SiFTcast in Print: Game Over

Recently it was announced that Activision (the producers of the “Guitar Hero” series) had shut down production of the franchise and closed the door on any future Guitar Hero projects, much to the chagrin of the guys of SiFTcast.

The guys recently discussed their thoughts on the matter and shared various degrees of disappointment with the cancelation of the series. Kris, Dave and Jason were disappointed by the news while Brian seemed more concerned as to when the next roster update for NHL 11 would be released.

Don’t get us wrong – we all love Guitar Hero. We’ve spent hours rocking out with those multi-coloured bars, belting out the lyrics of the biggest and best hair band ballads from the 80’s and let’s face it – NOTHING gets a party started faster than “Wanna play some Guitar Hero?”

Luckily for us (and you), the void that has been left by Guitar Hero will quickly be filled by the RockBand series, which most of us (guess who didn’t) have already made the jump to a long time ago.

So while every rose has it’s thorn, and we leave paradise city while our (wireless X box 360) guitar weeps gently, we will all remember the day the music died…

But just in case you want to have one last encore, here are Dave’s top 5 picks for the best Guitar Hero games of all time (and he should know – he’s played all but one of them!)

1. Guitar Hero Aerosmith – This was the first of the rhythm games to focus on the career of a single band. It included tracks from other bands, but focused on Aerosmith and their career. I thoroughly enjoyed this game for a couple of reasons: the music and the style of music. My playing style works really well with this game, thus it is the only in the series that I beat on Expert difficulty. The others I continue to try.

2. Guitar Hero World Tour – This was the first in the series to include other peripherals besides guitars and bass. It was in direct response to the release of Rock Band, but worked well. The music selection was good and the gameplay for up to four players is fun and responsive.

3. Guitar Hero Metallica – The second in the Guitar Hero franchise to focus on a single band. This game is a lot of fun and added a few innovations not seen in previous releases. It added an Expert+ mode to the drums, where you could add a second bass kick drum and it was the first Guitar Hero to include an open bass note, further differentiating bass playing from guitar playing.

4. Guitar Hero Smash Hits – Not a full game in it’s own right, this was a re-release of music from the first three games so they could be played using the Guitar Hero World Tour mechanics. Re-visiting some of these songs with drums and vocals made for a really fun experience.

5. Guitar Hero III Legends of Rock – This was the first rhythm game that got me hooked on them for good. The only reason I rank it so low overall is the fact it is also one of the hardest to play. The game is more focused on the challenge of beating the game (like a traditional video game) versus selecting music that people could pick up on a Saturday night and play with their friends.

And there you have it. Guitar Hero may have been cancelled, but let’s remember the good times and keep the party going with Rockband…or NHL 11.

 

 

As Kris says, that will do it for another article of SiFTcast.  You can check us out at SiFTcast.com, send us an email at info@siftcast.com or follow us on Twitter @SiFTcast . We’ll see you next month!

Recently it was announced that Activision (the producers of the “Guitar Hero” series) had shut down production of the franchise and closed the door on any future Guitar Hero projects, much to the chagrin of the guys of SiFTcast. The guys recently discussed their thoughts on the matter and shared various degrees of disappointment with [...]

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SiFTcast in Print: You Just Never Know

SiFTcast in Print
Brian Langille, Kris MacDonald, Dave Taylor and Jason White serve up a monthly dose of what they do best – SiFTcast!

Good day G! Readers!

We hope that everyone gets a break from all this snow and shovelling soon.

Before we start this months article, we’d all like to thank G!’s Commander and Chief, Meredith Morrison for not only being a part of SiFTcast Episode 23 “Monkey Fighters”, but also for completely rocking that episode. Thanks Meredith, and you are welcome to come back any time you want!

One of the recent topics we discussed on the show were reactions to Christmas presents. We shared a video that was posted online of a man in his mid 20’s opening a Sony Playstation 3 for Christmas and reacting as if he had just won the lottery (But be warned – language might be slightly NSFW).

