Teenage Kids and Guitar Hero

Picked up the newest Guitar Hero for the Nintendo Wii. I've played it a couple of times, but the majority of playing is by my 3 sons ages 11-12-13 and my 16 year old daughter.

I find it amusing that kids who only listen to new rock and mostly rap are walking around the house singing things like Hit me with your best shot, and Talk dirty to me like they are some sort of new hit single. Songs that I listened to when I was their age.

Maybe guitar hero has a postive benefit by exposing them to a wider variety of music, but more likely it's just rotting their brain cells in a different way.

I wonder how good some of these kids would be if they spent that time practicing on real instruments. In the game "rock band" they have a drum set and its essentially the same thing as a real one.

I may be young, but I feel like everyone I know is completely spaced out on video games.

Hey, everything you listen to at that age is new, I remember buying my first beetles cassete when I was 11, followed that with some Queen, and all the while listening to Pearl jam and Stone Temple Pilots on the Radio You can't beat good music, no matter when it was made.

BTW, Guitar Hero kicks major ass, I love that game:rockin: I just have Metalica - One and Slayer - Raining Blood to finish the third one on expert....

perversatile said:

I wonder how good some of these kids would be if they spent that time practicing on real instruments. In the game "rock band" they have a drum set and its essentially the same thing as a real one.

I may be young, but I feel like everyone I know is completely spaced out on video games.

Click to expand...

I agree, I have a hard enough time finding time to do anything productive, the last thing I am going to do with my free time is play a fake instrument. Pick up a real guitar and start playing it. I have become disillusioned with video games. I also don't have a television. I'm convinced that technology won't catch on


:EDIT: By the way, what the hell are you suckers still stuck at work for... I can't think straight any more but I have to meet these deadlines. Thank God HBT is here to keep me sane....

I try to minimize the amount of time they spend on games, and for me one or two songs a few times a week is more than enough. As far as ever beating that game on expert, not going to happen for me. Even on easy my hands start to cramp up halfway thru a song. Plus if I'm playing games, then I'm not killing brain cells on HBT.

Want to see something nuts, google the game on you tube and watch some 9 year old kid rock through a song on advanced. He'll be carpal-tunneled by age 11.

I finally got rock band. Me and a couple buddies like to jam out on it but while we're kicking butt at medium, the hard difficulty actually takes practice and effort.

I doubt I'll ever become competent at "Expert", there's just no interest in it for me. I play games to play, not actually work at it. I like a little bit of a challenge but have limits.

I do hope that the popularity of the game(s) encourages more kids to get involved with real instruments. Yeah, that's my justification for liking the game!

Oh my god the song ONE is on guitar hero? Dude I can play that on expert level on air guitar! Looks like I'll need to buy a console. They have it on PS3 right? right?

Man, I look at that game and think, "That looks like so much fun!" Then I remember that I can actually play the guitar for real. Instead of buying the game and controller, buy a real guitar and small amp. It takes practice to learn GH, why not practice on a real guitar and learn an instrument!

Homercidal said:

Man, I look at that game and think, "That looks like so much fun!" Then I remember that I can actually play the guitar for real. Instead of buying the game and controller, buy a real guitar and small amp. It takes practice to learn GH, why not practice on a real guitar and learn an instrument!

Click to expand...

Learning to play a real instrument is NOT like a game at all. Games are specifically designed to give players a sense of challenge and mastery simultaneously and consistently. When we design a game (and I had nothing to do with GH but it applies to any game development) particular attention is paid to the pacing of the challenge and giving frequent positive feedback to the player.

Furthermore, there is nothing fun about 4 people who can't play an instrument getting together and trying to make music together. However, in Rock band (or 2 people in Guitar hero) these people without musical skill can get together and enjoy the experience together.

It's also notable that there are more than one professional musician that has admitted to playing and enjoying games like Guitar hero and Rock band. I've seen very few musicians that make a living from music who slam games like Rock band and Guitar hero (neither of which invented this genre of music game). In my experience it's usually the person with a musical hobby that gets preachy about 'not wasting your time with a toy and learning to play 'for real'.

Neomich said:

I do hope that the popularity of the game(s) encourages more kids to get involved with real instruments. Yeah, that's my justification for liking the game!

Click to expand...

This is totally anecdotal but one of the managers at the guitar center near my house told me they saw a jump in sales of guitars and the like recently as well as having fewer and fewer slots available for people to get lessons because they are filling up. So yea-- based on that totally anecdotal story, I'd say that it has.

deathweed said:

You can't beat good music, no matter when it was made.

Click to expand...

That's a fact. We went camping over the weekend, and there were about six couples in our group, along with their kids. The kids all had their ipods out, so I was curious to see what they had on there. In addition to the music that you'd expect them to have (rap junk, etc) they had Kansas, Boston, Aerosmith, Uriah Heep, Queen, Heart, AC/DC, and a ton more. So for the hell of it I got out mine and passed it around. All of a sudden I had teenagers asking me to burn them CDs so they could put my stuff onto their ipods. None of them wanted the Buffett, though. Hmmm........

HAHAHAHA!!!!!! I just kicked "One"'s ass on expert!!!!!! 4 stars to boot! All that is in my way is "raining blood" and Satan


Sorry, SWMBO isn't home this weekend and I was so excited I had to tell someone......

Nice! I'm only missing about 5 songs on Hard, and have beaten about 8 songs on expert.

It's fun and I love playing the game, but I definitely don't think that the game should ever replace real instruments.