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1[[quoteright:235:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/guitar_hero3.jpg]]
2
3->''Gonna be a guitar hero\
4We finally got our way!\
5Gonna be a guitar hero\
6Gotta get on stage today!''
7-->--"Guitar Hero", the song, by Harmonix's in-house band ''Monkey Steals the Peach''.
8
9Originally developed by Creator/{{Harmonix}}, who are also the creators of ''VideoGame/{{Frequency|Harmonix}}, Amplitude'' and the ''Karaoke Revolution'' series, and went on to make ''VideoGame/RockBand'', ''Guitar Hero'' has become an extremely popular example of the RhythmGame genre that plays like ''[[VideoGame/{{Gitadora}} Guitar Freaks]]'', but with five buttons instead of three and licensed songs.
10
11From ''Guitar Hero III'' to ''Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock'', it was developed by {{Creator/Neversoft}} and published by Creator/{{Activision}}. Neversoft built their own ''Guitar Hero'' engine from scratch when Harmonix handed over the reins to work on ''Rock Band''.
12
13After ''Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock'' (Released in late 2010), development of all games in the series (including {{spinoff}}s ''VideoGame/DJHero'' and ''Band Hero'') were cancelled, the ''Hero'' franchise was discontinued by Activision in February 2011, and Neversoft's ''Guitar Hero'' division was liquidated. However, in April 2011, Activision changed their tune, claiming the series was now on "hiatus" and they claimed that a new game would be released in 2012, developed by Vicarious Visions and focusing solely on the guitar gameplay with a new redesigned guitar controller; however, [[DevelopmentHell numerous problems]] plagued the project and was subsequently cancelled. On March 31, 2014, [[http://www.joystiq.com/2014/03/19/activision-pulling-all-dlc-for-guitar-hero-dj-hero-and-band-her/ all downloadable content for the entire series was removed]] from the Xbox Live Marketplace, [=PlayStation=] Store, and Wii Shop Channel.
14
15In October 2015, Activision released a reboot of the franchise, ''VideoGame/GuitarHeroLive'', which dueled with ''Rock Band 4'' when it launched in the same month. Developed by ''DJ Hero'' studio [=FreeStyleGames=], the game utilized a new six-button guitar (not six in a row, however; six in two rows of three.), and replaced the classic 3D rendered stages with a first-person perspective of the guitarist using PreRenderedGraphics. Following the disappointing sales of ''GH Live'', the online servers shut down in 2018 and the franchise is again dormant. However, as of 2022 with Microsoft announcing their acquisition of Activision Blizzard, they have been [[TeasingCreator teasing fans with the possibility of another revival of the series]], but only time will tell. In the meantime, however, the fan community has taken the franchise into their own hands with fan works ranging from fan games made from the ground up (e.g., Clone Hero, Phase Shift) to modded versions of pre-existing games (e.g., Guitar Hero II Deluxe, Guitar Hero World Tour Definitive Edition), all of which allow for extensive modding with fan made charts and even custom characters as well as venues, resulting in the franchise [[PopularityPolynomial having a resurgence in popularity]] as a CultClassic.
16
17[[AC:Games in this series include:]]
18* ''Guitar Hero'' (2005)
19* ''Guitar Hero II'' (2006)
20** ''Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80's'' (2007)
21* ''Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock'' (2007)
22** ''Guitar Hero: Music/{{Aerosmith}}'' (2008)
23* ''Guitar Hero: On Tour'' (2008)
24** ''Guitar Hero On Tour: Decades'' (2008)
25** ''Guitar Hero On Tour: Modern Hits'' (2009)
26* ''Guitar Hero World Tour'' (2008)
27** ''Guitar Hero: Music/{{Metallica}}'' (2009)
28** ''Guitar Hero: Smash Hits'' (2009)
29* ''Guitar Hero 5'' (2009)
30** ''Guitar Hero: Music/VanHalen'' (2009)
31** ''Band Hero'' (2009)
32* ''Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock '' (2010)
33* ''VideoGame/DJHero'' (2009)
34** ''VideoGame/DJHero 2'' (2010)
35* ''VideoGame/GuitarHeroLive'' (2015)
36
37----
38!!This series provides examples of:
39
40[[foldercontrol]]
41
42[[folder:A-M]]
43* AchievementMockery: There are achievements for failing a song multiple times in a row, and failing at the 95% mark in a song.
44* AllDrummersAreAnimals: ''World Tour'' describes Matty Cannz, the game's designated drummer (though you can play other instruments with him), like this.
45* AllOrNothing: Unlike many other rhythm games, you either hit the note or miss it. As a side effect, this means that a "full combo" means you've played the song "perfectly", Star Power bonuses notwithstanding.
46* AllYourPowersCombined: In [[InsistentTerminology Warriors of Rock]]'s quest mode.
47* AndYourRewardIsClothes: Guitar Hero 5's career mode (using the Xbox 360 for reference) has the following items as unlocks: Clothing for custom rockers, alternate costumes for the premade rockers, more clothing for custom rockers, one quickplay venue, ''more clothing for custom rockers'', instrument parts, [[ChallengeRun extra options like Performance Mode]], '''more clothing for custom rockers''', Celebrity rockers, Cheats that [[AntiFrustrationFeatures are perfectly legitimate for unlocking stuff in career mode]] '''''more clothing for custom rockers''''', A golden idol as a playable rocker, AT LEAST ONE avatar award (which may not be tied to career mode itself), and '''''[[OverlyLongGag STILL MORE CLOTHING FOR CUSTOM ROCKERS]]'''''.
48* {{Animesque}}: The CG models have a slight influence, and, thanks to being animated by Creator/{{Titmouse}}, is further played around with in the cutscenes from ''GH III'' and beyond [[note]]which for the most part is depicted as a mixture of this and American-styled comic books. These cutscenes [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ix1BRDH_g9s here]] and [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5idd3Bqf29Q here]], both from the Co-op mode of ''GH III'', utilizes the trope outright[[/note]].
49* AnimeHair: Pandora's G-clef hair in ''Guitar Hero 5''.
50* ArtifactTitle:
51** ''World Tour'' onwards adds drums and vocals, meaning that guitar is just one of several instruments you can play.
52** ''Encore: Rock the 80s'' lives up to its name pretty well... until you realize that [[WebAnimation/HomestarRunner Because, It's Midnite]] was produced in 2003, and made it's one and only album appearance in 2007. This is because it was intended to be the game's bonus track, but got bumped up to the main setlist when they failed to secure the rights to [[Music/BowWowWow I Want Candy]].
53* ArtificialStupidity: Lou in ''Guitar Hero III'', but only when you hit him with an attack. He'll then miss notes that even a competent human player would hit ''while under attack''. Outside of this, Lou is PerfectPlayAI.
54* AudienceParticipation: The audience always claps along to the beat of the song when Star Power is activated. For some songs, they even sing along.