Best Christmas Gift Reaction – Jalani P

We thought this guy’s reaction was awesome; it really captured the spirit of how you’d expect a young child to react to a highly anticipated gift at Christmas, so it was great to see that natural excitement from someone in their 20’s. That, and let’s face it, a video like this is what makes YouTube so awesome!

Then you have Brian’s son, who is really into his LEGO video games, plays them religiously on the PlayStation 3 and XBox 360 and, much like his dad, enjoys spending time playing his favourite video games. So when Santa brought the little guy a Nintendo DS for Christmas, you would have thought his reaction would have been similar, if not identical, to our 20-year-old YouTube friend’s we mentioned above, right?

Um yeah, not so much.

He looked at the box, didn’t recognize what it was due to the packaging not really making it clear what was inside, put it down and looked for the next gift.

So while an over-the-top reaction like that of the guy on YouTube was totally expected, this little 6-year-old instead treated his “big” present like a box of socks and moved on.

Since the lackluster performance on Christmas morning, things have changed and now it’s almost impossible to get the Nintendo DS out of his little hands most mornings before breakfast or evenings before bed. But at the time, what Brian and his wife had thought was Santa’s grand attempt to knock one out of the park turned out to be an epic swing and a miss for the big guy in red.

So despite Brian and his wife not getting the “Christmas reaction” they had hoped for, we can all live vicariously through the reaction of the 20-something YouTube sensation.

Until next month…

 

 

As Kris says, that will do it for another article of SiFTcast. You can check our website at www.siftcast.com, shoot us an email at info@siftcast.com, or follow us on Twitter @SiFTcast. SiFTcast is available on iTunes with new episodes every Sunday.

SiFTcast in Print Brian Langille, Kris MacDonald, Dave Taylor and Jason White serve up a monthly dose of what they do best – SiFTcast! Good day G! Readers! We hope that everyone gets a break from all this snow and shovelling soon. Before we start this months article, we’d all like to thank G!’s Commander [...]

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SiFTcast in Print: An Alarming Discovery (Jan/Feb 2011)

By SiFTcast

Happy New Year everybody! We hope that you all had a safe and happy holiday. We also hope that everyone had success in shipping and mailing gifts over the holidays, and that they arrived on time without complication.

Recently, we had discussed some of the difficulties in shipping broken electronics back under warranty. Kris had his own experience with trying to ship a camera back for repair that ended up taking months before he got it back.

That led us to the story of a California man, Richard Lynch, who shipped his broken laptop back for repairs via UPS, but when his package arrived back at the manufacturer, all that was in the box was a phone book and some cans of pop.

Confused, upset and angered by what happened, he took matters into his own hands and took another package to his local UPS depot. However instead of a laptop in this box, he rigged it with a car alarm, and then shot video of himself shaking and dropping the box to prove that it would only trigger the system if the box had been opened.

Lynch dropped off his package and went back to his car in the parking lot to wait and see what would happen. Ten minutes later, he had confirmation that his package had in fact been opened thanks to a hidden electronic device in the box to transmit any sound. From the parking lot, he heard the alarm going off at full volume!

Armed with a video camera, Lynch re-entered the store to confront employees about his open package however, the employees stated that the box was dropped, not opened. (Keeping in mind that he had shot video earlier proving that the alarm would not be triggered to go off by dropping or shaking the package).

The police were called and they said they would investigate the matter further, stating that it is also possible that the alarm was set off before the box was opened. So they opened it to see what was making the noise. The owner of the UPS depot said that while this story is very strange, he did agree to meet with Lynch to discuss what had happened.

Good luck to Lynch in getting to the bottom of this and we hope that you all have much better luck in your shipping adventures!

As Kris says, that will do it for another article of SiFTcast.  You can check us out at SiFTcast.com, send us an email at info@siftcast.com or follow us on Twitter at twitter.com/SiFTcast . We’ll see you next month!

By SiFTcast Happy New Year everybody! We hope that you all had a safe and happy holiday. We also hope that everyone had success in shipping and mailing gifts over the holidays, and that they arrived on time without complication. Recently, we had discussed some of the difficulties in shipping broken electronics back under warranty. [...]

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