Review by: Toni Schwartz

After five games and a couple of celebrity rocker-themed expansions, one may wonder just how the Guitar Hero series can improve with this sixth take. The answer is: not by much. Sure, you have a new guitar design and the career mode has been transformed into a fantasy-themed storyline, but other than that it's the same Guitar Hero we've been playing for years, and frankly that’s just not good enough.

Warriors of Rock does usher in a new guitar controller design. This guitar has an angular, more heavy metal “axe” shape to go with the game's shred-heavy setlist, and unlike past guitars that merely required slapping on a skin to change its appearance, this guitar's whole body is changeable. The electronic guts of the controller have been relocated to the neck and fretboard, so you can then detach the left and right sides of the body and clip on a different style or color. My review model came with the default red body, and an alternative silver body. It all looks very Slayer.

Warriors of Rock does away with the standard Career Mode and replaces it with an actual storyline. The Demigod of Rock (voiced by KISS's Gene Simmons, who also narrates the story) has been Han Solo'd, becoming a stony prisoner to some sort of Beast. Meanwhile, his axe of awesomeness is lost so you need to recruit a team of musicians to recover the axe and free the Demigod. It sounds like Spinal Tap but Guitar Hero takes this all too seriously. Said musicians are composed of new characters such as Echo Tesla, and familiar faces like Judy Nails and Lars Umlaut. Yes, it's an incredibly cheesy and wafer-thin plot. If this story mode was meant to improve upon the unimaginative Career Mode, then it failed.

To pass each stage, you must collect enough stars to transform a particular character into a warrior. Of course, the number of stars you earn depends on how well you perform a song. Each character has a special power that slightly improves your chances of star collection. For example, Lars gives you a 5x multiplier instead of just 4x, boosted into a 6x multiplier when he turns into Warrior Lars. Once you've successfully recruited all eight warriors, you then face the beast.

But wait! Halfway through the campaign, you're plunged into a boss battle to retrieve the axe. This is one of the most tedious boss battles ever, as you're forced to play through all of Rush's “2112” album. Yes I get it – Rush has many complex songs and they're a challenging fit for a boss battle. But it's incredibly punishing to slog through their whole seven song album which lasts for over 20 minutes.

This Guitar Hero game is no different than its predecessor, which is both a positive and negative. On one hand you'll still enjoy the game if you like the set list. Then again, with the tantalizing introduction of keyboard play in Rock Band 3, I get the feeling that the Guitar Hero franchise will experience the final curtain call with Warriors of Rock. At some point people have to be tired of paying 60 bucks for this, right?