Originally published Saturday, January 3, 2009 at 12:00 AM
Comments (3)
E-mail article
Print view
"Rock Band," "Guitar Hero" battle doesn't seem to have a loser
Game reviewer finds both "Guitar Hero World Tour" and "Rock Band 2" enjoyable.
The Washington Post
The American people had an important and historic decision to make this holiday season: "Guitar Hero World Tour" or "Rock Band 2"?
Here's how it goes: Fork over about $180 at your local electronics store, and you get a large box. Inside are a drum kit and a guitar — or, at least, video-game controllers shaped as such — along with a microphone and a game disc.
Get a few friends together and you can put together a fake rock band. Hit the right notes on the guitar controller and sing the right tones into the microphone, and you and your friends can briefly live a video-game version of the rock 'n' roll dream.
I've played both quite a bit over the past few weeks and can say one thing for sure: They both offer pretty much the same kick, and neither is a dud. Beyond that, it gets a little more complicated.
One piece of good news is all the "instruments" included with both titles are now wireless, except for the microphones. They're also interoperable, meaning you can use, for example, "Guitar Hero's" fake ax to play "Rock Band," and vice versa.
Naturally, some gamer snobs have gone so far as to buy both.
While "Guitar Hero" is more of a household name, "Rock Band" has had a yearlong head start on the market as the first "full band" game, said Michael Pachter, an industry analyst who figures that the two titles will divide the market fairly evenly in the coming year.
"You can argue over whether this guitar is better or whether these drums are better, but at the end of the day you're doing the same thing and the music is similar," he said.
Odd as it still sounds, this is a billion-dollar business we're talking about here. When a new version of "Guitar Hero" came out last summer, dedicated to the music and career of Aerosmith, first-week sales more than tripled first-week sales of Aerosmith's most recent studio album.
As for those arguments Pachter refers to, here's the gist: Some fans, but not all, believe the latest "Guitar Hero" offers the superior "instruments."
Its drum kit, for example, comes with a set of rubberized "cymbals," which go a long way in selling the illusion you're playing drums and not, ahem, just hitting buttons on a game controller.
It's possible, though, for "Rock Band" owners to spend $30 or $40 more to get a set of cymbals to add to that game's drum kit. For that matter, one company is offering a deluxe drum kit for the game that will set you back $300.
![]()
"Rock Band's" fans say the title has the clear advantage because of the amount of content available for download for people who want to expand their collections.
Both game discs feature similar batches of songs from bands including Bon Jovi, Fleetwood Mac and Modest Mouse, but "Rock Band" has a wide library of 500 songs available for purchase online.
Recent additions range from Jimmy Buffett to punk ditties from the Dead Kennedys. So far, "Rock Band" fans have bought 28 million tracks this way. "Guitar Hero World Tour" has only 41 licensed tracks. While "Guitar Hero's" online library of licensed content is far behind "Rock Band's," Kai Huang, co-founder of "Guitar Hero" maker RedOctane, looks at the question of the song catalogs another way.
Thanks to a new feature that lets users create and upload their own songs, there are 75,000 fan-created songs available for download. Whether they're any good is another matter, but the user-created songs have been downloaded 21 million times, according to the company.
H.T. Gold, a D.C.-area champ at competitive matches of "Guitar Hero," said he prefers "Rock Band," though he spends several hours each week playing both.
"Guitar Hero" sometimes throws in notes that don't exist in the song, said Gold, to make the harder levels harder. (RedOctane confirmed this.)
Gold said he finds this practice a little annoying, but it seems to be one reason why "Guitar Hero" is the title of choice among people, like him, who play competitively.
Greg LoPiccolo, producer at Harmonix, which makes "Rock Band," didn't dispute this emphasis. "The real focus [of Rock Band] has been collaborative play," he said, "though we do have competitive modes."
I had a group of folks over one weekend to check out the two side by side and came up with inconclusive results.
Generally speaking, the people who play a lot of video games tend to like "Rock Band 2" more. And the people who don't spend any time playing the things tended to lean toward "Guitar Hero."
My friend Arne has forked over cash for both games and finds the character animations and song selections on "Guitar Hero World Tour" to be shoddy. That said, he took quite a shine to the "Guitar Hero" drums, which he tried for the first time.
But a college friend of mine who now runs his own board-game company liked "Guitar Hero" more.
"As a guy who doesn't play video games, 'Guitar Hero' was way more inviting," said my friend Dom, who liked that the beginner levels require players only to "strum" the guitar controller in time with the music and not hit any buttons.
At the moment, I'm feeling equally burned out on both of these titles, so I'll let someone else have the last word.
Game reviewer Ben Croshaw, an Australian who has become famous among regulars at Web sites like Digg for his snarky takes on the latest games, put it in a way that sounds about right to me.
"Playing 'Guitar Hero' is still as inherently entertaining and shamelessly pathetic as it's always been," he said. "Get either this or 'Rock Band,' because it honestly doesn't matter which."
Copyright © 2009 The Seattle Times Company
For defense team, singer's fame may pose challenge
Valentine's Day is like a box of chocolates — who knows what you'll find on stage?
'The New Adventures of Old Christine' on CBS is a Wednesday TV pick
Angelina Jolie visits Haiti with UN refugee body

shopping
events for Wednesday, Feb. 10
- Sales Bin-Mania at Sandylew
- Gary Manuel Aveda Institute 20 Percent Discou...
- Share Beauty and Hope at Julep
- Girl Power Hour
editors' picks
More shopping guides- Alaska Air dropping Jones Soda beverages, going back to Coca-Cola
- Man found shot dead in pickup truck in Seattle
- Seattle is first U.S. stop for Picasso exhibit
- Husky Football Blog | Pac-10 expansion to get consideration over next year
- Phil Harris, 53, of 'Deadliest Catch,' dies
- State Senate votes to clear way for tax increases
- Teen is beaten in bus tunnel; Metro to review policies
- Idol Confessions | "American Idol" hopeful from Seattle didn't make it to Hollywood afterall
- Belltown boulevard could be completed by early next year
- Nicole Brodeur | Chrisceda Clemmons' house wasn't the only casualty
- Republicans may be no-shows at health-plan summit
279 - State Senate votes to clear way for tax increases
265 - Pac-10 expansion to get consideration over next year
250 - Lee undergoes foot surgery
233 - Obama: GOP and Dems together can spur job growth
213 - Fort Lewis soldier charged with abusing 4-year-old, holding her head in water
196 - Bus-tunnel attack while guards watched prompts review of Metro security
191 - Rivals names Martin one of Pac-10's best recruiters
143 - Belltown boulevard could be completed by early next year
129 - White House mocks Sarah Palin from podium
102
- Seattle is first U.S. stop for Picasso exhibit
- Belltown boulevard could be completed by early next year
- 747-8 soars smoothly on first outing
- Wine Adviser | Oregon's quality pinots join the bargain ranks
- Alaska Air dropping Jones Soda beverages, going back to Coca-Cola
- Phil Harris, 53, of 'Deadliest Catch,' dies
- How clean are those pre-washed salad greens?
- Snap out of your photo funk: How to make sense of all those piles of images
- Answers to biggest Olympic TV questions
- Brier Dudley's Blog | Google rolls its own Facebook & Twitter with Gmail "Buzz"