55%%* BigRedDevil: Lou.
56* BlatantLies: One of Guitar Hero 3's loading messages: "I swear officer, the dressing room TV just [[ApplianceDefenestration unbolted itself from the wall and threw itself out the window]]!"
57* BohemianParody: Neversoft [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6u32Qupdd10 spared no time]] doing the Bohemian Rhapsody performance in ''Warriors of Rock'', complete with over-the-top gestures in the operatic section. When the motion capture data from that song got backported to ''World Tour'' by the ''World Tour Definitive Edition'' team, it did not take long for people to come up with [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2N1bHjgltEE some]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGxLf4HIwHQ rather]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djI47a7pCD4 interesting]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8a007j-Ji8 band]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C26UphJTI-A lineups]].
58* BossInMooksClothing: "Calling" is one of the hardest songs in Warriors of Rock on guitar [[note]]Barring only "Sudden Death", "Fury of the Storm", and "Black Widow of La Porte"[[/note]] but based on where it's located in Quest Mode, you'd expect it to be relatively easy. At least Quickplay doesn't attempt to hide the song's brutal difficulty.
59* {{Bowdlerise}}: One line in "Rock You Like a Hurricane" originally goes "The bitch is hungry" but was changed to simply "She is hungry" to keep the 12+ PEGI rating on ''Guitar Hero III''.
60** In fact, this was more frequent throughout the series than one may thinks, as Activision can go a bit crazy with censorship. The lyrics of "Police Truck" in ''Rocks the 80s'' are pretty much turned on their head to tone down the implications of police brutality (such as "We're going downtown, gonna beat up punks" rather than "beat up drunks"), while "2 Minutes to Midnight" in ''5'' omits every reference to child abuse, with the side-effect of cheapening somewhat the song's WarIsHell message.
61%%* BrutalBonusLevel: "[[ThatOneLevel Through the Fire and Flames]]". Good Lord.
62* TheCameo: One of the unlockable characters in ''Warriors of Rock'' is [[spoiler: Arthas Menethil from ''VideoGame/WarcraftIII'', as he appears after he becomes one of the undead (i.e. as a Death Knight). And better yet, he comes with his signature weapon, Frostmourne, which [[ImpossiblyCoolWeapon becomes his guitar]]!]]
63* ChallengeRun: Some cheat codes activate certain modifiers, some of which make the game harder. These include Performance Mode (hides the fretboard, meaning you can't see the notes at all) and Precision Mode (which makes the lax timing window for hitting notes much tighter).
64* ChuckCunninghamSyndrome: Of the recurring characters, Clive Winston, Eddie Knox, and Pandora were absent from ''III'' and ''Aerosmith'', though [[TheBusCameBack all three returned]] in time for ''World Tour''. Xavier Stone, on the other hand, was playable up to ''Aerosmith'', but was absent from ''World Tour'' (presumably because Music/JimiHendrix was in this one and, since Xavier had become an {{Expy}} of him, he was dropped) and hasn't been seen since. The singers, drummer, and bassist from the first five games were dropped from ''World Tour'' onwards, but [[JustifiedTrope their jobs had been taken by the player]].
65* ConsoleCameo: A Platform/NintendoDS is an unlockable guitar in the ''On Tour'' series.
66* CopyProtection: You can install and play the PC versions of ''III'', ''Aerosmith'', and ''World Tour'' without issue, but you need their respective license keys if you want to play online. This is par for the course with games at the time, where pirated copies would still run using an illicitly generated CD key, but an additional check is done in the games' online mode to keep pirates out.
67* CouchGag: The LoadingScreen always has a different message on it. In early installments, these were linked to the songs themselves.
68* CoverVersion: Used extensively early in the series, before the series had the pull and budget to license master recordings from artists; every main setlist song in the first game, as well as the vast majority in ''II''[[note]]"[[Music/JanesAddiction Stop!]]", "[[Music/{{Primus}} John the Fisherman]]", and the Xbox 360-exclusive "[[Music/MyChemicalRomance Dead!]]" and "Possum Kingdom" are master recordings[[/note]] and ''Rocks the 80s''[[note]]"[[Music/AFlockOfSeagulls I Ran (So Far Away),]]" "[[Music/JudasPriest Electric Eye]]", "[[Music/TwistedSister I Wanna Rock]]" (which is a 2004 rerecording, not the original 1984 version), "The Warrior" and "[[WebAnimation/HomestarRunner Because It's Midnite]]" are master recordings[[/note]], are cover versions. Any song that says "As made famous by" at the beginning is a cover; masters are prefaced by either "As performed by" or simply "By". However, all bonus songs, with the exception of "[[Music/TheStoneRoses She Bangs The Drums]]" in ''III'', are master recordings.
69** Some of these covers are even covers of covers, such as ''Guitar Hero II'''s cover of Van Halen's cover of The Kinks' "You Really Got Me".
70** ''III: Legends of Rock'' and ''Aerosmith'' would make greater use of master recordings, with a bit less than half of the former's main setlist tracks being covers and the latter only containing four covers, and ''World Tour'' onward used exclusively masters for on-disc songs (although there were still a handful of in-house covers as DLC, such as the ZZ Top pack). The only covers now are ones that were professionally performed by other artists (for example, Van Halen's cover of "[[Music/RoyOrbison Oh, Pretty Woman]]").
71* CurseCutShort: Expected from a series rated T at best, but the cover version of "Killing in the Name" in ''[=GH2=]'' shows a great example, by using "Now you're under control" to cover up the repetitions of "[[ClusterFBomb Fuck you]]" in the original song.
72** But in the ''Smash Hits'' version of "Killing in the Name" The repeated line "Now you're under control" and the big "UNDER CONTROL!" (which replaces the "MOTHERFUCKER!!!" of the original) are removed. 'Course, they couldn't dub replacement lines over the masters, so yeah.
73** Subverted in ''VideoGame/GuitarHeroLive'', where the word "Shit" finally gets a pass.
74* DamnYouMuscleMemory: In order to hit a note here, you need to hold the appropriate fret and strum, rather than just pressing the corresponding button at the right time. Players of other rhythm games are probably gonna have a hard time here.
75%%* DealWithTheDevil: The plot of ''Guitar Hero III''
76%%** And ''Smash Hits'' too, to an extent.
77* DemotedToExtra: Izzy Sparks, Eddie Knox and Clive Winston appear in ''Warriors of Rock'', but only as extra characters unlockable by leveling up in Quickplay +.
78%%* DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu: The final stage in ''Guitar Hero 3''.
79* DidYouJustScamCthulhu: In a cutscene in ''Guitar Hero: Metallica'', when confronted by Lou the Devil about not using the opening band they had a contract with, James Hetfield reveals that he had his fingers crossed while he was signing the contract.
