Guitar Hero
In 2015, Activision announced the first new title to the series in 5 years, "Guitar Hero Live", released in October 2015. The title is considered a reboot of the series, with development being performed by FreeStyleGames, who had developed the "DJ Hero" games previously. As of December 1, 2018, Activision disabled the GHTV servers for Guitar Hero Live, reducing playable content from approximately 500 songs to 42 on disc tracks. Guitar Hero
In April 2015, Activision announced a new entry in the series, titled "Guitar Hero Live". The title was developed by Activision's internal studio FreeStyleGames, who previously had worked on the "DJ Hero" spinoff titles. FreeStyleGames were given free rein to reboot the "Guitar Hero" series for next-generation consoles. One of their first innovations was to drop the standard five-button guitar controller, ultimately designing a six-button guitar controller, with two rows of three buttons each, allowing them to mimic actual guitar fingering. "Guitar Hero Live" was released with both a career and an online mode. The career mode used full-motion video taken from the perspective of a lead guitarist underneath the note highway, to create an immersive experience to the player. The online mode, called "GHTV", discarded the previous downloadable content approach and used a music video channel approach to stream playable songs to players, adding new songs to the catalog on a weekly basis. The game was released in October 2015. List of songs in Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock
"" is the sixth main game in the "Guitar Hero" series, released by Activision to the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Wii consoles in September 2010. The game was developed by Activision's subsidiary studios RedOctane, Neversoft, and Vicarious Visions; the latter provided support for additional features in the Wii version of the game. Following a decline in sales of music games in 2009, partially due to the large number of music games released that year, Activision scaled back their efforts in the "Guitar Hero" series. "Warriors of Rock" represents the final game developed by RedOctane and Neversoft. Both studios' respective "Guitar Hero" divisions were closed once the game was complete, with key personnel brought into Activision directly for future games. It was initially announced that Vicarious Visions would take over future game development of the "Guitar Hero" series, however due to declining music game sales, all further development of the "Guitar Hero" series was cancelled, until 2015 when "Guitar Hero Live" was released. List of songs in Guitar Hero Live
"Guitar Hero Live" is a 2015 music video game that's developed by FreeStyleGames and published by Activision. It is the first title in the "Guitar Hero" series since it went on hiatus after 2011, and the first game in the series available for 8th generation video game consoles (PlayStation 4, Wii U, and Xbox One). The game was released worldwide on 20 October 2015 for these systems as well as the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and iOS devices including the Apple TV. Guitar Hero
Following a five-year hiatus, as described below, Activision announced "Guitar Hero Live" for release in late 2015 on most seventh-generation and eighth-generation consoles. "Live" was developed to rebuild the game from the ground up, and while the gameplay remains similar to the earlier titles, focusing primarily on the lead guitar, it uses a 3-button guitar controller with each button having "up" and "down" positions, making for more complex tabulators. The game using live footage of a rock concert, taken from the perspective of the lead guitarist, as to provide a more immersive experience.
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock
The game also supports downloadable tracks for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions; several free and for-cost downloadable songs and song packs are available on both the Xbox Live Marketplace and the PlayStation Store. In July 2008, Activision announced that it would release downloadable content for the Wii in the first quarter of 2008, but eventually was unable to do so because of limitations with the Wii's internal memory storage, an issue that was overcome in the sequel, "Guitar Hero World Tour". When rock band Metallica released their album "Death Magnetic" on September 12, 2008, it was also made available as a downloadable song pack for "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock", "Guitar Hero World Tour" and the 2009 spin-off "Guitar Hero Metallica". In addition, the compact disc soundtrack for the game offers a code used to redeem three exclusive playable tracks on the Xbox Live Marketplace. Guitar Hero Smash Hits
Guitar Hero Smash Hits (titled Guitar Hero Greatest Hits in Europe and Australia) is a music rhythm game and the fourth expansion game to the "Guitar Hero" series. The game features 48 songs originally featured in five previous games in the series—"Guitar Hero", "Guitar Hero II", "", "" and ""—redesigning the songs to be based on master recordings and to include support for full band play first introduced to the series in "Guitar Hero World Tour". The game was developed by Beenox, published by Activision and distributed by RedOctane for release on the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Wii, and Xbox 360 systems and was released around the world in the second half of June 2009. Guitar Hero Live
Though FreeStyleGames experimented with other options including a controller-less game, camera and motion detection, and social-based games, but recognized quickly that the guitar controller was a key part of the series' success. The developers recognized they wanted to have a guitar controller that players would not be embarrassed to have in their living rooms and spent time getting the look of the controller accurate to a real guitar. The design of the game's guitar controller was overhauled, using rapid prototyping to test potential guitar designs. The final design of the controller for "Live" utilizes a new design with six buttons arranged into two rows of three frets, designated by black and white-colored notes in-game, instead of using the traditional row of five colored frets used by previous "Guitar Hero" games. Jackson explained that the new layout was meant to make the game easier for new players, as the three-button layout avoids the need to use one's pinkie finger, a difficulty they recognized new players had on the traditional five-button controller. The layout was also designed to provide a new challenge to experienced players, including more realistic simulations of chords. The choice to use only three buttons also came from statistical analysis of past games, where about 80% of the players would never play harder than the Medium difficulty level which typically only required the use of three fingers with the previous five-button controllers. The initial controller iterations, presented both in-studio and to Activision, were met with skepticism but they found that players quickly adapted to the new scheme as an improvement over the older controllers. The "note highways" for the songs were created by both programmers and musicians using MIDI software as to map to each of the six controller buttons and the open strum bar. Note highways were developed first for the Expert difficulty level, essentially recreating the guitar part of the song note for note, while highways for lower difficulty levels were then constructed by removing notes while assuring the core rhythm of the song remained.
The game itself is presented in a more realistic and immersive style; the rendered stages and characters of previous games are replaced by full motion video, shot from the first-person perspective of the lead guitarist, simulating real-world concert settings. The video footage is dynamic, and can transition between versions featuring positive or negative reactions by the crowd and band members based upon the player's performance. The first-person footage utilizes session musicians as actors playing the remaining members of the band, and is filmed using a Bolt robotic camera system, programmed to simulate the motions of a guitarist on stage. The Bolt ran along a track, and was able to move and turn quickly, mimicking the speed of a musician's movements. Prior to filming with the Bolt, an actor outfitted with motion and position detectors acted out the song with the other band actors; these movements were recorded and then used to direct the Bolt as it replaced the actor in subsequent takes. To avoid injury to the other actors from the motions of the camera, the routines were all choreographed based on the camera's motions and used as cues for the other actors. To enable smoother transitions between positive and negative versions of the band footage, multiple takes were performed for each song using the same camera motions. Groups of 200 to 400 actors were filmed using a green screen to construct crowds; using varying takes and other editing techniques, the groups of actors could be made to cover much larger areas. To simulate larger crowds, these shots were superimposed on a combination of live footage from actual rock concerts and 3D models constructed by FreeStyleGames. The effects studio Framestore helped with editing and assembling the digital live-action footage. Positional audio effects are also used as part of the footage, varying the volume of certain instruments depending on how close the player is to them on-screen in the footage. Guitar Hero Live
Players can purchase a "Party Pass" that allows full access to all of "GHTV"s on-demand songs and paid features for 24 hours, a mode that FreeStyleGames envisioned to be used when players are hosting large parties or similar events. As first held on the weekend of 6 November 2015, Activision may hold promotional periods that similarly offer full access. Uriah Heep Live
Uriah Heep Live is a double live album by British rock group Uriah Heep, released in April 1973 in the US by Mercury Records, and in May 1973 in the UK by Bronze Records. It was the band's first live album. The album was recorded by the Pye Mobile Unit, with Alan Perkins as engineer. Carlos Santana
Santana is featured as a playable character in the music video game Guitar Hero 5. A live recording of his song "No One to Depend On" is included in game, which was released on September 1, 2009. More recently, in 2011, three Santana songs were offered as downloadable content (DLC) for guitar learning software Rocksmith: "Oye Como Va", "Smooth", and "Black Magic Woman/Gypsy Queen". In the same year, Santana received the Billboard Latin Music Lifetime Achievement Award. Guitar Hero Mobile series
"Guitar Hero III Mobile" was well received upon its release. IGN considered it to be a "successful adaptation" of the "Guitar Hero" games to the cellphone keypad. They commented that while it may be tricky to download the songs for the game, requiring the user to be persistent during the download, the sound quality was excellent and the simplification down to three buttons from five makes the game "accessible to anybody with even a passing curiosity." CNET praised the quality of the sound and animations, as well as the ease of play. "Cell Play" referred to the game as "the true mobile port of rock," and praised the level of difficulty accomplished with the three button setup. They considered the shortened song length a negligible downside compared to the overall package. 1UPs review criticized the compact layout that led to hand cramps, and that the limited space on the mobile version only allowed two songs to be stored at a time. 1UP also lamented the shorted versions of the songs given the outstanding audio quality achieved on the mobile platform; their review summarized their experience as "As a literal interpretation of the Guitar Hero formula, there was apparently no room to alter the game to emphasize the strengths of the mobile platform." "Guitar Hero III Mobile" won two awards at the Qualcomm 2008 BREW Developers Conference for "Best Game" and "People's Choice Award". The game has been downloaded by users 2.5 million times, with both Verizon and Hands-On Mobile claiming that over 250,000 songs are played a day on the platform. Are You Gonna Go My Way
