Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock

Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock
Developer(s)	Neversoft[a]
Publisher(s)	Activision
Series	Guitar Hero
Platform(s)	PlayStation 3, Wii, Xbox 360
Release	EU: September 24, 2010 NA: September 28, 2010 AU: September 29, 2010
Genre(s)	Rhythm
Mode(s)	Single-player, multiplayer

Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock is a 2010 rhythm game developed by Neversoft and published by Activision. It is the sixth main installment and the eleventh overall installment in the Guitar Hero series. The game was released in September 2010 for PlayStation 3, Wii, and Xbox 360. Similar to previous entries in the series it is geared towards playing in a four-person band experience, including lead and bass guitar, drums, and vocals. The game is available as a standalone title, allowing players to use existing compatible instrument controllers, and as a bundle that provides these controllers.

Warriors of Rock shares core gameplay elements with its predecessors, but introduced a new story mode in which the player must recruit eight characters—each with a unique ability that modifies the mechanics of the game—to help defeat an antagonist known as "The Beast". The storyline also incorporated Rush's seven-part "2112", as well as "Sudden Death", a new song performed by Megadeth to serve as its culmination (the song would later be included in Megadeth's following album, TH1RT3EN). Warriors of Rock carried over core gameplay and multiplayer functionality introduced by Guitar Hero 5 (2009), including per-song bonus challenges and the ability to use power-ups from the story mode in standard gameplay.

Warriors of Rock received mixed to positive reviews from gaming journalists: while critics felt that Warriors of Rock would appeal best to long-time fans of the Guitar Hero franchise, some felt that the overall soundtrack was weaker than that of past installments due to its lack of focus and use of lesser-known songs and artists. The game's "Quest Mode" was met with a similarly mixed reaction, with some critics considering it a notable change over the career modes of previous Guitar Hero games and praising certain highlights, such as the "2112" segment, but criticizing the pacing of the storyline and how its songs were organized.

Sales of Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock were weaker than those of Guitar Hero 5, with combined sales of the game and DJ Hero 2 through the end of 2010 being 63% lower than the sales of Guitar Hero 5, DJ Hero and Band Hero through the end of 2009.^[1] Initial shipments of Warriors of Rock were also bundled with a copy of Soundgarden's compilation album Telephantasm; based on its distribution with copies of the game, Telephantasm became the first album to receive a Platinum certification from the Recording Industry Association of America based on distribution alongside a video game. As a result of the underwhelming sales, also credited to the oversaturation of the music game market, the Guitar Hero franchise was put on hiatus until the release of the 2015 reboot, Guitar Hero Live.^[2][3][4]

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