TGuitar Herohis isn’t a game review site and I’m not going to get into doing ‘proper’ reviews of games, but given how often I’ve mentioned Guitar Hero on the Forge, I felt I should at least provide my impressions.

First off, this isn’t a sequel in the traditional sense. It’s more of an expansion in the sense that there aren’t really any changes to the fundamental gameplay beyond adding three note chords. Sounds unimpressive, but in fact, the original Guitar Hero was missing some obvious peripheral but useful features, like the ability to play multiplayer but on different difficult levels and the ability to practice particular passages of songs at various speed levels in order to master them. Guitar Hero 2 fixes nearly all of these omissions and simply adds polish to everything else.

There were some great moments today:

  • Discovering for the first time how much fun it is to play co-operatively rather than competitively. This wasn’t unexpected. I don’t play Guitar Hero to score points for the most part.
  • Realizing that Guitar Hero 2 is a lot harder than Guitar Hero. I mean, by the end of the day, Chris and I had gotten to the seventh (out of eight) group of songs, meaning we had gotten to the 2nd hardest group on ‘Hard’, but not ‘Expert’. I can easily beat all of the songs on the original on Hard. Let’s just say that ‘Psychobilly Freakout’ is as crazy as it sounds. I really fear finally getting to the last group of songs. They’re going to be ballbreakers.
  • Sweet Child O’ Mine. I felt like it was 1988 again and I was at one of my first rock concerts. It was simply rockalicious.

I do have a couple complaints. First is the song list. There are too many ‘meh’ songs by bands like “Avenged Sevenfold.” It’s quite possible I’m just out of touch with guitar rock, I’ll grant. My second complaint is pretty minor, and the fact that I bother to bring it up at all is a testament to what a fantastic game this is: The little ’sayings’ on the loading screens are terrible. In the first Guitar Hero, they were generally amusing references to the rock and roll lifestyle. In Guitar Hero 2, they read like they were written by Harmonix’s accountant or something.

That’s it. That’s my review. Personally, I couldn’t have continued living without playing this game and while I’m not 100% satisfied, I’d trade three camels and a bushel of virgins for this game. Perhaps you only have two camels. In that case, just wait until there are used copies available and EB Games will likely give it to you for the two camels and a few cans of pickeled herring.

Rock on.