Guitar Hero III - Misc comments and a few questions

Published Sun, Nov 11 2007 15:54 | William

When I first picked it up, I was really wondering whether or not it would be value added in any way in my life.  Like I mentioned before, my TV has virtually no usage on it (until about two weeks ago) and sitting on my couch in front of the TV is not something I felt was missing in my life.  GH III has managed to eat up about 45 minutes to an hour each night though. I started on easy and felt like I wimp. Moved up to Medium and got to the point that I could pwn any of the songs on it the first time around (at least in the first three groups).  Moved up to hard last night.  Since it was Saturday night, I didn't feel bad wasting more than an hour.  Literally, I said "this is it, one more game and I'm hanging it up for the night" and I managed to finish - 89% on hit me with your best shot.

 

Got up this morning and got to where I can finish everything in the first two groups on Hard.   Decided to go into Career mode.  Moved back to medium for it.  Finally got to Battle Tom Morello and got my a55 handed to me repeatedly until I learned to shock him by moving the guitar up.  When I get to Atlanta tonight, I'll probably give it a go on hard just b/c I feel like a wuss if I'm not playing there.  Winning was cool so far but it was medium so it doesn't really count.

 

I've found that although it's a waste of time in terms of productivity, it is very effective in terms of clearing the cache.  No matter what's on your mind, after a few rounds of intense concentration, you've forgotten about it.  To that end, I guess i'm ok with it. If I start spending more time on it or something though, I'll probably revert back to my original curmudgeonly ways.

--- Question though....  I really hate a lot of the songs on there.  Poison? Barf.  Foghat?  Dude, you spilled the bong water.  Hit me with your best shot is cool b/c even though it's wussyish, Pat Benetar is cool.  The Killers? Uhhh.  Barracuda?  Bitchin but how many times can you play it?  Painted Black - totally rules.  So can you pull down other music?  I went to the store and EVERYTHING Sucked. Not just sucked but sucked on wheels or at least so it seemed. 

Is there a way to get stuff that in the words of Beavis and Butthead, Rules?  Metallica (Old), Linkin Park, NIN, Prodigy???????????? or something along those lines? Even if not stuff that awesome, I'd settl,e for way cool, Pink Floyd or anything old school that didn't blow chunks.  If so, pretty please, fill  me in. 

Slight rant - Back in high school, I'll cop to liking a lot of really whack stuff.  College was even worse.  But never did I go for Poison, or even know anyone that owned  Poison cd that I knew of.  They just sucked.  Stewart might as well have worn a Poison shirt b/c Brett Micheals was no cooler than Kip Winger.  Who on Earth made the call to put Poison in GH III?  I could sort of see missing the ball and doing it in GH I.  But I can only believe that kids of today must think Poison sucks and I know everyone in my day hated them. And that Social Distortion crap, WTF?  I honestly never heard that song before GH III and I just feel dirty afterwards, like I've basked in a cesspool of unadulterated suckiness.  I can almost hear Butthead saying "Change this or Kill me"

----

So I've found that no matter how bad you suck the first time you play, you can get good quickly.  I mean, I went from bombing out in the first section to busting pretty high numbers on Hard in under 2 hours.  Sarah was playing with me too last night. She went from never playing to jamming in the 90s on Easy in under an hour and a half.  Kim's still not playing but I'm hoping she will soon.  However I tried Expert today and just got smoked.  After repeated attempts, I wasn't getting better.  So I can't say the same for expert but I'm guessing by this time next week, I'll change my tune.  I just stubbornly kept going when I was sucking and got better fast so If you're playing now and suck, a little practice will get you there. Not even a lot of practice, just a little.

So if you can help me out with finding some better songs, I'll be indebted in a big way - if I can get any of the above 'cool bands' on there I'd be wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy appreciative.

Comments

# Keith Rome said on November 11, 2007 5:03 PM:

I saw you can download song packs from the online marketplace - so far all I see there is Foo Fighters and Velvet Revolver. None of the bands you mention.

Apparently Matt Stone and Trey Parker think GH3 is dorky enough to put out a South Park episode on it too... www.southparkzone.com/.../Guitar-***-o.html

# guitar hero » Blog Archive » Guitar Hero III - Misc comments and a few questions said on November 11, 2007 6:01 PM:

Pingback from  guitar hero  » Blog Archive   » Guitar Hero III - Misc comments and a few questions

# William said on November 11, 2007 7:47 PM:

Thanks Keith - I'm checking it out right now.  I need to look around - man I'd love Boulevard of Broken dreams by Greenday too - it would lend itself great to GH so hopefully I'll be able to find something cool.  I appreicate the tip. BTW, I'll shoot you my gamer tag in an email... I appreciate all of your help.