80* DifficultButAwesome: Tapping on guitar. Basically, you take your strumming hand off of the strumbar and use it to help with fretting. It's extremely difficult, especially with plain hammer-onpull-off notes (in which one miss means you need to strum again before the game will accept anything), but it it makes full-combing some of the hardest songs more doable, such as ''Through The Fire and the Flames'' and ''Surfing With the Alien''. Tapping is also a real-life technique, though like everything, it's simpler here.
81** Actually, it's much easier to tap on real guitar, considering the fact you don't have to strum again if you miss a note.
82** From ''World Tour'' onward, there are semi-transparent notes, which don't need any strumming at all. This encourages tapping by the technique much easier, especially considering how some sections in some of the harder songs are made entirely of this type of note.
83* DifficultyByRegion: The European version of ''On Tour: Decades'' places "Satch Boogie", which is by far the hardest song in the game, in the 80s stage of the campaign. Meanwhile, the American version rightly has it as an optional song.
84* DistaffCounterpart: The Fembot from ''Metallica'' is one to Metalhead from ''[=GH3=]''.
85* DoubleEntendre: From ''Warriors of Rock'':
86-->'''Demigod of Rock:''' Before this is over, I'm going to ride you like a ''pony''.
87* DownerEnding: In ''GHWT'', there are 5 bad endings (which are the ''true'' endings) for each finished mode. In Guitar mode: The magazine says that the Band sucks. In Bass mode, the bass character quits the band and goes solo. In Drums mode, the drums character gets shipped in a box, in a fallout nuclear bomb test and dies. In Vocals mode, The vocals character also dies from a statue-related disaster. And finally, at the end of the ending cutscene in Band mode, the evil guy (Who was only in one ending, featuring him, in full exposure) laughs evilly [[TeamRocketWins as if the game was mocking you!]]
88** Matty doesn't die in the Drums ending. After the bomb goes off, he's sitting there, all burned, and doing a horns-up with a smile in his face that seems to say "hell yeah!!!"
89** Also, the vocalist doesn't die when the statue falls. He's shown alive and well, shrugs, and [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere sneaks away.]]
90** There are other interpretations of the endings. For instance, the bassist (who happened to be Shirley Crowley in ''[=GHWT=]'') was frustrated at being overshadowed by the other band members as seen at the bassist career's intro video, so her going solo and releasing a successful album could count as a good ending for her. But then again, the evil guy (Lou) seems to have had a hand in it, so it could also be a case of making a DealWithTheDevil.
91* DownloadableContent: Quite a bit of it, though nowhere near [[VideoGame/RockBand its main rival]], for each main game of the series starting with the Xbox 360 port of ''Guitar Hero II'' (meaning not band-specific titles). For the most part, DLC is exclusive to the game for which it was purchased, but the Metallica album "Death Magnetic" for ''[=GH3=]'' could be played in ''World Tour'', and ''[=GH5=]'', ''Band Hero'', and ''Warriors of Rock'' support nearly all of ''WT'''s DLC with application of a patch.
92** Which, annoyingly, ''breaks the DLC index'' for ''World Tour'', but... not really a problem, except for that obnoxious message ''GHWT'' gives in quickplay about it.
93* DumbAndDrummer: Several of the LoadingScreen quotes throughout the series.
94--> "I'm the drummer, I don't get paid to understand any of this!" (''[=GH3=]'')
95--> "Don't let the drummer handle the money." (the first game)
96* EarlyBirdCameo:
97** Both "Juke Box Hero" and "Feels Like the First Time" by Music/{{Foreigner|Band}} appeared in the game (with the former as DLC, and the latter as a on-disc track on "Warriors of Rock") as re-recordings, prior to the release of the album "Feels Like the First Time".
98** In terms of characters, however, then Lou and The God of Rock first shows up in the tutorial for ''III'', before you fight the former in Career mode and unlock them both in the shop.
99* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: The first game. With nigh-on impossible Hammer-ons/Pull-offs, only one multiplayer mode, and every cover version of a song in the main setlist, it's most likely that the dev team brought in the toughest for first.
100** That, or they did not anticipate it being such a hit, hence why it looks amateurish compared to later installments.
101* EasierThanEasy: The Beginner difficulty introduced with ''World Tour''. It allows you to essentially play through the entire game by just strumming the guitar without needing to press any fret, or play the drums by hitting any pad in time. On the other hand...
102** HarderThanHard: The Expert+ (drums only) introduced in ''Metallica'' to support double kick pedals to support double kick bass drums like the ones Lars Ulrich usually has.
103*** In ''Warriors Of Rock'' however, it includes Ghost Notes in select songs.
104* EasterEgg: You know the Beenox logo that plays whenever you boot up ''Smash Hits''? Yeah, [[https://youtu.be/4bCEzSJguDI you can play it.]]
105* EasyModeMockery: Until the third game, you can't unlock anything by playing Easy Mode, and are repeatedly (condescendingly) told you should play harder difficulties. Also to boot, the final tier in ''II'' is ''unavailable'' if you play Career Mode on Easy. Oh, and you can't play any of the encores either.
106** Challenges on ''Guitar Hero 5'' cannot be attempted on Beginner, and some are only possible at Expert (and Expert+ for drums) however there are some exceptions.
107* EpicRocking:
108%%** ''Guitar Hero 2'' has [[Music/LynyrdSkynyrd "Free Bird"]] as the last song on career mode. (ZCE. How long is the song?)
109** ''Guitar Hero: Metallica'' is loaded with songs that are over six minutes long. The longest is "Mercyful Fate", which is over 11 minutes long (understandable, though, when you remember it's a medley of five songs from [[Music/MercyfulFate said band]]).
110** Also, "Do You Feel Like We Do" in ''Guitar Hero 5'', clocking in at over 13 minutes.
111** Warriors of Rock has Music/{{Rush|Band}}'s 20 and a half minute long epic "2112." however the individual tracks are pretty short in length.
112* EverythingsDeaderWithZombies: In ''Metallica'', the titular band members have zombie alternate skins with their eyes and mouths sewn shut, voodoo-style.
113* ExcusePlot: The plot's mostly there for the sake of backstory and/or lore-building; one recurring element is that of Lou (i.e. the devil) who serves as a regular antagonist and an obvious foil to the God of Rock in some games. In fact, this was mostly a design from Neversoft; the Harmonix games only had your band touring through bigger and better venues and that's it.
114* FakeBand: ''Guitar Hero 2'' contains songs by [[Film/ThisIsSpinalTap Spinal Tap]] and [[WesternAnimation/{{Metalocalypse}} Dethklok]]... and [[WebAnimation/HomestarRunner Strong Bad]]. ''Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80's'' has one by [[WebAnimation/HomestarRunner Limozeen]].
115** Dethklok has returned a couple of times since, being DLC for ''[=GH5=]'' and represented in ''Warriors of Rock'''s track list.
