Guitar Hero 5

For PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii; classified PG; RRP $130

I'm usually a little wary of those franchises that seem to crank out subsequent versions at an alarming rate, tweaking a few things here and there, but fundamentally leaving things the same as before.

You could say that about Guitar Hero 5 - as the fundamental game play remains unchanged - but the moment I saw my Xbox Live avatar rocking on stage during a rendition of You Give Love A Bad Name, I knew this one was going to be fun.

And it wasn't just my avatar's head on the pre-rendered body of one of the game's pre-installed rockers: it was my actual avatar, rocking along to the songs, strumming the guitar to the beat. It was a nice touch.

Fans of Guitar Hero won't need any introduction to what's going on here: grab a plastic guitar, microphone or drum kit, pick a song you like, then play it best you can, matching the notes that scroll down the TV screen. It's not rocket science.

And as with other GH games, you've got career mode and quick play, but you've now got party play, where up to four players can drop in and out of the game on a whim, using any combination of instrument (want two guitars and no bass? It's yours). It's a nice feature, too.

Thankfully, the boss battles from previous GH games are gone - I hated those guitar-shredding sessions against Joe Perry in GH: Aerosmith - and the 85 songs include In My Place by Coldplay, Smells Like Teen Spirit by Nirvana, Sympathy For The Devil by The Rolling Stones, Superstition by Stevie Wonder and Blue Orchid by The White Stripes, so it's a diverse list.

While GH5 is great fun, the music genre is at the point of over- saturation and they're all starting to feel a little samey. I wonder when the time will come when gamers pick up their pitchforks and proclaim: "Hey, Game Publisher Man, we've had enough of these music games. You should have stopped at Music Band Genius 6".

I made that name up. Music Band Genius isn't a real game.

Meanwhile, GH5 is great fun. – The Press

- © Fairfax NZ News