Post by The Chupster on Oct 28, 2007 5:18:31 GMT -5
Woo, what a mixed bag.
First off, I haven't played any online matches, but I have played through the game on Medium difficulty, so take that as you'd like. But I finished it.
If you're expecting Guitar Hero III to be the jewel of the series, you'll be wrong. That said, it's not a bad game at all, but if you really dug the shit out of Guitar Hero II, well, you're going to come away slightly disappointed.
Right off the bat, you'll notice that the songs are a very mixed bag, which has always been true, but this time, they REALLY cover a lot of area, and with fewer songs. You have 42 songs to beat in career mode, with several more that you can purchase in the store, but they're mainly bands that you've never heard of or don't really care about.
That said, as the credits were rolling, I noticed a few more songs that I never played and that weren't in the game's store, so I don't know where they come into play- probably something where you have to beat Hard to get them. Anyway. You aren't going to get all the songs on Medium.
Speaking of difficulty, there is a HUGE rift between Medium and Hard. Medium is downright simple until you hit the last couple of tiers (and probably isn't that bad, but I've been playing for like 5 hours straight, almost, and I'm so discombobulated that there's no way I could do shit now), and Hard seems almost like Expert on GHII- I tried playing through Poison's "Talk Dirty to Me" on Hard from the first tier, and I got through it, but it was a sloppy 3-star job.
The game has a lot of "slop" time- you don't have to be as precise as you had to with 2, and the game will let you off with a lot of near-misses that should have been misses.
The graphics are a mixed bag. While the models are more detailed and look great, the environments are almost too detailed and lack the same charm as those from GHII. And while they look nice, you'll get sick of the animation really quick- Neversoft has once again proven themselves the masters of recycled animation. Where in GHII your chosen guitarist would actually look like they were playing the song and getting into it, in III, there are several moments where you'll be staring at disbelief as your guitarist hops between a handful of animations, even if the song is almost over and the guitar audio is almost gone. It's like watching someone tripping on LSD, but without the cool part.
On the upside, the new boss fights- all 3 of them- are pretty cool. During these one-on-one bouts with guitar legends (well, real guitarists, anyway), you play until you hit a note with an attack icon on it, which stores the icon, and then you hit your star power to attack your opponent. Each icon does something different, but they all cause messed-up problems, from broken strings that you have to hammer on to fix, to boosting the difficulty or doubling the notes. It's pretty cool.
The new guitar is smaller than the 360 Xplorer, with a notably shorter neck that I especially dislike. It's wireless, but uses AA batteries, so stock up on rechargeables. No idea how long they'll last, but so far my XBox guide says mine is down to about 75%, so I'd expect about 24 hours of life from a fresh set.
Overall, the game's good, but it's easy to tell that it came from a different development house, and it's definitely not as good as II was. But hell, give it a try- if you like the series, you'll definitely, definitely like it.
First off, I haven't played any online matches, but I have played through the game on Medium difficulty, so take that as you'd like. But I finished it.
If you're expecting Guitar Hero III to be the jewel of the series, you'll be wrong. That said, it's not a bad game at all, but if you really dug the shit out of Guitar Hero II, well, you're going to come away slightly disappointed.
Right off the bat, you'll notice that the songs are a very mixed bag, which has always been true, but this time, they REALLY cover a lot of area, and with fewer songs. You have 42 songs to beat in career mode, with several more that you can purchase in the store, but they're mainly bands that you've never heard of or don't really care about.
That said, as the credits were rolling, I noticed a few more songs that I never played and that weren't in the game's store, so I don't know where they come into play- probably something where you have to beat Hard to get them. Anyway. You aren't going to get all the songs on Medium.
Speaking of difficulty, there is a HUGE rift between Medium and Hard. Medium is downright simple until you hit the last couple of tiers (and probably isn't that bad, but I've been playing for like 5 hours straight, almost, and I'm so discombobulated that there's no way I could do shit now), and Hard seems almost like Expert on GHII- I tried playing through Poison's "Talk Dirty to Me" on Hard from the first tier, and I got through it, but it was a sloppy 3-star job.
The game has a lot of "slop" time- you don't have to be as precise as you had to with 2, and the game will let you off with a lot of near-misses that should have been misses.
The graphics are a mixed bag. While the models are more detailed and look great, the environments are almost too detailed and lack the same charm as those from GHII. And while they look nice, you'll get sick of the animation really quick- Neversoft has once again proven themselves the masters of recycled animation. Where in GHII your chosen guitarist would actually look like they were playing the song and getting into it, in III, there are several moments where you'll be staring at disbelief as your guitarist hops between a handful of animations, even if the song is almost over and the guitar audio is almost gone. It's like watching someone tripping on LSD, but without the cool part.
On the upside, the new boss fights- all 3 of them- are pretty cool. During these one-on-one bouts with guitar legends (well, real guitarists, anyway), you play until you hit a note with an attack icon on it, which stores the icon, and then you hit your star power to attack your opponent. Each icon does something different, but they all cause messed-up problems, from broken strings that you have to hammer on to fix, to boosting the difficulty or doubling the notes. It's pretty cool.
The new guitar is smaller than the 360 Xplorer, with a notably shorter neck that I especially dislike. It's wireless, but uses AA batteries, so stock up on rechargeables. No idea how long they'll last, but so far my XBox guide says mine is down to about 75%, so I'd expect about 24 hours of life from a fresh set.
Overall, the game's good, but it's easy to tell that it came from a different development house, and it's definitely not as good as II was. But hell, give it a try- if you like the series, you'll definitely, definitely like it.
