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Several years ago, a music-rhythm game called Gitaroo Man came out on the PS2 and, with no advance warning, took the "Greatest Music Game Ever!" title. It's been over four and a half years since then, and though other games like Osu! Tatake! Ouendan! and Guitar Hero have knocked it off the top spot, it's still one of the PS2's legendary games. Now it's back on the PSP, giving those who missed it the first time a chance to see just what the fuss was about.
Gitaroo Man Lives! is a game cut from the Parappa mold. Each song is a chapter in the story of U-1, a whiny loser with dreams he'll never have the skill to realize. U-1 wants to skateboard with the cool kids and impress the girl, and transforming into Gitaroo Man to save the planet Gravilia is not only getting in the way but also utterly terrifying. But destiny isn't so much knocking as it is kicking the door down and dragging him away by his hair, so it's off to Gravilia to battle a bunch of musical lunatics and save the day. It's a goofy story and badly voice acted in the familiar Koei style, but still oddly charming and likable. The enjoyably bizarre character designs by the artist 326 add a huge amount of personality to it as well.
As fun as the story and visuals are, it's the music and gameplay that really sell it. Put simply, Gitaroo Man has one of the best original soundtracks of any game, no qualifiers. Every level offers a new style of music, and they're all winners. Flyin' to Your Heart from the second level is quite possibly the best J-pop song ever, with U-1's guitar skills going up against a flying saucer musical keyboard (trust me on this), while the Mexican-style fast strumming of Born to be Bone is a guitar/maraca face-off against a trio of skeletons. Bee Jam Blues, Void, and 'Nuff Respect are all as much fun to hear as to play, and all from different musical genres to boot. The final song, Resurrection, is an electric guitar battle that we can only pray will end up in Guitar Hero someday.
...Gitaroo Man Lives! is still Gitaroo Man at heart, and that makes it a must-have.
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Tying it all together is the gameplay, of course, and it's just as creative as the rest of the package. Each level is a musical battle, complete with health bars for U-1 and his opponent, and survival requires some serious skill. A line scrolls at a constant speed towards a dot in the middle of the screen, and pushing the analog nub sends out a cone of light from the dot. The trick is to push in the direction of the line as it bends and twists its way towards the center. The line is highlighted in orange for the parts that need to be "played", and hitting a button with the proper timing activates it. It's simple enough to begin with, but the complex rhythms of the later songs aren't for the weak or musically challenged.
The "scrolling line" parts are the most common, and are used to attack and recharge U-1's energy depending on the section of the song. There's also defense, though, where symbols stream in from the four edges of the screen and need to be clicked away. A symbol from the top will always use the triangle button, from the left uses the square, etc. Everything is perfectly in sync with the beat, both scrolling line and attacking symbols, and the songs easily jump between attack and defense at the drop of a beat.
The one problem with Gitaroo Man Lives! is a side effect of its conversion to the PSP. The original Gitaroo Man was developed with a square screen in mind, meaning that the line and symbols had relatively equal from when they appeared on the edge of the screen to when they reached the center, no matter where they were coming from. The rectangular PSP screen means that top and bottom notes get noticeably less reaction time than the left/right ones. It's hardly a deal breaker, but does take some getting used to and makes Master Mode more difficult than it should be.
There are a few other differences between the PSP update and the PS2 original as well. Flyin' to your Heart is now sung in English, and though the original Japanese version is better, it's not a bad version by any means. The PSP's analog nub is vastly superior to the PS2's analog stick, with its rough plastic being the perfect solution to the thumb slippage that plagued the PS2 version. (Very little was more annoying than missing a few notes because one's thumb slid off the analog stick during a long string of notes.) Master Mode, a harder version of the game that opens up after its beaten the first time, is noticeably more forgiving, which isn't the same as not being skull-crushingly hard any more. There's also a new Easy mode for beginners, with some simpler rhythms and lighter damage penalties for missing a beat. The biggest new addition is wireless multiplayer, complete with two new songs exclusively for that mode. A way to play them solo would have been nice, but at least the new music can be listened to in the Jukebox.
Despite the differences, Gitaroo Man Lives! is still Gitaroo Man at heart, and that makes it a must-have. There are very few games that I can still play over four and a half years after they come out, but Gitaroo Man still gets time in the PS2 every now and then. Even taking that into account, playing Lives! was more like kicking back with an old friend than running through overly-familiar ground. If you missed it the first time around, this is a rare second chance at playing one of the best music games ever made.
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