# Theo said on November 12, 2007 1:13 PM:

If you think the songs for GHIII are lame, check out the ones that the original GH had....oy. It's pretty harsh, though, to dismiss Social Distortion as "crap" out of hand, man. :-)

# Andy Lines said on November 13, 2007 9:16 AM:

Bill,

Dunno if you've made it to the later tiers yet, but there's some pretty good stuff up there.  Metallica (One), Stevie Ray Vaughan (Pride and Joy), G'n'R (Welcome to the Jungle), Iron Maiden (Number of the Beast), Slayer (Raining Blood), Eric Johnson (Cliffs of Dover), and of course, the epic battle w/ Satan to a metal version of Devil Went Down to GA.  I agree that there's a whole lot of suck in the earlier levels, but the later tiers have some pretty good stuff.

On a semi-related note, I tried out the drums in the Rock Band demo over the weekend and I may have found yet another productivity killer.  Played through Rush's Tom Sawyer and when I got done I had an audience of 10 or so people behind me.  You know I like to keep a low profile so of course, I just slowly walked away, but it was a blast while I was playing.

# D'Arcy from Winnipeg said on November 13, 2007 9:51 AM:

I can't believe that I thought you were kewl...that you were my friend...and then...THEN...you commit what Ozzy Osbourne was singing about in the song "The Ultimate Sin": you have bashed Poison.

:P

Yeah, the song list on the game is a bit of a weird mix considering the name of the game is "Legends of Rock". I mean, the Killers are already considered "Legends"? And I totally agree about the Social Distortion comment...some songs turned me on to new bands (AFI for example), but some (like Social Distortion) are like WTF?!

And the extra songs in the in-game shop are pretty lame. Make that VERY lame. Hopefully the music labels realize what a great promotional opportunity they have to get bands in front of a whole new audience and we get true "Legend" tracks out there on the XBox Live marketplace.

But seriously Bill...c'mon, you can admit it: you mullet-whipped to Unskinny Bop and Bon Jovi's Dead or Alive back in the day...its ok, we all did.

;)

D

# Jeremy Brayton said on November 14, 2007 10:06 AM:

Dragonforce. Expert. You don't get a more awesome song. Killswitch Engage's "My Curse". Fall of Troy's "F.C.P.R.E.M.I.X.".

Granted, you kind of need to be a metal freak like I am to really enjoy some of the tracks. GH3 plays much better than 1 and 2 so hopefully they can add a buttload of tracks you'll enjoy.

Personally? I practice every day on expert simply because I can rarely break 80%. I do it this way to keep tempo and to keep me humble because I'd get wasted trying half the songs I do in career.

I will say a couple of things GH has taught me. 1) Tempo: I keep time rather well. 2) Patterns: the hammer on/pull offs teach patterns that I can now recognize (for the most part) by ear. 3) Finger strength: I can now finger bend notes on my real guitar a LOT easier. I need to masturbate a TON more to keep my right arm as strong as my left now :)

# Jeremy Brayton said on November 14, 2007 10:07 AM:

Dragonforce. Expert. You don't get a more awesome song. Killswitch Engage's "My Curse". Fall of Troy's "F.C.P.R.E.M.I.X.".

Granted, you kind of need to be a metal freak like I am to really enjoy some of the tracks. GH3 plays much better than 1 and 2 so hopefully they can add a buttload of tracks you'll enjoy.

Personally? I practice every day on expert simply because I can rarely break 80%. I do it this way to keep tempo and to keep me humble because I'd get wasted trying half the songs I do in career.

I will say a couple of things GH has taught me. 1) Tempo: I keep time rather well. 2) Patterns: the hammer on/pull offs teach patterns that I can now recognize (for the most part) by ear. 3) Finger strength: I can now finger bend notes on my real guitar a LOT easier. I need to masturbate a TON more to keep my right arm as strong as my left now :)

# William said on November 14, 2007 6:01 PM:

D'arcy, you had me howling when i read this.  No B.S.  I never got a mullet. I had my share of equally whack high school style disasters though. I died my hair blonde and it turned orange. I tried to fix it b/c my head was glowing orange and then it turned black (I figured I'd err on the side of caution and go darker). i got an earing which I kept in my ear two whole hours until my Grandmother saw it and put an end to that nonsense. I sported Red Oakley Frogskin sun glasses, red and yellow, which looked like Tom Cruise's Risky Business sun glasses after Ronald MacDonald got a hold of them.  I rode around on a hot Pink Hutch Trickstar bike. I wore Guess overalls.

Your points are so valid though, how in the hell did the Killers get on there?

Anyway homie, the feeling is mutual - next time hopefully we'll get to hang out some more.

# William said on November 14, 2007 6:05 PM:

jeremy - I just shot you an email - we definitely need to get together and Jam - I suck so bad at Expert in most cases that I can't get through the first verses.  I've gotten to the point I can hit 100+ note streaks on Hard, but I can't even get started on Expert b/c i just suck too bad.  But two weeks ago, i couldn't even get through the first verse on medium so clearly it's practice. Check your email though homie, definitely like to get a hold of you.

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