Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock Bundle With Guitar | 
| From: Aspyr Media
List Price: $69.99
Buy New: $69.95
You Save: $0.04
New (1) Used (8) from $39.95
Rating:  47 reviews
Sales Rank: 3822
Platforms: Macintosh, Windows Vista, Windows Xp
Genre: musical_instrument_games
ESRB: Teen
Media: Toy
Edition: Wired bundle
Batteries Included: No
Age: 12 - 20 years
Operating System: Windows XP
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 30.8 x 11.6 x 2.8
MPN: 11728
Model: 11728
UPC: 618870117287
EAN: 0618870117287
ASIN: B000W5UNLY
Release Date: December 4, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Features:
| • | More than 70 of the most legendary rock anthems of all-time | | • | Added multiplayer modes: arcade inspired Guitar Battle and the dual shredding co-op career | | • | Challenge the legends of rock and roll in boss battles | | • | Take those axe shredding skills online and rock around the world | | • | All-new tricked out venues taking you to hell and back |
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Product Description
Fire up the fretboard, crank up the amp and get ready to unleash your inner rock star like never before. Guitar Hero III drops you into the spotlight of the largest and most legendary rock concert ever. The starstudded soundtrack contains more than 70 of the most legendary rock anthems of all-time, including master tracks by such legendary artists as The Rolling Stones, Beastie Boys and Pearl Jam. Challenge the legends of rock and roll in boss battles, or your friends in the new multiplayer modes, or rockers worldwide in online play. Pick up that axe and show 'em what you're made of! The franchise's favorite characters freshly fitted with a few new faces Fully playable with keyboard or keyboard/mouse Take Guitar Hero III anywhere you travel with your laptop ESRB Rated T for Teen - Mild Suggestive Themes Compatible for use with Windows XP SP2, Windows Vista for PC and OSX for Macintosh
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| Customer Reviews: Read 42 more reviews...
 Don't be afraid: This is the Guitar Hero you love. December 9, 2007
Jeff Nichols (New York)
53 out of 53 found this review helpful
When I first heard that a PC-port of Guitar Hero III was on its way, I was ecstatic. I refused to think about how terrible Aspyr ports tend to be, and I just took it for what it was: the best thing, in my opinion, about console gaming coming to PC. I no longer would have to look upon my friends' Xbox 360s longingly.
Then the bad news: it would come with the Xplorer guitar instead of the lovely new wireless Les Paul. If you haven't used the new Les Paul, you won't be as heartbroken, but trust me: it is a huge difference. It's akin to using an Epiphone instead of a Gibson.
And more bad news. Apparantly Guitar Hero III is a system hog; even top of the line rigs used by IGN for their reviews had stuttering issues and low framerates at times. My system is far from bad, but my 8800 GTS and AMD 5000+ couldn't touch their rigs. Stuttering would make any rhythm game unplayable; worthless. I decided not to buy it.
Fast-forward a couple of weeks. I'm in Best Buy looking at LCD monitors and I see Guitar Hero III for PC. A mere mortal, I cannot resist. I get home, install the game, and plug the guitar in. I already have an Xbox 360 controller for windows, so I didn't even need to install new drivers for the guitar. It loads, and I go to quick play to try out a song; I am surprised.
The game runs flawlessly, nary a hickup, with a very high framerate, graphics and physics on high, at 1600 x 1200. In short, it is even better than the console versions. Why was my experience so different than that of reviewers, and many other people? Probably because I keep my drivers up to date religiously, and had the 169.17 (nvidia) beta drivers installed; I think I read on some forums that these improve performance in Guitar Hero. Also, I have a lovely Creative Xi-fi Xtremegamer card (which I heartily recommend) which probably helps out a bit.
Lower-end rigs will probably struggle, as is always the case with PC games. Is this fair? Shouldn't some of the worst computers be able to do something that a ps2 can? Of course; the fact that this is a system-hog at all is due to it being a lazy port. On a medium to high-end rig, does it show? Not at all. It runs like a dream; better than on consoles. If you are a PC gamer, with a nice rig, do not hesitate to buy this: It will be perfect. On lower-end systems, I would recommend trying to find a way to demo it to see how it runs. As there is no demo yet available, I can't exactly support any means of trying this out unless your friends has a copy, but do what you must.
As of yet, there are no mods available for Guitar Hero III. But I imagine they will come in time, and then this will surely be the ultimate version of Guitar Hero III. Until then, you can download Frets on Fire for some more (free) fun with your Xplorer guitar.
Something which surprised me, since, as a PC gamer, I'm not used to it, is multiplayer. You can play with a friend; one using a guitar, one using keyboard. I imagine if I plugged in another guitar, it'd work as well. I don't have one, so I can't test it out. This is a great feature, and I'm impressed that Aspyr included it with the PC version. The online multiplayer seems a little buggy, and I haven't been able to connect to any games. I've seen complaints about it on other forums and reviews. As this is not a priority for me, I can't really dock points from my review because of it, and I imagine it will be fixed in upcoming patches.
