Welcome to a bit of a mashup. See, I was absolutely going to do a GTMM on Guitar Hero, but which one? 1,2,3? Band Hero?

Nah. I figured let’s do what I do best, make a damn list!

Bit of a long one though, series did a lot in 20 years.

Starting Off Small

‘Twas the year 2006, Summer. High School looming near, PS2 in full gear. My step brother visits with his best friend, as he has done quite a few times before, usually on school breaks. But this time, he brought a new game. Guitar Hero. Now back then I had no clue what it was, thought it was kinda weird, intimidating even. “You mean you gotta get up there and perform?” “Hell no.” i thought. SB and his buddy are playing on hard/expert. I’m a bit overwhelmed at the scene of colored gems whizzing by the screen as a cover of Symphony Of Destruction by Megadeth plays. Took me a bit to build up the courage to “perform” for the first time, but I eventually do and play the classic Iron Man by Black Sabbath.

I sucked.

But that was the moment, that probably changed my life forever. Like, seriously. This stupid little plastic instrument game shifted everything around, oh i NEEDED this.

It wasn’t until Christmas of that year that my Mom dropped on me the 2nd installment of Guitar Hero with the red and black plastic Gibson SG accompanying the game disk.

It was that very day that I started my very long journey with Guitar Hero, and rhythm games in general like DDR, Rock Band, DJMAX, Rocksmith, Clone Hero, YARG and Fortnite Festival among others.

A journey that has introduced me to so much MUSIC, between the main setlists and the thousands of fan made charts over the years.

A journey that has taken me from plastic guitar to real guitar, from plastic drums to….slightly nicer plastic drums.

A journey that has yet to end even in my 30’s.

Getting A Band Together

So here we go. Gonna exclude the DS games, DJ Hero and Band Hero since my experience is foggy with the former and minimal with the latter.

Now, starting with…

12. Guitar Hero - Live

Woof, oh boy, where to start. Well, let’s do some of the good: It brought the game back from the dead after 5 years away from the scene and introduced some interesting ideas such as the live concert backgrounds, GHTV, and for better and worse, the 6 fret guitar. Even all of those things are massively flawed in an of themselves, basically the whole game is a mess. I enjoyed it for what it was, but man the guitars sucked, the in-game setlist sucked(saved by GHTV) and Freestyle Games never should have called this GH in the first place, because it doesn’t look or FEEL like GH. At least they could’ve included a 5 fret mode to bring back long time players!(Well, they almost did). But alas, ‘twas death nail for the series that, as of writing, has yet to return. Thanks Bobby Kotick.

11. Guitar Hero Aerosmith

Built from the GH3 engine(more on that later), Aerosmith is by far the quickest and easiest game to beat in the series. A game that i’ve only played through once and pretty much set it down for good. Love Aerosmith, and this game shot the series popularity in the highest of highs, but it’s kinda meh and Joe Perry’s battle was underwhelming. It did however fix the massive infinite frontend bug from 3 that would later be the baseline for Clone Hero(fret spam). So overall to me a forgettable outting, but an important first stop to the many band iterations we’d see from both sides of the fence.

10. Guitar Hero 5

The one with the massively improved engine/graphics and a massive, massively inferior setlist. Much more pop rock, way less hard rock/metal. The DLC and the carry over imported setlists save this game for me, but really this felt the most generic artistically of the series. Sure we got Kurt Cobain and Carlos Santana, but gone were the bombastic flair of the older games with more realistic looking characters and stages. The challenges system for unlocks was cool though and more fleshed out on the next game, but nothing too crazy to write home about with this one, just a middling game towards the dying days of the series.

9. Guitar Hero

Funnily enough that despite it’s importance to the awareness of the series and genre for me, that it’s HERE on the list AND i’ve never gone back and played the game in it’s entirety. I’d have fully moved on to 2, 3, and the transition to Xbox 360. I was GONE from the PS2 games at that point, with little to no need to go back, especially considering is AGED engine(you like borked HOPOs?). And yet, it IS what started it all and an incredibly important game with a setlist that, while mostly covers, still kicks ass. Maybe one day i’ll boot up PCSX2 and do a full run for the first time.

8. Guitar Hero: Smash Hits

The beginning of the end. Lazy song choice, mostly awful charts, and yet a another game in the bloated series at this point in the dated World Tour engine. Bemoaned by fans. But for me? I loved this game. I got to play fully mastered tracks picked out from the first 3ish games. Sure i could’ve picked a better set in my sleep, but it did have my favorite track and chart of ANY GH game, Play With Me by Extreme. I still, to this very day, boot up any game with this loaded on it and do another playthrough. It’s so damn good. Despite my fondness for it, yeah, a fully priced game that is essentially a DLC pack, did suck. Imported it to a different game, never looked back.

