How could I get better at FoF(ix)?

[fradd]

So I've been playing Guitar Hero and FoFix for about 5 years. And I can still only do decent on Hard mode.

I play the real guitar, and for some songs it's easier to play on the real guitar than on FoFix, on Amazing/Extreme mode.

Well, I don't get how some people can read the notes that fast and react that fast. How long did it even take you people to get good enough to play virtually any song?
I like thrash metal and heavy metal, and I get tired of seeing Extreme Only versions of some of my favorite songs, and then I fail at playing them. I just want to get better.

[thebocaj]

I can't really think of any advice other than "keep practising". Took me around a year and a half to be able to pass virtually any song in the Guitar Hero/Rock Band games, although it took another year or so to be able to pass most songs in FoFiX.

My friend found that once he learned to play the real guitar, he actually found it harder to play plastic guitar. Not sure what the reason is for that but I guess it's probably related to your issue in some way.

[Hakuistheguitarhero]

As long as you're not doing ridiculous songs, and you're playing at a comfortable skill level, you should be good. Also, make sure that if you're using a keyboard and not a GH/RB controller, make sure you choose controls that will help you play good. Don't use difficult configurations. And like the guy above me said, keep practicing, you'll get it eventually.

[Asskickulater]

well I sucked pretty bad for most of the time I played these games, there isn't much advice that cant be given, there is one thing that I learned that I think would help anyone get a little better: set a small goal for you to achieve, and ocne you achieve that, set another one, for example, a good goal is to learn how to alt strum, things like that are good goals to set.

[Hakuistheguitarhero]

well I sucked pretty bad for most of the time I played these games, there isn't much advice that cant be given, there is one thing that I learned that I think would help anyone get a little better: set a small goal for you to achieve, and ocne you achieve that, set another one, for example, a good goal is to learn how to alt strum, things like that are good goals to set.

Goals such as get a 50 note streak on a song, then a 100-note streak, etc... or 80%, then 85%, etc... those are better goals, but you are on the right track. I do this in fire and flames (GH3 chart) w/ my scores.

[HOLLIDAY]

playing the puppetz heros really improved my skills




here is my advice

first of all never play any difficulty less than hard
medium really makes harder difficulties harder on you later on
if you get in the habit of using four fingers to press four buttons
you start to automatically assign each finger to a color

first finger = green
second finger = red
third = yellow
and pinky = blue

witch is a bad thing because when the orange note comes into play that whole system is thrown off
medium will not improve your playing skills

pay attention to the HO/PO notes and slow down on the pick when there is a lot of notes coming fast
you should only strum when a note is not a HO/PO note and after you miss a note

hyper speed makes good practice
the speed of the fret board increases but the music does not



your controller is also important like Hakuistheguitarhero said

[heretodl]

I believe a lot of stuff has already been said, but try to practice consistently. It's better to play one song every day than 7 songs every saturday. Obviously playing 7 songs every day would be the best option.

This might be a little to early for you to do, but what I like to do is to identify what patterns of notes that are hard to you and then practice them. Also try to do some thinking and figure out what the best way to play that pattern would be (what button goes to what finger etc). For example, I had problems with this pattern:

O
- - O
- - - O
- - - - O
- - - O
- - O
O

What I did was to take a sound file without any sound in and make a song from that where I repeated that pattern throughout the whole song, gradually increasing in speed. Well, actually I split the song into several parts. One with 60-90 BPM, another with 90-120 BPM, and so on. It's important that the speed is gradually increasing and not jumping from 100 directly to 150. Increasing by 5-10 BPM should be small enough, but smaller would proabably be even better.

Anyway, good luck. You'll get good eventually if you keep playing.

[Hakuistheguitarhero]

Yea, I do that too for some patterns.

[blatz89]

I mean, the first song that I ever played in any GH/RB game was "Mississippi Queen" on Rock Band on Expert Guitar. Not exactly a hard song, but on about my 3rd try I could pass it consistently. At first, I abused Overdrive to get through the difficult parts, and then I worked on them individually, and at my 6th or 7th try, I had my first FC.

What I'm saying is, it's different for everyone, because everyone learns/plays differently. The best advice I could give (not to sound redundant) but just practice and find out how you play. I'd recommend just picking a song on Expert (Not a super difficult one) and just playing it and playing it until you can get through it well consistently. You'll find that whatever you used to get through that song will work well on most other songs.

Oh, and you'll always keep getting better / keep learning new things about it. It's just one of those things.