Cons: Weak online multiplayer; a system-hog; Xplorer guitar instead of Les Paul.
Pros: On a good rig, even better than console version; possibility of mods; good multiplayer if you have a friend over, $20 cheaper than other versions.
Edit: I would just like to add that, upon updating my drivers to 169.21, I started receiving stuttering and lagging like reviewers and others have mentioned. That proves it; any problems with this are driver related, and not actually a problem with the game itself. For the time being, I'd recommend 169.13 or 169.17 for best use with GHIII. With time, I'm sure all drivers will have it running great.
Rocking The P.C. December 4, 2007
Michael Kerner (Brooklyn, New York U.S.A.)
26 out of 34 found this review helpful
This year, the Guitar Hero franchise has definitely proved that it has exploded beyond the brink of excitement. With Guitar Hero II earlier this year, as a debut for the Xbox 360, and Guitar Hero III: Legends Of Rock making its debut for the Nintendo Wii and Playstation 3, gamers of the new console eras do know what it is like to jam beyond excitement. But, there have been some misteps like Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks The 80's, which didn't show it way into the heart of gamers well, by being more about guilty pleasures, and not driving in the fans. But now, there is one new addition to Guitar Hero series that can make it home, the P.C., as it finally gets its way into rocking out loud.
Guitar Hero III: Legends Of Rock for the P.C. takes on the popular music game series for the first time, as you jam to 70 different songs. The gameplay is the same as it has shown from the other game systems, but the thought of bringing it to the P.C. takes on a whole new meaning. The graphics work well with Windows XP, adn the newest operating system Vista. You get to jam your way through great rock classics like Rock And Roll All Night by Kiss, Heart's Baracudda, and the Santana standard Black Magic Woman, as well as surprises like Hit Me With Your Best Shot by 80's icon Pat Benetar, and Sabatoge by The Beastie Boys. The game also has great gameplay features like co-op mode, where two gamers can rock out in career mode, and battle mode where you match your licks against rock greats like Slash from Velvet Revolver and Guns N' Roses. While the battle mode could've had more challenges, the though of seeing this game on the computer is worth the wait. The game also includes a specialty guitar controller which works well with the gameplay.
All in all, Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock is a great game to buy, and works well for your P.C. I absolutely loved playing this game, and I think it is a great buy for the hard core gamer in your gaming library. There is no doubt about it, you can really rock out loud, and it is worth the licks.
Graphics: B
Sound: B
Control: B+
Fun & Enjoyment: B for solo players; B+ for multiplayer
Overall: B 1/2+
 Might be fun if it worked. December 25, 2007
Scruffy Scirocco (Vancouver, WA United States)
15 out of 35 found this review helpful
Christmas morning, installed this on my system for my kids. The software installed okay, but just threw a system error when I tried to run it. No splash screen, no advice about what might be wrong, just a windows error, this application will close. My computer meets all the minimum requirements. So I had two disappointed kids on Christmas morning.
IMHO, the system requirements for this game are insanely high for what the game is supposed to be doing. Let's face it, all this game is about is hitting the right colored button at the right moment. There is no need for these high requirements, except shoddy programming. The only thing I can figure is that the game is running on a Wii emulator for the PC, which would explain the high requirements.
I expect commercially marketed software to at least get me to an interface screen that does something before it crashes. This is not ready for prime time.
This is the second unfavorable review I have written for this piece of junk, the first one apparently didn't get posted. Does Amazon cherry pick only favorable reviews? I wonder how much they get for that service?
Do not buy. March 19, 2008
Bdiddy (PA)
9 out of 12 found this review helpful
Do not buy this product. First a computer with the optimal settings has problems running this, god forbid you even try to two guitars on the same computer, the gameplay lags randomly and messes up. Another issue that is not advertised is that Aspyr the company that makes it has quietly announced that it has no plans to make any downloadable content. So the box is literally lying to you. There will be no new content for this game
 Awesome Game - Works nicely on the PC January 16, 2008
David Trotz (Walnut, CA)
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
I own two Wii versions of this game so my son and I can play on the Wii. I fell in love with this game after the first note played.
I decided to get the PC version because the TV is sometimes occupied and I still want to play. Plus my PC has a nice LCD Display running at 1680x1050 (which the game supports).
I did not experience the constant lags others did. I downloaded the 1.1 patch from Aspyr before playing it however and this is probably why I have had not problems. The songs load faster on the PC than on the Wii and the graphics look better.
I am running this on an Intel Core 2 Duo 2.5 GHz w/ 2 GB RAM and an ATI x1950 Pro Card with 256 MB RAM and RAID 0 HD configuration. I have all the options set up as high as they can go.
My only beef is that the wired controller is an XBox controller (it even has the XBox logo on it) while all the other GH3 versions have the newer wireless Les Paul Guitars. But the feel of the guitar is that same as that of the Wii version, just doesn't look as great.
If you have a good PC system and meet the requirements I would choose the PC/Mac version over the Wii version.
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