Guitar Hero, Guitar Musings → Will Playing Guitar Hero Make Me A Guitar Hero?
The guitar based video game series Guitar Hero is very popular these days with guitar playing wannabees of all ages (I think I saw a video of a cat) strapping on plastic guitars and jamming away to their favorite songs. These games are surely a lot of fun, but can they really help you learn to play a “real” guitar? The answer is a resounding definite maybe yes.
For those of you who are not familiar with any of the Guitar Hero and Guitar Hero type games, the idea is to push buttons on a game controller (fashioned after a real guitar that you actually strap on) in order to “play” a song. As long as you push the buttons at the right time and in the right order, the guitar part in the song that you have chosen will continue to play along with the backing band played by the computer.
If you miss a button or do not push the button at the right time, the guitar part will cease to play and you will hear a nasty guitar sound just like missing a note or chord on a real guitar. I am sure we are all familiar with that sound…
There are five different colored buttons on a Guitar Hero guitar controller. Little colored dots scroll from the top of the game screen on your TV to the bottom of the game screen in rhythm to the song you have chosen to play. When they cross the line at the bottom, that is when you have to push the corresponding colored button on the guitar controller with your left hand and strum the strum bar on the controller with your right. That’s right. There is a strum bar. And a whammy bar…
Now, back to our original question. Can Guitar Hero help in learning to play a real guitar? There are a few different areas that this game can help in.
First off, we have rhythm. It is very important to be able to hear and play along with the beat of a song when playing a real guitar. Guitar Hero forces you to hear the beat of a given song and precisely push buttons in rhythm with that song. That is the whole point of the game.
Since the game has different difficulty settings, beginner through expert, someone who is not familiar with listening and picking out the beat of a song can start slowly and build over time. The higher the difficulty setting, the more notes there are.
The second area that Guitar Hero can help in is finger dexterity. Depending on your Guitar Hero playing style (that’s right, you can have different styles) your fingers can get a good workout that should directly help in playing a real guitar. There are five buttons on the guitar controller and most people only have four fingers. One way or another you are going to have to get those fingers moving around. Did I mention there are chords?
There are multi button chords you have to play in the more advanced levels of the game that can get quite tricky. Make sure you use all four fingers when possible if you want to get the most benefit from the game. Especially that little pinky finger. That’s the trouble maker that needs lots of attention on both Guitar Hero and a real guitar.
The last area I think Guitar Hero can help in as far as learning to play a real guitar is in song layout itself. Depending on the song you are playing, the guitar part will consist of repetative chord progressions mixed with melodic passages and the occassional screaming guitar solo.
Visually seeing how a song is layed out as far as structure is something that can be very instructional to someone just learning to play guitar or even for someone who knows how to play guitar, but doesn’t know how to write an entire end to end guitar part.
So what’s the conclusion? Can playing Guitar Hero make you a real guitar hero? Unless in the real world you are already a master at rhythm, a master at finger dexterity, a master at creating guitar parts, and a master at picking out cool band costumes (did I mention there are lots of cool band costumes?), you should get something out of the game that will improve your guitar hero status in the real world.
If you are already a master at rhythm, finger dexterity, creating guitar parts, and picking out cool band costumes, you are already a hero and probably stopped reading this post after the words “plastic guitar”.
Tags: Band Costumes, Chords, Computer Games, Finger Dexterity, Guitar Hero, Rhythm, Song Layout
February 10th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
I like your arguments. Don’t necessarily agree but you make some good points. From my point of view, if one re-directs their “Guitar Hero” time and apply it to a real guitar, the amount they would learn immense. The problem is; unlike guitar hero, learning a real guitar takes years and years to become proficient. Where with a video game, a couple of hours of “practice” will take you farther, in that game.
Also, being good at Guitar Hero may help some basic rhythm and/or dexterity but I’m wondering how much would actually translate to the real guitar. My thoughts are that if you want to get better at real guitar, practice an actual six string guitar. Nothing can top playing the real thing.
February 11th, 2009 at 10:48 pm
I don’t disagree with you Guitar Musings on the time and effort needed to learn to play a real guitar and you can never get enough pratice on the real thing. However, I think someone who has never even thought about playing a real guitar before can get interested in the real thing by playing some of these Guitar Hero type games and the time spent is not necessarily completely wasted. Again, getting introduced to “playing” in rhythm and getting a very basic idea of what kind of parts a real guitar player might play won’t hurt when moving to the real thing. But, you are absolutely right, after a couple hours of jamming to 80’s tunes and dressing up in costumes, turn off the game and pick up your guitar already.
February 24th, 2009 at 3:20 pm
Thank you!