"Are You Gonna Go My Way" was released as the lead single. The song peaked at number one on the Australian Singles Chart, and also peaked at number one on the US Mainstream Rock chart, becoming his first number one single in both countries, while it peaked at number 2 on the Hot Modern Rock Tracks. It was only released for airplay in the US and therefore did not chart on the Hot 100, but was a worldwide hit, peaking at number 4 in both the United Kingdom and France. The song is not only considered to be one of Kravitz's greatest hits as an artist, but also as one of the biggest anthems of the 1990s. Appears in the video games "" (in a GT Remix) and "Guitar Hero World Tour" as well as "Guitar Hero Live". Guitar Hero: On Tour series
"Guitar Hero On Tour: Modern Hits" was announced on March 5, 2009, and released on June 9, 2009. Reflecting its title, "Modern Hits" incorporates songs published within the last five years of its release, and the developers had to balance what songs were included in order to make a setlist with a wide appeal. The engine of the game has no major changes, but Vicarious Visions stated that it has continued to work on strum detection on the DS touchpad to meet a wide range of playstyles. The interface, however, has been revised over the previous two "On Tour" titles to feature a more modernized look (particularly in-game on the touch screen side). The game includes a new single player career progression using "Fan Requests" to create a new non-linear progression through the songs in the games. These were added to help move away from gameplay that was "just going, playing a venue, and then moving on to the next one" and instead to "open the world up". The developers also noted that the Fan Requests helped to tap into the way that players had previously played games in the series, setting their own personal goals for certain songs. Audio designer Jason Willey created the game's theme song (titled "S.U.P.R.A.H.U.M.A.N.") through his two-man band, Protoshredanoid, to capture the Modern Hits theme of the game, and after demonstrating a sampling of the song to the rest of the team, were asked to create the whole song. The theme song was released as a free download for "Guitar Hero World Tour" the week before the game's release. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock
Activision called "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock" its "largest product launch ever", selling more than 1.4 million copies, and making over $100 million in its first week of release in North America; another 1.9 million copies were sold in the following month. Subsequently, the company was concerned that they were unable to meet the game's demand for the 2007 holiday season. As of July 15, 2008, the game has sold more than eight million copies. During the first seven months of 2008, the game sold 3.037 million units in the United States, 412,000 in the United Kingdom, and 26,000 in Japan, for a total of 3.475 million units, according to the NPD Group, GfK Chart-Track, and Enterbrain. More than two million copies of the game were sold for the Wii platform, making it the best-selling third-party title for the platform. Game sales during the first 12 months after the game's release were over $750 million. At the 2009 Consumer Electronics Show, Activision CEO Mike Griffith stated that "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock" is the first retail video game to exceed one billion dollars in sales. According to accumulated data from NPD Group in January 2010, "Guitar Hero III" is the second best-selling video game in the United States since 1995, following "Wii Play". In March 2011, the title had become the top selling game with $830.9 million in lifetime sales. Guitar Hero World Tour
The fourth major entry to the "Guitar Hero" series, at the time named "Guitar Hero IV", was officially announced upon the merger of Activision and Vivendi Games in December 2007. "We couldn't have done it without Red Octane's support." says the Guitar Hero Team. The game's new name, "Guitar Hero World Tour", was officially announced by Activision in May 2008. Guitar Hero II
On April 13, 2007, Activision revealed that the issue was not a problem with the hardware, and that the guitars were "not" defective. The cause of the problem was anti-cheat protection software, and Activision released a patch on Xbox Live on April 14, 2007 to remedy it. However, this patch may have caused some unintended side effects. Starting on April 16, 2007, numerous users began reporting lockups and failures of their system after downloading and installing this patch. RedOctane stated, "We're aware of the problem and we're looking into it." Guitar Hero II
The Xbox 360 version was released on April 3, 2007 in North America and Australia, and then on April 6, 2007 in Europe (only as a bundle containing the game and a wired Gibson X-Plorer guitar controller). It was released as a stand-alone game for the Xbox 360 in the UK on January 25, 2008. The arrangement of the songs were also altered, and the graphics were slightly improved. Guitar Hero Live
The task of developing the new game was given to FreeStyleGames around 2012. FreeStyleGames had developed both "DJ Hero" and "DJ Hero 2", and while both games were critically praised, the latter was released on the downward trend of the music game genre. FreeStyleGames had suffered some layoffs as a result of the hiatus of the "Guitar Hero" series, though remained an Activision studio and financially viable due to their work for the Wii U "Sing Party". As the development of "Sing Party" wrapped up, the studio created an internal research and development department to begin brainstorming what their next game would, with input from Activision. Hirshberg had encouraged the team to reconsider "Guitar Hero", noting the fan dedication to the series, but noted that the game needed innovation to be successful. Activision gave the team freedom to develop the game without relying on the previous titles in the series. The core gameplay of "Guitar Hero Live" was rebuilt from scratch; developer Jamie Jackson explained that the goal of the game was to bring "big innovation" to the franchise rather than continue with the same format used by previous games. He explained to his staff to only "think of "[Guitar Hero]" as a name. Think of it as a music game with a guitar peripheral, but pretend that nothing else has ever been done." The team brainstormed on what had made the "Guitar Hero" series fun, and recounted the earlier titles of the series which were designed to enable the player to envision themselves as a superstar guitarist, subsequent design choices were made around recreating that experience. The team also cited fellow Activison franchise "Call of Duty" as an influence towards the goal of providing an immersive, first-person experience. Guitar Hero World Tour
While the game continues to feature the use of a guitar-shaped controller to simulate the playing of rock music, "Guitar Hero World Tour" is the first game in the "Guitar Hero" series to feature drum and microphone controllers for percussion and vocal parts, similar in manner to the competing "Rock Band" series of games. The game allows users to create new songs through the "Music Studio" mode, which can then be uploaded and shared through a service known as "GHTunes". Absolutely Live (Toto album)
Absolutely Live is a live album released by the band Toto in 1993, with new vocalists Jenney Douglas-McRae, John James, and Donna McDaniel. Initially released in 1993, the album has been subsequently re-released in 1999 on Sony International. List of songs in Guitar Hero Live
Between August 2017 and April 2018, only one song was added to GHTV and on June 3, 2018, Activision confirmed that the servers will be shut down December 1, 2018. Guitar Hero (video game)
The game and its sequels have created interest in young adults and children in learning how to play a real guitar, and has been considered as a "cultural phenomenon" that has created a significant cultural impact. At the end of 2009, several journalists, including "Wired", G4TV, CNN, the "San Jose Mercury News", the "Toronto Star", "Inc.", "The Guardian", and "Advertising Age", considered "Guitar Hero" to be one of the most influential products of the first decade of the 21st century, attributing it as the spark leading to the growth of the rhythm game market, for boosting music sales for both new and old artists, for introducing more social gaming concepts to the video game market, and, in conjunction with the Wii, for improving interactivity with gaming consoles. Guitar Hero Live
Activision shuttered the "GHTV" mode on December 1, 2018, reducing the available Guitar Hero songs from almost 500, to 42. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock is a music rhythm game, the third main installment in the "Guitar Hero" series, and the fourth title overall. The game was published by Activision and distributed by RedOctane. It is the first game in the series to be developed by Neversoft after Activision's acquisition of RedOctane and MTV Games' purchase of Harmonix, the previous development studio for the series. The game was released worldwide for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Wii and Xbox 360 in October 2007, with Budcat Creations assisting Neversoft on developing the PlayStation 2 port and Vicarious Visions solely developing on the Wii port respectively. Aspyr Media published the Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X versions of the game, releasing them later in 2007. Guitar Hero World Tour
According to the "Game Informer" preview, the addition of drum functionality came from work initially done towards the "Drum Hero" title. This work was later folded into the "Guitar Hero" series after Neversoft was chosen as developer of the series. Neversoft's Allen Flores stated that with the addition of the existing drum gameplay, the development of "World Tour" took under a year, starting development immediately after the release of "Guitar Hero III". The drum instrument controller was designed to be more realistic, with input from Chad Smith (of Red Hot Chili Peppers), Stewart Copeland (of The Police) and Travis Barker (of Blink-182), all of whom requested the elevated cymbal pads. The ability to open-strum the guitar was a feature that was planned for "Guitar Hero III" but was removed before release, finding that it was too difficult on the guitar tracks. However, they built this feature in from the start of "World Tour" development for the bass guitar tracks. Zombie Live
Zombie Live is the first live album from heavy metal artist Rob Zombie. The CD was recorded over several nights during the band's "Educated Horses" tour and was said to include a 36-page super-deluxe book of never-before-seen live pictures and a DVD of live footage and animated videos. After the release of the album no artbook or DVD were included with the release of the album. Blabbermouth.net reported that the DVD companion would be available in spring 2008, but this still has yet to surface. A different concert film, "The Zombie Horror Picture Show", was released in 2014. List of songs in Guitar Hero Live
Two hundred songs were initially available on GHTV on the game's release on 20 October 2015. Aerosmith
