I am the greatest guitarist in the universe!

Yep. Guitar Hero II.

Let's just say that my fingertips are a little raw and cramped right now. (And not from THAT) Popped out of work yesterday at approximately 1500, slightly earlier than usual to head to Best Buy to pick up my GHII pre-order. Got there, walked in, was properly greeted by the yellow T-Shirt guy at the door (I think his name is James), and said hello to the super cute girl that works at the digi camera counters, and then proceeded straight to the X-Box aisle to nab my new toy. Now, I do consider myself to present a fairly serious image (if only on the outside) but I gotta tell you, I caught a glimpse of myself in one of the turned off TV monitors walking by and it is VERY HARD to look cool carrying a toy guitar box littered with cartoony video game characters on it. But I didn't care. My day has arrived.

I get home, still trying to maintain some semblance of dignity as my neighbors watch me treading up the stairs to my pad with this big box under my arm that all but screams GEEK! GEEK! EVERYONE LOOK AT THE GEEK! But I didn't care. Get in my abode and immediately tear into the box, yank out the "guitar", and pop in the disk. And it is all history from that point on...

...I am a golden god.

This game is amazing. Having never played the PS2 version and being a BIG music fan and a percussionist in my younger days I was very confident that I had the skills to make the beginnings a bit easier than the average bear. I whipped through the tutorials, learning the greatly helphul hammer-ons and pull-off technique. Created my band (appropriately named Dread Pirates) and hit the road. I started on easy mode and got the hang of the buttons the first few songs. Once the muscle memory of my fingers to the different "frets" kicked in, it was just getting down the timing and incorporating the whammy bar now and again. The learning curve is not steep, even for someone not musically inclined, just think of it as a game of Simon on steroids...and with a guitar...and kick ass music.

Some of the more notable songs on the set lists:

Heart Shaped Box - Nirvana

Mother - Danzig

Cherry Pie - Warrant

Carry On Wayward Son - Kansas

John the Fisherman - Primus

Killing in the Name - Rage Against the Machine

Once I conquered easy mode, I made straight to the Medium difficulty setting...woah. The easy mode only uses 3 frets, medium throws in a 4th fret. Woah. This proved to be a little more challenging, but at that time the Pirate Queen came home and I quickly sucked her in, reluctantly (Her first words were to the effect of "You look like a geek with that thing"). I got her to try the tutorial so she knew what was happening as she watched. (If you don't know from past blogs...she is a "watcher") Well, she thrashed the tutorial better than I did, and I could tell she was surpressing the fact that she was a tiny bit impressed with the game. To make a long story short, I offered her a song to play and she did...and another...and another...and we traded sets untill about midnight. We both chipped away at meduim all the way through to the second to last venue. Unlocked a few costumes and basically had a BLAST!

The graphics are great, characters are amusing and I like how they play the guitar in synch with the player. The sound is amazing, I have a nice surround sound setup and had to turn it down around 2230 for fear of rockin' my neighbors out of their sleep. Characters that you pick can be slightly customized with costume changes and you can buy new guitars (some are pretty wild looking) once you start earning some cash. New songs are unlocked once you are in Medium mode after every "set". You get asked to play an encore and it unlocks a new song. Some songs we unlocked last night :

Sweet Child O' Mine - Guns N Roses

War Pigs - Black Sabbath

Shout at the Devil - Motley Crue

Tonight I'm Gonna Rock You - Spinal Tap (yes...Spinal Tap! LMFAO!)

The set up cost about $90.00. You get the game and the guitar. I am going to buy a second guitar for the Pirate Queen if I can find one that is sold seperately so we can check out multiplayer mode together.

In closing...this game is cruise control for awesome.

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Tomorrow : 8 Films to Die For (If you like horror/slasher movies...you will want to read this)