Game Review - Guitar Hero (Franchise)

As a hardcore fan of music and rhythm video games, I got rather excited when I heard the initial rumors surrounding Harmonix’s new project; Guitar Hero. At that point I was a Dance Dance Revolution fanatic with years of experience in Parappa The Rapper, Bust-A-Groove, Amplitude, Frequency, Beatmania, and Pop’n Music. Hell, getting a new music game was just what I needed after backwashing DDRMAX 2 for the past half a year. However, as they say in show business: “Guitar Hero sucked.”

No, seriously, that’s a legitimate Hollywood slogan. Look it up.

Once upon a time, this rip tide music extravaganza released to the general public on November 8th, 2005 for a hefty sum of seventy nine dollars and ninety nine cents. The title received positive reviews from everyone (but me) due to the fact that America is very impressed with anything “shiny.” Thanks to that dull minded thought structure, the game has received cult status within the industry, landing it several different awards issued by several different groups of stinky people living in their parents’ basements. You may be asking yourself what it is I have against this crème brulee of crappy music games. If you think I’m not gonna devote multiple pages of rhetoric to my deep beliefs about this product, then you must be new to the site. Pull up a chair newb, as this may take a while.

The first thing this game does have going for it is a continuous theme. From beginning to end, the whole game’s interface is limited to stupid, garage band, high school face cancer artwork. From the options being written poorly on a scratch piece of paper to the name input placed above the urinal in a disgusting bathroom, this game sticks to its guns. Unfortunately for us, the guns are disappointing and unprofessional looking. The entire GUI feels like it was thrown together in half a work day by a guy who can’t even spell “lol” right. Any game where your first graphical impression comes from a crumpled piece of loose-leaf paper does nothing for the credibility of the Photoshop team (or lack there of). Buck up Harmonix and hire a competent artist, or at least someone who doesn’t crumple the paper before scanning it, unless this is an aesthetic you desired. In that case, I imagine your Gamasutra job posting looked like this:

Harmonix – job openings

Job Title: Fat Asshole

Job Description: Will work closely with the scanner. We named it “Fred.” Sometimes you have to jiggle the cord in back to get “Fred” to work properly.

Must have at least 20 seconds of Photoshop experience.
Must have 3 college degrees for no reason.
Must be able to pin “tail” on “donkey.”
Must be both fat and an asshole (prepare to show portfolio of work)
Must have at least 2 years of experience crumpling paper.

The other thing I immediately noticed about the graphics is the plethora of character doodles all over the place. Little lightning bolts, skulls, dragons, knives, etc decorate the sidelines of the option/set up screens. It’s like half the budget went to a 7th grader with ADD sitting in math class. He doodles a bunch of shit, puts it in his portfolio and BAM! Harmonix has a new “Art Director.”

The obvious follow up to the art is the game's soundtrack. I actually give some solid points to Guitar Hero for laying down some decent covers of classic rock hits. Some are better than others, of course, but on the whole I was kind of impressed with the quality of the covers and attention to detail. They tried very hard to make everyone of each age group happy with the song selection by taking hits from all the classic eras. I can see the point in this, but personally I wish they chose less crap. Either way, this isn’t what bothers me about the music in the game, but I’ll tell you what is; song length.

Apparently Harmonix wasn’t paying attention to this detail when setting up parameters for game play. DDR had it right; cut that shit down to 1:30 or 2 minutes at max. When I play a game where the inherent action focuses on a song, I want it to come, kick ass, then leave. I don’t need my song to hang around like an unemployed uncle who mooches my ho-hos. The best example I can give is the classic hit “Smoke on the Water.” We all know the stupid hook that repeats itself whenever some shackle cat picks up a guitar, so we don’t need to play it FOR SIX MINUTES STRAIGHT!! Good holy caravan of FUCK, what the hell were they thinking?! That song is devastatingly boring no matter how you slice it, so when you loop it for the better half of 10 minutes, the human soul gets shaken away like etch-a-sketch art. Well fuck that. The boys and girls at Harmonix need to google “audio editing” and put the knowledge to good use. Sometimes I’m even convinced they elongate the songs just to fuck with me. I’ll bet some shackle cat in the audio department decided that “Monkey Wrench” just wasn’t long enough and needed another 4 repeats of the chorus at the end.

Audio Director: “Hey guys, I have a great idea!”

Don’t want to be your monkey wrench.
One more indecent accident.
I’d rather leave than suffer this.
I’ll never be your monkey wrench.
Don’t want to be your monkey wrench.
One more indecent accident.
I’d rather leave than suffer this.
I’ll never be your monkey wrench.
Don’t want to be your monkey wrench.
One more indecent accident.
I’d rather leave than suffer this.
I’ll never be your monkey wrench.
Don’t want to be your monkey wrench.
One more indecent accident.
I’d rather leave than suffer this.
I’ll never be your monkey wrench.
Don’t want to be your monkey wrench.
One more indecent accident.
I’d rather leave than suffer this.
I’ll never be your waldo wrench.
Don’t want to be your monkey wrench.
One more indecent accident.
I’d rather leave than suffer this.
I’ll never be your monkey wrench.
Don’t want to be your monkey wrench.
One more indecent accident.
I’d rather leave than suffer this.
I’ll never be your monkey wrench.
Don’t want to be your monkey wrench.
One more indecent accident.
I’d rather leave than suffer this.
I’ll never be your monkey wrench.