116* FakeDifficulty: plenty of it. Boss fights in particular combine the horrible concept of ''VideoGame/MarioKart'' style battles with rhythm games. In Guitar Hero III, this can lead to an insane scenario where even if you're really good, the final boss on Hard and [[HarderThanHard Expert]] difficulty is pretty much impossible to beat consistently without ''just the right combination of attacks thrown at you''. That is, if you can survive and counter his first assault.
117** ''Guitar Hero 3'' and ''World Tour'' are very bad at this, due to the spectacular overcharting of many songs, which still manage to miss a great many notes that the original guitarists play. This led to many players abandoning the series for spiritual successor ''VideoGame/RockBand'' (easier in some regards, but also far more accurate), and many a flame war was brought against players for the only apparent reason to want more out of gameplay than [[NintendoHard "challenge"]].
118** ''Guitar Hero 5'' has this with 3 of the '''''[[RankInflation NINE]]''''' stars possible in each gig on Career mode (five for doing well enough in a song, plus one for maintaining a full combo, plus one for each of the three challenge tiers accomplished), as they usually have you doing things like alt-strumming a song that's not suitable for it, abusing the whammy bar (which might as well land you with a score below what you wanted -- you know, it ain't easy strumming while you keep your hand in the strum bar), and tapping all the slider/tap notes. And that's just for guitar. Oh, and if you're not on Expert (or Expert+ on select drum challenges), you may find star #9 is [[{{UnwinnableByDesign}} impossible]] due to not having enough notes.
119** ''Guitar Hero: Metallica'' does this by only including one guitar track, even though the band uses two guitarists. The lead track alternates between James and Kirk, depending who is playing something interesting (read: difficult) during that part of the song. So you don't get any of the rest that they would.
120*** Subverted in a few spots, even though it might initally seem otherwise, in Van Halen. Rock Band 2 vets will have to strum a lot more notes outside of the solos in Painkiller, but that's [[TruthInTelevision accurate given how it's actually played -- the notes are on different strings]]. Glaringly obvious later on at the end of the first solo when the chart follows the OTHER guitarist, who has sustain notes for all but two measures, before giving out the probably undercharted HOPO run at the end of the solo.
121*** The James/Kirk alternation is subverted with the downloadable ''Suicide & Redemption'', where rather than consolidating the guitar parts they released two versions, one with all James' parts, the other with all Kirk's. This does lean towards [[OneGameForThePriceOfTwo one song for the price of two]] though.
122* FanService:
123** Casey Lynch is a firm believer in equal-opportunity shirtless shredding.
124** Not to mention Johnny's sudden gaining of six-pack abs in Warriors of Rock.
125%%** And, how could we ever forget Judy Nails?
126* FauxToGuide: Throughout the games up until ''World Tour'' and its engine spin-offs (i.e. ''Smash Hits'' and ''Metallica''), the game's loading screens may give tips on what to do and ''not'' to do when you're in a band:
127--> ''If anyone insists on wearing a white belt, kick them out of the band.'' (''I'')\
128''Don't let the drummer have an "extended solo" unless you really have to go to the bathroom.'' (''I'')\
129''If your neighbors keep complaining about the noise, turn up the volume until they move away.'' (''II'')
130* FinalBoss: Every game ends with one, presented as the last encore for the final gig and is generally one of the better-known and most difficult song in the game.
131** 1: "[[Music/OzzyOsbourne Bark at the Moon]]"
132** ''II'': "[[Music/LynyrdSkynyrd Free Bird]]"
133** ''Rocks the '80s'': "[[Music/{{Extreme}} Play With Me]]"
134** ''III'': The single player ends with a boss battle against Lou to a metal cover of "The Devil Went Down to Gerogia", before playing "[[Music/DragonForce Through the Fire and Flames]]" during the credits. The co-op career mode ends with "Monsters" by Matchbook Romance.
135** ''Aerosmith'': "Train Kept-A-Rollin'", before playing "Kings and Queens" during the credits.
136** ''World Tour'' has different final songs for each career mode. Guitar and drums end with "[[Music/VanHalen Hot for Teacher]]", bass and co-op end with "[[Music/SystemOfADown B.Y.O.B.]]", and vocals ends with "[[Music/MichaelJackson Beat It]]", before playing "[[Music/DreamTheater Pull Me Under]]" during the credits.
137** ''Metallica'': "The Thing That Should Not Be"
138** ''Smash Hits'': "Through the Fire and Flames"
139** ''5'': A live version of "[[Music/RushBand The Spirit of Radio]]", before playing "[[Music/KingCrimson 21st Century Schizoid Man]]" during the credits.
140** ''Band Hero'': "[[Music/TheMightyMightyBosstones The Impression That I Get]]". "[[Music/DonMcLean American Pie]]" plays during the credits.
141** ''Warriors of Rock'': "Sudden Death", a song by Music/{{Megadeth}} created specifically for the game. After this, a bonus setlist is unlocked, featuring "Black Widow of La Porte" by [[Music/MarilynManson John 5]] and [[Music/{{Slipknot}} Jim Root]] as the final encore of that.
142** ''Live'': Live mode's final song is "[[Music/{{Queen}} Tie Your Mother Down]]"
143* FinalBossPreview: In ''Guitar Hero III'', after beating Campaign Mode, the credits are played over "Through the Fire and Flames". It's the game's hardest song by a long shot and the player has to play through the note chart. However, "No Fail" mode is turned on, and the song is unlocked after the credits roll. It's to show the player that there's one more ultimate challenge to overcome without letting them fail it.
144* FullMotionVideo:
145** Due to platform limitations, the [=PS2=] conversions of later games (developed by Budcat Creations) use polygonal models of characters laid on top of pre-rendered backgrounds taken from the main console releases.
146** Pretty much played straight with ''Guitar Hero Live'' as it eschews the highly stylised hard rock/heavy metal/punk art style in favour of filmed concert footage or in the case of DLC content, music videos for their respective songs.
147* GameBreakingBug:
148** Hardware edition again: Remember the early ''VideoGame/RockBand'' drums, specifically the drum pedal? That was easily fixable without voiding any warranty. The red pad on the ''World Tour'' drums, on the other hand, stems from a loose wire inside the drum, and fixing it yourself violates the warranty on it.
149** In Guitar Hero 5, the Expert/Plus glitch that crops up on Expert wherever doublebass is charted on Expert+. In these sections, every other bass kick is treated as a "null note", which means pressing the foot pedal down where the null note is counts as a miss, making fast bass patterns damn-near-impossible on Expert. This results in some people clearing Expert+ before clearing Expert. Band Hero (and ''Warriors of Rock'' too), despite its subject matter, actually ''fixes'' this bug. Yet, Neversoft refused to patch it on 5.
