• 12Oct 09

  Early Review of Guitar Hero Van Halen

  Like lots of people who bought Guitar Hero 5 back when it came out, I just recently got my copy of Guitar Hero Van Halen recently. The game doesn't drop until December, but I figured people might want to know if this game if worth the money, or if Activision just went and tried to squeeze more profit from the cash cow series.

  Gameplay: GH:VH uses the Guitar Hero: World Tour engine, surprising because that GH5's engine was just released. It doesn't change the mechanics in the least, as it has been since the series began. The game's career progression is also extremely similar to that of GH:WT, in that you only need to earn a certain number of stars to unlock more songs. The multiplayer is an essential copy and paste of GH:WT, except with different songs. Not that this is a bad thing, of course, but some innovation would have been appreciated. The ease of access to the game is less than that GH5.

  Sound: The catalogue is mainly Van Halen, as it should be. But all the songs by Van Halen are pre-Hagar songs. So "Dreams" and beyond are not there. The game includes 3 famous guitar solo songs by Eddie himself, including the venerable Eruption, along with Spanish Fly and Cathedral. While the Van Halen songs are well and good, some of the other songs seem a bit ill-picked. I personally doubled over when I saw "Stacy's Mom" as a track. But I guess that's what happens when you trust Wolfgang Van Halen, Eddie's son, to pick out songs for the list.

  Graphics: Like I mentioned earlier, the game uses the GH:WT engine, so the visuals are decent. The recreation of the band is impressive, including finger animating on Eddie and Wolfgang and the stages. The mainstay characters like Johnny Napalm and Judy Nails are still there, but besides slight costume adjustments, they are extremely similar to GH:WT's rendition. The menus are a lot cleaner than previous games, but not nearly as much as GH5.

  In the end, it really boils down to your love of the band. If you are a Van Halen fan, like hard rock, or like Guitar Hero in general, you'll enjoy this game. While lots of work has been done to make the game unique, you will not be able to shake the feeling that this is just like what happened in Guitar Hero: Aerosmith; in that the game was just copied and pasted. I can't complain about the price because I got it for free, but it is justifiable at a possible $60 price point.

  I give the game a 8.0 out of 10. It tries to be its own game, and it provides a fun experience, but underneath it all, it's like the art director had an Eruption all over GH:WT.

  • Posted Oct 12, 2009 2:17 pm GMT
  • Category: Games
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• 24Sep 09

  Guitar Hero 5: The New Method of Promotion?

  Recently, Activision pumped out another iteration of Guitar Hero. To many players, this just seems like another brick in the wall of music games on the market. While it does seem that Activision is just squeezing the music-game teat dry, this latest addition to the series brought along something that almost no game has before: a copy of an unreleased game.

  Lots of times, games sold through Steam or other online distributors will give you a copy of an older game in the series when you preorder the latest version. Activision offered a free copy of Guitar Hero: Van Halen, which has of yet not hit the shelves. While it may not bolster sales to gamers who dislike the series as a whole, it certainly gives incentive to fans and gamers who want to get into the series.

  It also begs this question: how long until other companies copy this? Imagine if, with the purchase of Halo ODST, you got a voucher for a free copy of Halo: Reach? That alone would send sales of the game past almost every other game for the Xbox, combined.

  The point is that while the latest Guitar Hero may not have been a humongous breakthrough in terms of gameplay, it brought a completely new method of promotion. Who knows what impact this will have?

  p.s. I am a Guitar Hero fan, always have been, always will be.

  • Posted Sep 24, 2009 7:30 pm GMT
  • Category: Games
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• 4Dec 08

  GTA 4 for PC (with a comparison to Saints Row 2)

  I personally bought GTA 4 on opening day fro the 360, and I loved it. The gameplay and graphics were wonderful, only bested by the addition of online multiplayer and the promise of DLC.

  Now that the port to PC has been released, everyone is complaining about the steep system requirements and DRM. Does anyone besides me see that this has been the case for GTA since GTA 3? The computer version always requires more power to run. Also, What about Spore, Mass Effect, and other titles that were hated for the DRM? Seriously, if those are the problems, don't waste several thousand dollars buying a system that can run it; buy an Xbox 360.

  Also, the semi-recent release of Saints Row 2 has me thinking. I don't understand why people would think that GTA 4 is better. While GTA 4 has better graphics, sound, and storyline, it fails to deliver in the biggest area of gaming: FUN! While doing the little things in the game like watching TV or going to a strip club are slightly fun, they don't really engage you. Saints Row 2 provides fun out the wazoo, with some new distraction/activity/mission/fun thing at every turn. Want to go streaking? Go ahead. Want to surf on a car? Have fun. Want to surf on a car while naked? Go for it. It never lets narrative or realismget in the way of something games should provide: FUN!

  Thus is my rant. If anyone actually reads this, I hope this messages opens some minds.

  • Posted Dec 4, 2008 5:48 pm GMT
  • Category: Opinion
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