Guitar Hero: On Tour

It's almost impossible to avoid running into this hugely successful series due to the amount of advertising on television, the internet and in the gaming press. Now, thanks to the portability of the Nintendo DS, you can also play the game on the go. There's simply no escaping it.

Lucky for you then that Guitar Hero: On Tour is as good as its predecessors. Though the lack of a guitar controller may prove to be a sticking point for some gamers, there is a fretboard handgrip bundled with the game that goes some way towards turning your console into a mini guitar.

To use the peripheral, which fits nicely into the front slot of your machine, you hold the DS like an open book and slide your hand into the grip. In this pose, you can tap the fret buttons with relative ease, but it can start to strain the wrist quite quickly, so heed the in-game suggestions and take a break every 15 minutes or so.

The aim of the game is to travel the world with your band as one of many weird and wonderful guitarists in a bid for stardom. Venues range from subways to rooftop penthouses, making good use of overblown abstract visuals that might be more at home in a comic book.

The gameplay is as follows: strum the touch screen on the right with your special plectrum-shaped stylus, matching the notes as they cascade down the screen on the left. Single notes, slides and power chords are played by hitting the colour coded fret buttons. It can take some seriously fast reflexes to play the toughest songs, but in time you'll get the hang of it.

All of the featured songs are master recordings from a wide range of artists, including No Doubt, Blink 182, Nirvana and Bloc Party, so there's music here to suit most tastes. The majority of these tunes are exclusive to this game, and haven't appeared in previous versions, you lucky people. There is also a wi-fi guitar duel mode for online shredding mayhem.

While it's a cool idea and the gameplay works reasonably well, the game is not without problems. Sometimes, especially during sequences of really fast notes, it is difficult to tap the touch screen without sliding along it by accident. This usually results in a few misses, breaking your hard-earned combo chain. Alternatively, some taps won't register at all if you go a bit wild and hit it too hard or too fast.

It's all a matter of working out the nuances of the system, and those prepared to put in the practice will unearth a nice little addition to the Guitar Hero series

But seriously, do take a break from playing before the RSI sets in — ouch!