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Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock

EMAIL PRINT wii

8.4 User Score:

Generally favorable reviews

Based on 36 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

Based on 63 votes
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Game Info

Publisher: Activision

Developer: Neversoft Entertainment

Genre(s): Music

Players: 2

ESRB Rating: T (Teen)

Release Date: October 28, 2007

Summary

Fire up the fretboard, crank up the amp and get ready to rock like never before. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock drops you into the spotlight of the largest and most legendary rock concert ever. The star-studded soundtrack includes master tracks by such legendary artists as Guns N’ Roses, The Rolling Stones, Beastie Boys, Muse and Pearl Jam, with added songs as made legendary by Kiss, Alice Cooper and Heart. Now drop that air guitar, tune your exclusive new Les Paul Guitar Controller and shred the night away with Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock. [Activision]

Also On Metacritic

GAMES: Guitar Hero Guitar Hero II

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Also On The Web: Official Website Predict this Metascore

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

Nintendojo

The learning curve will be steep for some, but give it a chance. The satisfaction level is even higher, and that's always the best reward a video game can give.

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netjak

Despite it's flaws, Guitar Hero 3 has it where it counts, which is a quality-and-quantity song list, tons of unlockables, challenge, and online play. It seems that every other day I am discovering a new "OMG, this is my favorite song!" track.

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Cheat Code Central

You'll easily spend months playing through the different difficulty setting to unlock new tracks, guitars, playable characters, and other excellent features.

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PGNx Media

Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock is undoubtedly the best game in the series. The amazing soundtrack, superb wireless guitar, subtle tweaks, and excellent online multiplayer are exactly what fans have been wanting from the series.

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NGamer UK

An incomparable gaming experience, well worth the expense. And Wi-Fi (co-op and competitive) means no need to splash out on a second guitar. Deserves to be a rocking hit. [Christmas 2007, p.40]

Game Chronicles

Neversoft did an admirable job, especially considering they had to take a legendary franchise and rebuild it from scratch and Vicarious Visions created an excellent Wii port. But for a series that I have traditionally given perfect scores and continuous editorial awards, I can’t help but feel a bit let down by some personally distasteful music and poor note designs.

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NintendoWorldReport

It's so good, you won't care that you don't have two-channel sound. I don't, which I think is a testament to how amazing the Guitar Hero experience is.

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Official Nintendo Magazine UK

Gripes about the lacklustre visuals and unwanted gameplay tweaks aside, Guitar Hero III is truly great, even if it's somewhat harder than we were expecting. [Christmas 2007, p.75]

DailyGame

Even with a new developer, the game doesn't miss a beat.

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Games Master UK

There's nothing else like it. If you've never picked up the placcy guitar, now's the time. [Christmas 2007, p.66]

Zentendo

Veterans, this game is everything you could hope for an more. While Battle was a bust, what is still tried and true to the series is still amazing.

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N-Europe

Despite a few shortcomings make no mistake Guitar Hero III is a must have.

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Nintendo Power

For my money, though, thanks to its strong song lineup and wireless rock capabilities--it's the perfect progression for the series. [Dec 2007, p.84]

GameTap

If you’re looking for the best version of the guitar peripheral, then the Wii version wins out. Not only does it have a more weighty feel to it, but it also rumbles when you kick into star power--pretty cool.

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GameSpy

Neversoft has done an admirable job of recreating Guitar Hero's gameplay, and the new guitars, fantastic setlist and challenging note charts push the series forward, even if some players may not be quite ready to rock that hard. Features like the boss battles, online play and co-op could have made Guitar Hero III a legend itself but end up feeling unpolished.

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1UP

The Wii version has online play as well.

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Game Informer

You're in for one hell of a good time. [Oct 2007, p.108]

n-Revolution Magazine UK

Brilliant fun. [Issue#17, p.76]

Da Gameboyz

Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock is the first time that the franchise has made it to a Nintendo console, and it does so with a bang.

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IGN

Online is a huge plus, especially on Wii, as not many games have excelled outside of local multiplayer play, and the massive amount of options, modes, and customization holds up to previous versions of the game, and should definitely impress any first-time Guitar Hero players on Nintendo’s console. What you won’t get, however, is downloadable content, which is a huge shame.

