Guitar Hero Metallica preview

Ever since I got hooked on Guitar Hero I’ve been saying that all we need is more music. Not just new songs every week, not just new games every six months, just more, More, MOOOORE! Guiar Hero Metallica is more, focusing on the title band but of course including other tracks lest any non-Metallica fan reconsider spending $50 on the game. This one follows Guitar Hero: World Tour so it has all four instruments.

The Metallica set list seems to favor the really hardcore GH player. I’ve gotten pretty good at lead guitar on hard (though One was always a stickler in GHIII) but a lot of these songs are murder. It’s the nature of the musician, lots of shredding riffs, but man, they’re even hard playing Bass.

Death tracks include Dyer’s Eve, Judas Priest’s Hellbent for Leather and Suicidal Tendencies’ War Inside My Head. Thankfully there are some mellower songs like Unforgiven and Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Tuesday’s Gone (from Happy Gilmore, you’ll know it.)

One is still the same note patterns as the GHIII version, but with a World Tour twist. Just a few of the sustained notes have extra surprises, and there are sections of notes strung together. Playing it with a full band helps you stay alive when it too becomes a murder song. Use your bandmates’ star power to survive those hammer-ons.

I never mastered the drums on World Tour, so I previewed Metallica on medium. This is where I noticed that Metallica songs are loooooooong. It never occurred to me how many of their songs stop, and then keep going, and you think it’s done, but then there’s more. Mercyful Fate gave me a serious leg cramp, and I didn’t even attempt the double pedal. It’s going to be a real bitch if you get eight minutes in and fail out.

I found the mellower songs more fun to drum because then you can focus on the patterns and rhythm. Most songs are still just red and yellow with occasional orange, but the green and blue pads seem to be used more than in standard World Tour tracks. Yeah, there’s lots of drumming in Metallica music.

A lot of the vocal tracks are just a straight line. No offense, but you really only have to scream in a sustained tone. A few Metallica songs like Enter Sandman have slight melodies, and rock songs like Thin Lizzy’s The Boys are Back in Town. But Metallica won’t be a game for singers anyway since they’ll be sitting around bored during the extended guitar and drum solos.

Even the bass parts have enough going on to give you a challenge. I should have mastered the open notes’ addition to World Tour, but I’ve never had to play bass on my own console. See how I sacrifice for my readers. I failed out of quite a few murder songs on Hard, though I bet I can at least get them with practice, if I’m so inclined.

Guitar Hero Metallica will be more great Guitar Hero fodder for parties or lonely nights. It will skew towards the metal fans and expert skill sets in a way that perhaps Aerosmith was not so niche. I’m just waiting for Guitar Hero Meat Loaf.