Parents' Guide to

Guitar Hero: World Tour

By Marc Saltzman, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 13+

A best-in-class "must have" music game.

Game Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Nintendo Wii, PlayStation 2 2008
Guitar Hero: World Tour Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this game.

Community Reviews

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age 14+

Based on 3 parent reviews

CSMContentDefault
CSMContentDefault Adult
December 9, 2018
age 13+

the butt review

JEDI micah
JEDI micah Adult
June 21, 2012
age 13+

This game ROCKS(literally)!!!

By far, this is the best Guitar Hero game ever! It is similar to Rock Band because they finally added a drum set to this game! Teenagers who love rock and roll will obviously fall in love with this game and the other old Guitar Hero games! In an educational kind of way, these games can actually teach people how to play the guitar or the drums!

This title has:

Great messages
Too much sex
Too much swearing
Too much consumerism
See all 3 parent reviews

What’s It About?

GUITAR HERO: WORLD TOUR is the sequel to the best-selling video game of 2007 (Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock). This new version adds drums and vocals to last year's game that was all about playing on the guitar and bass, along with a tour bus-full of new modes and features. For the uninitiated, these music games let you play along to hit rock songs on a plastic guitar, a drum kit peripheral, or sing in a microphone, and you must hit the right note/drum at the correct time in order to rack up points. Perform well and the virtual crowd claps to the beat, but make too many flubs and you might just get booed offstage. When it comes to instruments, the Guitar Hero: World Tour drums has two raised cymbals along with the three main pads and bass drum pedal, resembling a real kit. The newly-designed wireless guitar looks and feels great, and offers extra buttons for improv play and special effects, if desired. The wired microphone provides clear sound for the singer in your group.

After you watch the first of many entertaining animated sequences, you can select from a number of single-player, co-op or head-to-head game modes. A new rock star creator lets you customize the look of your virtual musician before entering a lengthy Career mode that lets players swap instruments as they progress through the story (or choose to stick with one); the Band Career options allows you to join or host an online band with other players. Or why not compete in an online competition – four against four – to see how many points your band can collectively rack up against a rival super group? As with Guitar Hero III, players who dual guitars on the same TV can unleash "battle attacks" to trip up an opponent such as causing a string to break or flipping the left and right buttons.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (3):
Kids say (44):

For those who have played the Rock Band series, this new version of Guitar Hero is similar, and it might be even better in some regards.The 80-plus musical tracks are about as good as the ones offered in Rock Band 2 (with some available in both, such as Survivor's Eye of the Tiger and Bon Jovi's Livin' on a Prayer). World Tour includes classics like Lynyrd Skynyrd's Sweet Home Alabama (live version), The Eagles' Hotel California and Michael Jackson's Beat It, as well as newer rock ditties such as Tool's Schism, Oasis' Some Might Say and Linkin Park's What I've Done. You can also download additional tracks from the Internet for a few bucks apiece.

But the way World Tour distinguishes itself from Rock Band is that it includes an editor to create and share your own songs. But be forewarned, it takes some patience and skill to fully appreciate the bundled "Music Studio." One to four players can choose to play lead or rhythm guitar, bass, keyboards and drums, but vocals cannot be recorded. Once you've saved your masterpiece, publish it to an online hub called GHTunes for others to download; on the flipside, you can download and play someone else' songs, too. Thanks to great songs, rockin' instruments, multiple game modes, and the built-in music studio, Activision's Guitar Hero: World Tour is the best of the music games.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Families can talk about whether these music games have hit its stride or its peak? Are the changes in games like the Guitar Hero and Rock Band series enough to justify the purchase or is it worth just downloading new songs each week?

Game Details

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