Guitar Hero: On Tour

"Great fun, Guitar Hero works great on the DS, minus a few flaws..."

Since I love the Guitar Hero games, and own a DS, I've always been interested in this. However due to it's price tag I never got around to actually buying it. However, thanks to an amazing deal, I got Guitar Hero On Tour, with the grip, for just £12 (RRP is around £40 for it). I'm glad I managed to get, it's great fun and if you love the Guitar Hero games, you'll love this one too.

On Tour essentially brings us the same gameplay found in other Guitar Hero games. You have a solo tour and four difficulties, where you must simply pass 4 songs in a tier to unlock the encore in that group. Beating that song then allows you to move onto the next tier. The game plays almost the same. With the game you get the Guitar Grip, which plugs into the GBA slot of your DS (it's ready to fit the Lite from the get go, but if you, like me, have an original DS you have to put in the original DS adaptor, an annoying task). The grip has just four coloured buttons, Green, Red, Yellow and Blue. A lot of people may think it's rubbish for having only four frets, but even then they're tiny, and you wouldn't really be able to slide your hand down, considering how the DS is held. Four frets are fine, there isn't any need for 5. You then hold the DS like a book (or Brain Training if you will) with your left (or right) hand, whilst the strap secures your hand to the DS, your fingers are then used for the frets. A quite big pick comes with the game, this is used to strum (it's basically pick shaped, but it has that stuff on the end, whatever it is thats on the end of the stylus, so it's safe). You simply drag it across the touch screen and it strums, you don't have separate strings and you can drag it across anywhere on the screen. When you hit a held note, simply drag the pick back and forth and it does the whammy bar, simple as. When you obtain star power, you have to blow into the microphone. However this was almost a deadly design flaw. The DS Lite has the microphone on the screen hinge (ie, it's located in between the two screens), and if you're playing, the Lite microphone is in the perfect position. However if you're playing the original DS, the microphone is underneath your hand. However I have simply blown hard toward the DS and most of the time it works. It's a little dodgy sometimes, but it's not too bad. Thats essentially the game play of On Tour. Not very different from the console games, just played in a different way.

I wanted to talk about the Battle mode separately. Unfortunately none of my friends have the game, and it isn't Wi-Fi enabled (hopefully Decades will be) so I haven't tried the multiplayer out. However you can still do Battle Mode. Nope, career has no bosses. Rather, there is a whole separate career, just for Battle Mode (essentially you need to play through the game twice to get the most of it, normal career and battle mode). You simply play battle for every single song, and whoever has the highest score wins, whilst you use powerups against your enemy to hinder their playing. You can't see the other persons fret board, but it kind of adds a challenge to it. In Guitar Hero III, provided you are playing on the same difficulty, there are plenty of powerups that you could simply look at your opponents screen and play off it. Some power ups return, but for the most part, they're DS specific. They range from blowing out a fire on your guitar, reconnecting a string, or getting hit by Hyperspeed (which is solid on the DS screen), or simply using a shield to protect yourself. It's really fun, and this time your opponent isn't able to hit every note perfectly. There were plenty of times they missed a power up sequence when I didn't use any powerups, it's makes it much more fair. One massive flaw I had to point out though, was the method of activating power ups. The power ups simply sit there at the top left of the touch screen, and you have to press them to use them. You can only use one at a time, and it's incredibly hard to use one and not miss any notes. It's almost as if you have to just stop playing altogether just to activate a powerup. For me, the power ups barely activated either, requiring many taps from myself to activate them. Although I didn't actually try blowing into the mic, the game does instruct you to just touch the powerups, and it really annoyed me. For completing the Battle Mode Career you unlock the game's single bonus song.

The games set list consists of 26 songs (including the bonus one), which isn't that big compared to the other Guitar Hero games. However the sound quality is really good, and it's only a DS game after all. Yes it's still short no matter what but you can't really blame it, it's to be expected. Quite a lot of the songs are really fun to play and they're quite good. There are a few rubbish songs (Maroon 5's This Love? What the hell?) although since the DS has attracted a large casual audience, I guess a few songs are to appeal for them too. A lot of songs however are void of really cool solos, which are certainly the most fun parts to play. A few songs from Guitar Hero III are in On Tour as well, but for the most part, they're some of the best songs. The bonus song is, rather surprisingly, "I am not your Gameboy" by Freezepop (they're a Harmonix band, who unfortunately were forced to leave Guitar Hero, then went on to make Rock Band). It's not really that hard or anything, and the song was probably picked for it's name. It's not a bad song, but it was slightly disappointing, considering it was the only unlockable song in the game. The difficulty isn't too bad. If you're a Guitar Hero veteran you'll have no problem. The only song I failed was "I don't wanna stop" since the solo completely threw me off, and I had no star power. However, even for veterans, the game still has challenge, and that is in it's strumming. The strumming is hard to get used to and requires slightly more skill. Single notes are easy to hit, but any strumming sequences are hard to get used to, and at time of writing, the only song I haven't 5* on Expert is Knock Me Down. The note chart itself is easy, I'd probably have 5* it easily on a console Guitar Hero. However the strumming really does add challenge, so you'll probably need a little practice to get it right.

If you love the Guitar Hero games, by all means go out and get it. It's great fun and really enjoyable. The gameplay is more Guitar Hero, however it's played in a completely different way which makes it more fun in some cases. The annoying Battle Mode and lack of WiFi are annoying, however the game is still great fun, and I definitely recommend it to anyone that has a DS.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 09/16/08

Game Release: Guitar Hero: On Tour (EU, 07/18/08)