On November 1, 2007, the band entered the studio to work on the final studio album of their current contract with Sony. At the time, it was believed that the album would include both re-recorded tracks left off previous albums as well as brand new material. In an interview, guitarist Joe Perry revealed that in addition to creating a new album, the band was working closely with the makers of the "Guitar Hero" series to develop "", a video game dedicated to the band's music. The game was released on June 29, 2008 and contains many of their most popular songs. Steven Tyler announced on VH1 Classic Radio on September 4, 2008 that Aerosmith intends to enter the studio at the end of September 2008 to complete the band's 15th studio album. Tyler also confirmed that the band plans to begin a new U.S. tour in June 2009, in support of the as-yet-untitled album. This tour was supposed to be preceded by a concert in Venezuela on February 1, 2009. However, on January 15, 2009, Tyler said the band would be unable to play the gig because of a second knee injury of guitarist Joe Perry. In mid-February 2009, it was announced that the album would be produced by the famed Brendan O'Brien and that the album would likely be recorded live, like their earlier records. Although the band had hoped to finish the album before the tour started in June 2009, Perry said that the group "realized there wasn't any chance of getting [the album] finished before we hit the road for the summer." The tour featured ZZ Top as the opening act for most of the tour. The Aerosmith/ZZ Top Tour, presented by "Guitar Hero: Aerosmith", was officially announced and the first dates released on April 8, 2009. Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock
Sales of "Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock" were weaker than those of "Guitar Hero 5", with combined sales of the game and "DJ Hero 2" through the end of 2010 being 63% lower than the sales of "Guitar Hero 5", "DJ Hero" and "Band Hero" through the end of 2009. Initial shipments of "Warriors of Rock" were also bundled with a copy of Soundgarden's compilation album "Telephantasm"; based on its distribution with copies of the game, "Telephantasm" became the first album to receive a Platinum certification from the Recording Industry Association of America based on distribution alongside a video game. As a result of the underwhelming sales, also credited to the oversaturation of the music game market, the "Guitar Hero" franchise was ultimately shuttered until the 2015 unveiling of a reboot, "Guitar Hero Live". Guitar Hero: Aerosmith
A departure from other games in the franchise, "Guitar Hero: Aerosmith" follows the career of Aerosmith, by playing significant songs in their catalog in a 'rough chronological fashion'. The gameplay follows the band through various periods in its history, spanning from its first show at Mendon Nipmuc Regional High School in 1970 to the 2001 Super Bowl XXXV halftime show, to their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on March 19, 2001. The player starts as Joe Perry, and will eventually be able to unlock Brad Whitford and Tom Hamilton. The game does not focus on the internal strife and stress within the band; Guitarist Joe Perry stated that the game would focus on the positive aspects of Aerosmith's history. Perry has stated that "Having a game built around Aerosmith has been a huge honor and really a great experience for us. We've put a lot of ideas into the game so that fans can have fun interacting with our music, getting inside our body of work and learning about the band's history." Live: Right Here, Right Now
Live: Right Here, Right Now. is the first live album by American hard rock band Van Halen, released in 1993. It is the band's only live album featuring Sammy Hagar, and the only live album by Van Halen until the release of "Tokyo Dome Live in Concert" in 2015. List of songs in Guitar Hero: Aerosmith
"" is a music video game developed by Neversoft and published by Activision. It is the second expansion title to the "Guitar Hero" series of video games, and was released in June 2008 for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, and Wii game consoles. It is the first title in the series to focus primarily on the works of one specific band, Aerosmith. The majority of the game's set list are works by Aerosmith, but there are also works by artists that have acted as inspirations or touring partners for the band such as Run-D.M.C., The Kinks, and Joan Jett. In addition to 25 Aerosmith songs, there are four songs from lead guitarist Joe Perry's solo album. The game contains a total of 41 songs. Guitar Hero Live
"Guitar Hero Live" was released to generally positive reception, with critics praising the new controller design for providing trickier and more realistic gameplay in comparison to previous "Guitar Hero" games, as well as the wider variety of content available via the "GHTV" mode. The main "Live" portion of the game received mixed reviews, with critics panning its weak soundtrack, lack of multiplayer, and describing the live action footage as being self-aware, exaggerated, and "campy". The "GHTV" mode also received mixed reception for its reliance on microtransactions, and the inability to permanently purchase songs to own. Guitar Hero Live
Ten different bands represent the songs in the "Guitar Hero Live" mode, playing in two different music festivals. Members of these fictional bands were selected through auditions prior to filming, making sure that they could recreate the actual performance of a song, as well as mixing and matching members of ensemble groups to get the right look and feel. Bands were filmed in a warehouse in Oxford, England. To help with creating appropriate stage presence for the fictional bands and their fans, FreeStyleGames created material that each band would have had in the band's career, such as album covers and clothing, using various musical genres to help inspire their designs. Guitar Hero
Prior to the release of "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock", Activision worked with the iTunes Store to provide more than 1300 tracks of "Guitar Hero"-related music across more than 20 compilations, including most of the tracks from the games in the series, called ""Guitar Hero Essentials"". These compilations, such as ""Killer Guitar Solos"" and ""Guitar Anthems of the '80s"", include songs related to but not contained within the "Guitar Hero" series. Dusty Welch of RedOctane stated, "Where there’s music, there’s "Guitar Hero", and with iTunes, we are able to provide fans with a central location for downloading their favorite rock anthems." Following the merger of Activision and Blizzard, the new company announced plans to create an alternative to iTunes based on the "Guitar Hero" brand that would allow for downloading songs and their associated note tracks for the "Guitar Hero" games. Guitar Hero
Many of the "Guitar Hero" games developed for the recent generation of consoles (Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Wii) support downloadable content, allowing players to purchase new songs to play in the respective titles. Songs each cost approximately $2 through the various online stores for the console's platform. Prior to "Guitar Hero 5", downloadable content for earlier games will not work in other games in the series, save for songs from Metallica's "Death Magnetic", which were available for "Guitar Hero III", "World Tour", and "Metallica". Existing "World Tour" downloadable content for "World Tour" will be forward-compatible with "Guitar Hero 5", "Band Hero" and "Guitar Hero Warriors of Rock", and for a small fee, some songs from both "Guitar Hero World Tour" and "Guitar Hero Smash Hits" can be exported to both "Guitar Hero 5" and "Band Hero", limited by music licensing. Activision has also stated that they are considering a monthly subscription service to deliver downloadable content to user for future games. "Guitar Hero World Tour" introduced a music creation mode that will allow players to create and share songs (excluding vocals) via the "GHTunes" service, which was also used in all other "Guitar Hero" games and "Band Hero" since its inclusion. The creation tools were improved with "Guitar Hero 5" and "Band Hero" to allow longer songs and other means of generating songs in real-time. Pro Tools
Ricky Martin's "Livin' la Vida Loca" (1999) was the first No. 1 single to be recorded, edited, and mixed fully within the Pro Tools environment, by Charles Dye and Desmond Child. In 2009, Pro Tools was used for creating the audio for the video games "DJ Hero" and "Guitar Hero", using the modeling plug-in Eleven for the guitar sounds. Guitar Hero
The "Guitar Hero" series has made a significant cultural impact, becoming a "cultural phenomenon". The series has helped to rekindle music education in children, influenced changes in both the video game and music industry, has found use in health and treatment of recovering patients, and has become part of the popular culture vernacular. Several journalists, including 1UP.com, "Wired", G4TV, the "San Jose Mercury News", "Inc.", "The Guardian", and "Advertising Age", considered "Guitar Hero" to be one of the most influential products of the first decade of the 21st century, attributing it as the spark leading to the growth of the rhythm game market, for boosting music sales for both new and old artists, for introducing more social gaming concepts to the video game market, and, in conjunction with the Wii, for improving interactivity with gaming consoles. Guitar Hero Live
The soundtrack for the "GH Live" portion was also considered weak. McElroy found most of the songs were from 2000 or later, forgoing classic rock songs, and considered the soundtrack to be the "biggest disappointment" of "GH Live". Buttersworth stated that many of the on-disc selections are pop songs that "just aren't cut out for Guitar Hero gameplay", as they feature the same repeating guitar riff over and over. Griffin was more favorable of the on-disc set list, finding that the tracks represented "the music landscape as it is rather than as it was". Carter also appreciated the soundtrack, calling it a "good spread" of songs that can appeal to everyone. Guitar Hero World Tour
All of the 86 songs in the game are master recordings, a first for the series. Project director Brian Bright claims that they have "a pretty even split between the '80s, '90s, and classic rock" with a "good amount of emerging bands". Some of the songs from the disc are exportable to both "Guitar Hero 5" and "Band Hero" for a small fee, with music licensing rights limiting which songs can be exported. Live (Tig Notaro album)
Live [liv, verb] is the second live [līv, adj.] album by comedian Tig Notaro. It is a deeply personal set performed just four days after Tig was diagnosed with stage two breast cancer. The album was first released by Louis C.K. on his website in 2012 by download only. It was the first release that C.K. had on his website that was not one of his own works. The album is no longer on his site, but it has a link to iTunes. The audio of the album was originally recorded at Notaro's regular monthly stand-up show "Tig Has Friends" at Largo for an episode of the radio show "This American Life". Notaro did not want to put out the album at first, but C.K. convinced her to release it. Guitar Hero
Gibson Guitar Corporation, whose guitar likenesses have appeared in the "Guitar Hero" series from the first game to "Guitar Hero Aerosmith", informed Activision on January 7, 2008, that it believed the games infringe its . Gibson claimed that this covers technology that simulates a concert performance via pre-recorded audio and a musical instrument. In response, Activision filed a suit seeking a declaration that it was not in violation of the Gibson patent; Activision also asserted that Gibson had given an implied license by waiting to assert the patent and that the patent was invalid. On March 17, 2008, Gibson sued six retailers (GameStop, Amazon.com, Wal-Mart, Target, Toys "R" Us and Kmart) for selling "Guitar Hero" products. Subsequently, on March 21, 2008, Gibson also filed a lawsuit against EA, MTV, and Harmonix over their game "Rock Band" also for violation of its patent, to which a Harmonix spokesperson stated that Gibson's claims are "completely without merit". Activision lawyer Mary Tuck stated in their legal filings that they believe that Gibson initiated the lawsuit due to the fact that "Activision was not [interested] in renewing the License and Marketing Support Agreement" with Gibson Guitars.
