Finally, finally... the Guitar Hero series hits the Xbox and it's been a long time coming. Having never owned a Playstation console it's a series that I've never been able to get a decent look at, and after reading the glowing reviews and high scores that it's received on the PS2, all I (and the rest of us Xbox owners) could do was patiently wait, first for confirmation that we'd eventually be getting it, and then wait longer for the release date to be announced. Well now it's here and yes, it's as excellent as it is long overdue!

There's something to be said for games that include funky controllers. There was the Silent Scope Complete game for the Xbox that worked with the Boss Battle light guns, but I've always longed for an ‘official' Xbox light gun and game to go with it. Even Duck Hunt on the NES was great fun and we all enjoyed Point Blank at the arcades so it's always surprised me that there haven't been more games like those. The immersion factor whilst holding a controller like a light gun, or in the case of Guitar Hero II (from now on GH2), its guitar shaped X-plorer controller, well, the immersion factor absolutely skyrockets and creates a truly unique experience. Take it from me, Guitar Hero II is immense fun.

Now as mentioned, having never owned a PS2 console, or played the previous version of Guitar Hero before, I can't really comment on whether or what technical improvements that there are. Suffice to say though that from scouring web forums around the globe, the Xbox 360 version sounds to be the definitive version in the series so far. But for all the Guitar Hero newbies like myself, I'll take a step back and start at the beginning for you all.

Guitar Hero II is played with a controller shaped like an electric guitar (sure, you can play it with your normal controllers, but why would you?) that has a bar that you strum instead of strings and 5 buttons up the top of the neck, each of which are a different colour. You press these buttons in time and strum to coloured notes that appear on a scrolling fret board on screen, sometimes the notes have a star surrounding them and hitting these builds up your star power meter which when unleashed by raising the guitar controller vertically, multiplies the points earned.

Sounds simple right? Well on easy, as with most games, yes it is but this game has a difficulty that takes it easy on you to begin with, but will take hours of practice to complete on even the hard setting, let alone the expert mode, which quite frankly scared the crap out of me. Unfortunately the controller isn't wireless which I thought would have been a given, but it isn't so and while the cable is quite long, easily 2-3 meters, and features the standard ‘break-away' plug, it's a shame, but hopefully we'll see one eventually.

The main goal of GH2 is to complete the Career Mode by completing gigs in different locations and in the process, unlock songs, earn money, buy new guitars, characters, guitar finishes and perfect your guitar skills. During the songs you have to focus on a scrolling fret board that shows you what notes are coming up and it's your job, as the lead guitarist of your own band to hit the correct colour on the fret board of your own controller whilst strumming. The songs are varied and feature a lengthy list of tracks from great rock bands such as Nirvana, Alice Cooper, Black Sabbath, KISS, Pearl Jam, Aerosmith, Van Halen, Wolfmother, Warrant, Foo Fighters through to heavier bands such as Megadeth, Anthrax and Lamb of God (among others).

The heavier bands were probably my least favourite ones so it was cool to see tracks from bands like The Pretenders, The Police, Stray Cats and Cheap Trick included. These bands really helped to break things up as too much metal is ok for some, but not for others and out of the whole song list, it probably does lean towards metal a bit much for my tastes. Hopefully when we get some downloadable tracks, we can get some more classic rock tracks because even though GH2 has a Rolling Stones and also a Van Halen track, Can't you hear me knocking and You really got me, aren't the 2 most prominent tracks from those bands that jump immediately to mind. Personally, Satisfaction or Jumping Jack Flash from The Stones or Dreams by Van Halen could have strengthened the track list just that bit more but obviously everyone's tastes vary and no doubt there's people out there wondering why there also isn't a Dire Straits, a Joe Satriani, or even a Carlos Santana track.

For the most part, as the songs (except for Dead by My Chemical Romance, Possum Kingdom by The Toadies plus a Primus and Janes Addiction track) are performed by cover band(s) they do a job that ranges from admirable, to fantastic. The weakest covers would have to be Nirvanas Heart Shaped Box, Sweet Child o' Mine from GNR and Can't You Hear Me Knocking by the Stones. These tracks are still great fun to play but the vocals do just sound a bit off and it's a shame that more original tracks couldn't be included but obviously the costs to licence this many original recordings would be excessive. The tracks that you've never heard of, which there were numerous for me, sound fine anyway as there was no basis for comparison. The quality of the audio is absolutely crystal clear, which was a great surprise and while my sound setup isn't the best, I got to connect GH2 up to a friends high-end sound system and it was absolutely phenomenal.

The graphics in GH2 feature an over the top, cartoony style to the characters that also contain plenty of detail and slick animations. If there's one complaint it's that you spend the whole game staring at the notes coming up so you miss the stage events happening on screen but at least this gives other people something to watch while they wait. And wait they did. The benchmark of a truly unique game is if it can get people that don't play video games to give it a shot and everyone that's visited my place and seen this in action has wanted to try it out. Everyone from my 4 and 7 year old sons, my wife (who has probably only played 3 computer games in her life), every single one of my friends and even our parents have given GH2 a shot and enjoyed it.

After doing the tutorials they were keen to try out some songs and generally did pretty well and I was surprised at how easy GH2 was to pick up and get into. The Practice mode lets you choose any song you've played in Career mode, select all or a part of it and also choose what speed you'd like to play it at. In the XBW forums the other day I was talking about how after beating Career mode on medium that I felt as if I'd hit a brick wall and couldn't progress as I was finding hard, well.. too damn hard. After deciding I wouldn't let the game beat me, I started practicing songs on hard, but slowed down a bit and after sticking to it, you really do improve. The practice mode is an absolute god send and a fantastic feature. If there's one complaint about the Career mode is that on easy, you don't earn any money so you've got to play it on medium at least if you want to buy all the goodies awaiting you in the games store, many of which are tied into the games achievements.

Unfortunately I was only able to try the multiplayer with one person using a normal controller as we only have a single X-plorer Guitar but there's some great multiplayer modes included that are just screaming out for some action. Face Off mode lets you play the same track as an opponent but let you adjust the difficulty setting to each of your own skill. Cooperative mode has one player on lead guitar and the second player on rhythm or bass guitar working together for the highest score possible. Pro Face Off puts you against a friend playing the same track at the same difficulty level. Xbox Live Leaderboards are also available so your top scores for Career mode and individual tracks are uploaded for your friends and the world to see. When you see some of the scores being pulled off already by people playing on expert mode you have to wonder just how it's done, Keith Richards, Steve Vai and Yngwie Malmsteen must have been sent advanced copies or something...