Guitar Hero Encore: Rock the 80s
Jul 21, 2007
Given that Guitar Hero is so awesome, there's not a lot you can say about Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s beyond that it's awesome, but with bigger hair and gaudier colors. This collection of thirty new songs for the Playstation 2 version is the fond farewell from Guitar Hero creator Harmonix before they move on to bigger venues with Rock Band and pass the Guitar Hero name over to another developer.
Seeing as how the Xbox 360 only has Guitar Hero II and a desultory collection of downloadable song packs, Rocks the 80s solidifies the PlayStation 2 as the platform of choice for guitar heroics. This new song list is designed to appeal to anyone who has a soft spot in his or her heart for 80s icons like Flock of Seagulls or Quiet Riot. A couple songs use their original vocalists, but most of them are solid soundalikes.
There's nothing here that will make you cringe like, for instance, the Kurt Cobain imitator in Guitar Hero II. However, this is a slightly disappointing collection in some ways. After Rockstar managed to assemble the definitive 80s soundtrack for Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, it's a bit disappointing that Harmonix seems to have taken a few shortcuts and saved a few bucks by skipping some bands and opting for lesser known songs from others. "Police Truck" from the Dead Kennedies? "Wratchchild" from Iron Maiden? And where are Van Halen and Guns n' Roses? For sheer cheese value, how can you leave out Styx and Foreigner?
But part of the fun of any Guitar Hero game is kvetching about the song list and what should have been in there. So it's hard to complain for too long when the tracks include notable songs like Asia's "Heat of the Moment," Eddie Money's "Shakin'," The Vapors' "Turning Japanese," 38 Special's "Hold on Loosely," The Romantics' "What I Like About You," and Scorpion's "No One Like You." Even if you don't like these songs (Heat of the Moment, for instance, might have been better in theory than practice), they're a varied cross-section of progressive rock, pop, and metal from back then. Even the most vehement detractors are sure to find ten songs they don't mind and five they love in the course of playing through the campaign to unlock everything.
The 80s theme is also a fairly shrewd business decision on Harmonix' part, given that these songs will appeal to the over-30 set who can afford to pay full price for an expansion pack that consists only of 30 songs. There's nothing new in here beyond the songs. The modes are the same, with the same three multiplayer options and that indispensable practice mode to help you learn the harder songs. Visually, nothing substantial has changed. The characters wear 80s themed outfits, and you'll see a few splashes of new artwork.
But the bulk of the effort clearly went into the songs themselves, with artwork and presentation simply carried over from Guitar Hero II. You can earn money from the campaign mode to buy new guitars and guitar paint jobs, but there are no new outfits and no bonus tracks. And the only unlockable character is the same Grim Ripper from the previous games, albeit in a tackier outfit. So whether this is a good value comes down to whether you're willing to pay $2 a song for a whole mess of songs, half of which you might not know or like. In other words, basically twice what you'd pay to get them on iTunes.
And when it all comes down to it, it's absolutely worth it to breathe new life into Guitar Hero II. Because there's nothing quite so exhilarating as facing down a whole long list of new Guitar Hero songs to unlock, learn, practice, and perfect. After all, this is the stuff of pretend rock gods in their living rooms, no matter what the decade.