Another post for Michelle
After 1 hour with Guitar Hero 5...
I'm a little ashamed to admit it, but I like it.
Somehow Activision brought the "fun" back to the franchise. Right from the get-go... the game boots up and says PRESS START TO SKIP at the bottom. I figure there's some cut-scene video about to start, so I don't do a thing. It starts up a venue and a random song, and says to press GREEN to join now. I have my guitar in my hands so I press GREEN to play WEEZER'S WHY BOTHER. It asks me guitar or bass. After that, it asks me what difficulty. The game then drops me right into the song, and it was a plesent experience.
So after that, I started carreer... and there is an EXTREME joy in selecting your own avatar to play in the game. Sure he (or she) looks odd with the other 3 game-rendered bandmates, but your avatar is really playing guitar, spinning around and throwing up the horns at the YOU ROCK! screen. I can't explain it in words, you have to see it for yourself with your own avatar.
Back to the game... it's really not that impossible. It's clearly built from the Metallica engine, both in terms of graphics and note-charting. I played 3-4 songs on expert guitar with no problem (98-99%) and the notes felt very forgiving. During some heavy strumming sections, I felt like I wasn't 100% on the beat, but the game basically say "meh... close enough" and I kept my 4x multiplier. That is one of the big aspect of "fun" returning to this franchise.
Another aspect of the fun is the drop-in/drop-out aspect. Much like the begining of the game, just joining a random song, you can quickplay and do the same thing. OR... if you are in a status screen (after finishing a song), or any static menu, and you don't touch the controller for about 5 minutes, it automatically kicks into a random song that you can either listen to (and watch), or join in. Or, you can press start, and it will take you right back to your status screen or menu where you left off. It's little things like this that scream HAVE FUN! JUST PLAY MUSIC! ENJOY YOURSELF! Which remind me of RB1/RB2... but on a whole different level.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKVxXl_YHCE
All this "fun" might make you think the game is super casual, but I think the hardcore plastic-guitar sporting douchebag will enjoy this game much like GH3/GHWT. It's got some HARD songs. And it's back to the simplistic tier system, where you play venue 1, and unlock more songs within that venue. After a certian amount of songs, you can unlock venue 2... and move to that venue. However, if you move to the next venue right away, you only have 1-2 songs available. You have to go back and continue everything in venue 1 in order to unlock more songs. It's a nice mixture of tiers & gameplay... but quickplay is totally open to every song on the disk. Plus, anything you downloaded (DLC) for GH3/GHWT on your HDD show up in GH5. Activision finally got their act together.
Everything is quick, uncluttered, and user-friendly. If money is tight, I'd wait a few more days until RB-Beatles comes out, because I have a feeling that will be the music game of the year... but if you can rent (and maybe keep from GameFly), or spend some extra money on this game - it's well worth the $60 (even with the duplicate songs already in RB).
I'm a little ashamed to admit it, but I like it.
Somehow Activision brought the "fun" back to the franchise. Right from the get-go... the game boots up and says PRESS START TO SKIP at the bottom. I figure there's some cut-scene video about to start, so I don't do a thing. It starts up a venue and a random song, and says to press GREEN to join now. I have my guitar in my hands so I press GREEN to play WEEZER'S WHY BOTHER. It asks me guitar or bass. After that, it asks me what difficulty. The game then drops me right into the song, and it was a plesent experience.
So after that, I started carreer... and there is an EXTREME joy in selecting your own avatar to play in the game. Sure he (or she) looks odd with the other 3 game-rendered bandmates, but your avatar is really playing guitar, spinning around and throwing up the horns at the YOU ROCK! screen. I can't explain it in words, you have to see it for yourself with your own avatar.
Back to the game... it's really not that impossible. It's clearly built from the Metallica engine, both in terms of graphics and note-charting. I played 3-4 songs on expert guitar with no problem (98-99%) and the notes felt very forgiving. During some heavy strumming sections, I felt like I wasn't 100% on the beat, but the game basically say "meh... close enough" and I kept my 4x multiplier. That is one of the big aspect of "fun" returning to this franchise.
Another aspect of the fun is the drop-in/drop-out aspect. Much like the begining of the game, just joining a random song, you can quickplay and do the same thing. OR... if you are in a status screen (after finishing a song), or any static menu, and you don't touch the controller for about 5 minutes, it automatically kicks into a random song that you can either listen to (and watch), or join in. Or, you can press start, and it will take you right back to your status screen or menu where you left off. It's little things like this that scream HAVE FUN! JUST PLAY MUSIC! ENJOY YOURSELF! Which remind me of RB1/RB2... but on a whole different level.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKVxXl_YHCE
All this "fun" might make you think the game is super casual, but I think the hardcore plastic-guitar sporting douchebag will enjoy this game much like GH3/GHWT. It's got some HARD songs. And it's back to the simplistic tier system, where you play venue 1, and unlock more songs within that venue. After a certian amount of songs, you can unlock venue 2... and move to that venue. However, if you move to the next venue right away, you only have 1-2 songs available. You have to go back and continue everything in venue 1 in order to unlock more songs. It's a nice mixture of tiers & gameplay... but quickplay is totally open to every song on the disk. Plus, anything you downloaded (DLC) for GH3/GHWT on your HDD show up in GH5. Activision finally got their act together.
Everything is quick, uncluttered, and user-friendly. If money is tight, I'd wait a few more days until RB-Beatles comes out, because I have a feeling that will be the music game of the year... but if you can rent (and maybe keep from GameFly), or spend some extra money on this game - it's well worth the $60 (even with the duplicate songs already in RB).