It's the best collection of plastic instruments ever. The game's not bad, either

It's the best collection of plastic instruments ever. The game's not bad, either

I had to think for a moment as I left the store, four miles away from the nearest available Xbox. It’s hard to look inconspicuous with a box half your size filled with an entire band of plastic instruments. With a few casual comments about Rock Band, my good friend had handed over £150 of his hard-earned cash and sent me to the nearest Gamestation in search of fake instrumental treasure. I asked myself: If Rock Band can easily command such power over my friend’s wallet, could it possibly be the greatest game to be barely contained in a giant cardboard vessel?

I resisted the urge to hook a crown over the microphone stand and proclaim Rock Band ‘Game of Games’ then and there. After all, I could hardly get away with such a thing in the widely read and meticulously scrutinized Tech section of Student: it would cause an outrage! Having played the game thoroughly however, I’m willing to return to my original hypothesis. The only possible explanation for Rock Band’s greatness is that God, after a bit too much milk and honey, accidentally let it fall to Earth from Heaven where it landed in Harmonix Studios after ricocheting off Red Octane’s face.

Strapped into our plastic instruments like elves setting up for a gig at Toys ‘R’ Us, my friends and I prepared to become Rock Gods. Even navigating the game menus shows the differences with rival franchise Guitar Hero. Rock Band has grown up, quit drugs, ditched the roadies and resigned from its dead-end job at the coffee shop. Gone are the wine-gum colours and teenage immaturity of Guitar Hero, replaced by a slick and intuitive interface. I don’t mean slick in an overly complex, “look what we can do!” way: it just works. This extends into playing the game as well; Star Power has now been replaced with the more serious ‘Overdrive’ and the eye-wateringly garish note charts of Guitar Hero have been squared out and made easier to identify, with simple coloured bars replacing the round edges and baffling white dots of its predecessor.

The most obvious additions to the formula are, of course, the new instruments. Your band consists of a lead guitar, rhythm guitar or bass, drums and some poor schmuck lumbered with the microphone (although he does get all the sex, or so I’m told). Rock Band does a great job at keeping things understandable for the audience with instruments split across the screen a la Guitar Hero, while wannabe Mick Jaggers have a bar running along the top of the screen to indicate pitch. I should take the opportunity to explain that the drums do not have a crazy representation on the note chart. Rather oddly they use the same layout as the guitars, with the four pads are laid out in colour order and the kick drum sandwiched in as a long orange bar across the chart. Although it appears rather unintuitive, it works well despite the odd design choice.

The instruments themselves are the weakest link in an admittedly heavy chain. The drums feel great and pounding out a rhythm is cathartic both to see and hear. While there have been some reported issues with the limp kick pedal, the whole set feels solid and worth the money. The microphone is nothing worth talking about, which is good in a way since there’s nothing wrong with it either. Weighty and aesthetically authentic, it’s just enough to induce the blood flow when you start howling. Surprisingly the guitar is the weakest of the three; while it looks and plays similarly to previous Guitar Hero axes, it feels a bit light and flimsy in your hands and has a strum bar as effective as a wet piece of macaroni. Fortunately there is backwards compatibility for your old Guitar Hero controller, so you can shred through the most complex of songs without hesitation.

The songs featured in Rock Band are fantastic, each a glaring reminder of Harmonix’s prowess in picking the best selection of delicious sonic apples from the orchard of rock. From “Gimme Shelter” by the Rolling Stones to “Paranoid” by Black Sabbath and “Enter Sandman” by Metallica, it’s easy to see where the Guitar Hero series went wrong once Harmonix left the scene to create the Rock Band franchise. Although there were songs I didn’t like in the set list, I did appreciate them for their contribution to the experience, allowing everyone from mohawks to faux-hawks to come together in peace and harmony.

Playing alone, Rock Band is as fun as expected. However like most party games, enjoyment increases exponentially depending on how many people are playing and whether they are drunk, or really drunk. This is amplified since everyone is playing a different instrument and aspect of the same song in unison. Everyone feels like part of a real band, playing together to stick it to the man and all the squares that have been keeping you down since the day you were born… man.

Rock Band screams effort and dedication on every inch of its (rather cumbersome) box. It serves as a timely reminder to us mere mortals that Harmonix will always hit the right notes when making a music game. With a newly-reduced price tag and a content marketplace bursting at the seams with downloadable songs, there’s little reason not to rock out with your groupies, roadies and even friends on Rock Band.