Hardcore rockers ACDC were absolutely spot on with their lyrics; it is a long way to the shop if you want a sausage roll. Activision has realized this fact too and, to make our arduous journey for delicious meat filled pastries more bearable, they’ve up and created a portable DS version of Guitar Hero.
This handheld reinvention of the game comes bundled with a new ‘Guitar Grip’ peripheral - a four-button accessory which inserts into the largely unused the Game Boy Advance slot on your DS. This fandangle attachment includes your traditional coloured fret buttons on it, minus the curse of uncoordinates everywhere, the orange button. For those of you about to rock, the idea is to Velcro strap your fret hand to the console, tilt that sucker ‘book style’ and strum on your touch screen like some midget ukulele. Free from the usual need to be in front of a TV, this surprisingly ingenious setup lets you effectively rock out with your… DS.. out. God gave rock and roll to you - and beer, and porn, to you… In terms of muzak, there are 25 songs for you to thrash out. However, like every other Guitar Hero game in existence, they’re a pretty mixed bag quality-wise. You get kick arse tracks like (‘Black Magic Woman’ by Santana, ‘Breed’ by Nirvana, ‘I Don't Wanna Stop’ by Ozzy Osbourne), dodgy tracks like ("Jessie's Girl" by Rick Springfield), and then you get ‘what-the-fuck, this-isn’t-rocking’ tracks like (‘This Love’ by Maroon 5). Ordinarily you could suffer these shitter songs with nothing more than a mild cringe - but when you remember that you’ve only got twenty five total tracks to work with, their inclusion will sting a little harder than usual. Fortunately there are some other songs of note (dad joke: intended) like; ‘La Grange’ by ZZ Top, ‘We're Not Gonna Take It’ by Twisted Sister, ‘Pride and Joy’ by Stevie Ray Vaughan, ‘Rock and Roll All Nite’ by Kiss, and ‘Are You Gonna Be My Girl’ by Jet. If these songs don’t rock your world, you can eventually unlock the decidedly apt ‘I Am Not Your Gameboy’ by Freezepop. Nice.