Rock Band > Guitar Hero 3

Well, hey, lookie here, I’m in the local paper!

Last week, Rob Thomas of the Capital Times called me up to talk to me about a paper I wrote for an educational psychology class last spring, on expertise in Guitar Hero. I’ve posted on this little blog about that paper before, but in case you missed it, here’s the original post I made about it over the summer. I’m pretty happy with how the article turned out, and it’s fun to see a little project like this end up getting some unexpected play in the local media.

Which brings up that I’ve been neglecting this poor little blog lately, and apologize for that. I’ve been too busy writing (two book chapters mostly done this semester, plus one journal article), taking classes, and, uh, playing videogames. Lately, that’s been more World of Warcraft than anything, but I have spent a fair amount of time on both Guitar Hero 3 and Rock Band (imagine Guitar Hero plus drums and vocals), so I might as well post some initial impressions.

First of all, if you didn’t already know, there was a bit of an unhappy divorce between Harmonix and Red Octane (respectively, the game developer and hardware manufacturer behind the first two Guitar Hero games). Red Octane got purchased by Activision, Harmonix got purchased by MTV, and suddenly consumers ended up with a choice of two different fake-guitar gaming franchises. So, Red Octane/Activision/Neversoft = Guitar Hero 3, while Harmonix/MTV = Rock Band. In my opinion, the only real choice between the games comes down to money, as the games are light years apart from one another in gameplay, quality, and fun.

Guitar Hero 3 is, without a doubt, the worst game in the series. I bought the PS2 version, and didn’t get a new guitar (two plastic guitar controllers is enough for my little apartment, thanks), so I can’t comment on the Xbox 360 version, nor the Wii version. But, if the game itself is anything like the PS2 game, it’s the gaming equivalent of a band “selling out.” Neversoft are the new game developers for the Guitar Hero franchise and are developers of the Tony Hawk series of games. And, frankly, I’m not sure how many of them actually play musical instruments, because the weird joy of sort of playing a musical instrument seems to be gone.

In its place, we’ve now got some terrible anime-style cut scenes (featuring everyone in your fake band other than you!), inexplicable leather clad women dancers who come out on the stage to the sound of a guitar going (I kid you not) “bow chika bow bow,” not to mention on-screen drummers who can’t keep a beat. In terms of the actual playing of the game, not much is different — no terribly consequential new bells nor whistles, and the songs are, uh, okay, I guess? Generally, it’s a waste of time at best and offensively dumb at worst. The images of women in the game seem suddenly trashier and creepier than in the earlier games in the series, and playing guitar on it seems more like button-mashing than ever before.

But, back to the gameplay — whose bright idea was it to add a ton of difficult and utterly unnecessary guitar noodling at the beginning of “Holiday in Cambodia” so I’d have to actually go and use practice mode on a song I already know how to play on the real guitar? This kind of thing just pisses me off. Somewhere, Neversoft got it in their heads that the first two Guitar Hero games were fun, but not challenging enough for “real gamers,” perhaps, and added crap to songs (moreso than the previous two games ever did) in order to be challenging for seasoned Guitar Hero players. Not to mention that, though the set list for Guitar Hero 3 looks great on paper, the songs they chose are really not that fun to play, when all’s said and done. I keep going back to “My Name is Jonas,” “One,” and a few others for replaying, but the songs I thought I’d have fun playing (”Holiday in Cambodia,” “Kool Thing,” “Anarchy in the UK”) are truly boring.

Contrast this with Rock Band, a game that is so far and above Guitar Hero 3 in nearly every aspect, there’s just no contest. Playing Rock Band with a bunch of friends is a whole new experience — my throat is hoarse from belting out “Sabotage” yesterday, and playing the drums on Expert is, frankly, like you’re really playing the drums. The avatar creation is sleek and integrated into the game (even the loading screens feature your band in goofy poses with your avatar), and while I normally don’t think I care about such things, whaddya know, it turns out I find that kinda fun. Playing the guitar isn’t any different from Guitar Hero, really, but it’s the rest of the game which makes it worthwhile — the little things, from the way the crowd will sing along with you (even your guitar solos!) if you’re playing well, to the simple game mechanic of letting other members of your band save you mid-song should you fail. And the artwork and graphic design are just fantastic.

Plus, the songs: Harmonix chose songs I probably wouldn’t have ever considered (”Maps,” “Dani California,” “Suffragette City,” “Go With the Flow,” etc.) and they simply… work. Unlike Guitar Hero 3, the songs seem like a slightly more risky mix — how many regular Wal-Mart shoppers would even know who The New Pornographers are? But, it pays off. What Rock Band gives you is a set of songs that are genuinely fun to play as a group, even if one doesn’t know them before playing. It’s like an interactive mixtape made by a bunch of people who both know a variety of music, and know how to design good gameplay.

The only two flaws of Rock Band are the crappier guitar controller (I’ve already had to fix the one we bought due to the downstroke failing on the picking button), and the heftier price tag ($180 is what I spent on the Xbox 360 version vs. $60 for Guitar Hero 3). But, it’s worth every penny and (so far at least, knock on plastic) every problem with the guitar controller. Harmonix sure seem to be, first and foremost, musicians who develop games, while Neversoft appear to be game developers who hired a few musicians to help them figure out this new (to them) franchise. Rock Band is good enough that I will probably buy an Xbox 360 within the next few months, just to play this game (not to mention playing online, which still blows my mind).

If you can afford Rock Band, go out and get it!