In February 2009, the United States District Court for the Central District of California ruled against Gibson in their case against Activision, stating that the controllers are not musical instruments but "toys that represent other items", and that Gibson's patent only covers instruments that send out analog signals. Activision and Gibson settled the suit following this ruling. Live It Up (David Johansen album)
Live It Up, released in 1982, was the first live album released by David Johansen as a solo artist. Johansen did release a limited and promotional live album, "The David Johansen Group Live" in 1978, but the album was not officially released until 1993. Additionally, by the time "Live It Up" was released, various bootlegs of Johansen's first band, the New York Dolls, were being heavily traded (an official live album would eventually be released in 1984). The impact of the New York Dolls, as both an influential band and as a live act, was becoming a legend in the late-1970s and early-1980s when Johansen was trying to start his solo career. However, his three previous solo albums were not selling as well as expected, therefore, Johansen turned to touring and selling his stage show. Guitar Hero
The double release of "Guitar Hero 5" and "Band Hero" in 2009 were the last of the series' games to be released on PlayStation 2. It was expected that the 2010 entry for "Guitar Hero", "Warriors of Rock", would be the final entry developed by Neversoft, based on claims that Neversoft would be letting go of its "Guitar Hero" division, with Vicarious Visions likely poised to take over future development. Further industry rumors pointed at the closure of RedOctane Studios and Underground Development (the development studio for "Guitar Hero: Van Halen") as further results from the scaling-back; Activision moved the controller hardware development within their own division to continue to support the series, with RedOctane founders Kai and Charles Huang remaining with Activision. A week prior to these announcements, the "Guitar Hero" division CEO at Activision, Dan Rosensweig, left the company, leading to some speculation on whether Rosensweig's departure influenced these changes. Activision and RedOctane had trademarked the titles ""Guitar Villain"", ""Drum Villain"", ""Keyboard Hero"" and ""Sing Hero"". RedOctane originally trademarked the titles ""Drum Hero"" and ""Band Hero"", but the work performed towards the "Drum Hero" title was eventually folded into the gameplay for "Guitar Hero World Tour", and "Band Hero" became its own game. Later, as of October 2009, Activision reapplied for a "Drum Hero" trademark. Pi Studios, which had previously helped to port "Rock Band" to the Wii, had started work on the karaoke title "Sing Hero" before Activision cancelled its development. "Dance Hero" would be in development before being cancelled. Several ideas for the game later made it into "Shake It Up". Greatest Hits Live (The Who album)
Greatest Hits Live is a compilation of live songs recorded by the Who throughout their history. The album was released exclusively on the iTunes Store on 19 January 2010. This collection was released as a compact disc on 23 March 2010. Guitar Hero Mobile series
Guitar Hero Mobile is a series of rhythm video games in the "Guitar Hero" series, adapting the normal console-based gameplay which uses a guitar-shaped controller to match notes of popular rock music songs to work with the face buttons on advanced mobile phones, including BlackBerry devices and those supporting the Windows Mobile platform. The first three games in the series—"Guitar Hero III Mobile", "Guitar Hero Backstage Pass", and "Guitar Hero World Tour Mobile"—were developed by MachineWorks Northwest LLC and published by Hands-On Mobile, while a mobile version of "Guitar Hero 5" was developed by Glu Mobile. The series has proven to be popular; the "Guitar Hero III Mobile" game has been downloaded more than 2 million times, and over 250,000 songs are played each day across the series. Buckethead
In 2006 the cross-console video game "Guitar Hero II" was launched, featuring Buckethead's song "Jordan" as an unlockable bonus track. Although the song has been performed live in the past, the video game version is the only known studio recording of the song. When playing it live, Buckethead would almost always simply perform the verse and chorus of "Jordan" before transitioning into the next song. However, the "Guitar Hero II" version contains a special solo created specifically for the game. Guitar Hero
"Guitar Hero Smash Hits" (titled "Guitar Hero: Greatest Hits" in Europe and Australia) was released in June 2009. It features full-band versions of 48 songs from earlier "Guitar Hero" games that only used the guitar controller. Unlike the previous versions, each of the songs is based on a master recording that includes some live tracks. The game follows a similar model as "Guitar Hero: Metallica", and was developed by Neversoft and Beenox Studios for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, PlayStation 2, and Wii. List of songs in Guitar Hero 5
"Guitar Hero 5" is the fifth main title in the "Guitar Hero" series of rhythm games, released worldwide in September 2009 for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 2 and 3 and Wii consoles. In the game, players use special instrument controllers to simulate the playing of lead and bass guitar, drums, and vocals for rock and other songs. Players are awarded points by performing specific actions on the controllers to match notes that scroll on screen that correspond with the appropriate instrument. Successfully hitting notes increases the player's scoring and performance meter, while missing too many notes will lower the performance meter and may cause the song to end prematurely. Songs can be played either by oneself, competitively with other players in several game modes, or cooperative with up to three other players in their own virtual band. Although traditionally a four-player band can have one player on each instrument, "Guitar Hero 5" allows any four-player combination of these instruments to be used, such as a band composed of four drummers. "Guitar Hero 5" is considered by its developers to be an expansion of the series into more "social play", featuring modes such as Party Play, which allows players to drop in and out and change difficulty in the middle of a song without worrying about failing or losing points.
