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The game does have a bit of a learning curve for players who are new at it, specifically at drums. While most look at the drums and think, “Oh that’ll be easily pick up and playable” then you couldn’t be further from the truth. While banging the drums on note is easy and fun, most people don’t realize that the addition of the foot pedal to the game really throws things off and presents a realization that it’s very hard to get your hands, eyes, and feet coordinating together correctly and on time. While many would’ve loved to just jump into the game and start banging on the drums like Neal Peart, it’s actually satisfying to learn how to play the drums and get the stamina to go through the songs in the game. In fact, the most common comment I heard while observing friends play drums after a song was “Wow, that was a work out!”
While this review has so far been overly praise, there are a few downfalls with Rock Band. For one, the single player aspect of the game is a little disappointing compared to Guitar Hero III, specifically on guitar career mode. You create an avatar from the game and bring him through a pre-determined path ranking the songs on difficulty. If you’re an expert player on prior Guitar Hero games than the difficulty will certainly disappoint as the game isn’t that hard. I’ve never been able to five star all the songs on expert in Guitar Hero but I was able to five star every song in Rock Band. Disappointing also rings true in that the solo career mode lacks the incentives of playing songs and gaining fans like the multiplayer World Tour Mode. The lack of being able to create your band members and even name your solo mode band is a big mystery and something that should’ve been there in the beginning. The lack of being able to play in all the arena’s that multiplayer can play in too is annoying. Also, three games later and we still do not have a single player Bass guitar career mode.
Drums in solo career mode are very fulfilling and a good way to practice and learn the game, but the vocal career seemed to be missing something. It’s just not as fun singing alone as it is with three of your friends around you playing the other instruments.
As for the multiplayer mode, Rock Band has the usual options that you’d expect with a quick play option for multiplayer, but also includes a mode called “Band World Tour” where you take a band that you create and put them through essentially a multiplayer version of the solo career mode, except instead you’re gaining fans and opening up new venues along the way (where in solo mode, you’re limited to only a few venues), and playing either self made or predetermined set lists. It’s fun, but you need a core group of people who want to actually play it, as most just want to jump into quick play and play songs they want to, instead of having to do the ones you dislike.
Rock Band is fully supported with weekly downloadable content to increase your song list in the game, ranging from an , well, range of prices depending on the band / song. While it’s nice to have a constant flux of new songs, it’s disappointing that the touches that the full games songs have – fans in the audience singing along and others – are missing from the downloadable content.
Overall though, Rock Band is a very satisfying, rewarding game and I’d recommend it to anyone who has a passion for the music game genre. While the single player modes might be a little disappointing, the multiplayer is where the heart of the game is and it’s quite possible that you won’t have as much fun in a multiplayer game, as you will with three buddies in your room all jamming out on instruments to “Don’t Fear (The Reaper)” by Blue Oyster Cult. And yes, the singer gets to play the cowbells in the song!
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Overall, Rock Band is a very satisfying, rewarding game and I’d recommend it to anyone who has a passion for the music game genre, and ideally friends to play with.
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