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Rock Band 2
September 24, 2008 | 4:47 PM PST
by: Jeff Rivera
Kombo's Review Policy: Our reviews are written for you. Our goal is to write honest, to-the-point reviews that don't waste your time. This is why we've split our reviews into four sections: What the Game's About, What's Hot, What's Not and Final Word, so that you can easily find the information you want from our reviews.
What the Game's About
By now everybody is pretty familiar with Rock Band and its brand of multiplayer-focused rhythm action gameplay. Up to four players can take their part in a rock band as the guitarist, bassist, drummer, or vocalist. Rock Band 2 continues on with what Rock Band started nearly a year ago, but makes a few adjustments and additions. Rather than tearing down and rebuilding everything that Harmonix did with the first Rock Band, the team went back and perfected an already solid offering. With weekly DLC releases, support for old Rock Band songs, and a strong online offering, Harmonix is still pushing hard to make the Rock Band franchise a household name.
What's Hot
There wasn't a whole lot to complain about with the original Rock Band, but Harmonix turned an attentive eye toward message boards across the Internet and made positive upgrades to just about every aspect of the game. The game's biggest draw, World Tour mode, is now fully playable in single player mode and you can easily engage in multiplayer with either local or online band mates. The World Tour mode is so much more approachable now that even lone wolf rockers will prefer it to the quickplay mode in most cases.
The soundtrack is very good, and every single song in the game is derived from the band's master track. Not only does this mean that the sound quality is excellent, but all those cover bands have been given the boot in favor of the real deal. Many songs that made their way into Rock Band 2 are somewhat of a surprise, and the overall variety of songs is enough to satisfy even the pickiest of music fans. It's also pretty nifty that for a cool $5 you can buy a license to export all your Rock Band 1 tracks to your hard drive to be seamlessly integrated into your Rock Band 2 track list. DLC from RB1 works automatically with RB2.
The new modes in the game make the game more casual friendly, but they also go a long way toward helping long time fans increase the level of enjoyment they get out of the overall package. There's a drummer training mode where the game will help you how to produce proper fills and get you more comfortable with the setup. The no-fail mode allows you to keep jamming, even if you're blowing the song completely. This comes in handy when breaking in new players that would normally get frustrated by failing out of songs while the other band members make it look all too easy.
While not available yet, the new peripherals are a step up from what came bundled in with the original Rock Band. The instruments are more responsive, of more solid build, and boast new features that will automatically adjust the input response time to compensate for any possible HDTV lag.
What's Not
There really isn't much to complain about with Rock Band 2. Of course, with every music game, there is bound to be a handful of tracks that just won't jive with your personal taste, but that hardly can be held against the title. There are a couple of tracks that do fall flat, no matter what type of music you like. For example, "So Wat'cha Want" by the Beastie Boys just proves to be a bit of a bore on all four parts, and it feels just a little shoehorned into the game. Luckily this is a pretty rare occurrence.
Final Word
As mentioned earlier, Rock Band 2 is Harmonix perfecting their established formula with a few gameplay improvements and the addition of some new modes. While some may look at the offering and think of it as a simple track pack released on disc, the upgrades to the franchise really do warrant the release of a whole new game. With Rock Band 2, Harmonix has proven that they are still king of the genre and are fully committed to providing the best possible experience for both veterans and newcomers. There is no reason that any music game fan should pass on Harmonix's latest release.
What the Game's About
By now everybody is pretty familiar with Rock Band and its brand of multiplayer-focused rhythm action gameplay. Up to four players can take their part in a rock band as the guitarist, bassist, drummer, or vocalist. Rock Band 2 continues on with what Rock Band started nearly a year ago, but makes a few adjustments and additions. Rather than tearing down and rebuilding everything that Harmonix did with the first Rock Band, the team went back and perfected an already solid offering. With weekly DLC releases, support for old Rock Band songs, and a strong online offering, Harmonix is still pushing hard to make the Rock Band franchise a household name.
What's Hot
There wasn't a whole lot to complain about with the original Rock Band, but Harmonix turned an attentive eye toward message boards across the Internet and made positive upgrades to just about every aspect of the game. The game's biggest draw, World Tour mode, is now fully playable in single player mode and you can easily engage in multiplayer with either local or online band mates. The World Tour mode is so much more approachable now that even lone wolf rockers will prefer it to the quickplay mode in most cases.
The soundtrack is very good, and every single song in the game is derived from the band's master track. Not only does this mean that the sound quality is excellent, but all those cover bands have been given the boot in favor of the real deal. Many songs that made their way into Rock Band 2 are somewhat of a surprise, and the overall variety of songs is enough to satisfy even the pickiest of music fans. It's also pretty nifty that for a cool $5 you can buy a license to export all your Rock Band 1 tracks to your hard drive to be seamlessly integrated into your Rock Band 2 track list. DLC from RB1 works automatically with RB2.
The new modes in the game make the game more casual friendly, but they also go a long way toward helping long time fans increase the level of enjoyment they get out of the overall package. There's a drummer training mode where the game will help you how to produce proper fills and get you more comfortable with the setup. The no-fail mode allows you to keep jamming, even if you're blowing the song completely. This comes in handy when breaking in new players that would normally get frustrated by failing out of songs while the other band members make it look all too easy.
While not available yet, the new peripherals are a step up from what came bundled in with the original Rock Band. The instruments are more responsive, of more solid build, and boast new features that will automatically adjust the input response time to compensate for any possible HDTV lag.
What's Not
There really isn't much to complain about with Rock Band 2. Of course, with every music game, there is bound to be a handful of tracks that just won't jive with your personal taste, but that hardly can be held against the title. There are a couple of tracks that do fall flat, no matter what type of music you like. For example, "So Wat'cha Want" by the Beastie Boys just proves to be a bit of a bore on all four parts, and it feels just a little shoehorned into the game. Luckily this is a pretty rare occurrence.
Final Word
As mentioned earlier, Rock Band 2 is Harmonix perfecting their established formula with a few gameplay improvements and the addition of some new modes. While some may look at the offering and think of it as a simple track pack released on disc, the upgrades to the franchise really do warrant the release of a whole new game. With Rock Band 2, Harmonix has proven that they are still king of the genre and are fully committed to providing the best possible experience for both veterans and newcomers. There is no reason that any music game fan should pass on Harmonix's latest release.
February 8, 2010
