
	Platform Playstation 3 Genre Music Publisher Activision Developer Neversoft ESRB T (Teen) Released September 28, 2010

- Solid tracklist, even if some crossover with rock band - Improved career mode - Quickplay+ Mode - Support for old GH games and old DLC

- Laughable story - No real innovation - DLC pales in comparison to Rock Band

Review: Guitar Hero 5 (PS3) Review: Guitar Hero: World Tour (360) Review: Dance on Broadway (Wii)
Newsletter
Be notified of site updates. Sign-up for the Newsletter sent out twice weekly. Enter E-Mail Address Below: Subscribe \| Unsubscribe

Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock

Score: 7.0 / 10

The last two years have a seen a swathe of music games released by both Rock Band developer Harmonix and Guitar Hero developer Neversoft. The games released over the last two years seem to have hit a peak in terms of creativity and innovation. Guitar Hero Warriors of Rock (GHWOR) does little to change that impression as it attempts to goes back to its roots and focus less on innovation.

The biggest change in this years game is the addition story driven career called Quest Mode. The Quest Mode, narrated by Kiss’ Gene Simmons, sees you on a

Advertisement

- Playstation 3 Game Reviews
- Music Game Reviews
- Games Published by Activision

journey to save the DemiGod of Rock from a creature called “The Beast”. On your journey you’ll recruit Rock’N’Roll warriors who eventually transform into their monster alter ego. Each of the characters features their own unique skill set. For example certain characters maybe able to increase your score multiplier beyond the normal limit or automatically increase your star count. Each

Advertisement

warrior features their own venue and setlist of songs that must be beaten to advance through the story mode. Rather than playing through the entire setlist of the songs for each venue, you’re merely required to achieve a minimum number of stars per venue. This change is welcome as you can work your way through the career mode much quicker. The career is fairly open ended as you usually have several characters to play as at one time.

The new changes to the career mode are welcome, but the story feels like an unnecessary distraction. Most of the critiques regarding rhythm games do not involve the lack of story. I got the feeling from playing the story mode was that the time spent creating the story could have been better used innovating and pushing the genre in a new direction much like Harmonix did with Rock Band 3.

Quickplay+ is a welcome addition to the franchise. Quickplay+ assigns multiple challenges to each song in your library and extends the replay value for quite some time. Party Play, which was first featured in GH5 also makes an appearance.

My biggest complain with GH5 was the diversity of the tracklist. The setlist was too varied for my liking as I have always been a fan of hard rock. GHWOR goes back to its GH3 roots by focusing more heavily on hard rock and metal. The tracklist is probably the best since GH3. Neversoft largely focuses on songs that are aimed at guitar players first and foremost. This approach largely pays off as most of the songs are fantastic to play and present a formidable challenge.

The noteable artists included in this year’s game include Queen, Kiss, Slipknot, Pantera, Avenged Sevenfold and Rise Against. There are several on disc songs, which are strange choices, but all around the setlist is solid. My only real complaint with the setlist is that some of the on disc songs are already available for Rock Band.

Out of the gate, GHWOR supports weekly DLC, but the DLC pales in comparison to Rock Band. At this point Rock Band has over 2000 DLC songs, while GHWOR supports roughly 400-500 songs. GHWOR does allow you to import some songs from previous Guitar Hero titles including Metallica, GH5 and Band Hero. Unfortunately, GH Van Halen is not supported at this time.

The presentation has a slightly darker tone than previous GH titles, but generally everything else looks the same. The only real standout in the game’s presentation is the choreographed performances during certain songs such as Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody. Also gone are musician avatars, which landed Activision in hot water last year. The musician avatars felt more like a distraction and after Kurt Cobain’s appearance in GH 5, it is probably best that Neversoft ended this practice.

GHWOR does little to change the minds of those who thought the series was past its prime. Frankly, GHWOR could have existed as a track pack, but for what it’s worth, Neversoft still manages to squeeze out some fun gameplay even if it is to the same old tune.

- Siddharth Masand

(November 15, 2010)