Game Review: Guitar Hero for PS2

So my son is visiting for a week because he is on his spring break. Unfortunately, it has not coincided with my spring break, so I've been working most of the time he's here. Because of this, I went and splurged on something I thought he'd enjoy, although I thought it would be lame - Guitar Hero on PS2. The game comes with one "guitar" with five buttons to represent the chords and a plastic switch to simulate "strumming". It even has a whammy bar to distort some of the sounds while you play your favorite songs. The guitar and the game are in a package and cost about $70 at Best Buy.

I like how the game starts out - there are some basic characters to choose from and some basic guitar styles to choose. You have a few songs to play until you "unlock" other songs from getting high scores on the beginning ones. As you progress, you can also unlock other cooler looking guitars and change their appearances. The game play itself reminds me of DDR because, on the screen is a band and the song starts playing and the buttons you're supposed to press on the guitar come flashing on the screen towards you. Sounds easy, right? Wrong! The only songs I can play thus far are "I Love Rock and Roll" by Joan Jett, "More Than A Feeling" by Boston, and "Ziggy Stardust" by David Bowie. Whenever I try to play "Sharp Dressed Man", I screw up about halfway through the song. Meanwhile, K has mastered much more difficult songs like "Iron Man" and "Bark at the Moon". With each new level unlocks five more songs, which are pretty good, I think. K has complained that there are no Metallica songs on there, but seems happy with the other songs. They have a good mix - from guitar legends like Jimi Hendrix and even newer bands like Incubus.

After each song you play, you get a rating - so many stars out of five - and a quick blurb in a newspaper-like background giving a review of your performance. You also get "points" for each song, which kind of gives you an indicator of whether or not you're ready to move on to the next difficulty level. Bottom line is that I thought K would lose interest in it during this week, which hasn't happened. The game is pretty well designed and fun for even me to play. If you want to have more fun, you can buy a second guitar and battle it out with friends.

My review: Nine out of ten dancing feet, even if you're not a guitar hero already.