Guitar Hero On Tour

[MinisterofDOOM]

There's a new portable Guitar Hero for the DS. It uses a grip with 4 fret buttons inserted into the GBA cartridge slot. Unfortunately, the controller is too small for anyone bigger than a gnome. It's still playable, but the grip will get in the way of your abilities on harder difficulty levels. The buttons are too close together and the grip is too small, putting the strap around your fingers and knuckles rather than the back of your hand. It also doesn't "lock" in like a GBA game and slides out easily which is completely inexcusable, especially considering that you have to restart the whole DS if it pops out--no popping it back in and continuing your current song.

As is usual with Guitar Hero games, the song list is a lot of CRAP and a little good, with mostly "meh" as the rest. The fact that I had to play through UtterCrap182's "All the Small Things" in the first song set is not a good start. Thankfully, the DS has a volume control and you don't really need sound to get through a song. However, there is some Doobie Brothers and Skynyrd, so it's not all that horrible.

Still, it's only $50 which is no more than other GBA games without attachments, so it's still worth picking up.

EDIT:Holy crap "Stray Cat Strut" sucks! Rockabilly needs to die.

[s13jus10]

I'm not sure what difficulty you play on, but have you tried expert? I don't have the game yet, because my concern is that the touch-screen "strumming" wouldn't be as accurate and responsive as strumming on an actual GH guitar, especially on expert where there are lots of notes that you have to hit.

..what about hammer-ons/pull-offs? do they work? and how do you activate star power?

[MinisterofDOOM]

Strumming definitely takes some adjustment. I'm working my way through all difficulties except easy. I have gotten some Expert in and, unfortunately, you're correct. The lack of feedback from strumming makes it hard to get the more difficult stuff right. Shredding is a pain, both due to the lack of feedback and due to how the screen seems to sense strumming. You can get a rhythm going, but it requires some "feeling out" which obviously hurts your performance.

The other problem is that due to the way you hold the DS, it's simply too hard to keep your fingers up with the transitions sometimes. I find it helps a LOT to set the DS in your lap to steady it so you don't have to use your fingers to help support it.

Hammer ons work fine, but seem less common to me. Usually it's only one hammer-on note and not often do you get multiples in a row. Better use of them could have compensated for some of the fret grip's weaknesses, so it's extra disappointing there.

Star Power is done in a few different ways. The main way is to yell into the mic. Of course, that's just stupid, but you can also blow into the mic. Unfortunately, the mic doesn't detect you blowing into it unless you hold it close to your face. You can also press one of the face buttons, but this is no better as it means you have to move your strumming hand from the screen, so you can only do that in spots where you have time to stop strumming. The last way is by touching the Star Power meter, and this one's the best. Unfortunately, it also leads to a lot of accidental star power activation for me. I accidentally tap it when strumming and it wastes my star power. If they had put the meter in a better place, that wouldn't be an issue.

[captainfalco]

I would say overall its a decent game. I have played through all of the medium songs and some hard songs. I would imagine that in the higher difficulties, the unit would come out of the DS, causing a restart (only happened to me once though). That is my only real complaint, I guess its as good as anyone would expect out of a handheld system. As far as music games for the DS is concerned, Elite Beat Agents is awesome, I really hope a new one is in the works.