When the Guitar Hero series launched in 2005, it was the undisputable king of music games. It certainly wasn’t the first or only rhythm game in town, but it changed the genre in ways no one really saw coming. The idea of playing popular songs on a fake guitar may have appeared silly at first, but four years later, it seems totally natural to have a variety of plastic instruments cluttering up your living room. However, Guitar Hero has faltered in that time, with competition from the Rock Band series and an onslaught of sequels and spin-offs diluting the once-great franchise. Guitar Hero 5 is actually the fifth game in the series to come out in 2009 alone, including cell phone and arcade versions, and won’t even be the last. While I was expecting Guitar Hero 5 to be just another installment with marginal changes other than the setlist, I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was, in fact, the most improved game in the series since Guitar Hero II.