The first thing we need to get out of the way is that this is not a Harmonix game. New developers Free Style Games have stepped up to the plate, and delivered the newest installment. So this is still guitar hero, but it’s not a Harmonix guitar hero. That being said, it’s still a great rhythm game, it has plenty of new touches and only a few negative points that I might expect out of the first game of a new franchise.
Guitar hero basically invented the rhythm genre, so it should be no surprise that it can now re-invent it. The biggest change to Guitar Hero Live is to the Guitar itself. It’s got six buttons now, three white and three black arranged in two rows. This is a radical change from the previous five brightly colored buttons. I found the new layout to be easier, requiring less movement of the hands, but more difficult to pick up than it previous incarnation. The games icons are arranged as such that you can see if you need to press the top or bottom row while strumming, but this means you now have to set left or right handed and makes the game less practical as a pass around party game. It’s fairly clear on screen which button you need to press, but I still found myself missing a fair few notes as I moved from top row to bottom, as well as missing the combined notes where both top and bottom need to be held. The buttons top and bottom rows have different textures which help distinguish them, and their natural feel means less looking at the fret board and more playing. Overall the guitar redesign is a HUGE win for this new Guitar Hero game, it pushes fresh life in to a series that got too bloated. One thing the controller does lack is a headphone jack, so there won’t be any silent rocking out at your house.
The new guitar with its six button layout
