Rock Band 4 vs Guitar Hero Live

[warhol]

Back to the age-old debate but without the name-calling and finger-pointing!

I guess the main differentiators would be Rock Band's multiple instrument function and Guitar Hero Live's 6-button map. Which do you guys think will come out on top? You can even discuss tracklist, personal appeal etc etc.

Personally I have to stick to Rock Band as my go-to for rhythm games because of song library and drums.

[Mr_Ice_Pickle]

Same here. There are some aspects to GHL that I thoroughly appreciate and believe to be good results of diverging away from the traditional formula, but I highly doubt that the game could keep my interest for very long compared to RB4 (which I haven't actually played yet, but I'm getting closer to that point).

That isn't to say that RB4 didn't come with its share of problems.

[warhol]

Just bought and played GHL and it's incredibly hard to get used to the control scheme! It's totally fun to try to learn a new way to play the guitar. At this point, I find this control scheme to be superior to the old 5-button version. However the pitfall I find in GHL is their method of DLC. In fact, there is none. It's all on-demand content which I cannot play because my apparently crappy internet connection will cause my perfect button presses to count as misses. What I should be getting 4-5 stars on get me 2 stars or so. This in mind I am restricted to playing the on-disc content, unless they fix this stupid buffering feature.

[zpatv01]

I always prefered GH over RB mainly because of the hit window in which you can play the note, in RB it's more strict and made playing dums somewhat hard for me. Don't know if I will grab RB4, as I don't really have that much DLC from previous RBs.

For GHL:
+It's a nice change in the button layout, I think solos are easier now, but chords on the other hand are more difficult to play. But finally some new challenge over the 7 or so years of GH/RB.
+GHTV is a great thing, forcing me to play out of my comfort zone in the means of old favourite songs from previous titles, and if I wanted, I have stockpiled so much plays for On Demand that I can play them whenever I want.
+You don't actually have to pay for new songs, it's a pseudo-DLC, I am just wondering where will they get the money for licensing, if you don't need to pay for new songs - probably from premium shows?
+Started on hard difficulty, now getting more used to it and today I tried expert and did suprisingly good. First it is hard to get used to the layout (also I for some reason I thought white was on top and black on bottom, it just felt that way), but once you get used to it, it feels great :)

-The track list for core game is... meh. Apart from the last stage of the US show, there weren't any old classics.
-They could have added a thing, where if you have barre chord and then another one higher with hammer on, you could anchor the previous barre without letting it go (I do it that way on normal guitar, this way it feels unnatural).
-The buttons on the controller are lower in quality. My 3rd black button is getting harder to press. And I read about similar issues from other pepople as well.
-Paid enhancements to your score.
-Scoreboard in GHTV seems bugged, displaying only offline scores instead of the scores of players playing at the same moment - hope that they will fix this some time soon.

Overall I think this is a great game with good potential. We just need to see, which songs will they add in the upcoming updates to the GHTV.

[AlexTaylor]

I have to go with GH Live.
@zpatv01, I agree with most of what you said, aside from some of your cons, which are indifferent for me. (that is a pro-con list, right?)

I am just wondering where will they get the money for licensing, if you don't need to pay for new songs - probably from premium shows?

You don't pay for premium shows either. You can however, buy plays and such with real money, and people that fall for it will be the ones to give them the money, just like Freemium games. :p
I just buy plays with the in-game coins you earn from playing, lol. I have about 60 of them. :p

But yeah, like I said, premium shows are free as well, you just need to meet a certain in-game requirement to play them.

[zpatv01]

The GHTV is actually a pretty clever idea from Activision, because this way they don't need to pay extra for the master tracks (at least I don't think there are master tracks there).

[weirdpeople]

I own both games, it took me about 5 hours of play on GH:L to get used to the button layout. GH:L is certainly interesting. RB4 also has a lot of issues right now which will get sorted out over time.

Basically i'd say at launch GH:L is the better game, long term i think RB4 will overtake them.

[Micicle]

For me GH:L's lack of drums and terrible setlist (SKRILLEX IS NOT A $%^#ING GUITAR HERO) makes it the automatic loser. On top of that it has those crummy pre-recorded live stage performances that look extremely forced and repetitive instead of a character creator and super cool visualisations. I wouldnt even consider buying that steaming pile of dog excrement.