"Guitar Hero 5" is distributed with 85 songs on-disc, many being from artists that have yet to have their music featured in a rhythm video game, and more than half having been published in the last decade. The setlist was considered the weakest part of the game; although it was praised for its diversity, critics believed that the widely varying genres represented would mean that players would not enjoy every song in the game. "Guitar Hero 5" is the first game in the series to reuse content from previous "Guitar Hero" games. Most of the existing downloadable content for "Guitar Hero World Tour" can be reused in "Guitar Hero 5" without additional cost, while for a small fee, players can import a selection of songs from "Guitar Hero World Tour" and "Guitar Hero Smash Hits" into "Guitar Hero 5". Such content is incorporated into the main game modes. Critics praised the ability to reuse content from older games, but felt that more songs should have been transferable when the game was launched. Activision no longer provides new downloadable content for Guitar Hero 5 since the release of "" in September 2010. Guitar Hero 5
The Wii version of the game, developed by Vicarious Visions, is "full feature parity" with the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions, including support for up to eight players online, each possibly on their own console. "Guitar Hero 5" is the first Wii game to support high capacity SD cards, allowing up to about 800 songs to be stored on a 32 GB card. While existing Wii "Guitar Hero" games allow players to purchase downloadable content one song at a time, "Guitar Hero 5" includes the ability to download complete albums and song packs. Players are also able to manage the content of their Wii memory cards through the game's interface. The game does not require players to enter game-specific Friends Codes, but instead uses the global Wii address book to locate friends. The "Mii Freestyle" mode, introduced in "World Tour", is also present, and with changes to address some of the issues with less-skilled players trying to play well together. A "Guitar Hero Nintendo Ecosystem" is introduced in "Guitar Hero 5", letting the Wii version communicate with the Nintendo DS, including a stage manager/video editor DS controller feature in conjunction with the Mii Freestyle mode, and a new game mode called "Roadie Battle". In Roadie Battle, four players play as two teams; each team has one player performing on an instrument through the Wii, while the other player uses a DS to connect to the Wii and act as the roadie. During play, the roadie players attempt to sabotage the other team by completing mini-games on the DS that affect the other team's music performance in a manner similar to "Guitar Hero III"'s Battle Mode. These can only be cleared by the other DS player performing another mini-game. Aerosmith
In the fields of technology and video games, Aerosmith has achieved several feats. In 1994, Aerosmith released the song "Head First" on the CompuServe online service, which is considered to be the first full-length commercial product available online. In 2008, Aerosmith became the first artist to have an entire "Guitar Hero" video game based around them with "". "Guitar Hero: Aerosmith" is considered to be the best-selling band-centric video game across both the "Guitar Hero" and "Rock Band" platforms. List of songs in Guitar Hero World Tour
The game disc contains 86 songs, all of which are master recordings—a first for the "Guitar Hero" series. In the single player and multiplayer band (Career Mode) modes, songs are distributed into various "gigs" that contain between 3 and 6 songs each; gigs may also contain a boss battle (for the single player guitar career) and encores that are revealed once all the other songs in the gig are completed. These gigs are arranged approximately based on the difficulty of the songs in that gig for the selected instrument or band, with more difficult songs appearing in later gigs. The player or band must complete easier gigs before the more difficult gigs are available. Once a player or band has access to a song via any instrument or band Career mode, that song can be played in Quickplay mode or any of the other competitive modes in the game. The set list has been described as containing well-known songs by "an impressive collection of artists" such as Van Halen, Jimi Hendrix, Joe Satriani, and Tool, as well as a considerable number of tracks from European bands. Guitar Hero
The popularity of the series increased dramatically with the release of "Guitar Hero II" for the PlayStation 2 in 2006. Featuring improved multiplayer gameplay, an improved note-recognizing system, and 64 songs, it became the fifth best-selling video game of 2006. The PlayStation 2 version of the game was offered both separately and in a bundle with a cherry red Gibson SG guitar controller. "Guitar Hero II" was later released for the Xbox 360 in April 2007 with an exclusive Gibson Explorer guitar controller and an additional 10 songs, among other features. About 3 million units of "Guitar Hero II" have sold on the PlayStation 2 and Xbox 360. Guitar Hero
The Guitar Hero series (sometimes referred to as the Hero series) is a series of music rhythm games first published in 2005 by RedOctane and Harmonix, and distributed by Activision, in which players use a guitar-shaped game controller to simulate playing lead, bass guitar, and rhythm guitar across numerous rock music songs. Players match notes that scroll on-screen to colored fret buttons on the controller, strumming the controller in time to the music in order to score points, and keep the virtual audience excited. The games attempt to mimic many features of playing a real guitar, including the use of fast-fingering hammer-ons and pull-offs and the use of the whammy bar to alter the pitch of notes. Most games support single player modes, typically a Career mode to play through all the songs in the game, and both competitive and cooperative multiplayer modes. With the introduction of "Guitar Hero World Tour" in 2008, the game includes support for a four-player band including vocals and drums. The series initially used mostly cover versions of songs created by WaveGroup Sound, but most recent titles feature soundtracks that are fully master recordings, and in some cases, special re-recordings, of the songs. Later titles in the series feature support for downloadable content in the form of new songs. Guitar Hero
In the first two games and the 2007 expansion "", the majority of the songs on the main career mode set lists are covers of the original song; for example, a song may be presented as ""Free Bird as made famous by Lynyrd Skynyrd"". "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock" introduces a much larger range of original recordings, and "World Tour" featured a setlist that contained all master recordings. The covers throughout the games are mostly recreated by WaveGroup Sound who has worked before to create songs for "Beatmania", "Dance Dance Revolution", and "Karaoke Revolution", making small changes to the guitar portions to make them more adaptable for gameplay. Almost all of the unlockable bonus songs are songs performed by the original artist for the game (the only exception is the song "She Bangs the Drums" by The Stone Roses, which is featured in "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock"). Live! (Guitar Wolf album)
Live!! is the first live album by the Japanese garage punk band Guitar Wolf. It was released in Japan in June 2000. The album is assembled from four different performances, including a show on October 31, 1999 at CBGBs. It also includes a MiniCD featuring a remix of "Jet Virus." Plays Live
Plays Live is the first live and fifth album overall released by the English rock musician Peter Gabriel. This album was originally released as a double album and longplay cassette in 1983, with sixteen songs. It was re-released in 1985, as a single CD version called "Plays Live (Highlights)" with only twelve songs, some of which are edited from their full-length versions, so that the album could fit on a single CD. It was eventually re-released in its entirety as a double CD set in 1987. In 2002, a remastered version of the "Highlights" version was re-released. Guitar Hero Live
"Guitar Hero Live" was considered to be a game that can be expanded upon in the future through content patches, as opposed to released new titles each year which had previously led to the music genre decline in 2009. Though FreeStyleGames added vocals prior to the game's launch, there are no present plans to include other instruments such as bass guitar or drums in the title, with Jackson stating that the game is "all about guitars". Doro Live
Doro Live was the first official live album by German hard rock singer Doro Pesch, recorded during the "Angels Never Die" tour in Germany and released by Vertigo in 1993. The VHS Doro Live '93 was released at the same time only in Europe. It was filmed during two concerts in Germany on 6 and 7 October 1993 and contains two more songs: "The Fortuneteller" and "East Meets West". Live at Leeds
Live at Leeds is the first live album by the English rock band The Who. It was recorded at the University Refectory, University of Leeds on 14 February 1970, and is the only live album that was released while the group were still actively recording and performing with their best known line-up of Roger Daltrey, Pete Townshend, John Entwistle and Keith Moon. Initially released in the United States on 16 May, by Decca and MCA and the United Kingdom on 23 May, by Track and Polydor, the album has been reissued on several occasions and in several different formats. Since its release, "Live at Leeds" has been cited by several music critics as the best live rock recording of all time. Guitar Hero
Another potential "Guitar Hero" project was discovered by the archival site Unseen64 for a game titled "Hero World", a massively multiplayer online game that would link the "Guitar Hero" and "DJ Hero" games. The game had been developed by FreeStyleGames, sometime after the release of "DJ Hero 2", with the main development duties passed to Virtual Fairground, using their platform The Ride, an Adobe Flash-based platform that would let the game be played in a web browser. The game was cancelled in 2011 along with other pending "Guitar Hero" projects. Guitar Hero: Aerosmith
On February 15, 2008, Activision announced that one of their two new "Guitar Hero" installments would be "Guitar Hero: Aerosmith", and would be released in June 2008. "Guitar Hero: Aerosmith" was developed by Neversoft for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions, the Wii version of the game was being developed by Vicarious Visions, and the PlayStation 2 version was developed by Budcat Creations.
