'Cause We All Just Wanna Be Big Rockstars

My husband & I owned Guitar Hero I & II for the Xbox 360 & loved them, so when Rock Band hit the stores, we were some of the first in line to purchase it as Guitar Hero had always been fun, but we were maxing out on the difficulty level & it was becoming less challenging which made playing Guitar Hero less fun.

Just as in Nickelbacks 'Rock Star' lyrics (a song that is sadly not released with the game), this game is a blast, mainly because "we all just wanna be big rockstars", whether we're 5 years old or 40 years old.

The game allows you to choose between playing one of the four key components (guitar, bass, drums, or vocals)to making a rock band so there's something for everyone.

Since my husband & I were already familiar with the guitar portion, it was an easy transition from Guitar Hero to Rock Band for the guitar portion. Some things to note, the guitar that comes with Rock Band is slightly different than the guitar controller that comes with Guitar Hero. The strummer doesn't click when you strum up or down, and the fret buttons seem a bit less forgiving in terms of timing in solos and other, tougher sections. It's not that it's bad or wrong--it's just different, and it takes some getting used to. For this reason, my husband & I still play guitar on the controller that came with Guitar Hero, more for familiarity sake than anything else. However, when we've needed more controllers like during our Rock Band New Year's Eve party, we've used both the Guitar Hero controller as well as the one provided with Rock Band without issue.

As to the vocals, you're provided with a microphone & I for one couldn't wait to try it out. It took a few tries to figure out what I needed to do, but after going through the tutorial one time through I got the hang of it. Basically, it's built on the same technology as Karaoke Revolution (a game I'd never played before, but have since thought about purchasing), but basically it's a bar that scrolls across the screen with the words & measures whether or not you can sing in key. There's a pointer that indicates what key you're currently singing in & a green line indicating where you need to be. Occassionally, it'll have these round things that scroll across where the person on vocals taps the mic against their hand sort of simulating a tambourine or cow bell or whatever. The cool thing is that if you don't hit these because you've set it up to be able to play guitar or drums AND sing, you don't lose points for not hitting the round things. Talk about increasing the guitar challenge that my husband & I were getting too good at! I've even invited my mom, an actual singer up to give this a shot, we'll have to see how she does.

What I really like about the way the vocals are set up is that I'd NEVER sing willingly in a karaoke bar without a lot to drink, but when we had our New Year's Eve Rock Band party is was much easier to sing in front of a crowd because I was focused on the screen to hit the key I needed to hit & when I glanced around the room for a brief second during a break, everyone else was intent on the screen too. *Phew!* Definitely takes the 'oh god I must look so stupid' factor away.

What I don't really like about the vocals, seeing as my mom is a singer & I CAN sing in key, is that it does't allow for any personal stylization. On the other hand, I've seen this be a VERY good thing for people that struggle with hitting the right key as they're still able to play the game without failint out. As for me, if the original song track has the singer trailing off or giving an extra shout out or something, don't try emulating this as the game is SO intent on you hitting the right key that you'll basically get penalized by not getting the maximum number of points. The only time you're allowed this free personalization would be during an "overdrive" section, which is basically at the end of some songs where every instrument can make as much noise as they want, "freestyle".

As for the drums, they are a blast! It even looks like an actual drum set, well, except for the 4 round colored pads. As the colored note comes across the screen you tap the appropriately corresponding note with the drumsticks that came with the game (I have to admit these do appear to be very sturdy drumsticks if any of you are worried about the drumsticks snapping in half). If you see an orange bar, put the foot pedal, but the tutorial for the drums covers all of this too. Seeing as I never was in band & all I've ever done is sing, I know that each colored pad responds to a portion of the drum, like the tom-tom, but I couldn't really tell you much more than that, but there's really no reason when playing the game that you need to know. I will say that when you play the drums without the foot pedal it takes it down a difficulty level so you can start out easy, but my husband & I enjoy the challenge the foot pedal provides as we're convinced that the only way to get any better is to practice.

My only complaint about the drums is that when you really get going & you're not the one playing the drums, the taps on the drum can (even with the microphone volume turned all the way up) totally drown out everything else in the room. If you don't believe me go to YouTube & pull up someone playing RockBand drums on expert, I've seen one where the guy mutes Rock Band completely & you just hear the taps on the drum set. Yikes! Not sure how you'd get around this though. So parents be warned if your children should decide to play Rock Band at 6am while you soundly slumber, you may not be able to sleep.

In case you were thinking that you needed more than one person to play this game, think again! You have the option of either solo plays where you can pick any instrument available & practice OR if you've got a party going on you can get a maximum of 4 people playing at a time. We had a total of 8 people at our New Years Eve party & it was a blast switching on & off & being able to take a break to get a drink or something to eat etc in between songs. What I like about having everyone play together is that if you have someone who's never played before they can play with someone who's been playing a while, the brilliance of this is that if the newcomer fails out the person who's been playing a while longer as soon as they achieve 'star power' (also known as overdrive) they can "save" the person who failed out up to a maximum of three times & continue with the song. And who doesn't like being what the game has deemed the "savior" or hero?


The game's song list goes a long way toward making multiplayer even more enjoyable. Though the game includes only 45 licensed songs (along with 13 bonus tracks from lesser-known bands), many of these 45 are big-name tracks that are immediately recognizable and span multiple rock genres.

Alternative rock fans:
Weezer's "Say It Ain't So," Smashing Pumpkins' "Cherub Rock," and Nirvana's "In Bloom."

Modern rockers:
The Killers' "When You Were Young," Foo Fighters' "Learn to Fly," and Yeah Yeah Yeahs' "Maps."

Classic rock fans: Black Sabbath's "Paranoid," The Rolling Stones' "Gimme Shelter," and KISS's "Detroit Rock City."

Other, less specifically denominational yet altogether awesome songs include The Ramones' "Blitzkrieg Bop," Rush's "Tom Sawyer," and Metallica's "Enter Sandman."

The vast majority of these songs are original tracks from the artists, with only a few covers scattered throughout the tracklist. What I like about having Rock Band on the Xbox versus the PlayStation is that I'm able to log on to XBOX live & purchase additional songs when I get bored with the ones that are there. So far I've purchased a package of songs from the Police that included 'Roxanne'. Too much fun!

My recommendation, get if you don't have this game or an Xbox purchase both as fast as possible you'll be glad you did as this game will give you, your family, & your friends hours of entertainment.