New 'Hero' light on legends

After the disappointment that was "Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s," the series regrouped and released what is without a doubt the best game in the series thus far.\nThe most noticeable new feature is the battle mode. The mode allows players to face off against each other using attacks such as broken strings and increased difficulty. In career mode, players must battle real guitar heroes such as Slash, Tom Morello and Bret Michaels. It's a nice addition to the career mode, but they are incredibly hard to beat in battle mode.\nAnother addition is the new online feature that, when combined with the new co-player career mode, allows two online players to play the entire career-mode song \nlist together.\nBut the thing that will make this game a huge hit is the amazing song list that Neversoft was able to line up for "Guitar Hero III." The game includes some of the greatest guitar riffs ever played, including "Sunshine of Your Love" by Cream and "The Seeker" by The Who. Besides these classic rock gems, players can also thrash to "Knights of Cydonia" by Muse, "One" by Metallica, "School's Out" by Alice Cooper and "Welcome to the Jungle" by Guns N' Roses.\nThe playlist is great compared to previous games in the series, but it still has room for improvement. The title of the game is "Legends of Rock," but it has no Jimmy Page, Jimi Hendrix or George Harrison contributions. Although "Sunshine of Your Love" marked Cream's second appearance in the series (the first was "Crossroads" on the first "Guitar Hero"), it would have been nice to see a solo Eric Clapton performance such as "Cocaine."\nFor a game that is supposed to be filled with "legends," only three guitarists -- Eric Clapton, Stevie Ray Vaughn and Keith Richards -- out of the top 10 of Rolling Stone's 100 greatest guitarists even made it into the game.\nThis was Neversoft's debut as the new developer for the "Guitar Hero" brand after Harmonix, which developed the previous games, departed to start work on "Rock Band," and Neversoft's final product is better than anything Harmonix was able to do with the series. But there is still room for improvement, specifically securing "Stairway to Heaven" and other songs from the real legends of rock.