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GameTrailers

Guitar Hero III abides to the “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” approach by sticking to the tried-and-true formula established in the first game and honed in the second. A few minor tweaks to pre-existing modes, like the ability to jump to practice mode mid-song and sift through organized song sets, tighten up the presentation a bit, but for the most part the features sing to the same old tune.

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GameZone

Co-op and competitive multiplayer modes ensure you’ll want to pick up a second guitar controller.

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PALGN

The Wii version doesn't support downloadable content right now, but with a huge track list, a solid mix of songs, and the trusty Guitar Hero formula basically untouched, Legends of Rock is well recommended.

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Extreme Gamer

Guitar Hero 3 is addictive and fun for all gamers, including those who don’t regularly play games. Guitar Hero 3 has its own unique magic that has found its own niche at the top of the charts. If you haven't experienced this solid rock performance, purchase a ticket and get ready for the button pressing time of your life.

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The Onion (A.V. Club)

It hits all the right notes, but gets no points for style.

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The Wiire

This game is a must-have for Wii-only gamers. Bring your friends over, turn the volume up to 11, and dream of being on stage. Maybe you, too, can stand atop Mount Olympus with guitar in hand jamming out to Dragonforce's Through the Fire and Flames.

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Pelit (Finland)

The same highly addictive and fun game as on other platforms, but the Wii-only features in the guitar are just mostly irritating. The only new thing that works is the vibration that handily announces the availability of star power. On the other hand, the sound from the controller makes you want to smash the whole thing in true Nirvana style. The visuals are ok on old television, but on never HDTV sets the picture quality so bad that the game becomes almost unplayable at times. Also the sound is only mono, which is a really strange thing for a music game. Worst version of a great game. [Jan 2008]

NTSC-uk

Arguably, Guitar Hero III has the best selection of music in the series so far, and although there are fewer slow-paced songs than before, there is a nice mix of modern and classic tracks within the 70+ licensed soundtrack.

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VideoGamer

Guitar hero 3 should most definitely be praised - for its almost entirely original recording song list, for its attempts to introduce something new into a near perfect formula, and for picking up where Harmonix left off effortlessly. The songs are diverse, hard-rocking and challenging, but in all honesty, these new tracks are the most exciting new thing about GH3.

GameSpot

Guitar Hero III ups the ante with increased difficulty and new modes, and though not everything it adds is fantastic, the excellent tracklist and stellar gameplay are sure to keep you hooked.

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Games Radar (in-house)

By going real with the songs, next-gen with the graphics and online with the gameplay, it leaves the wishlist relatively barren. At the same time, it's not delivering us much new on the gameplay front, and in fact lags a bit in terms of smart strumming mechanics.

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GameDaily

While we appreciate the new star power, the new too-difficult two-player Battle mode fails to impress and the new guitar, while sturdy and reliable, feels small in comparison to Rock Band's more realistic axe. Regardless, Guitar Hero still has that addictive quality. Combine that with an excellent soundtrack and online play, this mock rock simulator will have you jamming for months.

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Gamer 2.0

There are two good reasons why you might need to ignore our “rent it” recommendation and go buy Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock right now. One, you’re absolutely sure you’ll have a blast playing with and against people online and moving up the leaderboards for a very, very long time to come (again, this isn’t an option on the PS2 version). Two, you can’t wait another minute to have your fingers tied in knots by the three-note chord and wiggly solo onslaughts this maniacally challenging game throws your way.

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Hardcore Gamer Magazine

I got a gang of friends together to test it out and we spent hours unlocking songs and fooling around, but, because some of us are guitar heroes and some are guitar zeroes, having a truly quality time is a tougher than it should be. It's still well worth a look. [Nov 2007, p.63]

Game Revolution

Playing Guitar Hero III is like picking up a brand-new, fashionable (wireless!) guitar. It may have a light but solid body, a sexy and sophisticated shape, more durable strings, more easily adjustable tuners, and hell, it may just sound better, but it doesn’t have the spit and polish - that look of a mature instrument which reminds you of all the years you’ve spent with it, of all the sweat and beer stains.

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GamePro

Guitar Hero 3 for the Wii rocks. While the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions are easier on the eyes as well as the ears, the Wii version is home to the best guitar controller of the lot, features an engaging online mode, and plays just as nice.