The idea for "Guitar Hero: Aerosmith" came about during the development of "Guitar Hero III". Originally, a cover version of "Same Old Song and Dance" was present in the game, but Neversoft president Joel Jewett noted that the quality of the recording was poor. After getting in contact with Joe Perry, Perry was able to provide the original masters for the song, and, according to Neversoft developer Alan Flores, "that sort of established the relationship." This also came at a time where Activision was attempting to expand the "Guitar Hero" franchise, and fans expressed a strong interest in playing a game focused solely on Aerosmith's works, according to RedOctane's Dusty Welch. Another producer for the game, Aaron Habibipour, stated that Aerosmith was one of the five "holy grail" musical groups as polled by Activision. "Newsweek" reported that Aerosmith's license allows for exclusive use of their songs within the "Guitar Hero" series for a limited amount of time, preventing their use within other rhythm games such as "Rock Band". This is not the first time Aerosmith has appeared in a video game. The band was previously featured in both "Quest for Fame" and "Revolution X". Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock
Activision's original announcement of "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock" indicated a planned release in their 2008 fiscal year, ending on March 31, 2008.; RedOctane later clarified a release in the last quarter of 2007, and further revealed that all versions of the game would feature wireless controllers as well as online multiplayer and downloadable content. The game was officially announced by Activision and RedOctane on May 23, 2007 for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Wii and Xbox 360. Budcat Creations ported the game to the PlayStation 2, and Vicarious Visions ported it to the Wii. In September 2007, Aspyr Media announced they would be publishing "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock" for the Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X ports. Demos of "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock" appeared in "Tony Hawk's Proving Ground" for the Xbox 360 in the Xbox Live Marketplace, and from the Internet as an ISO image. The demo features five songs ("Lay Down", "Rock You Like a Hurricane", "Even Flow", "Hit Me with Your Best Shot", and "The Metal") played within the Desert Rock Tour venue. As shipped, the game did not offer offline Co-Op Quickplay mode, a feature that was included in "Guitar Hero II". This mode was added to the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions via a patch. Vitamins and Crash Helmets Tour – Greatest Hits Live
Vitamins & Crash Helmets Tour - Greatest Hits Live is the first live album by heavy metal band Dangerous Toys. It was released in 1999.All songs by Dangerous Toys. Guitar Superstar
Guitar Superstar is a yearly competition hosted by the Guitar Player magazine in which 10 finalists compete for the title of Guitar Superstar or Guitar Hero for the year. The competition started in 2005 as the Guitar Hero Competition but was changed in 2008 to the current title, probably to avoid confusion with the "Guitar Hero" video game series. Guitar Hero (video game)
"Guitar Hero" received critical acclaim upon release. It received a score of 91.96% on GameRankings and 91/100 on Metacritic. IGN praised the "fantastic soundtrack" and "great peripheral", further commenting that mini-Gibson SG controller "is what makes Guitar Hero, rather than what breaks it". GameSpot echoed these sentiments, stating "Guitar Hero" had a "great guitar controller" and "killer soundtrack" and was possibly the "best rhythm game ever made". Many reviews praised the game's gradual learning curve and difficulty approach through the song tier progression and the difficulty setting for each song. "Play" said the game "gives bedroom air guitarists a chance to live out their rock 'n' roll fantasies". GameSpys review commented on the length of the songs, in that "once you hit the three minute mark or so, things start to feel 'too long'". Eurogamer said, "the lack of international star quality about the roster of songs and the absence of the original artists is perhaps the only thing that may detract from the package from an importer's perspective" and "it would have been truly amazing with a better track list". Guitar Hero: Metallica
A demo version of the game was released on Xbox Live on March 20, 2009, with four playable songs: Metallica's "Sad but True" and "Seek & Destroy", Alice in Chains' "No Excuses" and Queen's "Stone Cold Crazy". All four instruments are playable. There is no Expert+ for the drums in the demo. Metallica made an appearance at the 2009 SXSW Music Festival held a week before the game's release for a "not-so-secret" performance, with demonstration stations set up to allow attendees to play the game. The game was the primary sponsor for Aric Almirola's Number 8 car in the 2009 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Goody's Fast Relief 500 run during the weekend of the game's release. Two television commercials, in the same style as those for "Guitar Hero World Tour" that parody the scene from "Risky Business" where Tom Cruise dances in his underwear during Bob Seger's song "Old Time Rock and Roll", were prepared for the game and were directed by Brett Ratner. The ads, which first aired during the 2009 NCAA Basketball Tournament, features NCAA coaches Bob Knight, Mike Krzyzewski, Roy Williams, and Rick Pitino along with the current members of Metallica. Guitar Hero: Aerosmith
Guitar Hero: Aerosmith is a music rhythm game developed by Neversoft, published by Activision and distributed by RedOctane. It was released on the PlayStation 3, Wii and Xbox 360 consoles, with Budcat Creations solely developing the PlayStation 2 port, Vicarious Visions solely developing the Wii port, and Aspyr Media solely publishing the Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X ports. The game was released on June 26, 2008 in Europe, on June 29, 2008 in North America, August 6, 2008 in Australia and October 9, 2008 in Japan. "Guitar Hero: Aerosmith" sold as both a bundle with a specially designed guitar controller as well as a game-only package. Guitar Hero
"Guitar Hero III Mobile" was released for mobile phones in 2007 and 2008, and was developed by MachineWorks Northwest LLC. The base version of the game includes 15 songs from both "Guitar Hero II" and "Guitar Hero III", and has released a three-song add-on pack every month since January 2008. The title has been downloaded by users one million times, with both Verizon and Hands-On Mobile claiming that over 250,000 songs are played a day on the platform.
The two companies produced two other mobile-based "Guitar Hero" games; "Guitar Hero III: Backstage Pass", released in July 2008, adds role-playing elements to manage the band's success in addition to the core rhythm game, while the mobile version of "Guitar Hero World Tour", released in December 2008, expands each included track for play on both lead guitar and drums, mimicking the expansion of the console series to the full band. Lived a Lie
On 2 September 2013, the band announced and premiered the first single to be off the new record, titled 'Lived a Lie'. The album was also revealed to be titled "Cavalier Youth". The album would contain 12 tracks, including an interlude track. The music video to 'Lived a Lie' was made available to the world on the band's Vevo channel and UK fans can download the new track on iTunes shortly after. The song is featured in football video game "FIFA 14" and the 2015 video game "Guitar Hero Live". Live (Usher album)
Live is a live album by American singer Usher. It was recorded on October 15 and 16, 1998 in the singer's hometown of Chattanooga, Tennessee, and released by LaFace Records on March 23, 1999. Both audio-only and video longform versions were released; it was distributed to break up the gap between Usher's second and third studio albums, "My Way" (1997) and "8701" (2001). Guitar Hero Live
Guitar Hero Live is a music video game developed by FreeStyleGames and published by Activision. It was released for PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Wii U, Xbox 360, and Xbox One in October 2015 and to iOS devices including Apple TV in November 2015. As with previous games in the series, the goal is to use a special guitar controller to match fret patterns displayed on a scrolling note pattern on screen in time with the music. Guitar Hero: On Tour series
"Guitar Hero: On Tour" was officially announced on September 7, 2007, at the Austin GDC '07, and released on June 22, 2008. During a conference call on May 8, 2008, Activision revealed that the game would be sold as an individual game (along with the "Guitar Grip") as well as bundled with the DS hardware itself. In North America, Nintendo released a bundle which included "Guitar Hero: On Tour" and a limited edition Silver/Black Nintendo DS Lite branded with the "Guitar Hero" logo. This bundle was available with the release of "Guitar Hero: On Tour" in the United Kingdom. This is the first third-party DS game to be included in such a bundle. When pre-ordered in certain stores, the consumer received either a special Guitar Hero: On Tour set of headphones, Nintendo DS Lite "wrap" pack (two stickers for use on the console) or an exclusive guitar pick stylus. The headphones and stylus feature the Guitar Hero: On Tour logo. On June 14, Toys "R" Us stores across the US hosted a "First to Play" event, where players tried out the game more than a week before its release. Also at the event, anyone who attended received a free Guitar Hero sticker, a temporary tattoo, and a special dog tag. Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s
Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s (titled Guitar Hero: Rocks the 80s in Europe) is a music rhythm game and the third installment in the popular "Guitar Hero" series. It was released in July 2007 in North America and Europe, and in August 2007 in Australia. Guitar Hero World Tour
Guitar Hero World Tour (initially referred to as Guitar Hero IV or Guitar Hero IV: World Tour) is a music rhythm game developed by Neversoft, published by Activision and distributed by RedOctane. It is the fourth main entry in the "Guitar Hero" series, the sixth on home consoles and the seventh overall. The game was launched in North America in October 2008 for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Wii, and Xbox 360 consoles, and a month later for Europe and Australia. A version of "World Tour" for Microsoft Windows and Apple Macintosh was later released. Lust for Life (Iggy Pop song)
The live version of "Lust for Life" from the 1996 UK single appears as a playable song in the video game "Guitar Hero 5". In addition, the original version appeared in "Guitar Hero Live", as well as being made available as DLC for "Rock Band 4". Love You Live
Love You Live is a double live album by The Rolling Stones, released in 1977. It is drawn from Tour of the Americas shows in the US in the summer of 1975, Tour of Europe shows in 1976 and performances from the El Mocambo nightclub concert venue in Toronto in 1977. It is the band's third official full-length live release and is dedicated to the memory of audio engineer Keith Harwood, who died in a drug-induced car accident shortly before the album's release. Guitar Hero
Activision and Konami, who had previously worked together to make sure that the "Guitar Hero" series meets with Konami's patents on music games, developed an arcade console version of the game, titled "Guitar Hero Arcade", distributed to arcades in early 2009. The game is completely based on the "Guitar Hero III" gameplay, but reducing some of the features such as the use of the Whammy bar, Star Power Button (Star Power may only be activated by lifting the Guitar) and Practice Modes, but keeping the ability to download new songs for the cabinet from the Internet. The arcade game has come under some scrutiny by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), who believe the use of the game in arcades is equivalent to "public performances" and seek additional fees to be paid by operators of the game. Live! (Status Quo album)
Live! is the first live album by British rock band Status Quo. The double album is an amalgam of performances at Glasgow's Apollo Theatre between 27 and 29 October 1976, recorded using the Rolling Stones Mobile Studio. Cultural impact of the Guitar Hero series
The series has created a market for products outside of the video games. McFarlane Toys has developed a series of six-inch-tall figurines based on the characters from the game. Brett Ratner, director for "Rush Hour" and "", has stated that he wishes to bring a movie based on "Guitar Hero" to theaters. However, Activision, the publisher of the series, did not approve the idea of a film adaptation.
