Comparison of UI in Guitar Hero II and III
After Guitar Hero II was released, the company behind the game, Harmonix, left the brand to begin work on their project “Rock Band.” There to pick up the pieces was Activision, which put out the next iteration of Guitar Hero to compete with the original creators of the game. Whether or not this split effected the game, there is a noticeable difference in Guitar Hero II and III. While the mechanics stay pretty much the same (perhaps with a few extra features, such as co-operative career mode), the design of the interface changed quite a bit. The new design is successful in many areas, but also fails sometimes due to its focus on appealing visuals over function.
The first thing a returning player might notice is the difference in the star-power meter. Star Power is a feature in the game that, when activated, would double the points gained for each successful striking of a note. In order to gain Star Power, the player must hit a succession of star-shaped notes, and in order to use Star Power, the player must gain at least half a “bar.” In Guitar Hero two, the amount of Star Power collected is represented by a blue bar. When the player gains enough Star Power to access it, the bar begins to lightly flash, and when the player uses Star Power, they can see the bar slowly drain. In Guitar Hero III, the bar is replaced by a series of lights. At first, only three lights are visible, which represent the half-way mark the player must reach before Star Power is available. After this half-way mark is obtained, three more larger-sized lights appear. When using Star Power, these lights fade out one by one until you run out. This design is indeed fancier, and adds a visual flare to the game that was missing before, but it also takes away from some strategy. When playing the game, different amounts of Star Power can be gained by hitting the wammy-bar on the right notes. In the original Guitar Hero and Guitar Hero II, it's easy to see about how much Star Power you have. But with the light-bulb layout, it's harder to see the increments. The idea you get from the new display is much rougher, and you might have less Star Power than you expect. Of course, players are usually more casual about their Star Power use, so this isn't a change that will greatly harm the experience, but it may cause a small frustration in some.
Another change is to the multiplier/score meter, which is changed to look more like a piece of rock band equipment rather than just a dial or scoreboard. Lights are used here, like in the Star Power Meter, to represent successfully hit notes. For every ten notes hit without fail, the multiplier meter raises the multiplier number, from 0 to 2 to 3 to 4. In Guitar Hero II, the meter was represented by 10 dots, but worked the same way. Both versions have color coded multiplier numbers, which help relay to the player how they are doing without them having to look too long at the actual number. However, the change from dots to lights is another change that makes the game less “readable.” There are only five lights instead of the ten dots in the old Guitar Hero games, and those lights are fairly transparent, making them hard to see. When a note is hit successfully, half of a bulb lights up instead of one dot, and that strange increment, along with each bulb's small size, makes it hard to read how many more notes you would have to play to gain another multiplier. Unlike the the Star Power meter, this is an important point for play. As a player myself, I rely on being able to know when my multiplier will become maxed out so I can use Star Power at just the right time.
One of the more successful changes is the change to the in-game fretboard. In the Guitar Hero series, the notes slide down the fretboard and the player must press the right color-coded button and hit the strum bar at the right point when that note has reached a target area on the fretboard. This target area is represented by 5 colored circles which coordinate with the colored notes and the colored buttons on the guitar controller. When the note is inside the circle, the player holds down the button and presses the strum bar to hit the note. In Guitar Hero I and II, color coordination and physical position of the notes on the fret-board are what clue the player in to what note to press next. In Guitar Hero III, an extra visual helper is added in the grove lines along the center of the note positions. These lines give the player a better view of the distance and placement of the notes on the board, making it easier to think about the relation between the spacing of the notes on the in-game fretboard and the spacing of the player's fingers on the guitar controller. Also, the colored circles which represent the target area are modified with a small arrow towards the top of the circle, which points to each groove line in the fretboard. These lines and arrows instantly connect each note to the physical button needing to be pressed to play it, and are a great improvement to the Guitar Hero Experience.
Finally, we come to the Rock Meter, which tells the player how good they are doing and how close to failing the song they are. The new Rock Meter shifts colors in a way which makes the player's rock status a little more obvious than in previous versions. The colors red, yellow, and green represent how well the player is doing, with red being the worst and green being the best. In the old Guitar Hero games, this meter simply pointed to the appropriate color, and flashed the word “Rock” in red when the player was doing very badly. In the new game, the hue of the meter changes to match the color the needle is touching in the meter, giving the player access to how well exactly they are doing through a speedometer type interface (just as the old Guitar Hero games did) as well as a quick notice on how they are doing.
All in all, the new Guitar Hero interface is very shiny and useful, but it also makes a few sacrifices for its art. The fretboard is much improved, but the meters are a bit of a step backwards overall. These elements change how the game is read and thus very much effect how the player reacts. Hopefully with the next iteration (which the game's high success necessitates will exist) these issues will be ironed out to make a game that is both beautiful to look at and easy to understand.
