Guitar Hero II, bringing out the air guitarist in all of us.

Guitar Hero, the mere mention of the title brings on memories of picking up that tiny plastic guitar and going to town. Well folks Guitar Hero is back and this time on the Xbox 360.

Presentation
We will start off with the guitar. This version comes with a mini replica of a Gibson X-Plorer guitar. The guitar is shaped very differently than those on the PS2, so it did take some getting used to. Now that I am used to it however I prefer the shape over the PS2 counterpart as it is more comfortable for me since it seems slightly larger. The only real grip I have with the guitar itself is that the Start/Back buttons are really small and hard to hit if you are trying to activate star power that way or just trying to pause the game.

The menus in the game are all straight forward and easy to navigate which is a plus. The leaderboards are fairly easy to understand and can even be looked at song by song.

Now there is one pretty big downfall that may keep a lot of people away from this game and that is the cost. This game is priced higher than it's PS2 counterpart, and on top of that but the guitar is wired compared to its wireless PS2 brethren.

Gameplay
Here is where Guitar Hero REALLY shines. For those unfamiliar with how Guitar Hero works it's like this: Colored notes scroll down the screen, when a colored note hits the bottom of the screen you hold the corresponding color down on the neck of the guitar and strum. It is a simple concept that has plenty of depth to it.

For those who have played the previous Guitar Hero there are quite a few subtle improvements that make a world of difference. The biggest I noticed while playing was the improved hammer-on/pull-off system. I was performing hammer ons and pull offs with ease, while I went back to the original Guitar Hero and I couldn't seem to get them to work.

The addition of leaderboards seems like no big deal, but once you get someone else on your friends list that you are competing with it makes it worth it to play a song over and over again to try and top them. Of course it wouldn't be an Xbox 360 game without achievements. The achievements in this game seem very balanced so you will be getting them from being a beginner to rocking out like a pro.

Exclusive to the Xbox 360 version are some new songs, 10 to be more specific (not including downloadable content). Whether these songs are worth it or not to someone who already owns this game on the PS2 is debatable, but they are a great addition to those who either love these songs or those who don't already own the game for the PS2.

One thing I was somewhat disappointed in was the fact that online play was absent. I was quite looking forward to rocking out with people on my Xbox Live friends list. However even with the lack of online play the local multiplayer has been improved. There are three local multiplayer modes; Face-off, cooperative, and pro face-off. In face-off mode (which was the mode in the original) players face off against each other to see who can get the higher score. In Pro face-off mode each player can play the same instrument on the same difficulty level (this mode is only playable after beating the game on medium or higher). And lastly is the cooperative mode in which each player plays a different track but scores, star power, and combos are shared.

Another great addition to Guitar Hero is the practice mode. In practice mode there is no way to lose a song and you can even practice small sections of the song. This is very useful for those songs where you just can't get past that solo. In practice mode you can slow the song down to slower speeds and work your way up to full speed.

Graphics
Graphics have never been the focus of the Guitar Hero games, but this one does greatly improve upon the graphics. Being for the Xbox 360, this version sports very nicely improved graphics for those folks with HD sets.

Closing Comments
Guitar Hero II is one of those games that can get people to play your Xbox 360 that don't normally like to play video games. It is also a game that you can get people to play who love video games. This game is about bringing out the rock star in all of us, and is a blast to play. The main problem most people will have with this game is the cost, and at $90 it is quite expensive.