Really trivial Guitar Hero World Tour questions

The Game Room
1

In short: I don’t know how, or why (the arcade version had something to do with it, that’s all I can tell you), but I, after absolutely shunning Guitar Hero for its overall ugliness*, monomaniacal focus on the hard and earsplitting**, and rampant and downright disturbing militancy***…

…I mentioned some things to that effect in this thread…

…bought 1 & 2 about a week ago.

3 a few days later, and Encore: Rock The 80’s just yesterday.

It’s been a total blast. I’ve spent hours on these today alone and I’m prepared to spend many, many more hours this week. I never believed this game could be so addictive. No, I haven’t suddenly lost my tast for cute and enjoyable and kitschy (though it’s been a while; I should get back to my import PS2 sometime). This is just an incredibly fun game, period. Also, I didn’t mention this earlier, but I always relish new musical experiences, one of the main reasons I’m such a huge Bemani fan. Most of the bands here I’ve never even heard of or were names on a Billboard page. Now I’ve heard them, and lemme tell you…a lot of it is good. Real good.

In fact, I think the first thing a GH rookie needs to really get used to is just how much rock music there is in the world. It is, after all, the most individual, independent music there is (excepting the pop stuff, the corporate stuff, etc.), so much so that just the successful bands are legion.

Anyway…yeah, I have my eye on World Tour (which I understand to be the “undesignated 4”). Just a couple of questions:

  1. Any new characters for the drums, singer, and bass guitar? I think I saw a few new faces in one of the YouTube promos. Does this mean the “stock” performers are long gone?

  2. Is it possible to play the drum side with anything other than a drum controller (I’m not interested in singing)? I have a whole bunch of joysticks and 3rd-party Dualshocks.

And on a lighter side, is the game in any way apologetic over the…er…good-natured ribs made against drummers and singers in past GHs? (“We didn’t call you an egomaniac! We were referring to the, uh, various lounge singers we met, uh, at the Rat Cellar, and, ah, similar places! You’re cool!” :slight_smile: )

  • Seriously. This was once a HUGE sticking point with me. I don’t like games covered floor-to-ceiling with skulls and devils and blood and puke and slime and tentacles. (Having such paragons of clean living like Johnny Napalm and Judy Nails didn’t help, either.) No, I’m not a fan of first-person shooters either, thank you very much. I don’t expect everything to be all cute and fluffy, but can’t at least the fret chart be clean?

** Not true, as it turns out; there’s a lot of old time rock 'n roll, alternative, and even flat-out sugary bubblegum pop. (We Got The Beat is a GH song. Think about it.) Be nice if someone could’ve mentioned this sometime within the past year and a half…

*** Y’know, stuff like “nobody wants to listen to long jazz numbers”, “real guitarists don’t sit on the couch”, and "Remember, NO STAIRWAY!!!'. Made the whole rocker expereince sound incredibly restrictive and stifling, the complete opposite of what it’s supposed to be.

2

For all the reasons you cite, you should consider getting Rock Band 2 instead of GH:WT. Or, you know, both. But Rock Band 2 first :slight_smile:

OK, so my perception is a little skewed and fanboyish, since I haven’t played GH:WT. But RB2 is as clean (or as hardcore) as you want it to be in the graphical department, the musical selection is much, much wider (both in raw quantity, and the musical spectrum it covers. They’ve got some fucking Devo, OK ?), and I hear the gameplay is tighter as well. YMMV.

3

Okay, thanks, I’ll probably give it a shot.

Seriously, anybody play this? I’m almost I saw Johnny Napalm at the drums in a screenshot, but it could’ve been an edit character. (It also looks like the stock male singer/drummer/bassist trio are back in business after their narrow escape from you-know-where…so can we pick them now?)

4

Yeah man I just bought RB:2, after buying the complete World Tour set…and RB:2 is soooo much more addictive. The beginning songs are kinda yawn but once you unlock a little bit, it rocks. Plus the downloadable content is amazing.

5

Johnny Napalm, Lars Umlaut, Izzy, and the two girls from GH3 are all in World Tour. You can create your own characters in WT, though - I found that much more fun.

6

I just got RB2. Gamestop had a deal, I wound up with the OLC edition for $80, free shipping.

soooo… what’s the most efficient way to add songs? There’s the Rock Band song packs…

7

I think the online store is the lease efficient (the Wii interface, at least, is sloooow) but it’s the most frugal. The track packs are less money per song, but you don’t get to choose what songs you get. Some of the songs are real duds.

8

I have 20 free songs, too. (I think that’s what the OLC edition gets you.)

Apparently, Rock Band doesn’t transfer Paranoid over. Bummer.

9

As for my other question, is the drum set absolutely needed for drums? I really don’t feel like shelling out another 40 bucks for a peripheral with questionable durability, and “pressure sensitive” puts my teeth on edge. (Yes, I played Mad Maestro.)

10

Yeah, they didn’t re-secure the rights for Iron Maiden’s Run to the Hills, Metallica’s Enter Sandman nor Black Sabbath’s Paranoid, so those can’t be carried over from RB1 to RB2. Dunno what the OLC edition is, but the 20 free songs were a bonus gift to those who had both games.

However, they’ve just released a huuuge Iron Maiden track pack on the Live marketplace, so I’m giddy :smiley:

@**DKW **: I’m afraid you have to have a drum peripheral of *some *kind, yes. The game treats regular pads as “singer peripheral” rather than “drummer peripheral”, and as far as I’m aware there’s no way to tweak that.
However, any MIDI e-drum set works as a GH:WT controller, not just the crummy plastic one they sell. And they can also be made to work with RB/RB2, if you don’t mind a bit of DIY electronics work.
Of course, a halfway decent e-drum set will cost you quite a bit more than 40 bucks :wink:

11

You can pick up Konami’s Rock Revolution (RB/GH clone) band pack for something like $39 - the peripherals aren’t nearly as good, and the game is apparently pretty sucky, but it’s really good value and the peripherals are compatible.

12

Worth keeping in mind - Rock Band is a social-style entertainment. The GH series (from 3 onward) is a game. With a much greater challenge, but which I find to be nowhere near as “fun”, but others will find more so.

When you’re looking to boost the song count, renting the original and exporting the songs should be your first port of call, but be wary about buying the packs.

They may be cheaper than buying each song individually, but it’s rare that I want all the songs and if you buy the pack you can’t delete the ones you don’t care for - it’s all or nothing.

13

Same thing I say about this every time it comes up:

Rock Band has songs that are more fun to play with your friends and a few beers around.

Guitar Hero has songs that make you smash the controller in frustration until you suddenly hit that “holy shit, I’m SO AWESOME” stage.

Frankly, I WISH I could afford both.

14

The feeling of accomplishment the first time I realized I was about to beat the really hard squeedly versus meedly part in Through The Fire And Flames was awesome.