The Guitar Hero series has only recently ventured out onto the handheld gaming sector  with the release of Guitar Hero On Tour less than a year ago on the Nintendo DS. Modern Hits is now the second sequel to be brought out in the same year but  will another return to the DS offer any new rocking content or will it simply be a stale re-make of its predecessors?

As you will be aware if you have played the previous Guitar Hero games on the DS, the gimmicky plastic is gone and you plug a 4-button “guitar grip” attachment device into the Gameboy Advance slot of the console. This can feel uncomfortable at first but you eventually get used to it after a while. The stylus and touch screen plays a big part as well in terms of strumming and fine tuning your so-called Guitar. Although it doesn’t match the same level of enjoyment of using a large plastic guitar, it still puts some rock’n roll in your fingertips.

 

So what is new about Modern Hits? Well firstly, there is a new tracklist with over 25 great songs and artists including Wofmother, Coldplay and Kaizer Chiefs. The main feature that hass been newly introduced into Modern Hits is the Fan-Request mode which adds some depth to the career mode. It simply revolves around you gaining more and more fans by playing a few various mission based songs and accumulating your popularity. These song missions are based on your choice of instrument, i.e a guitar, bass (drums/guitar) and a duel combination of the two.

One of the highlights of the game is the wireless multplayer in which you can merge songs from previous “On Tour” games into a larger list in which you and another player can play in either cooperative or competative game modes.

Again, those who are farmilliar with the Guitar Hero concept on the DS will know how it looks and sounds to play the game. The graphics are not bad but it doesn’t look like they have pushed to the max to utilise the DS’s capabilities. Its a similar story with the sound. Most songs sound decent enough to play along to but naturally, with a handheld device, they are not going to be quite up to scratch with sound quality compared to the the big next-gen consoles (PS3/Xbox360).

 

The game is not without its flaws and still retains some of the troublesome characteristics of its predecessors. Most notably, the “Guitar grip” still feels rather bulky and navigating your stylus across the touch screen can result in some slow responses causing you to miss beats and loose track of the rhythm.

Activision and Vicarious Visions do deserve credit for their innovative ideas and designs to bring the Guitar Hero Concept to the handheld market  but its is obviosly the big titles on the home systems that bolster the series’ fame. The third addition to the “On Tour” band doesn’t really bring very much new to the table and has failed to make any significant moderations and improvements to make playing Guitar Hero on the DS a truly pleasurable experience.

+ Varied Master Soundtracks.

+ Good multiplayer capabilities for song exchange.

- Poor Sound quality

- Very little new content from predecessors.

- Playing using touch screen can be awkward.

6.8/10

By Ian Ratledge Posted Sunday, July 5th, 2009 4:25 pm