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Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock

Publisher: Activision
Developer: Neversoft
Genre: Rhythm Game
Author: MrCHUPON

FIMP: Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock [X360]

"Day One of DigitalLife, neither co-op play nor the much-vaunted Battle Mode was on display. Perhaps this will change tomorrow."

At this year's DigitalLife conference, we had the chance to take a peek at a Guitar Hero III demo for the Xbox 360. RedOctane had a booth set up alongside a small exhibit set up by the Gibson Guitar Company, offering up real guitars for people to play with. But for those of us concerned with them dang vidjagames, the RedOctane booth had around ten - give or take - stations set up with Xbox 360s and single Gibson X-Plorer guitars. That's right - on Day One of DigitalLife, neither co-op play nor the much-vaunted Battle Mode was on display. Perhaps this will change tomorrow.

With that disappointment out of the way, we still had ten songs to fool around with. The demo consisted of the following songs (*** = the ones we played):

The Metal / Tenacious D ***
Hit Me With Your Best Shot / Pat Benatar
Even Flow / Pearl Jam
Rock You Like A Hurricane / The Scorpions ***
Avalancha / Heroes del Silencio ***
Lay Down / Priestess
Closer / Lacuna Coil
Take This Life / In Flames ***
Hier Kommt Alex / Die Toten Hosen

Here are some key takeaways from Day One of playing:

- The animations for the characters are much more life-like and smooth this time around. It's quite strange seeing these cartoonish, animated fellows moving in such a life-like fashion.

- The "Star Power" initiation "reaction" hasn't been coded in. So when we tilted our guitars, the notes just turned bright blue - no zap, no fireworks, no nothing. It was just bizarre to experience since we're so used to seeing some feedback. This will almost certainly change in the final version, unless we're wrong and that's how it's going to be.

- None of the guitars at Day One were the new model with the detachable neck. They were all the standard Xbox 360 Gibson X-Plorers. Thus we didn't get a feel for how the new guitar felt.

- Hammer-ons and Pull-offs (HO/PO) felt more lenient this time around. It's not quite as grand as the leap from Guitar Hero to Guitar Hero II, but let's put it this way. In the din of the event we couldn't hear the music and were thus played slightly off rhythm in some difficult phrases. The game was very forgiving and our note streak flourished. HO/PO's weren't the only thing that felt lenient, either - some of the strum timing felt looser, as well. Whether this is a good or bad thing is up to you, but it does make the game feel much more accessible as evidenced by our ability to sight-read relatively easily.

- You get Note Streak notices every hundred notes. There's also a Note Streak counter in the corner by your multiplier meter. Good for getting yourself distracted while you're trying to concentrate.

- We - well, MrCHUPON - failed Take This Life in about 10 seconds. While he considers himself pretty gifted, he... can't trill. "Take This Life" opens with, you guessed it, a series of nasty, long trills. The din made it even harder to hear where we were supposed to hit the notes. So, there you go.

- The "less exciting" parts of the songs we played still managed to be fun. Tricky chord changes and HO/PO's litter the main riffs of "The Metal" and "Avaanchia", for instance. "Rock You Like A Hurricane" has an extremely melodic, fun and challenging solo to contend with.

Without testing out the Battle Mode, it's hard to say just how new Guitar Hero III will feel. As it stands, it simply feels like a more accessible rehash with new songs. But then, who cares, right? "It's Guitar Hero" is the quick answer, and as long as the core game isn't tampered with, it'll likely remain fun for a really long time.

check out some of the shots we captured from the show floor.

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