Guitar Hero: Metallica Review

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The venues, which include London's Hammersmith Odeon and Los Angeles' Forum, have all been chosen as sites of legendary Metallica concerts and, as they're based on real-life locations, dodge the Spinal Tap-esque ambiance to which Guitar Hero's stages are usually submitted. But despite the fact the band themselves provided mo-cap for the game, the characters still have that ungainly, cartoonish feel, which sits slightly at odds with the slick, serious presentation elsewhere.

We're not here to review Metallica's music for you, but there are characteristics and traits that are significant from a gameplay perspective. By definition, the more notes in a rhythm-action game song, and the faster those notes come, the more interesting and challenging that song will be to play along with, which is in contrast to music for music's sake, where space and silence are just as important. System of a Down are always going to be more suitable for gameplay than an ambient act like, say, Stars of the Lid. In that sense, not all music is suitable for music games, at least music games in the Guitar Freaks mould.

For Metallica, however, this quirk is a resounding positive. The band's heavy, thick-layered rhythms and machinegun-fire downstrokes provide interesting, appealing level designs. Indeed, Neversoft has done its best work yet extrapolating these across various difficulty levels. At the easiest levels, beginners will be able to happily join in with "Enter Sandman" and "Nothing Else Matters", while seasoned experts will find most songs in the game a consistent challenge at Expert level. For drummers, there's even an "Expert +" mode for those who like their difficulty to go to eleven by trying their feet at double bass pedalling (although as a splitter is required for this we were unable to test it).

If you're playing multiplayer make sure you're not mean to your bassist lest he resign due to all the bullying.

The standard Guitar Hero: World Tour features are all included too, so players get full access to the Music Studio, where they can compose their own pieces, as well as the full band multiplayer capability. However, the only compatible downloadable content is Metallica's own Death Magnetic tracks, so if you want to play content you've previously purchased from the Guitar Hero store then you'll have you put your World Tour disc back in for access - a shortcoming offset somewhat by the fan service, which bundles multiple pieces of band and song trivia, exclusive videos and behind-the-scenes making-of documentaries in amongst the gameplay.

Much has been written (and filmed) about the Metallica of today, a band of men approaching their fifties who still play the music of their teens and twenties. Their output is precision-designed to appeal to adolescents because, in a great many cases, it was created by them. Its themes revolve around identity, anger and violence, while its heavy, palm-muted chugging rhythms and screaming pinched harmonics are the soundtrack of young men's alienation.