Guitar Hero

At first, I thought Guitar Hero was stupid when I saw my husband playing it. Well, maybe not stupid, but I definitely wasn't going to play it. My husband got really into it. By the time I started playing it, he had beaten most songs on Expert on Guitar Hero 3. Of course, the two that he has yet to beat: Fire & the Flames and Raining Blood.

I finally agreed to play with him one day when his bassist sat down the guitar, and no one else would pick it up. It was already set on Easy. I quickly caught on and was addicted ever since.

Easy To Learn
This game is easy to learn. Whether your 6 or 60, starting on Easy (or even Beginner in the newer versions) will get you going in no time. You don't have to buy the game to try it. A lot of Americans have this game. You can play Co-op, which takes the stress off of competition. Just ask to play, and most Guitar Hero veterans are more than happy to help you learn.

Doesn't have to be Time-Consuming
I'm a mother of a demanding 7 month old. He constantly whines if I'm not paying enough attention to him. So, my days can't be consumed with my Guitar Hero obsession. But the game is designed so you can start and stop easily. Most songs are only a few minutes long (okay, Metallica doesn't count). So, once you're done with a song, you can go about your day. There are lots of games out there where you have to spend a lot of time to beat a level or find a decent stopping point. This game eliminates that problem with the exception of a few 7-8 minute songs.

Play With Your Friends
If you have 2 guitars, you can play with your friend. With the newer versions, you can have someone play the drums and sing along too. The game is very Team-Friendly. If you play with your friends, you can score higher points. If you suck at the song, your friends can help you beat it. You can have a Giutar Hero Party, and not feel bad about people not being able to play.

Lots of Songs
Guitar Hero World Tour has over 80 songs. Those don't include the crazy Classic songs they added and songs you can download for $2 each. Needless to say, you have lots to choose from, and you'll probably never get bored. You'll probably know a lot of the songs, and you will learn some new ones (Escuela de Calor, anyone?).

I have had a couple of bad experiences with Guitar Hero. I suspect these problems are common with any new line of technological advances. However, the customer service hasn't been too grand either.

Guitar Hero World Tour Drumset
I bought the GH Band Set the first day it came out. I got it for my husband for his birthday. He was very excited about playing on the drums. Unfortunately, the problems started right away. You had to basically bang on the yellow cymbal to get it to read on the game. At first, we thought it was part of the game. However, as we started playing more and more, it was getting harder and harder to bang it, and then stopped reading it all together.

My first major problem was that I had paid in cash and had never gotten a receipt. Yes, that was very idiotic of me, and I have learned my lesson. So, I called the video game store I had bought it from (Gamestop - a popular video game store that started in Texas). I gave a date, time, and purchase total so the salesman could look it up on his computer. He said there was no purchase of that amount during or around that time. I didn't really know what else to say. So, my husband said he would call after he got home from work.

He spoke both to a manager at that store and a customer service rep at the corporate office. None of the employees were consistent. One would claim that we couldn't look up receipts, another would claim that we could but it was a hassle, and one would claim our receipt didn't exist altogether. Needless to say, the customer service at Gamestop needs some work. Anyway, we finally got our receipt after some very annoying phone calls.

It just got more aggravating after that. I had read online that many drumsets were malfunctioning. So, stores that sold the drums could not do a replacement. Not that they could anyway. There were so many returns that the stores didn't have enough drumsets to replace them with.

All the returns had to be sent directly to Red Octane (the co-creator of the game). The most annoying thing about that was that I had to pay for the shipping. We also had to send a letter with the problem and info and also the receipt of purchase.

Anyway, after a couple of weeks, the drumset was sent back to us in working order. I was more annoyed than anything that there were many drumsets that had malfunctioned. Red Octane should have done more random testing to make sure they were in working order. And Gamestop needs more consistency through the company.

Guitar Problems too
If you've played Guitar Hero long enough, you've probably have had some Guitar trouble. We had two guitars for about 6 months before one started acting up. The strummer started to malfunction. It would only work for about 60% of the notes. Of course, that was not nearly enough to beat a song, and it was just plain annoying. So, I went to go buy a new one. Of course, I went to Gamestop (when will I learn?). The guitar I bought didn't work very well either. It was very sensitive, I guess. It would stop in the middle of long notes. Anyway, I returned it. It wasn't the style I wanted anyway. A few weeks later, I got another guitar. The problem with this one was that the slider was too sensitive. It would read something when no one was touching it. So, my husband came up with the bright idea to take the old neck from the broken guitar (the one with the broken strummer) and put it on the head of the new guitar (the one with the broken slider). It worked brilliantly. Thank goodness. I am so done with that.