7. Guitar Hero Encore Rocks The 80s

The first of MANY spin off games in the series, Essentially an 80s reskin of GH2, with a smaller setlist. But MAN what a setlist. Only played through this twice back in the day(and only had it because of my best friend letting me borrow it) and yet it has stuck with me ever since. The aforementioned Play With Me, Krokus’s Ballroom Blitz, No One Like You, Balls To The Wall, Electric Eye, Holy Diver, Seventeen, Caught In A Mosh, I Ran (So Far Away) etc. Banger after banger. Just don’t talk about the absolute batshit chart of Because It’s Midnite….Tier 2, REALLY?! But yeah man, a great little side piece before the REAL action of 2007.

6. Guitar Hero World Tour

The one that brought the whole band together.

This one is kinda special to me, as it was the first midnight sorta-ish release i got to share with my best friend. We hiked all the way to Wallyworld to pick up 2 copies of the game, i got the Wii Guitar bundle and he got the whole band kit for 360. And that loser had to walk all the way back with that kit(jk love ya pal). We proceeded to blast through the entire game that day. I played drums, he played guitar. Even though I wasn’t on Expert yet, I was still absolutely thrashed by the end of it. AND we had school the next day. WOOF.

Not my favorite set, but had some favorites on there like the Ozzy tracks, Stillborn, Freak On a Leash, Pull Me Under, and Hot For Teacher. The 5 lane drum engine was tough, flaky, and ultimately the more inferior of the 2 drum engines compared to RB, they just plain did it better. But for my money, GH did guitar better, c’mon, it’s in the name. We got a ton of new stuff too, like the introduction of Tap Notes(“SLIDERS”), create a rocker and create a song.

A lot of fond memories with this one, and of course having the Prince Of Darkness in it was a huge bonus, especially for me(RIP).

5. Guitar Hero Van Halen

This is a weird one. On the dated World Tour engine, a free pre order bonus for GH5, and the most disjointed setlist in the series. And yet, i love it. Arguably the hardest game in the series, the man himself Edward Van Halen was a shredder after all. I love the 2 different versions of VH we get with the old and new variants(even though Michael and Sammy weren’t in it). I love the odd setlist with Killswitch Engage and Yellowcard randomly in a Van Halen game. And of course I love the 3 Eddie solos that are a bastard to beat, let alone FC. The first game to FORCE me to learn 2 hand tapping, even though it had been a staple technique of the community for years at that point. Overall a blast to play, but really after playing through Career mode once, just import it and put it down.

4. Guitar Hero Metallica

The best spinoff in the series, by far. It absolutely had the most love put into it. The art, the stages, the band attires, and a perfectly curated setlist. From modern metal to punk to grunge to old school rock. You had everything you needed in a GH game, hell even the WT engine was tighter here. Couldn’t ask for a better game at the time, it had one of my all time favorite bands as the main feature, i was eating good. Some of the hardest drumming in the series, and especially with the first inclusion of EXPERT+, you now get to thrash with TWO bass pedals. I never got to partake until MANY years later, but it definitely bumped up GH’s drum engine status a bit after RB2 absolutely stomped on GHWT. Of course the guitar parts are the main attraction and with Metallica’s famously 5+ minute songs, you were in for a GAUNTLET. Some say it’s the last great GH we ever got, but i have another opinion on that later on…

3. Guitar Hero II

The big one. The real start of my journey. Arguably the best setlist in the series, arguably the best engine in the series. (An engine that would become Rock Band) Tight, unforgiving, but so necessary in my climb to Expert. You had to git gud here, nothing was holding your hand other than Star Power. Especially in the latter tiers in the Career Mode and the ultimate test of mettle in Jordan by Buckethead in the bonus songs. I remember to this day completing Free Bird for the first time and my crazed excitement to go tell my Mom i beat it, the sheer joy i had in finally overcoming that beast of a song…but then i had to do it again on medium….and again on hard………..and again on expert. I had a system down where the only thing i did after school was play solos from my favorite songs to get better, and i did that EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. For weeks, honing my skills until i could finally topple the Career on Expert. Oh but that wasn’t all. I still had The Light That Blinds by Shadows Fall, Six by All That Remains, and the aforementioned real final boss, Jordan. I don’t recall having a more difficult time with the game since the grind to beat Jordan, even the climb to beat expert career wasn’t nearly as bad. Eventually though, it was(barely) toppled and really after that, I became obsessed with tough songs, IRATE when having to do the easy songs for others, no, I WANTED MORE. My step brother eventually saw how good I got and of course would say what all the casuals say, “jUsT gO pLaY a ReAl GuItAr”. Nah bro(that comes later), I craved this shit, all i wanted was hard songs. And BOY HOWDY did I get my wish in the next one.