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What Our Users Said

The average user rating for this game is 8.4 (out of 10) based on 63 User Votes

Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Jack T. gave it a9:
Despite its one flaw--not being able to download like the 360/PS3 versions--Guitar Hero III is fast-paced, fun, challenging, and has great online play. A definite must if you're into music games. One more note... to the people saying we should stop "wasting time" and learn a real guitar... that sounds great, we should all just spend hundreds of dollars and years of our life in practice... no thanks, I'll enjoy my video game. So anyways... enjoy.

Jonas incognito gave it a9:
A great game. The songs are wonderful, and it offers the great gameplay you know from GH1 and GH2. You'll have to play a looong time before asking yourself about *re*play value, simply because there's a lot to do: beat the game on all difficulty levels; 5-star all songs, gold-star all songs, full-combo all songs; now add precision mode and hyperspeed or performance mode and do it all again. On hard and expert, you will run into wickedly difficult songs that will take you a lot of practice to beat. Play all four difficulties in parallel and you won't run out of ways to progress. The high difficulty also gives you a greater sense of accomplishment, and the easier difficulties will allow most people to succeed. The cut-scene videos try to add an element of narrative to the game. They're cute and fun to watch. You won't feel particularly more attached to your character, but the gameplay is so much fun it doesn't need a story [back in the day, did you bicker about tetris not having a story? No, you played it and you loved it]. A few UI bits are annoying: quitting a song always asks "are you sure? You will lose unsaved progress"; I'm not sure what progress there is to save unless you finish the song. It seems like it could be done away with. Also, to switch between difficulties you have to walk a lot of the menu tree which gets boring after a while. The menus would be faster to operate if you could put one or two fret keys to pick a menu item instead of going down-down-down-down-green. For this reason and this reason alone, I can't give GH3 the 10 it almost deserves.

Chris W. gave it a5:
Guitar hero is fun.... at first. It got boring very quick and there's no real video game talent involved in this game. It's just a one way game and no point. the Wi-Fi is the only good thing about it.

Aimee B. gave it a3:
If you like Guitar Hero then I am sure you would like this, however I just cannot understand the hype of this game. I mean if I want to play a computer game, thats what I want it to be. This is not only repetative and dull but your wasting good time as you could go and learn the guitar for real and maybe pick up a useful skill along the way, much more rewarding.

Zathain S. gave it a6:
Let me begin with a simple sigh. The 3rd Guitar Hero seems to have lost its touch with the charm and mechanics of the first two since activisions take over. For whatever reason, the Wii version feels slightly broken. Compared to the other versions I've played on PS2 and 360, this one seems much more innaccurate. Comparing it to its previous installments, its also much harder, which at first is a welcomed guest, but the final duel with Lou and Through Fire and Flames are down right rediculous, and belong in the bonus songs and go the way of Jordan... which was a much better song than atleast the DragonForce one. If thats not enough, they haven't even announced extra guitar's for the wii, so co-op and its extra songs (MAJOR OVERSIGHT on activision's part) are as good as untouchable, even if only one or two are decent. Beyond all this, its still guitar hero. And guitar hero is fun, even if activision has tried its hardest to screw it up. I suggest getting it on another system or waiting for rockband. P.S. While Guitar Hero is definately not an actual instrument, thats no reason to pointlessly flame its players. Most, if not all, understand that the actual instrument is much more impressive when played, no matter how arrogant some of them may be at times. Heck, the game may even inspire some to pick up the instrument, such as myself... even though I'm heading for keyboards and synths now.

Polecat gave it a10:
An excellent music game, and the best on the system. I can't say my opinion should be the alpha and the omega of reviews, as I really can care less if the sound coming out of my 2 speakers is slightly different, it's really a bummer about the lack of DL-able tracks on the system, but I imagine that access to the SD slot is more difficult to institute into games than I can account for. Solid title though, and an excellent addition to any music aficionado's collection.

Mike G. gave it a10:
Best of all GH games, i wish they'd left out the boss battles (lou on expert is cheap).And Dan, instead of playing ANY video game, go do IT in real life: sports, racing, gutiar, etc. For the rest of us who aren't good at these things, there's video games.

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Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock

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