At my house, Guitar Hero and Rock Band live side-by-side.  Rock band comes out whenever we have company, but Guitar Hero is reserved for other times – special times – times when there is no one else around. 

It’s not that we particularly prefer Rock Band (I actually like the GH III tunes better), but who wants to sit around and watch one person play when you have the option of everyone participating together?

Neversoft has finally become aware of some universal truths. The most obvious: musicians and gamers don’t enjoy playing alone. 

To read more about Guitar Hero IV: World Tour, follow the links to the excerpts below:

Release date TBA
Input methods Guitar controller, drum controller, microphone, gamepad, Wii Remote

Guitar Hero World Tour (formerly known as Guitar Hero IV) is a forthcoming entry in the music video game Guitar Hero series, and will be developed by Neversoft and published by RedOctane and Activision. The game is expected to be available for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, and Wii consoles.

While the game will continue to feature the use of a guitar-shaped controller to simulate the playing of rock music, Guitar Hero World Tour will be the first game of the Guitar Hero series to feature the drum and microphone controllers.^[1] Gameplay will be similar to the competing Rock Band. Furthermore, according to Game Informer, the game will allow users to create new songs, including drums, rhythm guitar, lead guitar and bass guitar, although the studio mode will be without vocals, because of copyrights and storage limitations. It is confirmed that players will be able to upload and share their songs.^[2]

Live blog: Activision at E3 is ‘Guitar Hero’ and beyond

July 15, 2008 7:10 PM PDT
Posted by Daniel Terdiman

…Activision publishing president and CEO Mike Griffith… [reported that the company] is three times as big as the independent company was a year ago.

…Guitar Hero users have downloaded more than 18 million songs for the various versions of the game.

(Credit: Brian Bright of Neversoft shows off the new ‘Guitar Hero’ guitar during the Activision E3 press conference Tuesday night in Los Angeles.)

First, [Brian Bright] is talking about the game’s new guitar, which he says is longer, has a directional knob, and now has an accelerometer. It also has a slider on the neck, allowing for much more control over the play of music.
There’s also an all-new drum kit, and one of the interesting things about this is that it is possible to plug a professional drum kit into it.

Bright demonstrates the Music Studio element of ‘Guitar Hero: World Tour.’ This is the part of the game that will allow players to create their own music and then share it online through what is called the Tunes system.

(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News)

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