The popularity of the "Guitar Hero" series has led to the development of several commercial and independent clones. Besides Harmonix' "Rock Band" series, Konami released "Rock Revolution" in 2008 which features drums and guitar (the game does not include vocals) similar to "Guitar Hero World Tour". "PopStar Guitar" for the PlayStation 2 and Wii systems, developed by XS Games, features gameplay similar to the "Guitar Hero" series, but features pop music, as opposed to rock and metal. Digital Praise released a Christian rock-themed guitar-based game called "Guitar Praise" also in 2008. "Guitar Rising", to be published for personal computers by Game Tank by 2009, is based on using a real guitar in order to perfect one's skills. "" is a game promoted by "Rolling Stone" for the Wii that uses two Wii remotes as virtual drumsticks. "Frets on Fire" is an open-source clone of "Guitar Hero" for personal computers that features freely available independent songs and allows users to create their own note tracks. Other games based on Guitar Hero include "Battle of the Bands" and "Ultimate Band". "Guitar Hero" has also influenced other games outside of the music game genre. Tim Schafer credits Harmonix and the first "Guitar Hero" game to help establish his pitching of his heavy metal-inspired game, "Brütal Legend", due to the increase in popularity of metal music from the success of "Guitar Hero". Guitar controllers have been repurposed as controls for an independently developed platform game, "Fret Nice". "Rock of the Dead" for the Wii is based on combining the aspects of "The Typing of the Dead" with using a "Guitar Hero" guitar controller to fend off zombies. A PlayStation Home themed space based on "Guitar Hero", called "Guitar Hero: Backstage", was released on March 26, 2009 in North Americas version, and includes a "Simon says"-like minigame called "Guitar Hero-Master of Rock", themed objects, and videos for the user. Another Way to Die
The single was released as a limited edition 7" single of 6,000 copies in the U.S. on September 30, 2008 by White's label Third Man Records, and in the United Kingdom on October 20, 2008 by XL Recordings. It was also released as a downloadable song for the video game "Guitar Hero World Tour" on November 7, 2008. An instrumental version of the song was also used in a Coca-Cola commercial, as Coca-Cola Zero was used to promote the film; however, White subsequently announced that he had not approved of the song being licensed for this use. Roughly the first two minutes of the song were first played on September 13, 2008 on the radio show "Siglo 21" on Radio 3 in Spain. The song premiered on British radio on September 18, 2008 on BBC Radio 1's "The Jo Whiley Show". "Newsbeat" described the reaction from listeners who e-mailed their opinions as mixed. On October 3, 2008 the music video premiered on Channel 4. Guitar Hero
The series currently has ten major releases (seven "Guitar Hero" games, two "DJ Hero" games and "Band Hero") and five expansions on gaming consoles. There are spin-offs for Windows and Macintosh systems, mobile phones, the Nintendo DS (the "" series), and an arcade game. The "Guitar Hero" franchise was a primary brand during the emergence of the popularity of rhythm games as a cultural phenomenon in North America. Such games have been utilized as a learning and development tool for medical purposes. The first game in the series was considered by several journalists to be one of the most influential video games of the first decade of the 21st century. The series has sold more than 25 million units worldwide, earning US$2 billion at retail, claimed by Activision to be the 3rd largest game franchise after the "Mario" and "Madden NFL" franchises; the third main title of the series, "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock" is also claimed by Activision to be the first single video game title to exceed $1 billion in sales. Guitar Hero Live
Additional songs are provided through "GHTV". Two hundred songs were playable on "GHTV" at launch, and the developers plan on adding new songs to "GHTV" on a regular basis. There is no backward compatibility with songs or controllers from previous editions of the franchise; FreeStyleGames' developer Jamie Jackson justified the decision, explaining that "Guitar Hero Live" was a "completely new game" that existing content would not work with due to the change in core gameplay. There is not any traditional downloadable content for the game in the form of additional songs, instead using the streaming nature of "GHTV" to provide new songs. FreeStyleGames does not expect to make "GHTV" content available for offline play. Ubisoft Leamington
The first game the company developed under Activision's ownership was "DJ Hero" (2009), a spin-off of the "Guitar Hero" series, in which players used a turntable-based controller to mimic the actions of a disc jockey across numerous songs. The title was considered successful, and they completed "DJ Hero 2" the following year, though around that time, the rhythm game genre was suffering from a glut of releases and was in decline, and Activision had decided to end further production of any "Guitar Hero" title. The company had to lay off some employees during this time, but still were financially viable with success of "Sing Party" (2012). As "Sing Party"s development was wrapping up, Activision approached FreeStyleGames to have them consider how to reboot the "Guitar Hero" franchise. FreeStyleGames developed a new guitar controller atypical of ones that has been created to that point, and crafted a different approach towards presenting the game to players through a first-person perspective full-motion video. This work culminated in "Guitar Hero Live" (2015), the first new "Guitar Hero" title for the eighth generation of video game consoles. Guitar Hero Live
The game serves as a reboot of the "Guitar Hero" franchise, being the first new entry in the series since "" in 2010 and the seventh main installment (sixteenth overall). Activision wanted to bring back "Guitar Hero" for the next generation of video game consoles but wanted the new game to be innovative. FreeStyleGames was given a free rein to revitalize the series by Activision, which led to the development of a new guitar controller featuring a 6 button, 3-fret layout in contrast to the 5 button controller of previous games. FreeStyleGames also wanted to bring a more immersive experience to the player, and developed the main career mode "GH Live" to have the note pattern displayed atop full motion video taken from the perspective of a lead guitarist during a concert, with the crowd and other band members dynamically reacting to the player's performance. FreeStyleGames also wanted to forgo the traditional downloadable content model to provide new songs for the game, and created the "GHTV" mode which encompasses curated playlists in the style of music television channels that are streamed around the clock, allowing them to easily acquire and add new songs. Within "GHTV", songs are presented with the note track overlaid atop their music video or from live concert footage. "GHTV" allows players to pick up and play currently-streamed songs at any time or use money and in-game credits to play any song within the library, forgoing traditional downloadable content. The game was shipped with forty-two songs on disc and 200 songs within the "GHTV" library; New content has been added to "GHTV" on a weekly basis, provided through premium shows that earn players unique rewards. Guitar Hero Live
Rhythm games like "Guitar Hero" and "Rock Band" had been widely popular between 2005 and 2008, but due to oversaturation of the market and the onset of the recession in 2009, the rhythm genre suffered major setbacks, and the genre's popularity had quickly waned. Sales of the previous installment "" were below estimates and lower than previous games in the series. Weak sales of "Warriors of Rock", in part, led to Activision cancelling a planned 2011 sequel, and shuttering the "Guitar Hero" franchise. Guitar Hero World Tour
The primary single-player game mode is Career mode, which can be played on the lead guitar, bass guitar, drums, or vocals. Career mode has been slightly altered from previous "Guitar Hero" games. After creating a band, selecting or creating an avatar, and then selecting an instrument, the player is then presented with one of several gigs containing two to five songs each. Most gigs end with an encore song that is not revealed until the other songs are completed. Two of the lead guitar gigs feature "boss challenges" with Zakk Wylde and Ted Nugent; these boss challenges, featuring original songs by Wylde and Nugent, are different from ""s boss battle, removing the focus on attack power-ups and instead featuring a call-and-response mechanic similar to the existing Face-Off mode. The gigs are arranged by difficulty based on the selected instrument. The player is awarded in-game money for each song completed, and completing each gig can also award additional money for meeting certain criteria, such as never letting the Rock Meter drop below a certain level or playing the first several notes of a song perfectly. Completing a gig can also unlock one or more gigs with more difficult songs to complete. Additional awards, such as customization items, are also awarded for completing gigs. The player's accumulated earnings across any of the single player Career Modes are tracked and used to rank the player's overall performance level.
