Harmonix left Guitar Hero behind for Rock Band… and you should too!

Harmonix, a developer comprised mainly of musicians, has been making innovative music games since 2001’s Frequency for the PS2. While you may not be familiar with some of its older titles, you have undoubtedly heard of the Guitar Hero franchise, the series that has finally enabled Harmonix to make its “dream game”, a game that many would never have expected to see so soon. That game is Rock Band, and it is downright amazing that, for the first of its kind, it has been extremely well thought-out and executed. Admittedly, it has been in the ‘works’ for almost a decade, but so has Duke Nukem Forever and look where that has got it.

Anyone who has played a Guitar Hero will be instantly familiar with the gameplay in Rock Band, but there are some obvious and not-so-obvious differences. The biggest of course being that you are no longer restricted to just playing guitar or bass, but can now be a drum hero and vocal hero as well. The drums work much like the guitar but instead, you get a scrolling set of colour-coded notes. Each colour corresponds to a different drum pad, and there is also a foot pedal. Unlike with the guitar, where being a real guitarist has no actual advantage, experienced drummers will be able to transition rather easily to the drum system in Rock Band. It is a far more physically involving instrument than the guitar, and many casual players will find it difficult to get the hang of. On the more difficult settings, playing the drums in Rock Band feels an awful lot like playing them in real life. The biggest downside, however, is that the symbols are just flat pads like the rest of the kit; the game often mixes up the cymbals, poms, and crash interchangeably. This makes drumming a little less exciting than it should be, since having all the different pads so close together doesn’t allow for a lot of cool thrashing and arm-waving. There are also some concerns about the durability of the drum kit, but as long as you don’t stage dive onto it you should be fine. Harmonix has won numerous technical achievement and prestigious game of the year awards for its Karaoke Revolution series, so it makes perfect sense that the vocal portion of Rock Band is extremely top–notch. You get a microphone and a scrolling bar that measures your actual pitch, and even if you’re blasting your speakers or have other people in the room talking, the microphone only picks up the voice of the person singing into it. It’s actually quite impressive. Unfortunately, there isn’t much room for adding your own twist to the songs, as diverting from the preset length and pitch of the lyrics is the equivalent of missing a note on the guitar.

Star Power is now referred to as Overdrive mode. Once you have gathered enough energy by hitting a section of glowing notes without missing, you will be ready to double your score multiplier. For the guitar and bass, it is activated by tilting the guitar upwards, just as it is in the Guitar Hero series. The drums and mic work a little differently however. To activate Overdrive while singing, you will be given an opportunity to freestyle once you have enough energy. Here you can drop some mad rhymes, scream incomprehensibly, or ramble on about your stance on the latest political topics. It doesn’t matter, as long as you make some noise into the microphone. For the drums, you need to gather energy in the same way you would on the guitar, but instead of choosing when you go into Overdrive, you will be given a freestyle section where you can thrash away for a few good seconds. As long as you hit the last note in the freestyle section, you will activate Overdrive.

Because of the way that each instrument handles Overdrive differently, it’s important to plan ahead and especially to work together when playing cooperatively. The more players who are in Overdrive at the same time, the higher the total bonus multiplier will be. Similarly, when at least two players successfully gain energy at the same time, an additional burst of energy will be awarded to all band members. There is one other minor but major advantage to the Overdrive system, and that is the ability to collect energy even once the mode has been activated. In Guitar Hero, using Star Power would turn any incoming energy notes into regular ones, but in Rock Band there are certain songs where you can be in Overdrive for upwards of a minute. That’s a lot of bonus points. It also adds a bit of additional strategy to when you should and shouldn’t use up your energy. When a player fails a song, his or her fellow band mates can use their Overdrive to bring them back into the mix, but after three strikes they are permanently done for. If too much time goes by without saving the dead player(s), everyone will fail the song and your mum will think less of you.

While Rock Band can easily be referred to as three spectacular single-player games in one (at the very least), the biggest draw to the game is getting together two or three of your friends and forming your own band. This will allow you to access the Rock Band World Tour, where you start out as just another garage band and work your way up through dozens of cities and venues until finally being inducted into the Hall of Fame. Beating songs and sets rewards you with stars, cash, and fans, which in turn unlock more events. The higher the difficulty you play on, the more fans you will get, but here’s where it gets tricky; you can max out your fans on each difficulty, meaning you’ll have to step it up a notch to win more skanky groupies and homicidal stalkers. Not just you, but the whole band. So if your drummer was struggling just to keep up on Normal, now you’re screwed. It makes sense that the game should challenge you to take it to the next level, but it’s at this point that a lot of gamers will simply be physically (or perhaps mentally...) unable to continue.

Without a doubt the biggest flaw in the entire game is the fact that an online World Tour has been omitted. Not everyone has access to two or three musically inclined friends 24/7, and in the age of Xbox Live you probably have a better chance at assembling a great rock band with peeps off your Friend List than you do with your five-year-old sister and the homeless guy who lives under your porch. You can play any song in Band Quickplay just fine, so why not go the extra step and include what pretty much anyone who owns the game wants? It’s hard not to feel the icy hand of greed behind this decision. After all, if you could just hop online and play with whoever you wanted, there’s not much incentive for the casual gamer to own the full set of instruments, or any at all, especially when that wireless Guitar Hero III controller will work just fine. Whatever the reason, it is a major disappointment that sticks out like Amy Winehouse at an upscale restaurant, especially considering how superb the rest of the game design feels.

There are dozens of venues to play, but none of them stand out as much as the ones from the Guitar Hero series, nor are they supposed to. All the giant robots and UFOs have been replaced by a more realistic, immersive look. Side-by-side, most people will want to say that Guitar Hero III is the better-looking game, and it certainly does have clearer graphics, but Rock Band purposely bombards each performance with a deluge of special effects and visual filters to make it feel more like an authentic, smoky bar or a video of a live performance. Be warned however, anyone susceptible to epileptic seizures may want to find a different game to get addicted to. It’s also important to note that all of the crowds are fully 3D, something pretty much every other game (especially sports games) could learn from.

Unlike Guitar Hero III, which not only cranked up the difficulty of the gameplay but also the difficulty of the Achievements as well, Rock Band has a sensible assortment of goals to complete for GamerScore. About half of the achievements are the usual ‘beat so-andso difficulty with so-and-so instrument’, and the other half is mainly focused on the World Tour: completing all songs in each venue, reaching a million fans, being inducted into the Hall of Fame and so on. While they may sound reasonably easy, you will actually need to have your band perform well at the Hard and Expert levels to get most of them.

There’s a steady stream of downloadable songs coming each week, excellent character customisation, three different instruments to learn and master on four different difficulties, plus a surprisingly small amount of flaws for such an ambitious game. Couple this with one of the most thrilling multiplayer experiences to be had in the history of videogames, Rock Band is a must-have for just about anyone, or anything, in this universe and beyond.

Will Haley