I got a chance to play rockband 4 the other day and found it to be pretty enjoyable, didnt notice any issues with it personally. Only thing I disliked about it was the freestyle solos arent fun at all and pretty much feel like just wailing on the buttons like an idiot and sounds like the unadulterated wankery of a progressive metal song shoved into the middle of a classic rock piece for some reason, luckily you can trun that off and play the properly charted solo though.

[amak11]

People have known me for being an absolute fan of the Guitar Hero series no matter what. I have several problems with Rock Band 4 at the moment, no keys and pro instruments (aside from drums) is a huge let down coming off the better game (Rock Band 3). These are problems that wont be fixed at all and they are problems for me. As for the missing features at launch, that's uncalled for, and still no confirmation on whether my favourite Rock Band 2 feature is returning (pro duel).

While I don't share the sentiment of most of the Rock Band fanboys/girls. Guitar Hero Live is a different beast, it's harder by a large margin until you get use to it. I can barely play real guitar well, when you add the mechanic of "switching strings" you see my inherent problem. This doesn't mean I don't play expert, but for me this is an actual challenge (unlike Rock Band).

I personally have the Wii U version (yes it does exist, no I don't need your hate cause it's on a console I play currently). This leads me to a comparison, Guitar Hero Live is on; 360, PS3, Wii U, Xbox One, PS4, iOS, and Android, while Rock Band is only on Xbox One and PS4. Guitar Hero is the most accessible game where Rock Band, at least for me cost 429.99 + taxes (PS4, where all my DLC is) and 79.99 + tax (game), is not accessible at all. I'm not like a lot of these rich kids, I can't afford anything these days. If it takes me 6 months to save for 1 game, i'd rather play it on something I own. Since we are talking about money, lets talk about DLC.

DLC is about the only thing in Guitar Hero live that I love over the traditional model. What if I want to play Breaking the Law? I don't want to pay 2 dollars to play it once. This is good for me. Rock Band may have backwards compatibility, but I prefer not using my money for DLC.

Moving on to generic items, setlist. I'm in agreement with all my friends whom are heavy in to the scene. Guitar Hero Live has the better on-disc setlist while Rock Band has the worst on-disk setlist. But unlike the person above me who used an automatic dis-qualifier for the Guitar Hero setlist, my reason is a bit more educated. Guitar Hero has always had the better and more memorable setlist. Rock Band setlist, aside from the first game have been forgettable. Why bold more memorable? Well it's true, I can name 1 song in ever game that I like between both game series, Rock Band 4 has been the first one where I cant.

Anyways I don't really have time to go deeper in to things. Despite me actually working for a news site, I'm generally not interested in the topic of comparison

[warhol]

For me GH:L's lack of drums and terrible setlist (SKRILLEX IS NOT A $%^#ING GUITAR HERO) makes it the automatic loser. On top of that it has those crummy pre-recorded live stage performances that look extremely forced and repetitive instead of a character creator and super cool visualisations. I wouldnt even consider buying that steaming pile of dog excrement.

whoa dude ghl isn't that bad. The live stage performances are actually pretty well made! They actually made me feel the way they wanted me to: guilty for playing awfully.
I actually started on Expert right off the bat and I've never backed down. Consequently, I barely ever get 5 stars and I can range between that and 2 stars. Fun stuff. I'd have to say that GHL was money well spent for me! Although I still can't let go of Rock Band simply because it is the more social experience between the two games

[KingKazma4Cereal]

For me GH:L's lack of drums and terrible setlist (SKRILLEX IS NOT A $%^#ING GUITAR HERO) makes it the automatic loser. On top of that it has those crummy pre-recorded live stage performances that look extremely forced and repetitive instead of a character creator and super cool visualisations. I wouldnt even consider buying that steaming pile of dog excrement.

I got a chance to play rockband 4 the other day and found it to be pretty enjoyable, didnt notice any issues with it personally. Only thing I disliked about it was the freestyle solos arent fun at all and pretty much feel like just wailing on the buttons like an idiot and sounds like the unadulterated wankery of a progressive metal song shoved into the middle of a classic rock piece for some reason, luckily you can trun that off and play the properly charted solo though.

My thoughts exactly.

I played a little RB4 at Anime USA. I also don't like the freestyle solos, which the other players at AUSA did while I was watching them. Glad to know you can toggle that.

[tn44]

I haven't had a chance to play either of these, but on first impressions... I don't think I'd like GHL. I'm sooo so used to the 5 fret system there's probably no way I could make the switch. I've always preferred GH but this time I think they've lost me. >.<