Guitar Hero

aka: Jita Yingxiong
Moby ID: 19812
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Description official description

Guitar Hero simulates the thrill and the glory of rock 'n' roll. Choose from eight different characters, from classic rockers to metal heads, and build a career as a working rock musician.

The real kick is in the gameplay, which incorporates an included guitar-shaped controller. It allows you to "play along" with 30 awesome rock tunes by pressing fret buttons and working a responsive and durable strum bar. There's even a whammy bar for extreme action. The songs include selections from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Boston, Audioslave and White Zombie.

Four difficulty levels test your skills and six venues will place you before increasingly larger audiences. You love rock music. You're a master at air guitar. Take the next step and walk a career's worth of miles in a rocker's shoes.

Spellings

  • 吉他英雄 - Chinese spelling (simplified)

Groups +

Screenshots

Promos

Credits (PlayStation 2 version)

138 People · View all

Producer
Production Assistant
Music Committee
QA Lead
QA Analysts
Production Manager
Production Coordinator
Guitar Design Lead
Guitar Design
  • RedOctane
  • Harmonix
CEO
VP of Business Development
VP of Marketing
Marketing Specialist
Operations
Company Store
Customer Support
[ full credits ]

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 92% (based on 86 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.9 out of 5 (based on 53 ratings with 1 reviews)

Works better as a "Family Karaoke" than a game...

The Good
Ooooh, the tracks on this game. Viva la 70's rock ballads! I was never really exposed to 70's rock music, growing up with the 80's pop culture, but this is music knowledge one needs to know about!

The game is basically about pressing the right buttons at the right time on the "simulation guitar". The more right sequences you press, the more thrilled the crowd will until you successfully complete the song. The first time I played it I thought this game TOTALLY ROCKS. Well, it had a good first impression at least...

The higher the levels, the more buttons to press (at the same time) adding complexity to the game. There are a lot of great songs to choose from, so from an educational point of view, you can catch up on 70's music history!

My younger relatives came and visited and this game was a blast. You can sing a long while watching other people try to beat the game. The fact that they use original lyrics and voices only adds the fun and nostalgia.



The Bad
Unfortunately, the game gets pretty lame when your playing alone. There isn't really much reason to continue or finish the game.

It's just pressing the right buttons. The only song I liked was "I love Rock and Roll". Apparently the other rock ballads weren't as fun to play with in this game. There isn't a "sense of purpose" or 'sense of achievement" in the game. If you have win cash in the game for each gig, you can "buy" new props or items. But ALL are useless. New guitars doesn't do anything, and that's the only thing that has to do with the gameplay. The other stuff are worthless, new songs (but can't win money when you play it) and other production mumbo-jumbo. WHERE'S THE GAMEPLAY???

If you've played games like Grand Turismo, you understand the feeling of "upgrading your car". Here you can't upgrade squat. Getting money for successfull gigs didn't do squat, unless I'm missing something (which I doubt).

Higher levels are ridiculously difficult. My fingers just can't seem to keep up. Probably the bad thing about the controlling is that you can't configure the buttons to your liking. I did not quite agree with the controls in this game. It probably would be a little better if you could manually configure the controls.

When the game mentioned starting a "carrier" I was expecting a progress in story. Turns out there isn't a story. I only reached the 2nd pub before I got bored. Since there's nothing to achieve, there isn't much point to continue.

Lastly, for some odd reason, in the version I got, the tutorial doesn't work.

The Bottom Line
This is a game where there needs to be 2 people or more to be considered actually fun. Playing it alone is boring.

PlayStation 2 · by Indra was here (20760) · 2006

Discussion

Subject By Date
Shredz64 - Guitar Hero on the Commodore 64 Sciere (923797) Nov 27, 2007

Trivia

1001 Video Games

Guitar Hero appears in the book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die by General Editor Tony Mott.

Cancelled Xbox version

The Xbox version of Guitar Hero was being developed by Mad Catz, but they pulled out because of a lawsuit with Konami, meaning that the game was only released on PS2.

References

The knobs on the amplifiers as the game loads go up to 11, rather than 10. This is a reference to a scene in the film This Is Spinal Tap.

Awards

  • 4Players
    • 2006 – #3 Best PlayStation 2 Game of the Year
    • 2006 – Biggest Surprise of the Year
    • 2006 – Best Licensed Soundtrack of the Year
    • 2006 – #2 Best Hardware of the Year (for its controller)
  • GameSpy
    • 2005 – #7 PS2 Game of the Year
    • 2005 – Best Party Game of the Year (PS2)

Information also contributed by sgtcook.

Analytics

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Identifiers +

  • MobyGames ID: 19812
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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Bill Cook.

Additional contributors: Unicorn Lynx, Sciere, Martin Smith, DreinIX, Cantillon, Patrick Bregger, FatherJack.

Game added November 3, 2005. Last modified February 12, 2024.