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Dear Harmonix: Please Fix One Thing And I Will Love You
I consider myself to be a decent Expert-level Guitar Hero player. You won’t find me on YouTube with 100% full-combo runs of Freebird, Cliffs of Dover or Bark At The Moon. You won’t find me winning any tournaments, either. I’ve beaten Through The Fire And Flames twice and Jordan five times (five-starring it once and never again) and gotten the “Who Needs the Power?” achievement for Cult of Personality, though, so I’m not exactly a slouch either.
Yet, one thing in Rock Band’s guitar charts consistently destroys my note streak: the timing leniency. I’m specifically talking about the precision with which you need to hit hammer-ons, pull-offs and rapid strumming. (For the uninitiated, hammer-ons and pull-offs in the guitar-based games are a series of notes that you can hit without strumming, as long as you time the fret-presses and releases correctly and hit the first note of the sequence.)
If you look at the guitar note charts for Rock Band, they’re by and large much easier to play than those found in Guitar Hero III and the harder songs in Guitar Hero II. Rock Band, after all, seems to be more geared towards the casual party audience (despite the fact that Guitar Hero costs less to enjoy fully). So, there I was, looking at Green Grass & High Tides — which shares some note chart similarities with Guitar Hero II’s Freebird – and failing it. Repeatedly. Meanwhile, I can pass Freebird with flying colors.
The reason for that is because of how precisely you have to time your hammer-ons and pull-offs. Whereas Guitar Hero has made the timing more lenient with every sequel to make up for the fact that they get increasingly difficult passages, Rock Band seems to have taken it to a level only slightly more lenient than the original Guitar Hero — a game in which it was almost impossible for a “decent” player such as myself to consistently hit hammer-ons without strumming extra. I also think that other Expert players — ones that not only don’t have Rock Band’s current timing down to a science, but still struggle with the higher-tier songs in Guitar Hero II and III – should be able to pick up Blackened in Rock Band without being made to fail in the first two minutes. But chances are, they can’t.
This baffles me slightly because of how Rock Band supposedly caters to a slightly more casual rhythm game audience. I don’t know about you, but when I play Rock Band with my friends, I do want to play hard songs to combat boredom — yet, I don’t want to have to develop the precision of a robot in order to not fail out of them. I furthermore find it just downright odd that I can get through the Number Of The Beast solo quite well in Guitar Hero III and pass 400,000 points in that song, yet consistently get knocked out of that same solo in the Rock Band downloadable version — whose note chart is much easier!
What I’m proposing is that Harmonix patches Rock Band such that the timing leniencies in the guitar charts are at least comparable to, if not better than, the programming in Guitar Hero II. It’s not because I’m pissed that I can’t pass songs during a party (I can pass them — just only about 80% of the time), but rather because I feel that the majority of those who pick up Rock Band won’t want to stress out as much as they do when competing in Guitar Hero. Besides, hammer-ons in general should feel more natural than they do. A few complaints I heard about the original Guitar Hero wasn’t that the hammer-ons were difficult, but that they didn’t mimic the feel of doing them on a real instrument.
So howzaboutit, Harmonix? Will you fix this one thing and make me kiss your feet for all of eternity?
What do you Expert Rock Band guitar players think? Do you care that the leniency is tight? Do you want it looser, or do you want them to leave it? Leave your comments below.
May 10th, 2008 at 3:28 pm
to be honest, i find note charts with variance far more interesting to play than difficult note charts. but that’s probably because i can only do hard mode >_>;
May 29th, 2008 at 3:11 am
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Guitar Hero 3’s hammer ons and pull offs are TOO lenient. The game was made difficult for the sake of being difficult (aka overcharted), so they made the system insanely easy, and barely representing how guitars work. Rock Band strives for a more realistic approach, where you actually have to time your fingers like an actual guitarist would. I’m also fairly confident RB’s system is more lenient than GH2’s. I own all 4 installments up to this point, GH1, 2, 3, and RB. Rock Band’s system is by far my favorite because the charts make sense, and the system represents reality. I play Rock Band on Expert for every instrument, and have beaten all the careers, to establish some credibility in my words.
June 6th, 2008 at 10:30 pm
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June 24th, 2008 at 8:46 pm
A game is not a game if it’s much too easy or not too difficult but how difficult is difficult in Guitar Hero? Slash admits it’s not easy playing Guitar Hero and it’s entirely different from the real guitar-shredding. But I salute you for being so humble with your expertise. I even saw a guy once on YouTube that he did Dragonforce’s “Fire & Flames” 100% for 32 times already and he’s doing it the 33rd time. But if he gets hold of the real axe, I don’t think he can get past two notes on the intro. What a funny guy! So, Guitar Hero is a game and the more difficult it becomes, the more it becomes fun and entertaining. Forget about going through a guitar class from Joe Satriani. Satch must be a worst guitarist in Guitar Hero! hehehehe…but he is definitely the BEST of all guitarists out there! the teacher of Steve Vai, Kirk Hammett, Kerry King & Jeff Hanneman!
June 25th, 2008 at 4:07 pm
Translation: “I’m an EXPERT player. If i can’t complete songs in Expert difficulty, something must be wrong with the game!”
If you are having trouble with the timing in rock band drop down a difficulty till you train your timing up.
As far as i’m concerned I will never touch GHIII again because of how horrible a player it made me at any rhythm game with realistic timing.
July 3rd, 2008 at 8:59 pm
I am so glad that I have come across this. I have not had that much of a problem with Rock Band, it seems to be harder just because the bars on Rock Band are small and hard to see, atleast for me. My problem has been with Guitar Hero 3. Like you I am a decent player able to keep up with expert mode, able to pass hard no problems. But I am struggling to get the timing in GH3. I know that they dropped Harmonix from GH3, but is that why I cant play, or am I just trippin? Please someone tell me I aint trippin
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