Guitar Hero Metallica
Guitar Hero: Metallica puts you in the shoes of one of the most influential bands in rock and roll history. The band, which many credit for bringing the metal genre into the mainstream with their self-titled album (often referred to as “The Black Album”), was thought to be impossible to license for rhythm games until Guitar Hero III licensed “One” and Rock Band licensed “Enter Sandman”
Once those initial two songs were licensed, Metallica dove head-first into the rhythm game genre. Shortly after the release of Rock Band, Metallica had three songs released as DLC, then as Metallica released their latest album Death Magnetic, the album was available in it’s entirety for DLC for Guitar Hero 3 and Guitar Hero World Tour. Then, Neversoft officially announced, through a trailer on the Guitar Hero World Tour disc, that they would be releasing a full band game devoted to Metallica.
The game, which was released in March of 2009, features 49 songs, 28 of which are by Metallica. All songs on this game are master tracks, which follows suit with Guitar Hero World Tour. Also, if you bought the Death Magnetic DLC for Guitar Hero 3 or Guitar Hero World Tour, it is able to be used in this game (with the exception of “All Nightmare Long”, which is already included on the disc). The other 21 songs on the disc are songs that were handpicked by Metallica to be on their game. Past Guitar Hero favorites “Ace of Spades” and “One” also made their reappearances in this title.
In addition to Metallica being motion-captured for the game, some of the guest acts were motion captured as well. Lemmy Kilmister, bassist and lead singer of Motörhead, as well as King Diamond, lead singer of Mercyful Fate were also motion captured to perform their songs in-game.
The gameplay is almost exactly like the gameplay in Guitar Hero World Tour, but with a few minor tweaks for the better. Most noticeably, the “slider” notes were perfected for Guitar Hero: Metallica, which made the experience much more enjoyable for advanced players.
Speaking of gameplay that will please advanced players, Guitar Hero: Metallica was also the first rhythm game to implement the Expert+ mode for drums. The way it works is that all double bass parts in songs are charted accurately, instead of being toned down to single-bass-like parts. While not all songs in the game have Expert+ charts, the ones that do generally require the player to get a second bass pedal for the drum kit in order to succeed. While the mode is meant for double-bass, more advanced drummers will be able to pass songs with a single-bass pedal.
The game was generally praised upon released, with it receiving an average score of 84/100 on Metacritic. Critics praised the evolution from Guitar Hero: Aerosmith and Guitar Hero World Tour, but some felt as though the soundtrack was not varied enough to warrant a full-game.
Guitar Hero: Metallica is available for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Nintendo Wii & PlayStation 2.