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Guitar Hero II (360) -- April 3rd

I'm wary about exchanging my guitar pack right now. Right now if I jiggle the whammy bar a little before the song starts it plays fine 99% of the time. If I replace it right away, there's a good chance I'll get a replacement that's even more gimped. Might be best to wait a week or so (30 day return policy) and then replace it, to give the initial stock a chance to clear out a bit. I'm not sure they'll let me go cracking GH boxes open to get a "safe" product number.
 
Eel O'Brian said:
I'm wary about exchanging my guitar pack right now. Right now if I jiggle the whammy bar a little before the song starts it plays fine 99% of the time. If I replace it right away, there's a good chance I'll get a replacement that's even more gimped. Might be best to wait a week or so (30 day return policy) and then replace it, to give the initial stock a chance to clear out a bit. I'm not sure they'll let me go cracking GH boxes open to get a "safe" product number.
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Interesting tidbit from the support site I was linked to in the customer service email...

Problem:
Warranty For RedOctane Products Purchased at a Retail Outlet
Such as Best Buy, GameStop, EBGames and Target.

Solution:
Within 30 days of purchase we do ask that you take it back to the retailer for an exchange.


RedOctane will supplement any official RedOctane retailer’s product exchange policy up to a combined total of 60 (sixty) days.

For example, if a purchase is made from an official retailer that has a 20 (twenty) day exchange period, RedOctane will supplement this policy by another 40 (forty) days for a total of 60 (sixty) days of service.

Original receipt will be required for all exchange requests, and must be included in the package. Customers are responsible for shipping costs in sending the item to RedOctane.

Warranties are not renewed for exchanged items. For example, if a product has a 30 day warranty and was purchased September 1st, the original period lasts until October 1st. If an exchange takes place in between that period, the exchanged item’s warranty lasts until October 1st as well. The exchange does not receive a new warranty period.

If you’d like to make an exchange, click here to start the process.
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My whammy bar works perfectly fine, but the motion trigger for star power is totally dead. It works at random moments, and thats it.
 
Emowii said:
My whammy bar works perfectly fine, but the motion trigger for star power is totally dead. It works at random moments, and thats it.
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I think that's true for just about everyone. You have to lift it full vertical, and can't do it too quickly. Get used to reaching for select button.
 
Aaron said:
I think that's true for just about everyone. You have to lift it full vertical, and can't do it too quickly. Get used to reaching for select button.
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Nah, mine's all good. Same with my whammy bar.

It's weird, though, because four of my friends purchased theirs at the same time I did and they all have whammy bar problems.
 
Aaron said:
I think that's true for just about everyone. You have to lift it full vertical, and can't do it too quickly. Get used to reaching for select button.
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My guitar is fine. I just get Disk Read Errors every once in a while.
 
My guitar is pretty sensitive for the tilt power. It's happened twice where I sightly tilted it up and it triggered the star power when I didnt want to. But my tilt is working perfect other than that

Btw, I tilt quickly. I have to when the shit hits the fan on expert mode. I can't play too long on vertical or else I'll just lose my multiplier
 
sublime085 said:
But on easy the top 5000 scores would probably be all the same, perfect.
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That's not true at all. The scoring system is much more complex than you are giving it credit for. Not to mention star paths are huge in this game. Sure there will be a ton of similar scores but you will find that "perfect" is far from achievable from a large portion of the gaming population.
 
Kewk said:
That's not true at all. The scoring system is much more complex than you are giving it credit for. Not to mention star paths are huge in this game. Sure there will be a ton of similar scores but you will find that "perfect" is far from achievable from a large portion of the gaming population.
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Yeah but it would still be fairly useless in measuring skill.

It would be mostly luck, and some small strategy in timing that would determine the leaders.
 
sublime085 said:
Yeah but it would still be fairly useless in measuring skill.

It would be mostly luck, and some small strategy in timing that would determine the leaders.
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It has nothing to do with luck. It is entierly skill. Maximizing points is not as easy as you think. Even playing in an easy mode there is skill in scoring high.
 
I feel so, so cheap for getting the Perfectionist Award on easy. If you're going to get achievement points for 100% on a song, they should at least make you work for it.

Wario64 said:
Who cares about easy difficulty? Real men play on hard/expert difficulty :)
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Easy is practice mode with points. :D
 
xsarien said:
I feel so, so cheap for getting the Perfectionist Award on easy. If you're going to get achievement points for 100% on a song, they should at least make you work for it.
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You should feel cheap. It's like playing Oblivion and going invis through every dungeon. Any noob can do it but you didn't prove anything to yourself.
 