Did you find Waldo?

Another thing that tickles my respect for this game (in the taint) is its inability to stick to those guns we mentioned earlier. By the third installment of the five-finger-franchise, the game has done away with the “cover band” idea that themed so well (crumple the paper!) and went ahead and replaced it with the original tracks by the original artists. So, wait. Now you’re not a cover band who plays Aerosmith. Now you just are Aerosmith. That doesn’t make any sense to the consistency of the game since the on-screen avatars are obviously not Steven Tyler and crew. And what’s worse is that the title has a mixture of original tracks, covers of tracks, and the inevitable new music by bands that don’t belong in the series. I suppose it would have been OK to just get all of the original multis at this point and re-theme the game. That would have been an acceptable change of plans, however, the consistency is questionable with the mix now taking whatever professional quality the title had left and flushed it down the toilet (along with your initials). In short, this franchise keeps losing whatever credibility it had to begin with on every sequel installation. Most video games follow what I call “Opposite Day: Hollywood!” We all know that movie sequels generally go farther downhill with every addition, but video games follow an opposite path. Most games get better with the continuation of their franchise. The following examples prove (yet again) that I am undoubtedly correct (get over it).

Mega Man – Mega Man 2
Half Life – Half Life 2
DDR Max – DDR Max 2
Street Fighter – Street Fighter 2
Marvel VS Capcom – Marvel VS Capcom 2
Shaq Fu – Shaq Fu 2
Etc, etc, etc…

You get the point. Anyways, this game series ended up being ironically sold to the one company that could give a shit less about music- MTV. The corporation’s game studio, Neversoft (sounds like a Viagra subsidiary) is now responsible for the completion and shipping of future installments. This can only serve to hurt the game even more (insert metaphor- kick ‘em while they’re down) and over time will probably derail the series into an arcade fishing game. MTV has proven many times that they know nothing about the creation of a solid video game title and will no doubt continue to do so in their very own style with the Guitar Hero series. While some companies might say “quantity over quality,” MTV says “quality is for drunken pussies.”


On another note, the franchise has been dually ruined by the inclusion of internet pop culture within its ranks. Since the original release, we’ve endured tracks from Home Star Runner’s Limozeen, Metalocalypse’s Dethklok, and Boston’s synth pop icons; Freezepop. Don’t get me wrong. I have a very special place in my heart for Freezepop on and off their instruments. Talented people to say the least, but just because they’re good at what they do doesn’t mean they should be filling space in a rock ’n’ roll game. The product itself even makes fun of that during the loading screen.

“I’ll bet you weren’t expecting to see Freezepop in this game!”

You’re right, Guitar Hero. I wasn’t expecting that. I also don’t expect to see a humpback whale enjoying chamomile tea in this game, but I swear to chocolate fuck-cakes, if you show me that, I am driving to Boston to blaring the song “Violent Murder Banana” on my stereo with anger in my heart. What? Of course you haven’t heard of that song. I haven’t written it yet. But when I do……Harmonix, watch the fuck out. As far as the other songs I mentioned go, they just stole more street cred from Harmonix with their inclusion. Them being accounted for only validates that Americans are stupid and enjoy anything shiny. At this point they might as well include “Hamster Dance” and “Chocolate Rain.”

Something else I find rather interesting: *information* The publishing company Red Octane had a legal battle with Konami several years ago due to a copyright hassle involving a 3rd party dance pad. Apparently Red Octane created this dance pad so Konami couldn’t rape your average consumer on the price tag for dance game enjoyment. This seemed like a noble endeavor on behalf of the R.O. boys, until you look at the cold hard facts. Several years later, Red Octane became the publisher for Guitar Hero (duh) and went on their own little legal adventure. Another 3rd party developer made a guitar controller for the game with similar intensions to Red Octane’s dance pad days. However, Red Octane turned a blind eye to justice and took the same road Konami tread just a few years earlier by loading their legal canon with lawsuit ammo. I guess the almighty dollar (and fat bottomed girls) make the (rockin’) world go ‘round.

One last thing I want to mention before I wrap this up and kick it under the table. Game companies and fan boys (my least favorite species) love to claim this game’s originality is what sets it apart from knock-offs just trying to cash in on the “quick dollar.” For starters, you incompetent colostomy bags, Guitar Freaks did this exact same thing roughly 5 years before Harmonix even hit the drawing board. That title was a success in Japan because for its time, it was (in fact) a clever, new idea. People like new. Americans like shiny.

In conclusion, Guitar Hero blows goats and I have proof. While the idea behind the game is fairly solid, the execution was nothing to write home about. Plenty of people will try to prove me wrong, but can’t. Because all of my arguments are backed by science, your retaliations at my article will mean absolutely nothing. Also, you are ugly and your mother is a fat person who has difficulty getting laid because she is fat. I have faith.

The George Michael single.

Which (with any luck) should be in Guitar Hero.

Until next horrible thing,
-Sassy Frog