150** [[Music/LinkinPark "The Catalyst"]] is impossible to full-combo on Medium Guitar because a tap chord is charted, and is unhittable with any methods, even though the next chord is the same, and is charted as a HO/PO chord, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLzswzDhPGI&t=17s as shown here]]. Strangely, this tap chord only appears in the 360 and [=PS3=] versions, as the Wii version [[https://youtu.be/YO0_lBfRiRc?t=312 has said note appear as a HO/PO chord instead.]]
151** Another example is in [[Music/{{Metallica}} "All Nightmare Long"]] on Hard in [=GH3=]. (A ghost note [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UdVt0ZqvCs here]]). This is fixed when imported into ''World Tour'' and beyond.
152* GameMod: In spite of all of the port's faults, the PC version of ''III'' was generally popular to mod in extra charts and songs. [[PromotedFanboy Some even became official charters because of it]].
153** With the release of the ''VideoGame/GuitarHeroWorldTourDefinitiveEdition'' mod, it's not only possible to have custom song charts, but custom characters as well. [[https://youtu.be/63ZYY8U6JmM?t=362 Bask in the ridiculousness of seeing]] [[{{Franchise/Cars}} Lightning McQueen]] take center stage on guitar.
154* GenderEqualEnsemble: The eight main characters in ''Warriors of Rock'' are equally divided by gender, so at the end, you can even split them into an all-male band (Johnny, Austin, Lars and Axel) and a GirlGroup (Echo, Judy, Pandora and Casey) if you want. You even find two of each in each of the two parts of your journey to find the warriors.
155* GenkiGirl: Midori just can't keep still. And her GirlishPigtails that swing around as a result make her even more [[MaleGaze eye catching]].
156** Midori is especially genki when assigned as a drummer, as seen in ''Guitar Hero: Van Halen'', particularly in fast paced or drum heavy songs. See an example of her doing so [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wz3CmW3fCC8 here]].
157*** And despite the drastic makeover that rendered her beyond recognition, she's a lot genkier in ''Band Hero''.
158* GenreMotif: Each character has one to a different style of rock. Some are consistent throughout the series (Axel Steel representing Heavy Metal, Johnny Napalm representing Punk Rock, Clive Winston representing Classic Rock), while others may change from game to game (Xavier Stone and Pandora went, respectively, from Modern Rock to Classic Rock and Alternative Metal to straight-up Goth/New Wave).
159* {{Goth}}: Pandora, described consistently throughout the series as "[[RedBaron the Dark Princess of Rock]]".
160* GrandFinale: ''Warriors of Rock'' was thought to be the finale... until ''Live'' was released nearly 5 years later. As of 2021, it seems that ''Live'' will be the finale.
161* GreatestHitsAlbum: Well, Greatest Hits ''Game'' actually, but ''Smash Hits'' qualifies. It's even called "Greatest Hits" in Europe.
162* TheGrimReaper: Featured as an unlockable character until World Tour.
163%%* HumongousMecha: The Beast in Warriors of Rock in a way.
164* IDontKnowMortalKombat: In short, you are not guaranteed victory in this game just because you know how to play a real guitar. It helps to have a limber pinky, but that's pretty much it.
165** Creator/VH1's 100 Greatest Hard Rock Songs proved this '''''[[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin spectacularly]]''''' with the "Celebrity Rock Band Challenge" segments, which featured real professional musicians sucking hardcore at ''VideoGame/RockBand'' (which technically works just the same as [=GH=]). The most likely reason for this? Musicians usually aren't gamers, and rhythm games require strong hand-eye coordination--of the type you can only develop by being obsessed with video games.
166** Many have testified that having actual guitar experience will make you ''worse'' at the game than a complete novice. Unsurprising, since the controls work like a completely different instrument... namely a keyboard.
167** Even though the skills required for the game and the actual instrument are direct analogues of each other, [[IKnowMortalKombat there are still some benefits in having experience playing an instrument beforehand.]] Being trained in an instrument means you have a better ear for music, which makes it easier to keep rhythm while playing a song, as well as having the hand coordination and finger strength necessary to make the jump to Hard and Expert difficulty, when you have to learn how to transition between the orange button and back.
168* InstrumentalWeapon:
169** In ''[=GH3=]''/''Aerosmith'', Metalhead can sometimes be seen pointing his guitar around like a gun.
170** In addition, one of his signature guitars is made to resemble a laser gun.
171* {{Instrumentals}}: "Spanish Castle Magic" became one in the original Guitar Hero, because Hendrix's estate didn't want someone impersonating him.
172** There's also a few songs that are instrumentals without ExecutiveMeddling, like Frankenstein in [=GH1=], Jessica, Gemini, Jordan, Soy Bomb and [=YYZ=] in [=GH2=], Cliffs of Dover and Impulse in [=III=], Satch Boogie in [=GHWT=], Orion in [=GH:M=], and Younk Funk and Scatterbrain in [=GH5=] (though [[FridgeLogic strangely enough, for the cases from [=GHWT=] on, the vocalist is still on stage, while he was not in previous games]]).
173*** Subverted with MemeticMutation and LampshadeHanging when Satch Boogie is played as a full band: the lyrics indicator will display a bunch of funny messages instead. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOT5XJ5xZro Proof can be found here.]]
174** In Guitar Hero Van Halen ''Cathedral'', and ''Spanish Fly'' has only a guitar part, but ''Eruption'' actually has a drum and a bass part, however the majority of the notes is in the guitar part.
175*** If that's not enough, there's also "Speeding (Vault edition)" by Music/SteveVai, and "Black Widow of la Porte" by [[Music/MarilynManson John 5]] featuring [[Music/{{Slipknot}} Jim Root]].
176* IntercourseWithYou:
177** In ''Guitar Hero III'', there's "Talk Dirty to Me" (Poison), "Rock You Like a Hurricane" (Scorpions), "Suck My Kiss" (Red Hot Chili Peppers) and "Welcome to The Jungle" (Guns'N Roses).
178** ''Warriors of Rock'' has "Pour Some Sugar on Me" (Def Leppard) and "Sex and Candy" (Marcy Playground), to name a few.
179* {{Irony}}: In ''Guitar Hero Metallica'', the very first time you play some of the Metallica songs, sometimes James Hetfield will make various quotes, such as "Alright, who's singing along tonight?" If you're playing [[{{Instrumentals}} Orion]]...
180* JigglePhysics: Judy Nails in ''Guitar Hero III'' is ''very'' bouncy.
181%%* LargeHam: Gene Simmons as the Demigod of Rock in ''Warriors of Rock.''
182* LawyerFriendlyCameo: The person hired to brainwash the crowd in the Band intro (Wich doubles as the game intro) is Kenny G in all but name.
183* LeadBassist:
184** In ''World Tour'', Shirley Crowley due to her solo career.
185** In the ''On Tour'' series, the lead singer also plays bass guitar.