Kewk said:
You should feel cheap. It's like playing Oblivion and going invis through every dungeon. Any noob can do it but you didn't prove anything to yourself.
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Hey, it just happened, all right? I like to take the occasional dance through Easy to get a basic feel for the music I'm not too familiar with; knowing the song makes hitting the notes that much easier in general.
 
xsarien said:
Hey, it just happened, all right? I like to take the occasional dance through Easy to get a basic feel for the music I'm not too familiar with; knowing the song makes hitting the notes that much easier in general.
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Hey, it's your conscious. :) I'm just say'n
 
Kewk said:
It has nothing to do with luck. It is entierly skill. Maximizing points is not as easy as you think. Even playing in an easy mode there is skill in scoring high.
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I guess I still think the current leaderboard setup makes more sense. There is more of a risk/reward in trying to go for a high score on hard while being easier to keep a combo, or maximizing score potential by trying an expert song but making it more difficult.

edit: and my Perfectionist was Soy Bomb on hard. *puts on cool shades* :D
 
I'm completely stuck in hard mode. In the middle of "woman" where you have to roll 4 fingers off the frets superfast I just crash and burn. Any tips? Also, do most people always strum down or strum back and forth?
 
yeah woman was real hard, i'd lose at around 75% but I eventually got it.

key is the do the hammer down/pull up thing (advanced tutorial)... certainly haven't mastered it but it helped because you don't need to strum as much.
 
Track selection is horrible. I hate most of these songs. Bring on the GH1 DLC. MORE THAN A FEELING

I like the thought that's gone into some of the achievements though.
 
Okay wtf, I just loaded up the game again and my save seems to be gone. Does this game not auto-save or something? I just lost like 6 hours of play time....

edit: the auto save box was checked but my band name is missing and it's only showing the first 2 sets of songs with a message "play career mode to get more songs" and when i go to career mode it's asking me to enter my name.

did i do something wrong? cause i don't want this to happen again.
 
Got mine yesterday.. still horrible at Medium and above (although I did "beat" the 6 songs I tried. I started over on Easy to try and force my fingers to not always be moving off the keys and I did better, so I'll try and beat it that way and hope it translates to me being better at the harder modes.
 
OK, so I haven't been keeping up on the DLC part of Guitar Hero 2, so I have a question. Has anything been confirmed about how the GH1 songs are going to be added into GH2? Are they going to adjust the GH1 songs for GH2, ie add co-op play (and being able to play bass when appropriate), easier HO/PO etc? Because that would make me a lot more interested in buying the same songs again.
 
I'm just updating everyone to let you know that my pinky has decided to play GHII with my other three fingers. I never thought it was going to happen.



I am addicted and my wife thinks I am an idiot...but I can only imagine this is what Slash felt like during the late 80s. Off to Wal-Mart to find me a top hat.
 
Z_Y said:
I'm just updating everyone to let you know that my pinky has decided to play GHII with my other three fingers. I never thought it was going to happen.
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Holy shit, same here! When I started on Medium I was like "Uh oh" but then at some point, it started to play along. Such a rush.
 
SHOTEH FOCK OP said:
I know Target is.
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Great, will go there if BB doesn't come through (have gift certs there).

Was happy to 100% my first song yesterday ("Salvation," on Easy, har....) now I want to try to 100% all of the Easy songs, and it certainly feels doable. Been playing in Medium as well and it can be a bit tough on a newb but it's really not too bad. I'm being strict about using my pinkie even if it's occasionally at the cost of a note or two. Definitely had a lot of "holy shit, I just played all that?" moments where I was genuinely shocked that I got all the notes out.

Only thing I am having trouble with right now is going back and forth between two notes quickly when there is a tricky (to a newb) pattern (e.g., red red green, red green, red green, etc.) most prominently on "You Really Got Me" right now. I think I will have to go into practice to 100% even the Easy b/c my mind/fingers just don't fully "get" the pattern as of now.

Whammy bar works great, I even throw it into non starred notes just for the hell of it. Tilt sensor is a bit tricky but I just have to discipline myself to wait for a slight break.

Wonderful game, can't wait to rock out with the wife tonight.

