Rock Band

"The best party game ever made, bar none."

Don't mistake Rock Band for a Guitar Hero knock-off. This comes from Harmonix, the same folks who were behind the first two Guitar Heroes (and even that silly 80s spinoff). Rock Band takes the Guitar Hero formula of rocking away on the guitar, and boosts the experience by also allowing the player and his friends to control drums and/or vocals.

Playing guitar is nearly verbatim from Guitar Hero, with some minute differences. Star Power is now called “Overdrive” and while in Overdrive more power can still be consumed to increase your current Overdrive. Additionally, on the harder difficulties there is a handy little feature on the note scale which indicates which notes can be strung via hammer-ons and pull-offs. Singing on the microphone is similar to Karaoke Revolution (another Harmonix created franchise), which does a solid job at recognizing pitch and tone like it always has, and still randomly decides to completely ignore said pitch and tone which can result in completely throwing the timing off.

The drums are the star attraction in Rock Band. Personally, the learning curve took noticeably longer compared to learning with the first Guitar Hero before feeling comfortable on the drums. Of course, I'm no professional drummer or guitarist, so those artists will likely adapt in no time, for the rest of us, there are a nice series of tutorial videos that do a tremendous job of showing the ropes for each instrument.

Instead of picking from the usual misfits from Guitar Hero past, Harmonix grants the user the ability to create their own rock star, and trick them out with a diverse selection of rock and punk-inspired clothing. Rock Band offers up the same type of progressive career mode as seen in Guitar Hero for each instrument (except bass, and now there are no encores, bummer). More cash is accrued for better rated performances, which is cashed in for new visual gear and instruments to deck out your created rocker with.

The co-op career in Guitar Hero was received well, but Rock Band takes it up a notch and then some with the “Band World Tour” where up to four people can rock across the globe at gigs all over the world. The Band World Tour is the way to play the career, as it is far more fleshed out than the standard career mode where the band is tasked with goals to achieve more fans so they can upgrade their method of transportation, hire agents, roadies and more in order to achieve ultimate fame. The only downsides to Band World Tour is early on, songs tend to repeat a lot in selection, and there is a fan cap for each level of difficulty that encourages playing on a higher level which may turn off some friends who can't shred it up as good as others.

Rock Band is all about playing with friends, and making a band and taking them on tour is spades better than the co-op career in Guitar Hero. For those that wish to play competitively there is still the face off and pro face-off modes from Guitar Hero, but now re-dubbed “Tug-of-War” and “Score Duel,” respectively. Most importantly, both these modes are compatible with all the instruments in offline local and online multiplayer! I found more people online in guitar and drums, but unfortunately a lot of people don't like to partake their mad karaoke skills online as I found no one online to battle me in “Timmy!”

Before Rock Band was released, the designers made the ambitious promise of at least three downloadable songs each week for at least a year. Rock Band already shipped with a modest play list of 58 songs (13 of which are “Bonus” tracks), while not the star studded launch list of songs that Guitar Hero III launched with comparatively, it still had a number of hits. However, after launch and as of this writing four months after release, Rock Band has lived up to its promise of three songs per weeks (with a couple of weeks with six downloads). It has actually more than doubled its overall soundtrack with additional hits like Weezer's “Buddy Holly,” Metallica's “Blackened” and Iron Maiden's “The Number of the Beast” to name a few. Best of all, these songs are slightly more affordable than the downloadable songs in Guitar Hero III, which means a friendlier beating on the wallet in the long run, which is a small price to pay to customize the soundtrack to your liking.

Visually, Rock Band takes a grown-up approach to stage and character designs when stacked up against the over-the-top, in-your-face nature of Guitar Hero. During performances there are some spiffy foam-light and other special effects which deliver a cool vibe of the band participating in a music video. The note scales and some of the stage sets look drab next to the crazy atmosphere presented in Guitar Hero, but overall Rock Band is a refreshing, more serious graphical direction for the genre.

Rock Band is an amazing package all around. There is nearly an infinite amount of replay value with a wealth of single and multiplayer options, and a ton of downloadable content to boot. Yes, the $179 retail price is a huge investment; but Rock Band is worth that experience because it is that damn good.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 04/08/08

Game Release: Rock Band (Bundle) (US, 11/20/07)