Battle of the Band Games: Part 2 - Rock Band 3

Alright, given this is part two of two, I will take some liberties and assume you read part one. If you didn't, then your missing an explanation of controls and some of the "same" points between the two games.

Rock Band 3, by default on the disc, has 83 songs. This is only about 7 less than the newest guitar hero, but when you factor in the number of songs that have already appeared in past music games, the number gets cut significantly. This may be good news to some, because they wanted all those songs, but to others not so much.

The controls are the same here (with the exception of less pads on the drum set), and the only difference is how star power is deployed on the drums and vocals. For drums, a "fill" section is added, where you can drum whatever hits your little heart wants, as long as you hit that cymbal at the end in time to activate. For vocals, a psychedelic section appears, indicating that you must scream or otherwise make a loud noise into the mic to activate. Honestly, I personally find it sub par to the free-willed open tactics used in GH, and it makes it less useful in RB3.

One aspect of controls I could not test is the new Pro Mode instruments. Why couldn't I? I'm not rich. The biggest drawback to this game is the new features. For starters, they added a keyboard - although scrolling down the list at minimum one quarter the songs do not have a keyboard part anyways - and of course the new Pro Mode. What a wonderful idea! To have the game basically TEACH you how to play real instruments! Yet... 120 dollars for a pro guitar, and 60 dollars for a cymbal attachment for the drums... it gets pricey - too pricey - rather quick.

The outfit selection is about equal to other RB games, except practically every single piece of clothes and accessories is locked and tied to some achievement, like "complete Road Warrior set list", which is all fine and good until you read that some of the coolest stuff requires you to do Pro Mode, which means shell out all that money for pro instruments.

The band failure is still the same thing - 3 strikes and you fail, as the bar will continually drop regardless what the other band members do.

So what to go with? Again, not that RB3 is a bad game, but if you only had to get one, I would recommend you stick with GH's newest addition. RB3 has plenty of potential for those wanting to get into playing real instruments, but only if you actually have the bankroll to do it.