Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s

Jul 24, 2007

Even as a Guitar Hero addict, it's hard to look at the new Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s as anything but a letdown. Yep, it's always a great day when there are new official Guitar Hero songs to rock out to, but unlike Guitar Hero II, where it was obvious that a lot of care went into every aspect of the product, Rocks the 80s feels like it was slapped together with as minimal an effort as possible. A $50 price tag only adds insult to injury, as it's arguable whether it's even worth half that price.

Sad Songs Say So Much

The basic gameplay for Rocks the 80s remains the same as its predecessors: as a song plays, you strum along in rhythm with notes as they scroll down the screen to rack up points. You'll probably want one of the familiar Guitar Hero Gibson SG-styled controllers for this, which aren't bundled with the game (it's somewhat assumed at this point that you've got a few lying around from Guitar Hero or Guitar Hero II.) The same four difficulties (Easy, Medium, Hard and Expert) are back, and as you complete easier songs, you unlock harder ones until you've completed the entire tour.

Rocks the 80s' song list falls flat in a number of areas. The first problem is that there are only 30 songs -- only six tiers and zero bonus songs. As a result, it's possible to blow through the entire set list in three hours, whereas Guitar Hero II had over twice as many tunes.

Then there are the actual song selections. About half the release focuses on the heavy metal and hair bands that ruled much of the decade -- the Scorpions, Anthrax and Judas Priest -- while the other half leans on more pop/rock offerings from The Romantics, A Flock of Seagulls, and the Go-Go's. (Check out the full track list.) Most of the selections are decent, but in many cases, the actual song structures lack enough variety to make them worth playing over and over. It's not until the final tier, with songs like "Electric Eye" and "Seventeen," that the songs really become engaging to play. In some ways, it's like Guitar Hero II with the final 10 songs chopped out; just as things heat up with Extreme's "Play with Me," it's all over.

It turns out that Rocks the 80s is also significantly easier than the previous two installments in the series. Aside from the occasional mini-solo, most of the songs are extremely simple to get through; I 5-starred almost all of Expert on my first pass, and out of sheer boredom started playing through Hard, where I currently have 100% on 23/30 songs. Maybe this will actually be a positive for some players who just want to rock through the songs, but for more experienced players, there just won't be as much replay value.

Another problem with the set list is that about 80% of the songs are cover versions, and while most are passable, several are brutal; it's a dealbreaker in a game with so few tunes. The vocals on "Metal Health" are so painful that I wince at the thought of playing it again. The arrangement on "Heat of the Moment" falls apart during the chorus. The singer attempting to emulate Ronnie James Dio on "Holy Diver" has been the source of much pain here at GameSpy HQ. And maybe the biggest head-scratcher of all: Twisted Sister's "I Wanna Rock" is actually a master track and yet the slower, lower-pitch album version rather than the one we grew up with on MTV. Somehow, we've ended up with an original track that still doesn't sound like the version we're familiar with.

What makes the easy-and-brief set list that much harder to swallow is the sheer number of guitarists perfect for Rocks the 80s who are nowhere in sight. The '80s were, more than any other, the decade of the guitarist. After the emergence of Eddie Van Halen, it was when shredders like Joe Satriani and Yngwie Malmsteen rose to prominence, followed by a cavalcade of players like Paul Gilbert, Vinnie Moore, Eric Johnson, Tony MacAlpine, Greg Howe and others; even more mainstream artists like David Lee Roth and Dokken featured brilliant guitarists like Steve Vai and George Lynch. Without fail, every one of these artists performed countless songs that would have been perfect for Rocks the 80s, providing plenty of material for an extra tier or two and a little extra difficulty. To have an 80s-themed guitar game go so skimpy on songs and yet ignore this collection of players is perhaps its biggest failing.

Aside from the new tunes, it's hard to tell if much effort was put into any other areas of Rocks the 80s. There's a new intro movie, and some of the familiar characters have been decked out in '80s outfits, and that's about it. The venues are the same as before, with most menu screens re-tinted in awful-looking pastel colors, and the special guitar rewards, like the "Log" guitar for 5-starring everything on Expert, are exactly the same. In fact, several characters from GH2 were removed from the game for Rocks the 80s. The split between developer Harmonix and Activision and Red Octane has now been pretty well-documented, and it's easy to conjure images of a handful of guys left to work on Rocks the 80s while the rest of the company focused its energies on the upcoming Rock Band.

The Final Word

Although I've been pretty negative throughout this review, it's still pretty hard to screw up a Guitar Hero game, and I plan on playing a good deal of Rocks the 80s over the next few months. I can imagine spending a lot of time trying to nail all the solos in songs like "Round & Round" or "Play With Me," and the return of co-op play will help make the game a solid party title. But the differences between Guitar Hero II and Rocks the 80s couldn't be more drastic. While I once said GH2 felt like a love letter to the series' hardcore fans, Rocks the 80s feels like a title lacking in heart. Or, for that matter, Heart.