EDIT: One other note on the dizzying/hallucinatory effect. I've had this happen as well and I think it's because I have to look down a bit at my TV. It's really weird, like the combination of the effects, what my eyes are focusing on, and the slight reduction of bloodflow to my head produce it. I'll be moving the TV up today to see if it helps (it's not too bad, though). I've also found that if it's a song I know, rather than staring at the individual notes all over the place, I just focus on the center of the screen and not look at any notes in particular and it goes away pretty quickly. I think the effect is also caused by your eyes just jumping around the screen so quickly if you're focusing too intently on each note.
 
AstroLad said:
Great, will go there if BB doesn't come through (have gift certs there).

Was happy to 100% my first song yesterday ("Salvation," on Easy, har....) now I want to try to 100% all of the Easy songs, and it certainly feels doable. Been playing in Medium as well and it can be a bit tough on a newb but it's really not too bad. Definitely had a lot of "holy shit, I just played all that?" moments where I was genuinely shocked that I got all the notes out. Only thing I am having trouble with right now is going back and forth between two notes quickly when there is a tricky (to a newb) pattern (e.g., red red green, red green, red green, etc.) most prominently on "You Really Got Me" right now. I think I will have to go into practice to 100% even the Easy b/c my mind/fingers just don't fully "get" the pattern as of now.

Wonderful game, can't wait to rock out with the wife tonight.
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The hardest thing for me so far has been that famous lick from War Pigs. It goes from Green to RedYellow and I CANNOT nail it. It is too fast. I've tried strumming both down, Green up and then RedYellow down but I'm still to slow. I can't Hammer On that, can I?

(You know the one. It's the "BEW-NEW" in "BEW-NEW ... ... BEW-BEW-BEW .. BEW ... BWAWWWAWWWW")

:)
 
AstroLad said:
Only thing I am having trouble with right now is going back and forth between two notes quickly when there is a tricky (to a newb) pattern (e.g., red red green, red green, red green, etc.) most prominently on "You Really Got Me" right now. I think I will have to go into practice to 100% even the Easy b/c my mind/fingers just don't fully "get" the pattern as of now.
Click to expand...

If you're referring to a passage that uses single notes (no chords), keep in mind that you don't have to release a lower note to play a higher one. So if you've got a phrase that's going back and forth between green and red, you can just keep green held down the whole time, and press and release red while you strum.

Getting used to this comes in pretty handy, and it's good practice for learning Hammer-Ons and Pull-Offs.
 
Just beat it on medium. Got pretty challenging in the last set for this newbie. The whole
Free Bird thing
was cute, as was the
UFO taking Lars up into space
after I flailed my way through it.

Really terrific game, can't wait to start working on actually playing stuff well now. I don't plan on even touching Hard for a while, think that fifth button alone would be too much for me at the moment.
 
Vlad said:
If you're referring to a passage that uses single notes (no chords), keep in mind that you don't have to release a lower note to play a higher one. So if you've got a phrase that's going back and forth between green and red, you can just keep green held down the whole time, and press and release red while you strum.

Getting used to this comes in pretty handy, and it's good practice for learning Hammer-Ons and Pull-Offs.
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It sounds like this could be the missing link in my play. Passages that alternate between two notes rapidly are kicking my ass. In particular, Psychobilly Freakout and Freebird, I always screw up those parts because I can't strum and alternate my fretwork fast enough. Maybe I was doing it wrong all this time.
 
IJoel said:
Am I the only one that finds it tough to hit the Blue+Red keys simultaneously? It completely throws me off. :p
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Oh man that is tough...even worse when there is a green + yellow chord right before it.

As I mentioned, I jumped into medium last night to get some encores. I was happily 3 starring everything (got a 4 on Dead! though, wooo) ...just getting through the sets and unlocking songs. Then it happened....The Trooper. A little piece of me died inside. :(
 
Sort of unrelated question–but was Guitar Hero II's version Jordan the only time it had a solo like that? Every time I watch a video of Buckethead playing it he never plays the solo.
 
Eggo said:
It sounds like this could be the missing link in my play. Passages that alternate between two notes rapidly are kicking my ass. In particular, Psychobilly Freakout and Freebird, I always screw up those parts because I can't strum and alternate my fretwork fast enough. Maybe I was doing it wrong all this time.
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Yep, I can do most everything fine but with these parts half the time I get completely screwed up and, pathetically, wind up just playing the one note to at least salvage the song. I'm going to go into Practice to work on HOs; the nice thing is that you can just play certain parts and slow things down--Practice mode is really excellent.
 
