Guitar Hero: Metallica

 Music, Video Games  Add comments
Mar 312009
 

GHMI have to get this out of the way first. ¬†I’ve kind of lost track of how many times Metallica has raised a hand to me. ¬†I’ve been beaten so many times, it’s hard to remember every incident. ¬†And when the smoke clears for a moment, rather than hold them accountable for their actions, I’ll just come out and say that I fell down the stairs, absolving the band yet again.

So here we are in 2009, with Metallica coming off of what is arguably their best album since 1988 and my bruises finally fading away. ¬†Did Guitar Hero: Metallica give me a fresh one or does it continue on with their rehabilitation? ¬†No one is asking me what happened to my face today if you know what I’m sayin‚Äô.

Ok, enough horrible spousal abuse comparisons, that’s just not funny. ¬†Maybe. ¬†Guitar Hero: Metallica is flat out fucking awesome. ¬†The tracklist is solid and would make even the most bitter ex-Metallica fan a little bit happy. ¬†The best part of that great tracklist is that it seems Neversoft has finally made sense of their difficulty settings. ¬†The difficulty ramps up nicely from easy to expert, as opposed to Guitar Hero III which had an easy that should’ve been a medium, and a hard that could’ve been an expert. ¬†I’m a huge puss though, that’s probably why I’m more of a Rock Band 2 guy.

To put it simply, these songs were made to be in a guitar rhythm game. ¬†You will no doubt have a blast chugging away on ‘Whiplash’, taking a breather with the underrated ‘No Leaf Clover’ and then ramping it right back up with ‘Disposable Heroes’. ¬†That song alone being on this game was enough to warrant purchase as it’s my favorite of the band.

Don’t forget this puppy supports all the other instruments Rock Band or Guitar Hero versions) and vocals as well. ¬†Bass is certainly not forgotten because this is after all a metal band that actually features the instrument (And Justice For All aside) on their albums. ¬†Playing through Orion on bass was top notch.

A lot of fuss has been made over the Expert + mode for the drums, and well, it’s hard enough that I’ll probably never bother with it. ¬†If you have the Guitar Hero drum kit, you can add a second pedal via a splitter which makes it ridiculously fun and hard. ¬†I prefer to just do the more
jammy drum tracks myself like ‘Sad But True’ but that’s probably because I’m a terrible drummer. ¬†There’s a lot for aspiring plastic drummers to love here. ¬†Go ahead and try ‘Dyer’s Eve’ on Expert, see how long your legs stay attached.

The game also features 20 something other bands which can be hit or miss depending on where your musical interests lie. ¬†Chances are if you’re a Metallica fan you’ll enjoy jamming on some Corrosion of Conformity, Slayer, or Judas Priest. ¬†I fired up Slayer’s War Ensemble on drums just to see how they translated Lombardo’s work into a colored note chart and was quickly intimidated. ¬†I failed so hard, and so quickly on that I curled up into a ball on the floor and started crying for my mommy.

Enough of my rambling. ¬†Look, this game is just fun. ¬†Metallica is perfectly suited for plastic instrumentation and if you’re a fan you should’ve already bought it. ¬†If you’re not, then you’re missing nothing. ¬†The addition of a lot of behind the scenes video and some performances of the band in small clubs is pretty sweet as well and really make this thing feel packed with goodies. ¬†It
does support importing your Death Magnetic downloadable content, but that’s it in the DLC department. ¬†It would’ve been nice to be able to add more content other than that down the road, but it doesn’t really take away from how good this game is. So go bust out your fake instruments and get crackin‚Äô already!

Recent posts by Adam

 Posted by Adam at 1:45 am  Tagged with:
   
© 2011 Media Breach Suffusion theme by Sayontan Sinha