Band Career mode is similar to the solo Career mode, with the game songs presented as several gigs to be completed. A band must have at least two players to proceed. The second player may be either a local player or one over the network. Players may be at different levels of progression in the game, but still gain benefits for successfully completing songs when playing together. The in-game interface features vocals along the top of the screen, and three tracks underneath, for bass, drums, and guitar; only tracks for active players are shown. Full four-player bands can compete with other bands online in a Battle of the Bands mode. David Live
David Live is David Bowie's first official live album, originally released by RCA Records in 1974. The album was recorded in July of that year, on the initial leg of Bowie's Diamond Dogs Tour, at the Tower Theater in Upper Darby, PA, a suburb of Philadelphia. The second leg, a more soul-oriented affair following recording sessions in Philadelphia for the bulk of "Young Americans", would be renamed 'Philly Dogs', as reflected on a different live release, "Cracked Actor". Guitar Hero: On Tour series
"Guitar Hero On Tour: Decades" was announced on July 15, 2008, at the 2008 E3 conference, and released on November 16, 2008. Executive Producer David Nathanielsz stated that the short time between releases was to help give DS players the same depth of content as available to the console players of "Guitar Hero". Additionally, Vicarious Visions incorporated the ability to share songs between different versions of the game through the wi-fi capabilities of the DS in order to expand the number of potential songs to more than 50. Guitar Hero II
"Guitar Hero II" was originally announced for the PlayStation 2 on April 17, 2006. A demo version of the PlayStation 2 version of "Guitar Hero II" was released with issue #110 of "Official PlayStation Magazine" on October 5, 2006. Features of the demo included four playable songs on four difficulty levels for single player and co-op modes. Demo releases do not feature the ability to flip the notes for left-handed players. Demo versions feature the songs "Shout at the Devil", "You Really Got Me", "Strutter" and "YYZ". The retail game was released for the PlayStation 2 on November 7, 2006 in North America, November 15, 2006 in Australia, and November 24, 2006 in Europe. It was released as both a stand-alone game, and as a bundle containing the game with a cherry Gibson SG guitar controller. Cultural impact of the Guitar Hero series
The name "Guitar Hero" is often juxtapositioned with other instruments or other tools for humorous effects. There are T-shirts available from at least one vendor, parodying the "Guitar Hero" logo with a number of different instruments, from violin to bagpipes. Marketing for "The Simpsons Game" included mock posters for "Sitar Hero", depicting "The Simpsons" character Apu with a controller with 21 buttons and a small list of songs parodying real-world songs, such as "Pour Some Curry on Me" (a parody of Def Leppard's "Pour Some Sugar on Me") and "Shankar Groove Thing" (a parody of Peaches & Herb's "Shake Your Groove Thing"), a parody Harmonix praised. GameSpot released an April Fools' article in 2006 announcing "Cowbell Hero" as a successor to the first game, referencing the "More cowbell" skit from "Saturday Night Live". Also, a "Cowbell Hero" T-shirt appears among Chuck's collection of shirts in an episode of the NBC series, "Chuck". One Penny Arcade comic strip envisioned a game entitled "Photoshop Hero", which has become a design for one of their T-shirts. A 2008 FoxTrot Sunday comic showed the characters Jason and Marcus playing a video game called "Chamber Music Hero." The satirical newspaper The Onion published an article entitled "Activision Reports Sluggish Sales For Sousaphone Hero." In the 15th episode of the first season of the Adult Swim cartoon "Metalocalypse", a young girl played a song for Dethklok member Toki Wartooth with a "Guitar Hero" controller. Later, in the 3rd episode of the second season, one Dethklok fan is seen with a "Guitar Hero" controller in his room whilst illegally downloading Dethklok MP3s. Live (Champion album)
Live is a live recording by Champion et ses G-Strings (live moniker for DJ Champion and his guitarists), released in 2007 on Saboteur Records. The package contains two discs, one in CD format and one in NTSC DVD format with no region coding. The album features a live performance featuring tracks from Champion's 2004 debut album, "Chill'em All". Guitar Hero: Van Halen
A demo of the game was released to Xbox Live on December 9, 2009, featuring two Van Halen songs, "Eruption" and "Panama", along with Weezer's "Dope Nose" and Killswitch Engage's "The End of Heartache". Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s
"Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s" was initially announced by EGM in January 2007 as "Guitar Hero: 1980s Edition". Orange Lounge Radio claimed that the game would be released in June 2007, based on an Activision announcement, though no other source has cited this announcement. Activision officially revealed the first details of the game May 11, 2007, in addition to changing the game's title to "Guitar Hero: Rocks the 80s". Only a few weeks later, the game name was revised again as "Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s", as official artwork for the game was first released. Nevertheless, the word 'Encore' has been dropped from the title of the European releases. DJ Hero
DJ Hero is a music video game, developed by FreeStyleGames and published by Activision as a rhythm game spin-off of the "Guitar Hero" franchise. It was released on October 27, 2009 in North America and on October 29, 2009 in Europe. The game is based on turntablism, the act of creating a new musical work from one or more previously recorded songs using record players and sound effect generators, and features 94 remixes of two different songs from a selection of over 100 different songs across numerous genres. List of songs in Guitar Hero Live
A player can access a Premium Show either through playing specific songs already in the "GHTV" catalog or through microtransactions. Completing Premium Shows can earn the player in-game rewards such as a decorative item for their player card or on-screen fretboard. The week after their introduction, these songs are added to the on-demand playlist, and after another week enter into the "GHTV"s rotation of songs. At the release of "Guitar Hero Live", Activision announced plans to add 70 new songs to "GHTV" before the end of 2015. Guitar Hero
"Guitar Hero" was created from a partnership between RedOctane, then their own company that produced specialized video game controllers, and Harmonix, a music video game development company who had previously produced "Frequency", "Amplitude" and "Karaoke Revolution". RedOctane was seeking to bring in a "Guitar Freaks"-like game, highly popular in Japan at the time, into Western markets, and approached Harmonix about helping them to develop a music game involving a guitar controller. Both companies agreed to it, and went on to produce "Guitar Hero" in 2005. The title was highly successful, leading to the development of its successful sequel "Guitar Hero II" in 2006. While the original controllers for the first "Guitar Hero" game were designed by Ryan Lesser, Rob Kay, Greg LoPiccolo and Alex Rigopulous of Harmonix and built by the Honeybee Corporation of China, subsequent iterations and future controllers were developed inhouse at RedOctane, with development led primarily by Jack McCauley. Guitar Hero II
Guitar Hero II is a music rhythm game developed by Harmonix, published by Activision and distributed by RedOctane. It is the second installment in the "Guitar Hero" series and is the sequel to "Guitar Hero". It was first released for the PlayStation 2 in November 2006, and then for the Xbox 360 in April 2007, with additional content not originally in the PlayStation 2 version. Guitar Hero II
RedOctane stated that the Xbox 360 version of "Guitar Hero II" "planned to feature more downloadable content than any other 360 title" utilizing the Xbox Live Marketplace, including many of the songs from the original "Guitar Hero" a week after the release of the game. Four such packs have been released since April 11, 2007. Additionally, two packs featuring new content to the "Guitar Hero" series have also been released, including songs from My Chemical Romance, Protest the Hero, Trivium, and Atreyu. There have also been individual track downloads featuring songs from bands Los Rodríguez, Pleymo, and Soilwork. Live (James Taylor album)
Live is the first live album by singer-songwriter James Taylor, released on August 10, 1993, on Columbia. The double album presents selections from 14 shows during a November 1992 tour. "Live" peaked at number 20 on the "Billboard" 200 chart, and has sold more than one million copies, being certified 2x platinum by the RIAA. Guitar Hero
The original "Guitar Hero" was released on the PlayStation 2 in November 2005. "Guitar Hero" is notable because it comes packaged with a controller peripheral modeled after a black Gibson SG guitar. Rather than a typical gamepad, this guitar controller is the primary input for the game. Playing the game with the guitar controller simulates playing an actual guitar, except it uses five colored "fret buttons" and a "strum bar" instead of frets and strings. The development of "Guitar Hero" was inspired by Konami's "Guitar Freaks" video game, which at the time, had not seen much exposure in the North American market; RedOctane, already selling guitar-shaped controllers for imported copies of GuitarFreaks, approached Harmonix about creating a game to use an entirely new Guitar controller. The concept was to have the gameplay of "Amplitude" with the visuals of "Karaoke Revolution", both of which had been developed by Harmonix. The game was met with critical acclaim and received numerous awards for its innovative guitar peripheral and its soundtrack, which comprised 47 playable rock songs (most of which were cover versions of popular songs from artists and bands from the 1960s through modern rock). "Guitar Hero" has sold nearly 1.5 million copies to date. Harmonix
At this time, RedOctane, a peripheral manufacturing company who had enjoyed Harmonix' previous games, approached Harmonix about developing the software for a game that would be based on a guitar-shaped controller, inspired by the "GuitarFreaks" which was popular in Japan. This relationship led to the creation of "Guitar Hero", published by RedOctane in 2005. The game features similar gameplay elements to "FreQuency" and "Amplitude". "Guitar Hero" uses a guitar-shaped controller designed uniquely for the game. Specifically, the "Guitar Hero" controller was designed with five color-coded "fret" buttons and a "strum bar". "Guitar Hero" became largely successful, both critically and commercially, resulting in the well-received 2006 sequel "Guitar Hero II", also developed by Harmonix. List of songs in Guitar Hero II
The Xbox 360 version of the game allows for the use of downloadable content available through Xbox Live Marketplace. These are typically released as packs of three, or as single song. These packs include songs from the original "Guitar Hero" for the PlayStation 2. Additional packs consist of songs that have not been featured in "Guitar Hero" before, and are masters, even though some are indicated as covers in the game. As of March 31, 2014, these songs are no longer available in the Xbox Live Marketplace. Guitar Hero Live
On 14 April 2015, Hirshberg and Jackson invited Pete Wentz of Fall Out Boy and Gerard Way of My Chemical Romance to promote the game. Wentz performed his band's song "My Songs Know What You Did in the Dark" in the Guitar Hero Live mode, while Way and Jackson dueled each other on My Chemical Romance's song "Na Na Na". A commercial for the game was revealed in October 2015, starring Lenny Kravitz and James Franco. In conjunction with Activision, The CW ran special promotional ads for "Guitar Hero Live", featuring the actors David Ramsey and Candice Patton playing the game in the week prior to the game's release. Activision arranged to have rapper Macklemore play "Guitar Hero Live" with FreeStyleGames' Jamie Jackson during the halftime show of the Seattle Seahawks home game on the Sunday prior to the release of the game.