186* TheLegendOfX: ''Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock''.
187* LicensedGame: All of the games use licensed tracks, or at least covers of them, but of note are the ones with a band on the title.
188* LighterAndSofter: ''Band Hero'', which, unlike the rock-heavy, T-rated ''Guitar Hero'' games, is rated E10+ and is filled with pop music, being intended as a more "family-friendly" version of the game.
189* LizardFolk: Casey Lynch's warrior of rock transformation.
190* LoadsAndLoadsOfLoading: ''[=GH: World Tour=]'', ''[=GH5=]'' and ''Band Hero'' for the [=PS2=] are fraught with long loading times, up to about 3 minutes in the case of ''[=GH5=]''. On the plus side, on ''[=GH5=]'', if you play a setlist on Quickplay, only the first song has the abnormally long load time, and loading the rest of the songs will be more reasonable.
191%%* MaleGaze: Just play "Music/KnightsOfCydonia" with Judy Nails.
192* MarathonBoss: "[[EpicRocking Do You Feel Like We Do]] (Live)" on ''Guitar Hero 5'' and "2112" on Warriors of Rock (though only if all seven songs are played one after the other, such as in the campaign).
193** Warriors of Rock has another in the form of the final battle, but rather than a single track broken up into several parts, it's a trinity of Music/{{Megadeth}} tracks (three Megadeth Tracks). Doesn't make it any less epic, though.
194** Likewise "2112" ''is'' broken down into its seven parts, so it's not as much of a marathon as DYFLWD (or "Free Bird" back in ''[=GH2=]''). Granted since these seven individual tracks are pretty short in length.
195* MetalHead: The character of Axel Steel is a stereotypical metalhead. Casey Lynch also appears to be an example of a female metalhead (though she leans more towards 70's hard rock). Then there's the character called "Metalhead" ([[IncrediblyLamePun A robot]]) if you want to be literal.
196* MiniGameCredits:
197** "American Pie" by Music/DonMcLean plays during the end credits of ''Band Hero''. Appropriate, because the song is well known for its length.
198** "[[Music/DragonForce Through the Fire and Flames]]" plays during the credits of ''Guitar Hero III''. It is also impossible to fail, [[ThatOneBoss thank goodness]].
199** "21st Century Schizoid Man" by Music/KingCrimson accompanies the credits of ''Guitar Hero 5''.
200** In keeping with the game's theme, you play "Kings and Queens" during the credits of ''Aerosmith''.
201** "Pull Me Under" by Music/DreamTheater is this in ''World Tour''.
202* MissionPackSequel: ''Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80's''. ''Guitar Hero Aerosmith'', ''Metallica'', and ''Van Halen'' are a little more involved, but not much.
203** The DS ''Guitar Hero On Tour'' series, which is entirely comprised of {{Mission Pack Sequel}}s, with the first "On Tour" game being a random collection of just under 30 songs from a variety of eras and styles, "Decades" being the same, but with the songs separated by era (and "00's" and "Modern" being two separate tiers for no apparent reason other than there were too many 2000's songs to fit in one tier), and "Modern Hits" being a collection of just under 30 songs, all of which are from the 2000's.
204* MultiPlatform: (since ''Guitar Hero 2'', except for ''Rocks the 80s'')
205** Averted with the ''On Tour'' subseries, [[NoPortForYou exclusive]] to the Nintendo [=DS=].
206* MusicGenreDissonance: Since the games decided to add the song's genre to their general info and sorting options in ''5'', the creative team has done it on a hit-and-miss bases. For example: 3 Doors Down's "Kryptonite" is categorized as Southern Rock (which it's not by a longshot; it's alternative/pop-rock), Music/BobDylan's "All Along the Watchtower" is placed under the Blues Rock header (it's actually folk), and {{Music/Gorillaz}}'s "Feel Good Inc." is said to be Hip Hop (it's indie/electronica).
207** Some of these were fixed in ''Warriors Of Rock''. However, Music/FallOutBoy's "Sugar, We're Going Down" (originally Pop Punk) is now listed as ''Prog Rock'', of all genres.
208[[/folder]]
209
210[[folder:N-Z]]
211* NinjaPirateZombieRobot: You can have this as a band in ''Guitar Hero 5''. There's a Pirate [[AndYourRewardIsClothes costume]], a Ninja [[AndYourRewardIsClothes outfit]] (the latter for men only), Kurt Cobain or Johnny Cash can be your undead revenant, and Shirley Manson is a [[Series/TerminatorTheSarahConnorChronicles Terminator]]. ''Sweeeeeet.''
212** Taken to near extremes with ''Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock'', where the first four recruited characters get transformed into all sorts of abominations: Echo Tesla becomes Robot, Johnny Napalm becomes Nightcrawler, Judy Nails becomes a she-devil (complete with hooves replacing her feet), and Austin Tejas becomes the Headless Horseman, then they get lumped together as a band in the 2112 mission.
213*** Then there's the next stage of the Quest Mode: upon transformation Lars Umlaut becomes a PigMan, Pandora becomes a [[OurElvesAreDifferent Drow]], Casey Lynch becomes a [[ScaledUp Gorgon]], and Axel Steel becomes a {{Mummy}}! After all that, all eight of them combine their powers to battle a HumongousMecha.
214*** And if you feel like it, you can have a band with a robot (Echo transformed), a minotaur, and [[spoiler:[[VideoGame/WarCraft Arthas Menethil]]]] in it!
215* NobodyLovesTheBassist: PlayedForLaughs in ''[=GH2=]'' and ''3'' with loading messages such as "You need a mini-fridge in your practice space. It's more important than a bassist" and "You seem to have a problem with your bass amp. I can hear it!". Deconstructed in ''World Tour'' where, sick of being overshadowed by her bandmates, bassist Shirley Crowley signs a DealWithTheDevil and ends up with more success than the others. Averted from ''Metallica'' onwards.
216** Subtle example in World Tour. Achievements exist for performing as a guitarist, drummer, and vocalist, playing as the celebrity cameos for each one, and completing challenges on certain songs that are tailored to these instruments. No such achievements apply to the bass. This changed beginning with ''Metallica'', but even there the achievement for performing as a bassist is called "Invisible Kid" (as a reference to the Metallica song of the same name).
217* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: Not always obvious, but many characters (or costumes, like Axel Steel's alt in ''III'' which was a homage to [[Music/{{Pantera}} Dimebag Darrell]]) are based on real rock stars. Xavier Stone is an interesting case: as he was based on Music/JimiHendrix, he was absent in World Tour, which featured Hendrix himself, among other licensed real-life stars.
218%%* NotQuiteDead: Matty Canz in the Drum Career outro in ''Guitar Hero World Tour''.
219* NoodleIncident: Judy Nails earned her nickname when she was seven, in what her bio describes as "a nail gun incident."