BrandNew said:
Sort of unrelated question–but was Guitar Hero II's version Jordan the only time it had a solo like that? Every time I watch a video of Buckethead playing it he never plays the solo.
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Well the version in the song was made for the game, so I would asssume so
 
someone earlier posted about how there's an entire section of Laid to Rest that you can play with one strum with HO/POs

Select the song in practice mode and expert, choose only Verse 3, and watch all 192 notes fly by :O

I can do all of them if I put it on the slowest speed...it's pretty amazing just watching it that way. I can't imagine how crazy it must be to do it at full speed :lol
 
HUSH!!!!!

Such an awesome song, but I found myself trying to play along with the organ, throwing in all kinds of extra strums FTL.

Now, can I use this guitar on a Mac or the inevitible PS3 version?
 
Just played this for the first time about 40 minutes ago... One of the most revolutionary game experiences ever... It is so fun to play and when the going gets tough, you know you can eventually accomplish it with some practice.....

I'm loving this...
 
BenjaminBirdie said:
The hardest thing for me so far has been that famous lick from War Pigs. It goes from Green to RedYellow and I CANNOT nail it. It is too fast. I've tried strumming both down, Green up and then RedYellow down but I'm still to slow. I can't Hammer On that, can I?

(You know the one. It's the "BEW-NEW" in "BEW-NEW ... ... BEW-BEW-BEW .. BEW ... BWAWWWAWWWW")

:)
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:lol Awesome representation of the song there Mr. Birdie...

I wasn't able to get that to register as a hammer-on in War Pigs. Found it best to just strum (the green before it and the red/yellow) both down. I've really got to understand what the game allows you to hammer/pull better though. I can get really obvious ones but more often than not they don't count one's that I think I should be able to do it with.

I'm about half-way through med. w/ all 5 stars (completed Easy). I'll be sticking with it for a while, too it would seem. The higher difficulties were pretty out there for this Guitar Hero newbie.

Also, anyone else find themselves listening to CD's or the radio and thinking about whether or not the songs would work in GH? It's driving me frggin' nuts... LOL!
 
Cahill said:
:lol Awesome representation of the song there Mr. Birdie...

I wasn't able to get that to register as a hammer-on in War Pigs. Found it best to just strum (the green before it and the red/yellow) both down. I've really got to understand what the game allows you to hammer/pull better though. I can get really obvious ones but more often than not they don't count one's that I think I should be able to do it with.

I'm about half-way through med. w/ all 5 stars (completed Easy). I'll be sticking with it for a while, too it would seem. The higher difficulties were pretty out there for this Guitar Hero newbie.

Also, anyone else find themselves listening to CD's or the radio and thinking about whether or not the songs would work in GH? It's driving me frggin' nuts... LOL!
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Heh. Thanks. I'll keep "picking" away at it!

Ha ha!

ETA: I know I've been dreaming of a world where all the rock ballad and Spin Doctor parody songs from Tom Goes To The Mayor are playable. They seriously shread!
 
"Also, anyone else find themselves listening to CD's or the radio and thinking about whether or not the songs would work in GH? It's driving me frggin' nuts... LOL!"

Yes. This is almost the equivalent of seeing target cursors over people after GTAIII came out. I visualize how the song would look on GH (esp. for stuff like Joan Jett's "Bad Reputation," aka the theme to Freaks and Geeks, which we were watching yesterday and which really gave me the itch to play).

I know it'll never happen, but I really really wish there were some sort of iTunes music store-type service that let you just DL GH-ready favorite songs. Unlike a few in this thread, though, I quite like the tracklist. Certainly little of it is really up my alley musically, but the songs are broadly recognizable and for the most part, damn fun to play.
 
ok jumped to normal yesterday not bad-_- wont be jumping to hard so quick becuase the orange button-_- has me a little worried, normal is not that hard though. i love this game!!!:D gonna go play
 
IJoel said:
Am I the only one that finds it tough to hit the Blue+Red keys simultaneously? It completely throws me off. :p
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Yes. I'm starting to learn to slide those two fingers for the green-yellow chord down for the red-blue chord due to my "yellow" finger not wanting to lift when the "red" and "blue" fingers are down thus keeping the yellow note down as well.
 
storybook77 said:
Yes. I'm starting to learn to slide those two fingers for the green-yellow chord down for the red-blue chord due to my "yellow" finger not wanting to lift when the "red" and "blue" fingers are down thus keeping the yellow note down as well.
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SAME. EXACT. THING.

:lol

"Jump In!"
 
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