Guitar Hero World Tour

The fourth game in the Guitar Hero series adds drums and vocals to the mix, along with a music studio that you can use to create new tracks and share them online.

Mac

PlayStation 2

Xbox 360

PlayStation 3

Wii

Overview

Guitar Hero: World Tour is the fourth "main entry" Guitar Hero game in the series, and is the true follow-up to Guitar Hero 3. It was developed by Neversoft, with Vicarious Visions handling the Wii version and Budcat porting to PS2. All current generation consoles share the same features, with the Wii version sharing the downloadable content of the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions, a first for the series.

Previous Guitar Hero games have allowed players to play lead guitar and bass. World Tour adds drums and vocals to the game, the former featuring a drum kit constructed specifically for use with this new release. The Guitar Hero drum set features three pad-based triggers, two raised cymbal-like triggers, and one kick pedal trigger. Both the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 version have basic compatibility with Rock Band instruments. However, unlike in Rock Band, you cannot use a headset to sing vocals.

Guitar Hero: World Tour's soundtrack includes songs from Van Halen, Linkin Park, The Eagles, Sublime, Lenny Kravitz, and more. Unlike previous Guitar Hero games, there are no cover songs in the game--every track is from the original artist. The game also has a music studio mode where players can construct new tracks. It supports online play for many of its modes such as band career mode, where the player can recruit friends to form a band and play online or on the same console and fight other bands in a new Battle of the Bands mode. It also allows players to complete the single-player career mode as any of the four instruments. To encourage families playing together a new "Easy Rhythm" difficulty has been added so that parents can play with their kids. This mode removes the necessity to worry about hitting the correct fret or drum pad and instead just focuses on having the player strum or hit a pad at the right rhythm.

Gameplay

There are several new gameplay addition new to Guitar Hero (and to full band games in general). For the bass guitar there is a new open strum note, effectively a "sixth button" to make bass more interesting. Like a bass pedal kick, this is signified on-screen by a horizontal line across the fretboard. Drums have "sustained" cymbal notes, which act as cymbal rolls without the precision required of drums rolls. Drums are also be able to activate starpower by hitting both cymbals at the same time at any point during a song. There are also drums notes that one must hit with above average force to gain maximum points, taking advantage of the velocity sensitive drum pads. Lead Guitar has tapping sections like Rock Band, that can be performed on both the normal fret buttons or the slide strip. Lead Guitar also has multiple sustained notes that can started at different times, like those in DDR. In full band mode, the Band shares a maximum starpower pool, but be able to activate starpower separately.

Setlist

As a part of a pre-order bonus for Guitar Hero: World Tour, Gamestop gave away a cheat code for the game that unlocked every song in the game. To activate, head to the "Cheats" section of the "Options" menu and enter the following code:

Blue, Blue, Red, Green, Green, Blue, Blue, Yellow

Setlist:

30 Seconds to Mars - "The Kill"
311 - "Beautiful Disaster"
Airbourne - "Too Much, Too Young, Too Fast"
Allman Brothers Band - "Ramblin' Man"

Anouk - "Good God"
The Answer - "Never Too Late"
At the Drive-In - "One Armed Scissor"
Beastie Boys - "No Sleep Till Brooklyn"
Beatsteaks - "Hail to the Freaks"
Billy Idol - "Rebel Yell"
Black Label Society - "Stillborn"
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club - "Weapon of Choice"
blink-182 - "Dammit"
Blondie - "One Way Or Another"
Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band - "Hollywood Nights"
Bon Jovi - "Livin' on a Prayer"
Bullet for My Valentine - "Scream Aim Fire"
Coldplay - "Shiver"
Creedence Clearwater Revival - "Up Around the Bend"
The Cult - "Love Removal Machine"
Dinosaur Jr. - "Feel the Pain"
The Doors - "Love Me Two Times"
Dream Theater - "Pull Me Under"
The Eagles - "Hotel California"
The Enemy - "Aggro"
Filter - "Hey Man Nice Shot"
Fleetwood Mac - "Go Your Own Way"
Foo Fighters - "Everlong"
The Guess Who - "American Woman"
Hush Puppies - "You're Gonna Say Yeah"
Interpol - "Obstacle 1"
Jane's Addiction - "Mountain Song"
Jimi Hendrix - "Purple Haze (Live)" and "The Wind Cries Mary"
Jimmy Eat World - "The Middle"
Joe Satriani - "Satch Boogie"
Kent - "Vinternoll 2"
Korn - "Freak on a Leash"
Lacuna Coil - "Our Truth"
Lenny Kravitz - "Are You Gonna Go My Way"
Linkin Park - "What I've Done"
The Living End - "Prisoner of Society"
Los Lobos - "La Bamba"
Lostprophets - "Rooftops (A Liberation Broadcast)"
Lynyrd Skynyrd - "Sweet Home Alabama (Live)"
The Mars Volta - " L'Via L'Viaquez"
MC5's Wayne Kramer - "Kick Out the Jams"
Metallica - "Trapped Under Ice"
Michael Jackson - "Beat It"
Modest Mouse - "Float On"
Motörhead - "Overkill"
Muse - "Assassin"
Negramaro - "Nuvole e Lenzuola"
Nirvana - "About a Girl (Unplugged)"
No Doubt - "Spiderwebs"
NOFX - "Soul Doubt"
Oasis - "Some Might Say"
Ozzy Osbourne - "Crazy Train" and "Mr. Crowley"
Paramore - "Misery Business"
Pat Benetar - "Heartbreaker"
Radio Futura - "Escuela de Calor"
R.E.M. - "The One I Love"
Rise Against - "Re-Education (Through Labor)"
The Sex Pistols - "Pretty Vacant"
Silversun Pickups - "Lazy Eye"
Smashing Pumpkins - "Today"
Steely Dan - "Do It Again"
Steve Miller Band - "The Joker"
Sting - "Demolition Man (Live)"
The Stone Roses - "Love Spreads"
Stuck in the Sound - "Toy Boy"
Sublime - "Santeria"
Survivor - "Eye of the Tiger"
System of a Down - "B.Y.O.B."
Ted Nugent - "Stranglehold"
Tokio Hotel - "Monsoon"
Tool - "Parabola", "Schism", and "Vicarious"
Trust - "Anti-Social"
Van Halen - "Hot for Teacher"
Willie Nelson - "On The Road Again (Live)"
Wings - "Band on the Run"

Characters:

Hayley Williams (Paramore)
Travis Barker (blink-182, 44)
Jimi Hendrix
Ozzy Osbourne (Black Sabbath)
Zakk Wylde (Ozzy Osbourne, Black Label Society)
Billy Corgan (Smashing Pumpkins)
Sting (The Police)

Ted Nugent

Downloadable Content

Like the two previous Guitar Hero games ( Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock , Guitar Hero II (Xbox360 version only,) Guitar Hero World Tour Supports downloadable content, all of which is forward compatible with Band Hero and Guitar Hero 5. World Tour was the first Guitar Hero game to have full albums available for download.

Drum Tuning Kit

After the release of Guitar Hero: World Tour, many players started having problems with their drum kits. Activision and RedOctane later acknowledged that the earliest models did in fact have sensitivity issues. As a solution to this they started shipping out USB-MIDI cables on request, and made a "Drum Tuning Kit" available for download. This allowed players to manually tune the sensitivity of their Guitar Hero: World Tour drum kit using their computer.

The program is distributed through the RedOctane customer service website, and is available for Windows and Mac OS X.