And then, there are the drums. After the drums from Rock Band received a good deal of criticism, these puppies had a lot to prove. For starters, the new drum set is laid out in a very different fashion. Instead of four pads and a kick pedal, we now have three main pads, two raised cymbals, and the obligatory kick pedal.

Now I’ll admit that I’m not the most knowledgeable person when it comes to drums, so I enlisted the help of one of my closest friends, Elizabeth. Dear Liz has been studying percussion for more than a decade, and she has been the recipient of fantastic instruction by some of the world’s most renowned percussion experts. If anyone knows her stuff, it’s Liz. After some extensive consultation with the drums connoisseur, we were able to come to a few distinct conclusions. First, the overall feel of the GH: WT drums is fantastic. The feedback the user experiences from a solid strike on the pads is extremely consistent, and much more akin to an electronic drum kit. The raised cymbals provide a distinct feel, and one that is very different from the pads. The kick pedal is more akin to the pedal used for a high hat, rather than a standard bass drum. When all of these concepts are combined, you get a drum set that performs surprisingly well.

The career mode in GH: WT has received a bit of a visual and organizational facelift. Rather than progressing down a list in sequences of five songs, which you can play in any order you choose, we’re now performing entire gigs. Our performances are listed on bulletin boards, and they vary in length from two to seven songs. No, this isn’t an extremely momentous transition. After all, we’re still just trying to pass each song before we can move on to the next. But the overall pacing of the career feels very different. More accurately, the career mode in GH: WT feels much less monotonous than in previous installments of the franchise.

The solo career progresses pretty much as you would expect. The band career, however, can get a bit dicey. First, you have to choose a band leader. Don’t worry, they’re not going to get all the great interviews with Rolling Stone magazine. No, the band leader simply holds domain over the band’s name and cash flow. But, if you’re not the band leader, your individual band info (from your solo career) won’t have any influence over the full band.

If you’ve become accustomed to Rock Band’s setup of earning and losing fans throughout your band’s career, you’ll probably be a bit disappointed with GH: WT. In fact, there’s really nothing at all to earn during a band career. For me, this didn’t really make the band career any less fun, but it’s now essentially the exact same thing as playing with your buddies in quick play. So if you’ve unlocked all the songs in the game, there’s no real incentive to playing in a full band career other than earning cash for some new instruments and what-not.

One aspect of GH: WT that has received a decent overhaul is the animation system. I can honestly say I failed a couple of songs because I was distracted by the motions of the on-stage characters. No, I’m not exaggerating. They really are that much better than in years past. I guess you could say things just feel much more fluid this time around. Whatever the case may be, the animations really do look great.

There’s also one other minor inclusion here that’s worth noting from a musical perspective. In past Guitar Hero games, a held note was just that, a held note. By that, I mean that strumming or playing other notes while playing a held note typically counted as a “miss” and an end to your streak. With GH: WT, this has all changed. Neversoft decided to implement pedal tones and arpeggiated chords this time around. Now, you will encounter multiple passages in which you will strum a held note and continue to strum other melody notes, all while holding the original tone. On the other hand, some chords will be “rolled,” wherein the chord’s notes are played in quick succession and held, rather than played all at once. It’s a very small addition, but it really takes you by surprise the first time you run into it. More importantly, it allows the guitarist to play music that is much more true to the original composition

Now these small addenda are nice and all, but the biggest addition to GH: WT is probably the new creation mode, where would-be composers can create their own unique track and share it worth the world. The creation studio is divided into two distinct sections. In the Recording Studio, up to four individuals can take part in a veritable jam session. You can tell the game to record at any time, where it will essentially produce a master track of whatever you and your buddies played. You can customize the scale in which you’re playing, the instruments you’re using, the effects on those instruments, and everything of that ilk. This can be fun for about five minutes or so. After that, it gets very old, and the music you record is never very accurate. This is where GHMix comes in. Here, you can create your entire song by hand. Or, if you have a previously-recorded track from the Studio, you can edit it in this mode. Unfortunately, this is a completely solitary experience, so your band mates can’t take part in the fun. The good news, though, is that GHMix gives you infinitely control over the final musical product than the Recording Studio offers. You can edit single notes, or you can drop in entire sections from your recording. This is where all the magic happens, folks. The problem, though, is that this can be extremely time-consuming if you’re really pushing for a top-notch product.