But as I was working on my proposal, I couldn't really put it through its paces.
Btw, if you're wondering what's inside, it was this:
Please ignore my crotch on the bottom of that picture.
Anyway, having had a bit of time to mess around with it, though most of my gaming time right now is spent on Dragon Age II, I have to say, it's pretty damn awesome.
And here, I'm going to give you my impressions of it because, hey, why not? This blog is about my favorite occupations, and music is a pretty big one in my life. Both listening to and playing, and this thing also doubles as a controller for a video game, which is another big occupation in my life? I'd be crazy NOT to!
So first off, how is it as a guitar?
Well, seeing as the only amp I have is the SWR Workingman's 15 I bought when I first came to LA, I can't really say much for its sound. That said, also being used to awkwardly playing guitars through bass amps throughout my entire electric bass & guitar playing life, I can say that the single bridge pickup gives it a very twangy, lead sound. Not necessarily a bad thing, since with a bit of EQ tweaking you can get a deeper, punchier sound out of it.
The guitar does lack any sort of onboard EQ controls, though. Not even a tone knob! But again, that can be messed with on your amp too. I don't really see anybody using this as a main stage guitar, so I don't think there's really much need for onboard controls. Especially since it's also a fully functioning MIDI guitar, all that will more likely than not be done on the computer.
Look ma, no onboard EQ!
So how does it work as a MIDI controller?
I have no idea. No recording software on my computer.
OK, what's it like playing Rock Band with this baby?
In short: really hard.
Like every review out there has surely already mentioned, the note highway for pro guitar is like nothing you've seen before. Not sheet music (thank goodness), and not tablature. Chords give you a root note fret number and then a vague shape of what the chord is supposed to look like. Without going through the first few basic tutorials, I would have been utterly confused. That said, it's done in such a way that, like the pro keyboard mode, it's incredibly challenging at first, but confidence slowly grows as you get used to watching strange numbers and blue line chord shapes come down the highway at you.
I do have 2 complaints about the guitar, though.
First: the string mute that MUST be used when playing Rock Band happens to sit where I strum and pick most comfortably, forcing me to shift my picking hand closer to the bridge, which feels a little awkward for me.
Second: the high E string seems a bit less sensitive than the others when playing Rock Band, which means I have to use significantly more force for it to even sense that I've plucked the string. It's not bad enough that I feel I need to return it or even post about it on the Rock Band forums, but it did make completing some of the tutorials a little harder than they should have been. Then again, maybe I just need to use a heavier pick?
That's not a lipstick pickup, it's a foam string mute! And yes, the fretboard is made of plastic.
If you want to see all the pictures I took of my "unboxing" of the guitar, click here.
