GH4 World tour

Guitar Hero World Tour (initially referred to as Guitar Hero IV) is a forthcoming entry in the music video game Guitar Hero series, and is being 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 on October 26, 2008.[1] A version of the game has been rated by the ESRB for Microsoft Windows and Apple Macintosh computers, though Activision has not officially confirmed this version.[3]

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 in the Guitar Hero series to feature drum and microphone controllers for percussion and vocal parts.[4] Gameplay will be similar to the competing Rock Band series of games. 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 not allow players to record vocals, officially due to copyright and storage limitations, among other undisclosed reasons. Players may upload and share their songs as well as download others' songs through a service known as GHTunes.[5]

Game modes
The traditional single player Career Mode has been revamped such that instead of playing through a linear setlist, players will encounter gigs during career mode, which offer a choice of songs to play; one does not, however, have to complete every song in the list to proceed. The game will allow the player to change their difficulty during a career, and possibly during an individual song. The player will also be able to switch to a different instrument during the same Career without having to restart. There are four instrument career modes within the game: lead guitar, bass guitar, drums, and vocals.[7]


Gameplay of a whole band. On top is vocalist, bottom from left to right: Guitar, Drums, BassThere is also a Band Career mode, which can be advanced by oneself or with others offline or online. A player that has not progressed as far as another player's band, or has progressed farther, will still gain benefits for successfully completing songs when playing together. The in-game interface features vocals along the top of the screen, and three tracks underneath, for bass, drums, and guitar. Full four-player bands will be able to compete with other bands online in a "Battle of the Bands" mode.[9]

The Boss Battles that were present in Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock and Guitar Hero: Aerosmith will return; however, the format has been changed to remove the focus on attack power-ups and instead features a call-and-response mechanic similar to the existing Face-Off mode. Artists are writing new original songs for their battles.[7] The current battle mode will remain playable in multiplayer.


Characters and customization

Players will be able to alter many aspects of their avatar's guitar within Guitar Hero World Tour.Users will be able to use a "Create-a-Rocker" mode, based on the similar "Create-a-Skater" mode in Neversoft's Tony Hawk series and the advanced character creation scheme from the Tiger Woods PGA Tour series. Players will be able to affect their character's poise, clothing, tattoos, makeup, and age. Selected characters from previous Guitar Hero games will also be available as starting templates for creating a rocker. As a result of the present lawsuit with Gibson Guitars, the player will also be able to customize their own guitar for the game to a high degree. Drum sets and microphones will also be customizable.[7]

In addition to the game and player's own characters, character models based off famous musicians will be in the game. Hayley Williams was confirmed to be a playable character at Activision's press conference held simultaneously with E3 2008,[10]; Jimi Hendrix,[11] Ozzy Osbourne,[12] and Zakk Wylde[12] will also be playable characters. Both Billy Corgan of The Smashing Pumpkins[13] and Travis Barker of Blink-182 and +44[14] have been shown doing motion capture for the game. A recent survey suggests that the game will also feature caricatures of Ted Nugent and Sting.[15]


Instruments

All three of the new instruments for Guitar Hero World Tour. From left to right: Guitar (with sunburst finish), microphone, and drumsRedOctane is developing a new guitar controller for the game, featuring a touch-sensitive pad just below the normal five fret buttons along the neck of the guitar. The pad will allow the player to alter the sound of sustained notes, strum without using the strum bar, and tap or slide their fingers on the pad to play notes in certain sections without strumming at all.[6] The touchpad can also be used for sustains and staccato notes in the music studio feature while recording guitar, and is used for finer control over loops when recording other instruments. Also, the guitar will have longer whammy bar for better access, and the strum bar will be a bit quieter and longer. The select button, used to activate Star Power, has been redesigned to bear the appearance of the guitar's bridge and moved just below the strum bar for easier access. The guitar also features start/pause buttons on either side of the strum bar.[6]

Previews of the game revealed that a wireless,[14][6] velocity-sensitive[9] six-piece drum controller is being developed, with two adjustable cymbal pads, a snare, two toms, and a bass drum pedal.[7][16] The drum kit was designed with help from John Devacka, who is credited with creating the first music game, MTV Drumscape, and developed key patents used for most modern music games that are now owned by Activision.[7] During song creation, the velocity sensitivity will be used to allow players to alter the sound made by the drum.[14] The drum set also will have a MIDI port in the back, allowing for users to connect any drum kit, drum machine, or other compatible device.[17] Activision has promised that the drum set will be the "most realistic drum experience ever in a video game".[9] The Wii version of the drum controller includes a slot for the Wii Remote to fit into, enabling it to become wireless, much like the guitar controller introduced for the Wii version of Guitar Hero III.

The official microphone used for vocals uses a USB connection rather than a wireless one; players may alternatively use any standard USB microphone. When playing vocals, a standard controller will be necessary in order to navigate menus, select difficulties, and pause.[18]

New instrument controllers are not required to play World Tour. Older Guitar Hero guitar controllers will still work with the game.[6] Activision also stated during their press conference held alongside E3 2008 that for Xbox 360 users, the existing Rock Band instrument controllers as well as other third party controllers will also work in Guitar Hero World Tour, though it is unknown if Rock Band 2's new instruments will work.[19] Vicarious Visions has confirmed that controllers developed for the Wii version of Rock Band will not be compatible with the Wii version of World Tour. World Tour will adjust the tracks in the game to account for the instrument controller being used. For example, sections of the lead guitar track that are designed to be played on the new controller's touchpad can be played by tapping the frets on older controllers without strumming.[6] When using Rock Band's drum controller, which has one fewer drum pad than the World Tour unit, two of the drum tracks will merge, reducing the note track to four drum pads and bass pedal.[17]

Neversoft director Brian Bright stated that the instruments designed for World Tour would also work with the first Rock Band, although he was unsure of whether they would work with Rock Band 2. This is currently known only to apply to the Xbox 360 versions of the games,[20] and is known not to apply to the Wii versions.[18] Analysts speculated that future Guitar Hero games in 2008 will need to include additional instrument peripherals in order to compete against former Guitar Hero developer Harmonix's Rock Band.[21]

The fourth major entry to the Guitar Hero series, at the time named Guitar Hero IV, was officially announced upon the merger of Activision and Vivendi Games in December 2007.[22] Activision's CEO Bobby Kotick later revealed that Guitar Hero IV will branch out into other instruments including vocals;[4] this was further confirmed by an initial preview from Game Informer.[5] The game's new name, Guitar Hero World Tour, was officially announced by Activision in May 2008.[23]

According to a Game Informer preview, the addition of drum functionality came from work initially done towards the Drum Hero title, but later folded into Guitar Hero after Neversoft was chosen as developer of the series.[7]

The custom song creation feature was inspired by the current "hacking environment" that has arisen from the first two Guitar Hero games, where players would create new tracks and share them with others.[9][24]


Soundtrack
All of the songs in the game will be master recordings, a first for the series. Neversoft claims that there will be more songs on disk than any other Guitar Hero game.[5][7] IGN reports that the game will feature over 85 songs.[6] While Neversoft and Activision have expressed intentions to release content available for download (downloadable content) more frequently, existing downloadable songs for Guitar Hero III will not be playable in World Tour, according to IGN.[6][25] Downloadable content will be available through the in-game store and will include full album downloads and more regular releases compared to Guitar Hero III.[6] Project director Brian Blight claims that they have "a pretty even split between the '80s, '90s, and classic rock" with a "good amount of emerging bands".[7]