning curve. If you go into the game on a difficulty like Hard or Expert then you'll suck, i guarantee. So you should start with easy. Basically you only have to hit three of it's notes, then on medium you start to use 4 notes, then on hard you have to to hit all five notes and then on expert you have to really give all your ability when you play. The songs are also changed a bit when on a difficulty. Basically the songs will go faster and you'll need to hit more than one notes. It's really good how Guitar Hero's learning curve is set out, meaning this game can be played by beginners. The gameplay is quite simple. You have a scrolling fret board coming at you with notes that you need to hit which is similar to Amplitude. Once you hit the notes, you get points and these points effect the outcome. The more notes you hit in the row, the more your combo multiplier goes up, which can go up to 4x. If you hit star notes then your star metre goes up and once it's full enough, you can activate 'Star Power' which you can activate by tilting your guitar upwards. This basically doubles your combo metre and raises your Rock metre quicker, which is basically your life metre. You have three sections which are Green, Yellow and Red. If your metre is in green you're safe, if your metre is in yellow then you're good but could be better but if your metre is red then you suck. If your metre goes right to the left end then you failed the song. After you completed a song you'll will be rated on up to 5 stars. You'll be rated on Points, Percentage of notes hit and number of notes hit in a row. The better you do, the more stars you get.

There are three modes in total. The main mode is the Career mode. You basically play through songs and unlock arenas. There's no real story to Guitar Hero but that doesn't effect the game at all. The story on easy has about 25 songs to play through (5 songs per arena) but on harder difficulties there are more songs. In the easy difficulty you don't have the unlock shop but when you play on harder difficulties the unlock shop is available. On harder difficulties you earn cash to spend in the unlock shop. The better you do, the more money you receive. There's not much to the story mode, as all you do is play songs, but the song selection is so fantastic, that you'll forgive that point. Quick play is like the exhibition mode from the WWE games, where you can play any songs you've unlocked. This is great for practice and is fun to play as the song selection is so great. I played it with a mate and have lots of fun with the multi-player. The screen is split in half and you and you and your friend (or enemy) do solos and the song is split up so both of you can play. The songs are split up very well to suit multiplayer and this mode is fun to play as well. Unfortunately the game costs a heck of a lot, even after 7 months of release. It's still £50 and that's too much as far as I'm concerned as the sequel is out in less than a month, but that's my opinion. Obviously this doesn't effect the gameplay, but it may effect the purchase.
10/10

-(The Graphics)-
Most rhythm games arent much to look at, but Guitar Hero is very different. It looks fantastically cool. The character models look fantastic. There are quite a lot of characters, ranging from punk chicks, to hard rock men and even death himself. Come on, isn't death himself enough to make you buy this game? Anyway the arenas look just as fantastic, with arenas like a garage, to pubs and even arenas. One nice touch is the crowd, they look fantastic. Though they're not got much variety, they look fantastic. The guitar models look great, with a lot of variety. There are Lot's of guitars as well which is even better. The frame rate holds very steadily throughout the hole game. It's a shame you can't look at the graphics much, as your mind will be focused on the notes coming across the screen.
10/10

-(The Sound)-
The sound really stands out. I mean what's the point of a rhythm game with rubbish music. The soundtrack has some old rock songs like Ozzy Osbourne's "Bark at the Moon" and Judas Priest's "You've Got Another Thing Comin'," and some new songs like Sum 41's "Fat Lip" and Franz Ferdinand's "Take Me Out.". You are more than likely to find a favourite song on here. There are a total of 30 songs in career mode, plus another batch of unlockable tunes from the developer's various bands. The sound effects are just as good. If you miss a note if just has an evil realistic fret noise. You can also hear the crowd clapping which is another good effect and when you do a star power move, the hole game goes louder than usual.
10/10

-(Replay Value)-
If there was one word for the replay value it would be MASSIVE! The career is very long, lasting at least 15 hours. Once you've completed the game on Easy you can try to complete the game on the other three difficulties, try to unlock everything in the unlock shop, play on the multiplayer and quick play modes and play on all the songs. I got this a couple of months ago and I'm still playing it now.
10/10

-(Score)-
Controls=10
Gameplay=10
Graphics=10
Sound=10
Replay Value=10
Overall Score:10.0/10 Perfect

-(Ending Comments)-
Guitar Hero is very creative, sounds extremely fantastic, has Lot's of re-playability and look great. It's a shame there wasn't much variety in the crowd, then the game would of been perfect, but you won't actually see the crowd much so that doesnt matter. This game is perfect and one of my best games ever. You will love this if you love Rock. And if you don't really like music then you may like this for the challenge. Obviously if you're mad about Hip Hop or Pop then this game will disgust you, but if anything else then you will like this. If you don't mind paying a lot of money, then this will be well worth it.

-(If You Like This I'd Suggest)-
Amplitude
Frequency

-(Where You Can Buy It)-
This is easy to find...

£39.99 from Amazon or £25.99 with just the guitar
£49.99 from Play.com
£49.99 from Game.net
£49.99 from Gamestation.co.uk

Summary: ROCK ON!