220* OddlyNamedSequel: If a {{numbered sequel|s}} can even be considered an oddly named one as well, then ''Guitar Hero 5'' fits the bill for being sandwiched between ''World Tour'' and ''Warriors of Rock'', which {{stopped numbering sequels}}.
221* OffscreenMomentOfAwesome: The version of Music/QuietRiot's "Metal Health" which appears in ''Rocks the 80s'' doesn't have the guitar solo in the middle - instead, you just play rhythm corresponding to the bass parts in said solo (because Quiet Riot didn't have a rhythm guitarist). Before the game was released, the song ''was supposed'' to have the solo, but it was removed for difficulty reasons, since it was the first song in the first tier.
222* OldSaveBonus: ''Guitar Hero 5'' and ''Band Hero'' can be augmented with songs (not all, just a few) from ''World Tour'', ''Smash Hits'', and ''Metallica'', supposing the player uses a one-time code from said games' manuals and pays a fee (heavy, considering the small percentage of songs exported) for the cost of relicensing the songs. Neversoft has stated more songs will become added this way as they work out the licensing.
223** ''[=GH5=]'' and ''Band Hero'' are also cross-compatible; a player can export a majority of songs from one game into the other.
224** ''Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock'' can import all the exportable songs from all of the above, and thus can end up with a HUGE library of songs (as many as 500).
225* OurMinotaursAreDifferent: One of the unlockable characters in ''Warriors of Rock'' is a Minotaur who jams music with you.
226* PerfectPlayAI: Lou in ''Guitar Hero 3'', for the most part. He will never miss a note (unless you throw him an attack, then he devolves into ArtificialStupidity.)
227* ThePowerOfRock: More or less the game's entire premise, but particularly Star Power. It is exaggerated with ''Warriors of Rock''.
228** Many custom note chart authors from the ''Guitar Hero'' fan community were also picked up by Neversoft to write charts for their game. Of course, these were the sort of players who were already very, very good at the game and wanted to write harder charts to challenge themselves, which carried over directly to ''Guitar Hero 3''...
229* ProductPlacement: In the first three games, which were endorsed by Gibson, you could have Les Pauls, [=SGs=], Explorers, Flying Vs, and so on and on (even an EDS-1275, that double-necked one [[Music/LedZeppelin Jimmy Page]] played sometimes). Starting with ''World Tour'', when Activision lost Gibson license, you could construct your instrument out of parts from others (''5'' had brand names like Ibanez and Paul Reed Smith to choose from).
230* PutOnABus: Xavier Stone never appeared again in the games after ''3''/''Aerosmith''.
231* RankInflation:
232** Staring from the first four games, your score is represented on a five-star scale, though the lowest you can get is 3 as performance any worse would result in being booed offstage. From the 5th game and onwards, netting you the 6th star if you maintain a full combo. Reaching the goals for the bonus challenges in said game nets you up to 3 more stars for each song. And in the 6th game, with abilities like increasing your multiplier or saving your streak, you can obtain up to '''40''' stars in a single song.
233** Said 40 stars (or rather, learning how to earn 40 stars in every on-disc song in quest mode (Except the 7 2112 songs)) are necessary for the HundredPercentCompletion.
234** Even for the earlier games, the Score Hero website, having worked out the math used to determine star ratings in the game, extends this logic to create 6, 7, 8 and 9 star ratings. No song is 9-starrable, but 8 stars are possible on quite a few.
235*** Double bass can swell the scores because there's simply so many more notes under the star power; the exported version of ''[[Music/{{Motorhead}} Overkill]]'' has an Expert+ FC which, if Score Hero ever updates to track the extended ratings post-GHA, will be good for '''[[SerialEscalation 9.4]]''' stars.
236*** ''[[WesternAnimation/{{Metalocalypse}} Bloodlines]]'' looks to be worth about '''''10.8''''' stars.
237* RememberTheNewGuy: Echo Tesla and Austin Tejas from ''Warriors of Rock'' seem to have had this treatment, being completely new characters counted among the legendary warriors, although the narration does specifically state that Austin has hidden himself away from the world until now.
238* RetGone: The band-centric games always do this to past members of the title band, even as they are going through the band's career.
239** ''Aerosmith'' glosses over the period Joe Perry and Brad Whitford left the band (despite the intro showing Steven reconciling with Joe backstage), especially since the formation change lasted only one album (that, and Ray Tabano being their [[ThePeteBest Pete Best]]).
240** ''Metallica'', more glaringly, completely ignores Cliff Burton and Jason Newsted, having Rob Trujillo as their bassist throughout. He even has his own classic model, patterned after his tenure with Music/SuicidalTendencies, which sort of clashes with the rest of the band.
241** ''Van Halen'' tries to justify it with the band (Dave, Eddie, Wolf and Alex; no Sammy Hagar or Michael Anthony to be seen) going back to their past gigs and their appearances changing accordingly.
242* RhythmGame: If we have to explain this one...
243* RiskyBusinessDance:
244** The ad campaign for ''World Tour''. Parodied with the ads for ''Metallica'' and ''Band Hero''.
245** "Old Time Rock'N'Roll" eventually became available as DLC for World Tour. The vocalist does the dance.
246* RockMeAsmodeus: Lou provides the trope picture. You fight him as the last boss of ''Guitar Hero III'', and you can unlock him after beating the game.
247* RummageSaleReject: The random bandmates generated by ''World Tour'' have some terrible style clashes between pieces of clothing and hairstyles (devilock and a white frilly shirt?). You can preview some of these in the Rock Star Creator when picking a style.
248* SchizophrenicDifficulty: ''World Tour'' was the first game in the series to introduce the four-instrument setup, and had a separate career mode for each instrument where all of the songs were re-assorted in each tier for each instrument to ensure a proper difficulty curve no matter which instrument you're playing. While ''Metallica'', ''Van Halen'', and ''Smash Hits'' continued on this, ''5'' did away with this entirely, having only one career mode for all instruments, leading to things like [[Music/{{Queen}} "Under Pressure"]] (which is rated as a ''10'' on Vocals and by far the hardest song in the game for vocalists) appearing in ''Tier 3'' even if you're only playing Vocals, or [[Music/TheRollingStones "Sympathy For the Devil"]] (a 7 on Bass) appearing as the encore of ''Tier 1''.
249** Even discounting that fact, ''5's'' difficulty curve is rather messy, with [[Music/DireStraits "Sultans of Swing"]] (a 6 on Guitar, 4 on Bass, and 7 on everything else) appearing as the encore for Tier 5, well before [[Music/JohnnyCash "Ring of Fire"]] (which doesn't have a single instrument rated above a 4) appears in Tier 9.
250* SerialEscalation: Many examples, from the addition of extra instruments to the increased difficulty of the songs, but the best example is this: In Warriors of Rock, the cap for the amount of stars you can get in a song has increased from five to '''FORTY'''. (Only in Quest mode though, and only after clearing it once.)
