The following is my unbiased and totally honest review of Rock Band. For those of you that don’t know what Rock Band is, it’s basically guitar hero, but with drums and a mic added to the guitar/bass concept. For those of you that don’t know that game, please go fuck yourself.
That being said, THE GAMEPLAY consists of you starting a band, creating your character (you can change the sex/hair/body type/name/band name). You can have up to four players with you in the band of course, and then you pick your starting home city (London/Amsterdam/North American cities, etc) and you’re on your way. My name was Sir Guitar Rammer, but it wouldn’t fit on the screen, so I changed it to Dr. Stabs-a-Lot. The career is actually pretty involved, certainly moreso than guitar hero, you play local gigs, then buy a van so you can travel to other cities and so forth. It’s pretty fucking fun! GAMEPLAY – 9/10
THE SONGS in Rock Band are 10 times better than the guitar hero series. There are so many more songs we’ve actually listened to before, like garbage, yeah yeah yeahs, radiohead, nirvana, the clash and too many more. The song list is the best yet of these types of games, and there’s more coming out every week that you can download. I want the song “psycho killer” by the Talking Heads. SONG LIST – 9/10
THE GUITAR looks pretty cool, like a real fender from the 90’s, complete with effects switch and the wire coming out of the front of the body at an angle, just like a real friggin strat. It has the regular 5 buttons, but it also has the 5 buttons duplicated towards the body of the guitar, so you can solo up there if you’d like, since it will make girls swoon. And if you’re already a girl, you’ll swoon at yourself. But then you strap it on and start playing. And it all goes downhill from there. This guitar blows more than a windmill in Chicago. It sucks as well! Blows AND sucks, and that’s quite a feat. The buttons are unresponsive, the strummer doesn’t click, which I thought I could get used to, and thought would be better (aka, less noisy), the whammy bar feels likes its attached with twisty ties - it just all around doesn’t play well. I was missing notes that I KNOW I was hitting because the buttons started to stick a little bit. Quick fix – I went back to my guitar hero 3 guitar (which, unlike this rock band one, is wireless), and all was well. All your old GH guitars will work with this game, so no worries. GUITAR – 3/10
THE MIC was heavy, and sturdy feeling, and it was just that – a microphone. You sang into it and it translated your wailing into digital signals on screen, you know how those things work. Your pitch is measured (and judged) based on the song and the words scroll across as expected. Also, during parts where there aren’t a lot of vocals, it turns into a tambourine. Yes, like a fucking transformer. The only thing strange is that it’s a little stubby looking, but that’s more of an aesthetic preference. MIC – 9/10
THE DRUMS. Ooh boy. I set this thing up, sat down and it felt GOOD. Like I was back behind the skins again. OK, so I have been playing drums/percussion for 15 years now, and I would consider myself a professional. So I was a cocky punk, and picked the song “won’t get fooled again” by the Who. You know, the opening song to CSI: Miami. I also picked it on hard level. I figured hey, yeah, I can do this, piece of cake, go fuck yourself “The Who”. So the song starts, and let’s just say that the game bit my ass off, cooked it in a casserole and served it back to me. I fucking failed after 30 seconds! It really is nothing like playing drums. I mean sure, rhythm is integral, but after playing guitar hero for SO long, and being used to strumming notes on a guitar when seeing them come towards you on screen, it’s totally different playing the drum pads. Also, syncing the foot pedal was weird at first. So I tried “Maps” and got through it just fine, and after a couple songs I was used to the set, went back to The Who and kicked its ass – PAYBACK FUCK-HEADS!. A little bit of a learning curve on this one, but a very responsive set-up. DRUMS – 9/10
OVERALL SCORE – 9/10 (because I have a different guitar) Thanks for reading!
