Music 101 for the Rock impaired.

Have you ever wanted to stand on a stage in front of thousands of people. All of them cheering for you to play your song? Have you ever wanted to just look them all in the eye, and bust out a face melting, spine tingling song that gives them the chills? Lets be honest. Pretty much none of us are ever going to have that chance...or so we thought...

Guitar Hero for Play Station 2 can make your rock and roll dreams a reality. Simply by the pushing of a button, and the flick of your wrist you can deliver that face melter to all of your adoring, die hard, computer simulated fans.

The game itself has a setup reminiscent of the ever famous Dance Dance Revolution. With color coordinated notes falling from the sky, in line with the colored buttons on the actual guitar paddle.

The paddle itself is a simple device. It has a neck, a body, and a whammy bar. The body consists of a piece of plastic where a normal guitar would normally strum at, that you push up and down, just like you were strumming. Below that is the Whammy bar, which on a regular guitar pulls the bridge up and down which bends the strings and gives it that Wa Wa Wa pitch bending sound. This whammy bar gives the held note you're playing the same sound. When "whammying" a held note, the more you whammy, the more points you get. The neck to me is like I said, reminiscent of a Dance Dance Revolution mat. There are six buttons that are in the same order as they appear on the screen. Notes come down, and when the notes get to their designated color on the bottom, you have to have the correct button(s) pressed down and strum at the same time. Almost just like a real guitar.

Guitar Hero is such a simple, yet such a perfect concept. With songs that range from "Take Me Out" from Franz Ferdinand, and "Stellar" from Incubus, to classics like "Frankenstein" by the Edward Winter Groupe, and "Godzilla" from The Blue Oyster Cult, to Heavy Metal legends like "Cowboys from Hell" by Pantera or "Bark at the Moon" by the legendary Ozzy Osbourne. This game will give anyone a brief but accurate rock and roll history lesson.

Sure, there are a lot of great songs on this game, but there are also a lot of songs that you just sit there and wonder how a song like that got on a game like guitar hero. Songs from bands that nobody has ever even heard of, that just basically suck. Mostly these are bonus songs, not the actual game songs, but still, couldn't they put in some really good bands that are recent for bonus songs, not sucky songs that are ridiculously stupid. But don't fret, there are only about 5 of these such songs, the rest are there for a reason.

The gameplay has your selected character, whether it be an old school, mohawk sporting, punk, or an old, wise guitar legend, in in the background doing famous guitar moves and tricks while you play to the song. The game is so accurate, your characters hand actually don't move when you miss a note or two. And it's actually quite entertaining to watch.

My favorite part of the game is when you get to use your star power. Now what is Star Power, you ask? Well, let me tell you. At certain points in the song, like really hard parts, or epic parts of the song, the game will offer notes shaped as stars, and if you hit all those notes in sequence with the stars you gain a certain amount of "star power". And once you gain a certain amount of this star power, by lifting up the neck of the guitar (a classic guitar move) it activates the start power. All the notes go a whitish blue and electricity fills the fretboard and stage. Your character does an gravity defying trick like throwing the guitar in the air and catching it with his neck and spinning it around his neck while still playing. Or something crazy like that. It's truly an awesome sight.

Not only does star power amount to a good show, but it can either times your points by 2, 4, 6, or 8, depending on how many notes you've consecutively hit in a row without missing one. This can really help you out when you're about to fail a song during a super hard solo that you just can't seem to get, you just fire up that star power and it doubles your ability to raise up your rock scale. (the rock scale, consists of a green, yellow and red section, with a needle pointing to where you fall on this scale. If you're doing good, it's green, if you're about to fail though, it'll be in the blinking red zone. Once you go too far in the red, you fail the song, and get boo'd off stage). Not only is star power an essential element of every guitar hero, but it's a lifesaver in many situations.

Personally, I'm not the biggest fan of video games. I think they are a waste of time that doesn't do anything for you mentally or physically. However, I am willing to waste my time on Guitar Hero. Other than DDR, there aren't any sort of games out there that requires actual physical activity. Guitar Hero two actually takes some sort of skill developement to master. And once you do master this game, you actually feel a little bit of accomplishment.

Now, as corny and lame as that sounds it's true. It may be pathetic but nobody that's played this game can deny that it is hard and that when you do beat this game (if you ever do) you actually feel like you've accomplished something. There are some songs on this game that at first glance you say to yourself, "man, there's no way I could ever move that fast and beat that song" but then you work, and you practice and you train, harder than Rocky himself. And before you know it you're nearing the end of defeating "Cowboys from Hell" on Expert getting giddy as you near the spine pounding solo ending. Everything, you've worked hard for is finally coming together on this one song. And faster than you can say "rock steady" you've beaten one of the hardest songs on the game. The screen says it's epic "You Rock". You've just beaten your guitar hero nemisis and you, feel, GREAT.

Of course guitar hero will never amount to actual guitar playing. It can give you a false sense of accomplishment, because you feel so good, but you really didn't do anything that special. But it is an awesome game no matter how you put it. It has the gameplay that is flawless. The paddle that is unique, yet perfect in it's design. And the difficulty level that will keep you playing for months to come. All in all, it's a game that must be played for anyone out there who wants to really know how amazing the gaming experience can really be. This game is Guitar Hero, and it is truly a game for the ages.