Guitar Hero

Reviewed by Angie Quidim
November 26, 2005

Developer: Harmonix Music Systems, Inc. Publisher: Red Octane, Inc. Website: www.redoctane.com, or www.guitarherogame.com Consoles Available: PS2 Number of Players: 1-2 ESRB Rating: T for Teen Review Rating: 9 out of 10

Forget dancing and singing into a mic. The days of dancing on a metal pad and singing into a headset are through. It's time to rock out and dump that old air guitar. Harmonix and Red Octane introduce a way for longhaired rockers and metal heads to get into the new wave of rhythm games that's sweeping the video game arena.

Guitar Hero is a rhythm-based game that comes equipped with a guitar, including a whammy bar. The game provides fans with a wide array of songs, from Joan Jett's “I Love Rock and Roll” to more difficult songs, such as “Ace of Spades” from Motorhead or “Unsung” by Helmet. The basic idea of the game is to match the notes by pressing the colored buttons according to the patterns on the screen. Each wave of colored buttons follows a riff in the song. If you mess up, you will hear the sound of a string breaking. Your success is based on a meter that measures how many notes you hit and how the audience likes your style. The better you do, the more your character starts showing off and getting the crowd into your superstar quality. A poor performance will cause a whole lot of booing and even invite a few dirty looks from your band members. Keep up that awful strumming, and you will mess up your band's vocals and eventually fail the song.

There are three modes found in Guitar Hero. The Career mode starts you as a stock garage band flunkie and goes through your musical career. In this mode, you can customize your character, build up your guitar, and unlock some pretty cool stuff. After you play each venue, you earn money to get cool items from the guitar shop. In the Quickplay mode, you can just play the songs you have unlocked from career mode. In multiplayer, you can go head-to-head and bang out the riffs to compete for the lead.

With the great quality of cover songs, a wide variety of music selections, and the easy use of the guitar controller, there is no doubt in my mind that Guitar Hero is the best guitar game to ever hit the Video Game market. It's a great party game that two people can play and even spectators can enjoy.

Guitar Hero is a great game, and the difficulty increases in each level. However, with the inability to acquire more songs to play, the game has limited replay value. Although it is innovative for the rhythm game genre, and the cover songs are great, that's about it. If a sequel is to come, hopefully it will allow online competition and downloading.

More Screenshots: