Back in the saddle

After the huge amount of attention Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock received after its launch, it's definitely no surprise that there is going to be a Guitar Hero IV. The next installment in the popular Guitar Hero series will not only utilize a guitar, but a microphone and drums as well. Since the game is competing with Rock Band, another popular console music game, the developers of the game need enough time to tweak Guitar Hero IV (which was later renamed Guitar Hero: World Tour) to their standards. To satisfy those raging Guitar Hero fans, Activision decided to release two new entries in the series. Please give a warm welcome to Guitar Hero: Aerosmith and Guitar Hero: On Tour, two spin-offs in the popular series.

Livin' on the edge

As one would expect, Guitar Hero: Aerosmith focuses primarily on the legendary band Aerosmith. However there is a little catch. The game doesn't feature music just from Aerosmith. Many other bands and artists are showcased in the game as show openers. In career mode, there are six venues in total to play in. At the beginning of each venue is a short video highlighting Aerosmith's past at the venue.

After the video, players must then complete the two show openers. Only by completing these two songs will two Aerosmith songs appear. Complete all four songs and you'll get to play an encore. Unlike previous Guitar Hero games, players must complete all the songs before they are allowed to progress to the next level. In previous games, players only had to complete a certain amount of songs to continue. This opened up the option to skip a song if it was too difficult for you or if it didn't appeal to you. In Aerosmith, you'll need to complete all the songs, rather you like'em or you don't.

Get a grip

In terms of gameplay, Aerosmith is practically identical to previous games in the popular series. Like previous Guitar Hero games, colored buttons will run down the screen and when they align with one of your buttons, players will have to push that specific button on their guitar or controller. While pressing down on the button, you'll also have to push down on the strum bar. For each note you hit, you'll also need to press down on the strum bar. Essentially if you play 100 notes in a song, you'll need to press down on the strum bar one hundred times.

In Aerosmith, there are several ways to acquire points. Though the main objective of each song is to complete it without failing, players can also try to get a high score on a song. In order to gain points, you'll need to play the notes as they run down the screen. Play the right note and you'll get a certain number of points. This number varies because if you manage to play a long string of notes without missing one, you'll get a multiplier bonus. If you manage to hit thirty notes in a row, you'll get a multiplier bonus of four. That means for every note you hit after thirty, you'll get four times the points. Notes are worth fifty points each without any multipliers, so in this case you'll get two hundred points.