Guitar Hero Metallica Review (360)

A big improvement on World Tour for the Metallica fans out there

I’ve been playing the Guitar Hero games since Guitar Hero 2, until World Tour which was a big let down to me. Rock Band took the place of the best music rhythm game in my books and I’ve loved it ever since, mainly due to the fantastic songs available for download but also because of the gameplay. I wasn’t too pleased that Harmonix split from Activision and Neversoft took over the task of creating the Guitar Hero games, Guitar Hero 3 was good but didn’t live up to my expectations and World Tour, as I said, was a big let down in my opinion.

Now, with Guitar Hero Metallica on the market, I feel Neversoft have outdone themselves. It is a big step for them and a big step for the gaming community who wanted a new big title on the market and who better than one of the best, most well known metal bands out there?

I do however feel that they’re rushing things a little. Between GH Metallicas release and the day that this review was published, Guitar Hero Greatest/Smash Hits and Guitar Hero 5 have been released. People might not see that as a problem but I do, it’s a little too much too soon and there are several other ‘Hero’ titles to be released within the year. There has to be a limit, a stopping point of some sort.

Anyway, that’s enough ranting from me, onto the game itself.
Guitar Hero Metallica plays better than any other Guitar Hero game out there, it’s smooth, looks fantastic and although I’d never say this, they’ve gone all out to make it feel as if Metallica are playing.

double bass with a single pedal is how it’s meant to be done!

The only problem I have with the game is the lack of rhythm guitar, I admit, it’s a more challenging for those who like to do vocals and guitar like myself, but playing lead guitar as Kirk Hammet and vocals as James Hetfield isn’t realistic as the vocalist, if playing it correctly, should be playing rhythm guitar.
But that’s just me being picky.

Sorting the men from the boys was difficult when playing previous games on guitar. But Metallicas riffs aren’t particularly easy and although the game does not represent playing an actual guitar that well, it’s still a challenging task to get through most songs.

Vocals are a little more challenging than previous games with vocals support but they’re no different when it comes down to the chart, anyone can do it making any kind of noise.

Drumming has become more challenging since the release of Guitar Hero Metallica, Expert+ adds a new difficulty to the games and also adds double bass to the charts. Adding something which was left out of the Rock Band games puts it a step ahead of the rest.

Overall, it’s a fantastic game and that small step further in the progress of music rhythm games and I love the challenge that the drums now offer, double bass with a single pedal is how it’s meant to be done! I recommend Guitar Hero Metallica to those who like the previous Guitar Hero or Rock Band games, I’d also recommend it to those who would like a change and are unsure about which rhythm game to go for.

Gold Y Award

4.5 / 5