[bluzer]

For me, it was a matter of getting better at playing a song I like...which happened to be GH3's "One"....yeah, I liked "Sweet Child O' Mine" also...but when Metallica's "One" came out in GH3, that was my ambition.

[beebe]

For me, it was a matter of getting better at playing a song I like...which happened to be GH3's "One"....yeah, I liked "Sweet Child O' Mine" also...but when Metallica's "One" came out in GH3, that was my ambition.

I was the same way, it was actually with GH3's One too. I find that just playing songs to get better doesn't always work that well. Some times you have to set out a goal, like a particular song you want to be able to play, and maybe get a certain rating on it. When I first started playing I aspired to playing One on expert, and I managed to be playing on expert in a matter of only around 2 or 3 weeks of playing. But as far as being able to beat most any song, except the really tough ones which are usually done by Puppetz, that took more or less a year or two of playing. In FoFiX you can set a minimum rating for a song to counted as passed in "campaign" mode. If you happen to have like the GH or RB songs what I might recommend is start from the beginning and work your way to the end but set it that you have to 4 star every song on the way in order to continue, that's what I do when I want to really practice getting better. You might even adjust the hit window to be tighter for faster results, but that might just end up being more frustrating than anything.

[Hakuistheguitarhero]

For me, it was a matter of getting better at playing a song I like...which happened to be GH3's "One"....yeah, I liked "Sweet Child O' Mine" also...but when Metallica's "One" came out in GH3, that was my ambition.

I was the same way, it was actually with GH3's One too. I find that just playing songs to get better doesn't always work that well. Some times you have to set out a goal, like a particular song you want to be able to play, and maybe get a certain rating on it. When I first started playing I aspired to playing One on expert, and I managed to be playing on expert in a matter of only around 2 or 3 weeks of playing. But as far as being able to beat most any song, except the really tough ones which are usually done by Puppetz, that took more or less a year or two of playing. In FoFiX you can set a minimum rating for a song to counted as passed in "campaign" mode. If you happen to have like the GH or RB songs what I might recommend is start from the beginning and work your way to the end but set it that you have to 4 star every song on the way in order to continue, that's what I do when I want to really practice getting better. You might even adjust the hit window to be tighter for faster results, but that might just end up being more frustrating than anything.

I'm with you both there, same thing happened to me, with GH3's Through the Fire and Flames. I kept failing after the solos, but every time I got closer to the end, I kept going. And then afterwards, once I started getting the hang of beating the song, I would practice some of the solos that are troublesome and see if I can get as many as possible.

[acrox999]

I never played a real guitar, so I don't really know about it (though I really wish to have a guitar, but I never have the opportunity to have one). But my theory is that the timing. Unlike playing the real instruments, in games, you need to hit all notes at the perfect timing (or a little bit further from that 'perfect' timing). In real guitar you might miss some notes and timings but the song never stops playing and you can just keep on playing.

That's my theory though, but I'm sure most players who have experiences with real instruments would think of the same.

[SketchMan3]

Thread topics haven't changed at all, I see.

I remember reading a tip on here awhile ago where somebody said to learn the common fretting patterns, and learn to play them the same way with the same fingers every time. For example, a pattern of o o o o o

is pretty much identical in practice to a o o o o o sequence. So he suggested that instead of trying to play it by keeping your fingers in "index-finger-> positon", shift to "index-finger->yellow" position for the latter sequence. I don't know how well that works, but it seemed to work for him.

One thing that I feel hindered my growth was only playing custom charts. I spent 80% of my FoF time avoiding GH/RB charts, and rarely playing anything other than Expert (except with the 3 songs that came stock with FoF). Trying to run before I could walk, I think I missed out on using the lower difficulties to work my way up, and developed some bad habits as a result of trying to do things I couldn't and failing at them. I didn't have much problem moving up from Four-notes to five-notes, so the "never play medium" thing never really bothered me. But I didn't play on medium very much.

[jonathonrt]

I've been playing for about 4 years, And got to playing where I can play pretty much everything after about 2 years of playing, And about one year to master the drums, But after having no drumkit for a year, My skills have dwindled a tad, But I digress. What Helped me was I would always play songs I couldn't pass. I would spend a good chunk of the day playing it over and over until I could pass it. For fingers, Mine are assigned as Index is Green and red, Middle as yellow, Ring as Blue, Pinky as Orange, You could give that a try. In the nd, My only real good advice is play songs beyond your skill constantly, Breaking once in a while playing something fun you can pass so You don't get angry :P