251* SheIsAllGrownUp:
252%%** Judy Nails, between ''Rocks the '80s'' and ''Guitar Hero III''.
253** Pretty much ''everyone'' got all grown up after the ArtShift when the franchise was passed from Harmonix to Neversoft. Axel Steel and Johnny Napalm, for example, looked like teenagers in the first two games.
254* ShoutOut: [[ShoutOut/GuitarHero See here]].
255* SocializationBonus: In ''Guitar Hero II'', 1/5th of the game's achievements were based on local co-op.
256** ''Guitar Hero III'' had the same co-op of Guitar Hero II (second player plays bass/rhythm guitar). That, alone, isn't bad at all. What makes it bad is that it introduces co-op career mode that must be played with two players, and said mode includes six songs that aren't unlocked in the course of single-player mode or the unlock shop (though, mercifully, a cheat code is available that unlocks everything).
257* SoundtrackDissonance: The uplifting "Cliffs of Dover" sticks out like a sore thumb in the "Battle for your Soul" setlist.
258* SovietSuperscience: Metalhead, according to his bio, was originally created by the Soviet Union until he was reprogrammed towards the end of the Cold War to be a guitarist.
259* SpontaneousHumanCombustion: Happens to your band's drummer at the end of [[Film/ThisIsSpinalTap "Tonight I'm Gonna Rock You Tonight"]] in ''Guitar Hero II'', See Also: ShoutOut.
260* SuspiciousVideoGameGenerosity: Does a song have two strings of Star notes suspiciously close to each other? Chances are the game's letting you fill up on Star Power before a finger-melting solo.
261* TheStinger:
262** ''Guitar Hero 3'' lets you play the bonus song ''[[Music/DragonForce Through the Fire and Flames]]'' during the end credits, but there's no [[LifeMeter energy meter]] and thus no risk of failure. This is because even those good enough to beat the whole game on Expert have no guarantee of even getting through the ''opening'' of that song without significant practice.
263** ''Aerosmith'' has Kings and Queens, and ''World Tour'' has Music/DreamTheater's Pull Me Under. Neither is as hard as Through The Fire and the Flames (though the solo to Pull Me Under is pretty ridiculous), but they are played over the credits in the same un-failable conditions.
264** In Metallica, this extra song (''The Thing That Should Not Be'') is playable in a "final" venue of sorts, and doesn't appear automatically when just beating the final standard setlist song. [=GH5=] goes back to the previous style with an unfailable ''[[Music/KingCrimson 21st Century Schizoid Man]]''. Not present whatsoever in Guitar Hero Van Halen, though.
265*** And again, in ''Band Hero'', with Music/DonMcLean's ''American Pie''.
266%%* ThemeMusicPowerUp
267* ThisIsGonnaSuck: “Through the Fire and Flames” on Expert has a unique loading screen tip that simply says “Good luck”.
268* TitleDrop:
269** One of the 17 bonus tracks in the first game is [[Main/ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin "Guitar Hero"]] by "Monkey Steals the Peach".
270** There are achievements in the second and third games named after the game as well[[note]]for the former, it's when you reach the final stage in Career Mode; for the latter, it's when you 5-star all songs on Expert.[[/note]].
271%%* TransformationSequence: In ''Warriors of Rock''
272* TVHeadRobot: One of Metalhead's unlockable outfits in [=GH3=] gives him a TV for a head.
273** In a lesser example, later games allow you to give your customizable character a TV head.
274%%* UnlockableContent
275* UnintentionallyUnwinnable: "Trogdor" in ''Guitar Hero II'' is the only song that can't be [=FCed=] due to the end of the solo requiring the player to strum a total of ''30 frets'' in quick succession, well exceeding the game's 15 note per second strum limit. This was fixed in the PAL version, due to the strum limit impacting the game less severely thanks to the 50 Hz refresh rate. Of course, this means exploiting technical knowhow in order to get that version running on an NTSC system, something not a lot of players have experience with out the gate.
276* UpdatedRerelease: ''Guitar Hero II'' had an updated version for the Platform/Xbox360 released a bit after the original Platform/PlayStation2 version. It added a few new songs (not counting DLC, among which were a dozen of the main songs from the first game), rearranged the difficulty tiers, and had a new, fancy X-Plorer controller.
277* VeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon: ''Black Widow of La Porte'', which is the final bonus song after the main game in ''Warriors of Rock'' is completed. A fast-paced lead guitar song which is essentially an entire guitar solo, runs for [[EpicRocking almost 7 and a half minutes]], has tricky sections that mimic ItsAllUpstairsFromHere by escalating notes rapidly, and is often on the top of lists of hardest songs in the ''entire'' series.
278* VirtualPaperDoll: ''World Tour'' allows you to customize your characters' clothing, not to mention their face, in excruciating detail. And their body type, in much less detail. ''Smash Hits'' and ''Band Hero'' allowed for this too (even giving you Midori's TwinTails hair as an option for custom females) as well as ''GH5'' and ''Van Halen''. All four games also allowed for customizing the clothing of built-in and unlockable characters, though with more flexibility in ''Smash Hits'' and ''Van Halen'' (not possible however for the licensed characters like the Music/VanHalen band members in ''Van Halen'' [the only options available for them are two different looks from different eras], and Music/TaylorSwift, Adam Levine, and the members of No Doubt in ''Band Hero'', who could not be customized at all).
279* VersionExclusiveContent: Depending on which edition of ''III'' you get, you could be getting different content
280** The HD versions lets you play as The God of Rock and The Grim Reaper, while the SD versions has Metalhead and [[ElvisImpersonator Elroy Budvis]]. The SD versions also has a few extra guitars to boot, including one modeled after the logo for {{Creator/BudCat Creations}} (the company in charge of porting the games to [=PS2=] and Wii, with Vicarious Visions helping them out for the latter).
281** The [=PlayStation 3=] and Xbox 360 versions of ''III'' each had an exclusive DLC song released on their platforms. [=PlayStation=] owners had [[VideoGame/GodOfWar The End Begins (To Rock)]] while Xbox owners had the MJOLNIR Mix of the iconic ''{{VideoGame/Halo}}'' Theme
282* YokoOhNo: One of the loading screen messages in ''World Tour'':
283--> When in doubt, blame the singer's girlfriend.
284* YuppieCouple: Freezepop has managed to become a ''musical'' example. One Freezepop song showed up in almost every Guitar Hero game developed by Harmonix since one; this particular trope followed over to ''VideoGame/RockBand'' when Harmonix switched to that series. (And then back again for the DS version... although the fact that the song was called ''I Am Not Your Game Boy'' means that it at least made sense for it to be there.) This owes largely to the fact that one of the members of Freezepop is a Harmonix employee.
285[[/folder]]

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