guitar hero 5 was REALLY REALLY REALLY good
Meh. GH5 came out at around the same time I got Rock Band 2. I heard about it and its impressive track quantity and lived in my RB2 world in squalor. I always felt like I was missing out every time I plugged in RB2 to satisfy my Music Game cravings, I thought there was another game out there that was doing this better.
Well, a few months into 2010, I got a copy.
The thing that makes a music game is its soundtrack. Overall, it needs good songs that are somewhat memorable, but unknown surprises are always heartily welcomed.
Rock Band 2 opened with Eye of the Tiger, hit Act 2 with White Wedding, and finished with Everlong, Painkiller, and Battery. Best Soundtrack in a music game so far. (haven't played RB3 yet... still behind) On top of that, RB2 seemed to be more focused on the show of a concert, immersing the players and, in a rockstar sim, making them feel like they were really a rockstar. The "
ick-and-choose" World Tour was an excellent far cry from "Here is a list of songs. You will play every single one until I run out of paper" mode that is present in Guitar hero since day 1.
On top of that we have full character customization (I think it was added in later renditions of GH, but until then I just played Lars Umulat cuz he was phat) constantly-updated "Battle of The Bands" weekly challenges, and mini-challenges to complete on the side.
Guitar Hero 5 just doesn't deliver on all those points. The song creator is cool and all, but a bit too deep for some people, the game is graphically pleasing but fails to immerse you in the concert experience, and the soundtrack never seems to deliver with any heavy hitters (excluding that one Dethklok track I downloaded and ADORE playing the solo for).
GH kinda started to smell funny when Harmonix left (GH2 was their last game in the franchise, everything after was Red Octane) and really stunk with Guitar Hero 5. Sure, Party Play was cool, but a year later, Rock Band 3 came around with a shovel, walked up to the bleeding, crawling, gasping for air GH franchise, and gave it the final shovel to the head to kill it once and for all.
-Chillz
