Guitar Hero & Rock Band Titles: Pro Tips for Training?

[Jeff Kelly]

I used to only play those titles on medium difficulty and needed a fair bit of time to get from 3 starring all of the titles to 5 starring everything.

I once or twice tried to play on hard difficulty but usually gave up quickly because it seemed too fast for me and I had a hard time switching buttons to reach orange.

A few weeks ago I had a breakthrough however and I now usually finish a song on hard difficulty and have a lot of them on 5 stars. It is astonishing how fast I got from finishing the first song on hard to finishing most hard songs and even a few expert ones.

I even manage to get through solos without thinking too much about them (seems a bit automatic to me). In GH3 the hardest song I five starred on hard is La Grange and in Aerosmith it's Dream On.

I even have the first two tiers of songs on Expert now.

Good medium seems to run so fucking slow when you are used to expert and don't get me started on easy.

Where I still struggle is songs with unusual note combos (3 button cords, odd chord changes) and songs where you need to alt-strum (strumming up and down.

I have the first 15 songs of GH 3 5 starred except Barracuda (those fast triplets are fuckers) and I eventually break down in the 'Live in Japan' setlist where there is a lot of alt-strumming going on (especially Knights of Cydonia)

Do the few GH and Rock band Pros have any tips on how to proceed?  I don't seem to get the hang of alt-strumming at the moment and don't know how I should go on practicing.

[Sky]

I have the first 15 songs of GH 3 5 starred except Barracuda (those fast triplets are fuckers)

The gold standard back in the 80s for triplet training was The Trooper. Barracuda is slow and easy compared to the tight, fast triplets of Maiden. To practice alternate picking, do more alternate picking.

I can't help you with fake guitar, but that's what a real guitarist would do.

[Mosesandstick]

For alt-strumming: Make sure you're not using a RB guitar 

[schild]

Play a lot of Guitar Hero 2, Guitar Hero 3 is easier. Guitar Hero 4 I hear is easier still.

Warm up on Misirlou. I would skip a lot of the metal stuff otherwise because it simply doesn't prepare you for things like Cliffs of Dover or The Metal (from Tenacious D).

Also, some of the songs are just stupid. As in, I can't see where the fun is in them.

Oh, off Guitar Hero 3, a good song to practice with is Impulse by the Endless Sporadic - which is a bonus track.

Edit: Also, not sure why Sky is in here.

[Samwise]

For alt-strumming: Make sure you're not using a RB guitar 

What he said.  And what Sky said.  Practice on easier songs and force yourself to alt-strum even when the song is slow enough that you don't HAVE to.  It'll become second nature soon enough.

[schild]

I find it's far better to learn where it's important to alt-strum rather than it becoming second nature - part of the reason for warming up on Misirlou. You don't have to make alt-stumming a part of your muscle memory, you just have to be good at it where it's required. I would, in fact say, that scales are far more important. Pick a song like Jessica, start there, and really try to hammer on-and-off of everything.

[Nonentity]

One of the biggest tips that helped me was for Hard and Expert, if you're not doing this, is to keep your four fingers anchored with your index finger on red, and your pinky on orange.

It's far, FAR easier to stretch down to hit green then to stretch up to hit orange with your pinky. Once you get used to that, you'll find yourself swapping your index down to green for sections with a lot of green, then swapping back.

Getting the ability to swap easily and quickly makes a huge difference.

[DeathInABottle]

Alt-strumming is a transferrable skill: if you can play a real guitar, you'll be able to alt-strum in GH and RB.  The advantage that the real guitarist has is an intuitive, or at least a built up, sense of when to strum down (on the beat) and when to strum up (off the beat).  Even if you can't play the real thing, you can learn how to alt-strum pretty simply: alt-strum everything.  Every note.  Go back to medium, and try doing a simple song with nothing but alt-strums.  Then try something harder, with solos.  Once you can do it consistently, switch up to hard, still doing the same thing, and then to expert.  It's WAY more efficient in most circumstances to just alt-strum everything, and I find it a lot more accurate, too.

[Ratman_tf]

Well, I got my DvD rom working again (long stupid story)* and have been playing a bit of GH3. Tried the alt-strumming (and made some progress) and still having trouble with the jump from Medium to Hard.

Not to sound like Sky  but beating on a Hard mode song makes me think I could spend the time learning it on a real guitar. Medium was much more fun. On some Hard solos, you can't learn a technique to execute them, you just have to memorize every keypress and play it back like a tape recorder.

*sigh*

Still love this game.

*Fuck. That jinxed it. God Damn.