Tales of the Rampant Coyote

Adventures in Indie Gaming!

R.I.P. Guitar Hero

Posted by Rampant Coyote on February 9, 2011

Okay, so I haven’t played Guitar Hero since GH3, so I can’t say I’m really gonna miss it all that much…

Activision Dissolves Guitar Hero Business

Now I feel a sudden urge to dust off the PS2 controllers and rock out to the original. It had a good run.

Not like the original game-maker Harmonix is having it easy, with recent layoffs. But I always felt like they held the soul of the series. The “true” heir to the Guitar Hero legacy was Rock Band, in my mind. But even so… they are running into the limits of the genre, I guess.

Ah, well. I’m still having fun with Rock Band 3.


Filed Under: Biz, Mainstream Games - Comments: 5 Comments to Read



  • Brian 'Psychochild' Green said,

    I think that headline should read:

    Activision admits, “Oh, that franchise we beat to death to get a few more golden eggs out of it? Yeah, it’s dead.”

    Maybe not as snappy….

  • Rampant Coyote said,

    Might have been snappier than “R.I.P. Guitar Hero.” But you know, I hate taking strong positions on things I don’t know about, and I’ve pretty much ignored Guitar Hero after GH3.

  • McTeddy said,

    You know… I’ve played just about every music game released in the past ten years… and Guitar Hero has been dead since Harmonix left the show. It began as such an amazing prospect… but they really did drive it into the ground.

    Every game they’d add heavier rock and expand the hit box to compensate for the increasing difficulty. When you have a full second second range to hit notes… you lose the feeling that you are playing music at all.

    I even had hopes for Warriors of Rock because THAT was the kind of game I made for my college final project. But somehow they had the talent to make a game that was less fun than something created by 6 college students.

    Guitar Hero… I’ll do my best to remember the early days when you didn’t suck. Sadly, that was something like 27 games ago so it may be a little hard.

    And Activision… STOP MILKING US AND RE-RELEASING YOUR CRAP! PLEEEASE!

  • LateWhiteRabbit said,

    No surprise. Really, there is only so far you can take a themed or narrow genre. With Activision and Harmonix burning the candle from both ends with the Guitar Hero and Rock Band series it was bound to happen sooner rather than later.

    Once you introduce making your own band, your own character, all the other instruments, etc. what more can you do but release new songs? And re-release old songs. Players were basically being forced to re-buy the same game over and over again as it stood.

    The genre (neat as it is) is played out. (Ha! Puns!) Where else could they take it? Orchestra Hero? “Invite over 100 of your closest friends and relax as you all play covers to Bach and Beethoven! Conductor’s wand included, other instrument controllers sold separately.”

  • mk2net said,

    This is good news – now the good music game (Rock Band) can have the stage all to itself.

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