Hands-On - Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks The 80s

So Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80's came out yesterday. How many of you rushed out and grabbed a copy? While I wasn't nearly as excited about this expansion as I am about Guitar Hero III and Rock Band, I couldn't resist.

The game is pretty much the same, which is to be expected. It's only an expansion after all. Surprisingly, you actually get less characters to play with than usual. Only Johnny Napalm, Judy Nails, Izzy Sparks, Pandora, Axel Steel and the Grim Ripper made it into the game. Don't expect a lot of unlockables either, you get the same guitars as Guitar Hero II with the same skins, but no extra outfits for your characters, though they're already decked out in new 80's style threads.

Video after the jump.

As for the music, I'm a bit disappointed with the track selections, while I was more a child of the 90's, many of my favorite songs and bands were from the 70's and 80s, and there were quite a few songs that I'd never even heard of (or care to hear again). Inclusions of bands like A Flock of Seagulls and Oingo Boingo were also a disappointment. Couldn't they have gotten Van Halen again, or maybe some Guns N' Roses? Don't even get me started on Radar Love. White Lion butchered that song when they remade it back in the 80's, and the remake that was on the game was barely even recognizable from the original.

While I was disappointed in some of the song selections, they obviously can't appeal to everyone, so I understand. I did have a good time rocking out, I breezed through the track list in no time. I'm not sure if that's because they were relatively easy songs, or if I've just been spending too much time with a plastic guitar. Either way, there were some tracks in the last tier that really kicked my ass. I knew that Play With Me by Extreme was going to be tough, so I set up a camera to record my first time through. This is probably the toughest song on the game, though it's certainly no Jordan. Enjoy!