Guitar Hero made its debut a mere four years ago, and in that short time has seen subsequent releases ranging from the hair-metal, ear-shattering tunes of Rocks the 80’s to the imminent launch of the face-melting tracks commonplace in Guitar Hero: Metallica. ‚ The Guitar Hero brand name is so engrained in our minds it is difficult to imagine a world without the plastic guitar phenomenon.‚  Every time I hear a song on the radio my first thoughts race to “this would be a kick-ass Guitar Hero song,” or “Damn, imagine playing that solo in Guitar Hero.”

The latest in Guitar Hero title was officially announced yesterday via an exclusive interview with IGN.com and Beenox studios, developers of the new game, Guitar Hero: Greatest Hits.

Speaking with IGN.com, Paul Gadbois, producer at Beenox stated the new game will feature 48 tracks compiled from every previous Guitar Hero iteration.

Greatest hits will feature all master recordings with updated note tracks that Beenox promises will retain their original essence with enhanced sound quality and accuracy plus new twists to riffs, new solo challenges and a lot more.

Beenox announced 7 songs that made the cut and even with this limited example, the spectrum of genres are well covered, hopefully a sign of things to come when the full list is unveiled.

“Them Bones” by Alice in Chains

“Killer Queen” by Queen

“Nothin’ But A Good Time” by Poison

Rage Against The Machine’s “Killing in the Name”

“I Wanna Rock” by Twisted Sister

Joan Jett and The Blackhearts’s “I Love Rock N Roll,”

Heart’s “Barracuda.”

Dragonforce’s “Through the Fire and Flames!”

New features include 8 new venues everywhere from The Rain Forest to the Polar Ice Caps and even The Grand Canyon, and a stupefying drum-only Expert Plus mode aided by the functionality of the double bass pedal equipped first in Guitar Hero: Metallica.

Sadly, Greatest Hits will not allow for the transfer of downloadable content or World Tour’s plentiful song list into its own setlist, Beenox says.

“Currently, downloadable songs for Guitar Hero World Tour will work with that title only”. And “The 48 songs in this game will all be instantly playable and are designed to be playable off the disc only.”

That’s too bad, I hate swapping discs, and you probably do to.‚  Isn’t there a game out there that lets you pay a licensing fee to transfer all your tracks? Oh yeah, Rock Band.

Overall, Greatest Hits looks to be another run of the mill title, enabling you the full band experience you were so deprived from earlier titles.‚  Other than that, Greatest Hits is just a bunch of songs you’ve already played with tweaks to the experience sweetening the deal.

So far only 7 tracks have been revealed, however, you can log onto the Guitar Hero official site and register to vote for which songs are unveiled next.

Greatest Hits is scheduled to release sometime in June for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii and PlayStation 2, thankfully GH: Metallica lands on shelves in just a few weeks, March 29th.

Read the full IGN interview here.

About The Author

Eddie Makuch is a Blast staff writer. Reach him at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @EddieMakuch.

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