Zero Punctuation catch-up: The Beatles Rock Band, Guitar Hero 5, and Darkest of Days

Apologies for the stagnant week of no posting. At the very least, though, on this "Lazy Friday," I can at least double up on the amount of Zero Punctuation reviews, with a review of The Beatles Rock Band and Guitar Hero 5 (two reviews, one video), and a review of Darkest of Days.

My own personal experience of The Beatles Rock Band have been gone over already, and it's a splendid title to have if you've exhausted your fill of Rock Band 2. Guitar Hero 5, on the other hand, has been off my radar for some time. In fact, I've officially made my peace with it some time ago, and haven't looked back since.

Darkest of Days appeals to my interest in time-traveling (BIG fan of Back to the Future, read Time Traveler's Wife), so I could foresee the game to be a quick and interesting romp through the most famous battles in history.

Both videos below and NSFW. Enjoy!

The Beatles Rock Band and Guitar Hero 5


Darkest of Days

The Beatles Rock Band...finished!

And not only finished, but 5-starred every song on the game! Well, okay, this shouldn't have been TOO surprising for many reasons, but playing through their songs reminded when I listened to their music in my youth.

Like Rock Band 2, The Beatles Rock Band will warrant much more replay value in the months to come for a couple good reasons - my wife is always willing to sing, and the trophies list is quite challenging to complete, if not downright impossible. Well, perhaps not for someone specifically good at one instrument. I don't foresee myself completing that 550-note streak for expert drumming anytime soon. But so far I'm knocking them down as I go.

The Beatles Rock Band ends up in my hands

I enjoy listening to Beatles in pleasant, music-inspiring batches when I feel that the music scene is too bogged down in repetitious songs, but never did I consider the The Beatles Rock Band to be an immediate purchase. Even after the time I spent on the game at E3, the game just didn't offer the challenge that I've gotten accustomed to in Rock Band. Yes, I understand the songs are simpler and known for their melody and impact, not for their wicket riffs and drum sets.

So why did I end up making the purchase? To play with my wife.

My interests peaked when she inquired about the game randomly. "Did you hear about this game? I'd play this game with you - I recognize more songs here than your Rock Band 2 game." And it's true; most of the time in Rock Band 2, she just doesn't know or get into the songs played there.

With a small glimmer of hope, I bought the game yesterday and left it alone while I attended to other errands. When I got home around 10:20 pm, my wife, to my surprise, wanted to play The Beatles Rock Band with me. And better still, she took on the drums AND mic at once, with me on the guitar. This proved a bit too taxing on her, so she ended up just taking the mic for the rest of the time, but that over-enthusiasm was priceless.

For the rest of the night, we went from song to song, mostly navigated by my wife, and sometimes to songs that even I'm not familiar with. Little did I know that she bought a greatest hits CD years ago and listened to their songs before - she's possibly a bigger Beatles fan than me! (Which isn't much of a stretch - I'm more of the "vanilla"-fare Beatles fan) Best of all, she seemed to enjoyed herself more than I did, with all the glorious visuals and myriad of songs to play and sing to.

And thankfully, my view of the game at E3 was slanted. All I got to play was the bass, and that wasn't terribly difficult even in Expert setting. But guitar was decently difficult in Expert mode, and that made me all happy all over again. The sort of happy I got when I first played Rock Band for the first time. And I thought I'd never feel that way again at least until the next Rock Band, let alone a stand-alone game for just Beatles songs.

Thank you, Harmonix, for getting my wife to play games with me again!