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Guitar Hero: Metallica

Years ago, the glory that was Guitar Hero graced the PS2, and the audiences found that it was good. Lo, it spawned many children. There was Guitar Hero II, which greatly improved some gameplay mechanics and was the first with downloadable songs (albeit very few). We then saw the cash grab that was GH: 80s, followed by the Great Rift of Rock. Since then, Activision has been at the reins on the Guitar Hero side, and I will be the first to admit that, for as much as I love the genre, I have not been a huge fan of Activision’s work in the area. GH3 loosened up the gameplay even more and was arbitrarily hard at points for no reason, including the accursed battle system, and GH: Aerosmith was basically that GH engine’s version of a cash grab.

Therefore, going into Guitar Hero: Metallica, I readily admit some trepidation, that it was going to feel awful because it’s not the core Guitar Hero: World Tour game, just the engine, and so it wouldn’t get any love.

Friends, I come to you today to tell you that I was wrong. GH: Metallica is not the cash grab that other expansions have felt to be. At $60 for 49 songs, it’s not a good deal compared to the cost of Guitar Hero: World Tour, but compared to the cost of that many songs as downloadable content, it’s really quite good. Really, I think it’s a good way to approach the game: GH: Metallica feels like it would have been a really good expansion pack to GH: World Tour, but is on its own disc. There are 28 songs by Metallica themselves, and 21 songs from other groups, including the likes of Queen and Lynyrd Skynyrd to Slayer and Samhain. The music selection is really solid, delivering some of the most well-known Metallica songs as well as some deeper cuts, and the other artists are greatly varied and generally of high quality – in fact, the full song listing is on the packaging, so you can truly judge this book by its cover – at least, in regards to the music selection. 

If it’s not clear by now, this song set is aimed very squarely at the metalheads. If you aren’t a fan of metal, this game is not for you and you can go away now. Still here? Good deal. You will like this game and you should at least rent it, if not pick it up. Let’s continue.

GH: Metallica includes some fairly brutal charting, but it’s only appropriate, given the genre of the music. As an expert guitarist since the beginning, I had a LOT of fun with these songs. Also, the story mode seems to take the diffculty into account, as you only need to amass a certain number of stars to open the next area, as opposed to beating a full set of songs. I “finished” the game within 32% completion (77 of a possible 245 stars, expert guitar), so it definitely leaves room for the player to move about. The story is basically that you’re a Metallica-lovin’ cover band that got picked up as an opening act — but seriously, we’re not here for the story. In fact, GH:M knows this, and by default, ALL songs are unlocked in quick play. If you don’t want to make a character, you don’t have to – you can dive right into the quick play and rock out to whatever you want, right away. The worth in the story mode is that as you beat songs, you unlock “Metallifacts” – basically it lets you sit and watch the song without the charts in the way, to enjoy the animations on stage (which are great, as I’ll touch on later), but it also includes a bunch of random facts about the song playing. If you’re a Metallica fan, you owe it to yourself to beat songs in story mode just to get the Metallifacts. The ending of story mode was… less than satisfying, so, don’t do it for that sake.

That being said, it does include many of the accoutrements found in GH: World Tour. You have the character creator, and you can also use any of the default characters (Axel Steel till I die, baby). You earn money and unlock and buy things, if you wish, but you don’t have to bother with it, which really is quite nice. The music creation system is here too, and if you know GHTunes from GH:WT, well, you’re set here. Really though, that’s not why you’re buying this game. Several stages, some real, have been added in, and when you’re playing Metallica songs, you’re playing as Metallica. The renderings of the members of Metallica are easily the best character models to date in any Guitar Hero game, and they did a ton of motion capture, resulting in absolutely great entertaining performances. Seriously, my wife even remarked at how good the models were, and while she enjoys a little medium drumming on occasion, she’s not exactly a big gamer in general.

If you are a drummer, GH:M has a special treat for you. Several of the songs include an Expert+ mode, which includes the need to double-bass-pedal in a lot of the songs. There is another pedal available for the GH:WT drum set, so that can be accomplished. It’s worth noting, however, that this extra pedal is *not* compatible with Other drumkits. If you prefer the other kits, well, no Expert+ for you unless you’ve got an unsupported rig for that, and frankly I don’t know how well that’d work. Seriously, the footwork is *fast*. It’s basically note-for-note, and these bands aren’t generally known for their simple drum work. I readily admit, while I can gimp my way through a song or two on expert drums, I can’t hang with expert+. It’s absolutely brutal and if you’re an ace drummer, you will be drooling with joy.

Also, as a quick note, the other instruments are compatible, much like they are for GH:WT, which means if you prefer that Other series (as I tend to), you don’t need another kit.

If you’ve stuck with me this far, you can probably guess that I really enjoyed GH: Metallica. I wish it had support for GH: World Tour downloadable content, but it doesn’t — with one exception. Their album, Death Magnetic, is available as GH:WT DLC, and will work in the game. That’s it, though. Considering its the same engine, it’d be nice, but I can understand the reasoning to not allow it, as it keeps a focus on the band, and if you care about the DLC, you probably already have GH:WT anyways.

Guitar Hero: Metallica is easily the best band-specific music game yet. Depending on the series’ that you count, it’s the second or third, and it definitely sets the bar for the others. It’s not perfect, but it’s pretty darn good and does a lot more right than any band-specific one has yet.

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Tags: Guitar Hero: Metallica

Posted by Brian Arnold on May 8th, 2009 and is filed under Reviews, Xbox 360 Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can post a comment, or trackback from your own site.

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