Oh, Rock Band how you have sucked my life away! We have had the privilege to review Rock Band and we could just barely tear ourselves away to review it. This has been no easy task as I’m starting to already get withdrawal symptoms – how I long to hit those drums and do awesome guitar solos… but, no, I must be strong. So does it live up to all the hype? Will people want to suddenly be your friends? Will you be able to live out your fantasies of being a rock and roll superstar? YES, YES and YES.

Graphics
It’s pretty much unavoidable to not compare Rock band to Guitar Hero III. While the graphics are less superior than Guitar Hero III, Rock Band does get the job done well enough. In the end it’s really the gameplay that matters and you are primarily staring at the red green, yellow, blue, and orange targets on the bottom of the screen. Unfortunately, I do wish though that the targets were bigger like they are in Guitar Hero. The targets in Rock Band are slimmer so it can be difficult to tell if you actually have hit them. However, there is one option that Rock Band has that Guitar Hero doesn’t, and that is the ability to set up TV calibration so that IT really may be your TV who is to blame for missing all those targets. Just select what TV you have (eg: Plasma. projection, etc) and your audio and video should play at the same speed as it was meant to be.
As for the quality and look of the characters, they are decent but lack the fluidity that the characters in Guitar Hero have. For example, they tend to repeat the same gestures over and over and the stage doesn’t really do anything that spectacular like in guitar Hero. However we do appreciate the nifty load screens between concerts in Rock band. The loading screens feature your character in different scenarios Eg: You might be taking a picture, your lead singer might be on the cover of an album, there might be a shot of your band members arguing while bus has broken down, or just a snapshot of the band as everyone crosses the street looking all cool. I also didn’t feel that the colors in Rock Band were as crisp and sharp as they are in Guitar Hero. But really are we playing this game for the graphics – nope! So lets move on…

Controls
What makes Rock Band stand out from the crowd is its controls and hardware. There is no other game out there that has a drum kit, guitars, and microphone for you to interact with. When we first got the system, the “bass” guitar was broken but it was replaced right away by Harmonix. In the box it instructs you not to return any defective hardware to the store but to contact the manufacturer and they will replace it. With crazy excitement I unpacked all of my toy instruments -

*In Rock Band your guitar is a “Fender Stratocaster”. The guitar can be used by right handed or left handed people because the fret colors are on both sides of the arm of the guitar. There are frets on the top part of the arm and by the body of the guitar which are called solo buttons. The lead guitar and bass guitar are physically the same in design but when you play the game you can select which is which. There is also a whammy bar and a 5 way switch for to choose different sound effects while playing. And finally there is the strum bar. All in all the guitar is very similar looking to the newest version of the Wireless Les Paul, the big differences lay with the solo buttons and that it is not wireless.

* The drum kit has to be assembled and took less than 15 minutes to set up. if. There is also a kick pedal which has to be attached. You can adjust the drum kit to the level that is most comfortable to you. We suggest stretching your legs first before playing the drums because your shins are going to kill from the strain of either not pushing the pedal or pushing the pedal. Get a comfortable chair or stool. Positioning is everything. Then let it rip like Phil Collins.

* The Microphone will certainly pacify the karaoke star in your band. I’m not a singer but even I enjoyed using it because I didn’t really have to sing good or bad to do well, I just had to know how to read…Elementary school paid off! For certain songs you have to “sing” at different pitches to get points or hold a note for along period. When you are not singing and the option is available you can use the microphone as a tambourine so just follow along with the little clear circle targets that appear, and you’ll be just like Stevie Nicks on the tambourine. Since the mic has no buttons to control anything you must have your gamepad plugged in to make selections such as raising or lowering the volume of the original artist singing so you can hear or not hear yourself sing.

Overall, there are so many instruments and you only have so many USB ports on your console so how can you plug everything in?! Well the kit also comes with a powered USB adapter that can allow you to plug in all four of your instruments. I didn’t like that I had to use yet another electric outlet up for this but what can you do. Also when we turned on the X-Box to play we had to un-plug and re-plug in the adapter from the electricity to get the instruments to be picked up by the X-Box. We also felt that on a few songs such as a “When you were young” by the Killers that the drums or guitar had a problem with the targets. For example, I saw I was hitting them but then I would fail out. It was very frustrating!! Some songs picked up the drums really well while others I feel I had to smash them so hard that I got blisters from the drumsticks in order to hit the target. Maybe a update down the road will fix these connectivity or sensitivity problems. However, the mic was a breeze to use and so were the guitars.

Playing the Game

So is Rockband all it’s cracked up to be – YES and more!!
When you first start the game you have the options of SOLO, MULTIPLAYER, TRAINING, OPTIONS, and COMMUNITY.

