Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks The 80's

Ok, Well, This game came out for the Playstation two in the middle of Summer 2007. It was after I got into Guitar Hero II for the 360 but before Guitar Hero III and Rock Band came out. Why it was only released on the Playstation 2 is still a mystery to me and forced me to get out the old PS2 and dust it off. Now, I had a PS3, but unfortunately there was no way to use the PS2 Guitars with the PS3. There was no crappy third party PS2 to USB dongle made yet, so I was forced to just use the PS2.

This was a terrible thing because my PS2 died about a year earlier. Which didn't really phase me that much other than Julie and I were not able to complete Kingdom Hearts 2 for quite a while. But since my PS2 wasn't working, I had to either pay for it to get fix, buy a new Playstation 2 (which would be pointless for one game and then never use it again) or I could try and borrow one from one of my friends (which would be hard, since most of my friends still only had a PS2 and used it all the time.

My sister Julie got back from Africa with our church the day the game was released. Brady also went and I knew that he had a PS2 lying around and didn't really uses it anymore since he got a Xbox 360 and Jeffers The Panda Bear had a Wii. So I drove over to Brady's house to borrow the PS2 and then drove down to Games-4-U and got Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks The 80's.

First off, this is a really long and annoying title. There is no need to make it be that long. So from now on I'm calling it Guitar Hero 80's. Now, if you know anything about me at all, I'm a HUGE 80's fan, my favorite band is an 80's band (Tears For Fears). I was born in the 80's, most of the greatest music was made from that era, some of the best movies were made in that time. The fashion was awesome, Some of the greatest slang words were invented. The toys/action figures were totally awesome...the list goes on and on.

That being said, Guitar Hero 80's isn't much of a new game in the series or a sequel at all, it should have just been an expansion pack. The reason is, well, there isn't anything new in this game other than the songs. The only other difference is that they swapped out a few colors and made everything more neon. Same interface, same characters, same venus...even the same intro (just super imposed head bands and leg warmers on characters and color swapped red for hot neon pink). The characters also got a little makeover, not anything like more polygons or high resolution textures, but just different skins. Leopard print and acid washed jeans and whatnot.

Now, don't get me wrong, I love this game, I love it even more than Guitar Hero II and III, but there was only like 30 songs and no unlockable content. just new skins and songs. But the songs are what make this game great. You have classic 80's pop like "We Got The Beat" and "I Ran". Then you got some just good classic 80's rock like "Shakin'" by Eddie Money (My favorite song to play on this game) "The Warrior" by Scandal, "Only A Lad" by Oingo Boingo, and "I Wanna Rock" by Twisted Sister. Then you got some heavier metal stuff like "Wrathchild" by Iron Maiden and a song that was in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure "Play with Me" by Extreme

The songs are what make this game worth buying. This game is more of a single player game than the multiplayer game that was Guitar Hero I and II. But again, it's one of those games that you can throw in and play a few songs and then go on and play something else. It's a great game, but then again, I love Guitar Hero and I love the 80's so it's perfect for someone like me.

Likes:

Guitar Hero but with Eighties music (It doesn't get better than that for me)

New costumes for characters that make them look like a band from any 80's movie ever made.

Dislikes:

Came out on the PS2 only ...I really don't know why they didn't make a 360 version at least.

Nothing really new, no new characters or unlockable stuff, just new songs and paint jobs over the characters

Should have either been an expansion pack and not been full retail for 30 songs and almost same game or released as Downloaded Content on the 360 I would have paid for it.

Overall: Get this game if you either love Guitar Hero and need new songs to play and don't have a 360 and Rock Band, or if you just love the 80's like me!