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Guitar Hero: Metallica

Guitar Hero: Metallica
Reviewed by: Joaby
12:58pm 04/06/09
2 member comments

Genre: Other
Developer: Activision
Publisher: Activision
Classification: MA15+
Release Date: 14th May 2009
Platforms: XBOX360


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The Good bits
Great game - if you like Metallica...
The Bad stuff
If you don't, why would you buy this anyway?
Ok, this one's gonna be a short one. Deal with it. The thing about Guitar Hero: Metallica is that it's pretty much all right there in the title. It's Guitar Hero... with Metallica. If you love Metallica - you'll like this one. If you love Guitar Hero - you'll love this game.

Screenshot
There are some details not included in the title though. First off - it's the new kind of Guitar Hero, the one with more than just guitars. In fact, the drums are the real stars in this Guitar Hero, with double bass pedals and Expert + mode making the challenge for drummers that much more pronounced. This doesn't mean guitar is a cake walk - Metallica seems to have a rule against any song being shorter than 15 minutes long, and thrash metal 6 minute solos are evidently written into the band's code of conduct. Singing... Well, if you can singscream more than three songs in this game in a row and go for a fourth, you're a greater man than I.

Then there's the whole "it's not just Metallica" thing. Of the 49 tracks in the game, only 28 are from Metallica. The other 21 (maths is fun!) are songs hand picked by the garage metal band for the game - you can check out the whole track list on the game's details page. Some of the tracks are well picked like Skynyrd's "Tuesday's Gone" and Motörhead's Ace of Spades - others aren't as good (Machine Head have some good songs... Beautiful Mourning is not one).

Screenshot


Other things not stated in the title are the improved graphics - I know graphics in the Guitar Hero games are a fairly secondary concern, but Guitar Hero Metallica actually looks good. The character models of the band members are good though they paint a rather mythological image of the band from when they were young rock gods - not like now, when they're old and slowing. The animations are solid all-round and the background effects are actually pretty good. This isn't to say that the previous games looked bad - they were simply average.

At the end of the day Guitar Hero: Metallica offers just enough to justify it not just being another track pack - just barely offering enough to be worth purchasing yet another Guitar Hero game. It's fair to argue that Expert + and double bass drums aren't really the sorts
Screenshot
of thing you'd just give away as a content upgrade for normal Guitar Hero World Tour - especially seeing how most of the tracks already in the game wouldn't use the features properly - but at the same time you sorta wish they'd tried.

Oh, and everything said only really applies if you either love Metallica or you love Guitar Hero enough that you don't care about the tracks - if you only crack out GHWT when people come around or you're trying to scare away a female, just wait for Guitar Hero 5. Maybe we'll finally get to play Hold the Line.
Comments
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Game Comment by TheAwesomeness

In stark contrast, I have not been a fan of Metallica ever. I liked their radio singles and that's about it.

I grew to love One in Guitar Hero III and the Death Magnetic DLC Album contained the greatest fun to challenge ratio of any Drum track in World Tour.

While the drums never get any better than Death Magnetic's did, the guitar shines throughout this game. Just about every song has been chosen for it. This is the sequel to Guitar Hero III that expert players have waited for. The solos never approach the so fast i can't see wtf is happening Devil went down to Georgia/Through the Fire and Flames speed. They go at a humanly capable blistering pace. And that is why they are awesome. If you couldn't pass Slayer in GH3, you may be able to do it in this game after getting awesome playing all the ones the lead to it.

Drums is where the difficulty is at it's greatest. I considered myself to be a better drummer than guitarist, but i can't pass any of the songs on the final tier (On guitar I got some 5 stars). Double Bass is almost a novelty until your brain has learnt how to use your feet interchangeably at great speeds, and this is what is required to pass any challenging song in this game. I don't mean a sequence where you flail on both during the chorus a la Fuel, I mean when you need to do bass drum triplets and single then double hit loops. How on earth does lars do it?

Vocals have always been Guitar Hero's weak point and yet again you have to sing in an expressionless lifeless choirboy drone to get marks. (In tony stark contrast to Rock Band, where you can imitate them and have an awesome time and get judged fairly) At least the UI has improved dramatically, except the ridiculously thicker than they really are pitch lines. The songs are picked for the instruments, there's next to no love here.

If you play on expert difficulty on guitar, you owe it to yourself to get this off EB (pricematched to JB Hi Fi) with the intention of giving it back in a week, but you'll find you won't want to give it back. Also, Mercyful Fate's Evil is unequivocally the best plastic guitar song ever. I have no band prejudice here, i'd never heard of them before this game.


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Game Comment by Smokinxp

I have been Metallica through and through since the One Music Video was debuted.

Finally with Death Magnetic - Metallica are back to what they do best play metal and rule at it.

The song selection of Metallica songs is vast and very enjoyable, sure there is some songs that many would want included in replace for the sub-standard "Songs that inspired Metallica"

Why would i want to pay for half a track list that isn't Metallica on a Metallica game. they should've been optional downloads.

the two songs that crossed over from previous Guitar Heroe's One and All Nightmare Long have had there charts rearranged to cater for another guitar, in the case of One personally i don't like the new arrangement it was better the way it was in GH3

Overall though it's well worth the money, and if you add the Death Magnetic download content on top you have hours and hours of fun.


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