Solo allows you to conquer the world as a Rock-star alone – do it as a Guitarist, Drummer, or Singer. Under solo is also an option to do a Quickplay of songs you have all ready unlocked or is currently available.

Multiplayer is just that play with friends via X-Box live or with your posse at home. You can also play Quickplay as a group. Hit the road for a World Tour, want to see who truly is the better Pete Townsend of the bunch battle each other in “Tug of War” or “Score Duel” modes.

Options is were you can go to adjust the audio, gameplay, and calibrate Rock Band for your television.

Community will let you check out the competition on-line and other special features available.

So you want to be in a Rock Band? First you will have to decide if you want to go it alone or start a group. Get your buddies together and from there you can create your bands name and each individual player’s name. After that play a few gigs and earn some cash to purchase some cool threads. Go it alone and you can do the same thing. Rock Band tops Guitar Hero big time by the looks options you can customize for you characters. You can choose and mix and match from Metal, Rock, Goth, and Punk clothing and with time you can purchase clothes from your head to your toes. Change your makeup, hair, face, body type, add accessories for your face and hands like gloves and sunglasses. As a female gamer I thought that this aspect was really cool – My Rock-Star became a regular Barbie or Ken doll for me to dress up. But even the male band members in my team enjoyed dressing up their fantasy player. Also you can upgrade or change your guitar just like in Guitar Hero- Snore…

However, getting around menu options is a bit tricky at first. I didn’t find the menu to be very linear or easy to navigate, however once you get used to it – it becomes simpler. I found myself backpedaling alot and re-doing my choices. After you play dress up it’s time to play and according to how well your band plays you will gain fans, cash and stars. Just like Guitar Hero you are rated on a star system but it really doesn’t impact you very much except to unlock other gigs in the game. Your main goal is to get alot of fans, cash and of course points. The more fans you get you can go on world tours and unlock more songs you also get more money to buy more outfits. I was a little annoyed after killing myself playing Rolling Stones “Gimme Shelter” I only earned $15 bucks! I’ll never be able to afford the Metal Spike vest with $15 bucks! As you continue to play you can unlock gigs that will get you buses and airplanes. There are Easy, Medium, Hard and Expert  modes. After a certain time on Easy you will not gain anymore fans if you don’t move to Medium and so on. I found that irritating as I’m not ready for the Hard level yet. You can still unlock some gigs with the stars that you earn but I’m pretty much capped on how many more fans I can get, but if I fail I can still loose fans. Another oddity I found is that you can have a male lead singer for a few songs singing male lead songs and then all of sudden he will still look like a guy but sound like Shirley Manson from Garbage and Vice Versa… I’ll have a lead female singer and then she will all of a sudden sound like Jon Bon Jovi. However it is kind of amusing.

One of the aspects where Rock band real shines is in its songs list which is really outstanding – overall there are original artists and very few cover songs. Songs ranged from the 60’s till now like Dani California that have great guitar and drum solos. The downside though is that after awhile you seem to repeating the same songs over and over. I’m completely brainwashed by Soundgarden’s Black Hole and Radio Head’s Creep…I think I’m depressed?! Thankfully you can buy more songs via Xbox live.

The equivalent to Star Power here is Energy. Hit all the Energy Targets to fill your Energy Bar when the time is right go into overdrive which will multiply whatever streak you are on. If all the players do it at the same time you can really max out your points.

Also, One of my favorite parts of Rock Band was the Big Rock Endings which let you go crazy at the end of a song. You see green, red, yellow, blue, and orange bars light up on screen which is basically your cue to go nuts and strum and pound away. This is were those solo keys come in handy on the Stratocaster. Rack up the points but be sure to hit the last two notes after the bars fade away and you’ll collect big bonus points.

End Game

Rock Band is truly for those looking for the ultimate party game. The $169 price tag is definately a lot more than you’re used to paying for a video game, and it can be scary at first but this is an unusual type of game. The game is available for XBox 360, a PS3 or PS2. And even if you can’t afford all of the instruments at once, or you just want to play solo, we’d pick playing Solo with Rock band over Guitar Hero and just buy Rock Band alone ($59) and a single guitar. The gameplay on Rock band seems like it lasts longer, and in the long run if you decide to expand your band you can just buy the additional instruments. Everyone will have a good time young, old, male, or female. We love the Tireless options and that it has tons of a great songs with more on the way to download. Overall, Rockband is one game that will take you awhile to break free of. So go drive your neighbors crazy and be proud of those blisters and carpel tunnel!!! Rock-on!!

Conclusion:

The Good: Awesome party game that will keep you and the neighbors up for hours. Excellent song list

The Bad: Would have like some of the instruments to be wireless out of the box. Some sensitivity issues with the hardware.