My Top 100: #97 – Guitar Hero

 

As Dance Dance Revolution became one of the fastest-growing franchises in gaming, I wasn’t buying into any of it.  It just seemed like a gimmick to me, and something that you actually had to put effort into.  I wanted to play my games sitting down and being lazy, and there was no convincing me otherwise.

In late ’05, a friend of a friend brought Guitar Hero over with him for a gaming sesh.  He had a guitar controller that had a clicky-bar instead of strings, five buttons on the fretboard, and a whammy bar to give it a bit of attitude.  It reminded me of a Fisher Price toy my little niece might play with.

I rolled my eyes and thought “oh boy, here we go”.  I don’t like to be rude or judgemental in front of new people, so I gave it a shot anyway…  I’m quite glad I did.

 

 

Songs in the game were actually all covers of the originals, which was fairly impressive, since I couldn’t really tell the difference at first.

I didn’t read this until a few years after its release, but Guitar Hero was intended as a tool for people to discover new music.  I already knew a few of the songs in the game, but a bunch of new artists really only hit my playlist after playing along with them in GH.

I had heard of The Exies and Helmet, and thought I knew all about Jimi Hendrix and David Bowie without having to really dig their music.  But here I was, bobbing my head to “Unsung”, and having a blast playing “Spanish Castle Music”.  It was a challenge, but I couldn’t stop playing!

Sure, many other Guitar Hero titles have come along since the original, and pretty much all of them had better (and more numerous) songs on them than this one did.  Though they slapped a new coat of paint for each one of its many sequels, none of them could really duplicate that same “wow” feeling that the first one did.