Guitar Hero 5 Review
So, Guitar Hero has been around since 2004, and there have already been 5 games. That if you’re not including Guitar Hero Aerosmith and Guitar Hero Metallica. And of course the catch up release – Guitar Hero Greatest Hits. So what can we expect from Guitar Hero 5? Is it worth buying? Or should you just download a ton of new tunes for Guitar Hero World Tour?
Well, for a start, Guitar Hero 5 has got 89 new songs. So if you need more songs, maybe Guitar Hero 5 could be the best way to get them? Plus as always, you can buy the Game+Guitar pack, which might be a cheap way to get a new guitar and new songs if you need both.
But then there is also Party Mode. Party Mode could be the killer feature of Guitar Hero 5. The idea is that you can use Guitar Hero as your own rock jukebox. But if you hear a song you love, you can just in and begin playing it. And you can’t fail, so it’s the perfect way for friends to begin playing Guitar Hero even if they’ve never played before.
Another really cool feature is backwards compatibility. You can import up to 35 of your songs from Guitar Hero World Tour into Guitar Hero 5. It’s not free and will cost about 280 Microsoft Points. Plus you can import all the songs you’ve downloaded for Guitar Hero World Tour.
In Career Mode, you will now be able to download your Avatar from the Xbox 360 into the game. I’m not so sure this is a good idea. A cartoony character jumping around on stage. Could be interesting to see if they also implement this on the Wii. It’s a possibility because the two styles are kinda similar!
Another change to Career Mode is that you won’t earn money. These have been replaced by challenges. You get five challenges per song, as well as the normal “out of 5 stars” measure. These include how far your note streak goes – 120 getting you a gold and over 300 getting you diamond. The one major flaw with all of this is that the songs are keyed into the instruments. Guitarists won’t get much from drum heavy songs. Vocalists won’t get a lot from instrumentals. So you’re going to have to become a jack of all trades in the band!
A great progression in the series is that you now have all the songs unlocked from the start, you don’t have to unlock them from the career mode. This is great for someone like me who wants to play the songs without having to beat the sometimes insanely hard duels in career mode.
In conclusion, I think this is going to be a great game. You can jump in, just play, the songs are just waiting for you and jump out when you’re done. Some complain that rhythm games are getting old, I disagree. I’d love to be able to play guitar but my fingers are too big for the strings. The Guitar Hero franchise lets me belt out songs like a rock star. Long may the series continue!