2. Guitar Hero III

If you said this was the best in the series, i wouldn’t argue with you. For me? #2. But really it’s 1a 1b 1c for my top 3 games. GH3 is one of the greatest games of all time, let alone rhythm games. It catapulted the game to mainstream status, seen on talk shows, news outlets, and exploded on this little known site called Youtube. All from the remnants of a Tony Hawk game. Neversoft had to do the impossible, create a GH game from scratch and do it in less than a year since Harmonix(who created the series) went on to make Rock Band. So the fact they took the THPS engine and created an all time classic with the most perfectly curated setlist, is nothing short of miraculous. I remember the build up to release being excruciating for me, i played the 360 demo TO DEATH….on PAD because i was still stuck on PS2 and the 360 in the house was my stepdad’s. I remember poring through the bits of the setlist as it was revealed and listening to it on my iPod Nano. Getting ecstatic on how it would translate to GH.

But i wouldn’t be prepared for what happened around the time it finally dropped.

So before release, i had asked my mom to take me to Gamestop for midnight release, my first one. Was anxiously anticipating using the new PS2 exclusive Kramer guitar(a guitar I have since dismantled into a woodshop project but did end up getting a used one recently to mod it and restore it since i love the style so much).

And just before release, my stepdad had a horrific accident at work and had to get his leg amputated. I had to take a week off from school in the chaos around it since my mom was gone to take care of him. But despite all that, she still went out of her way to take me to Gamestop for midnight release, and goddamn I’ve appreciated that endlessly ever since. I guess it helped cope with the situation for everyone having me being all jazzed for GH3.

It for sure helped that the game was incredible. Led to a lot of fun times with my best friend competing for scores, and eventually expanding to full band shenanigans in Rock Band. Led to honing my skills even further with the toppling of giants such as, the chord heavy bridge of Before I Forget, the orange fret training of Cliffs Of Dover, the impossible tapping Solo A of One, the final boss The Devil Went Down To Georgia and the most iconic song in the series Through The Fire And Flames. It led to getting my 15 seconds of fame in high school showing off playing Raining Blood in front of a crowd. Led to me expanding into the PC modding scene and clone games like Frets On Fire, Clone Hero and YARG. Which has led to the discovering of so much good music over the years that I STILL listen to, to this very day. And of course led to my current day love of playing custom drum charts in RB3DX.

GH3 changed me forever. YET, it isn’t my number one….

Guitar Hero Warriors Of Rock

This is.

So my dumb ass failed my driving test because it was the same day as release, this was more important, of course. Aced it 2nd try but only after I beat Career mode. :)

Warriors Of Rock has my favorite all time Career mode(Quest mode), favorite engine, favorite art style, and because of imports and DLC, my most favorite and most comprehensive setlist in the series. The Quest mode alone is worth it for me though. I love the addition of hero powers to shake up the formula, the dorky Gene Simmons narration, the incredible 2112 playthrough(which has led to Rush becoming an all time favorite band of mine) and of course the final tier and boss showdown that had the hardest songs in the game. I was eating so good with this game for hard songs. Black Widow of La Porte, Speeding, Fury Of The Storm, and the Megadeth tracks just to name a few, kept me busy well after the series had passed on. I knew this was it, i knew that even though the game was incredible that it wasn’t gonna save the series from itself. Too much bloat, too much greed had already done it in. But i didn’t care, i had the best time with it well after everyone else i knew had moved on to other things. This was MY game. Warriors Of Rock still holds up to me, even though the purists hate the nitty gritty engine faults, doesn’t matter, my favorite of the series and number 1 on my list.

Eventually after release, another rhythm game came out to absorb my time and retire my 5 fret gaming for well over a decade: Rocksmith.

Yeah bro, I picked up a REAL guitar.

But i’ll talk about that one later down the line, for now though, thanks for reading!

RANK’D/Games That Made Me: Guitar Hero