Meh. I'm honestly much more interested in the Gretsch RB/GH guitars that were covered a while back. It's still $100 for a guitar controller (which I won't buy regardless), but at least Gretsch makes some really nice guitars, and the style follows over a bit to the plastic ones.

o_O my real guitar cost me 225€ ...

I'd gladly pay 200 clams for that beast. If only because I like seeing the "play real music" crowd squirm.

Those buttons better press themselves for $200.

seriously, they keep raising the price on these plastic gimmicks, kids will buy real guitars and say F.U. to these music games.

keep it up. make it $300.

This shit better have lifetime warranty for that kinda dough.

I just looked at the Gizmodo comments, those guys are going crazy over there with the "buy a real guitar." Seriously, some people want to play guitar hero. Could you imagine if people did this with every game?

"Quit playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, join the army!"
"Stop playing LittleBigPlanet, go get a degree in architecture!"
"Turn Pokemon off and start catching wild rabid animals with red and white balls!"

Wow. My guitar was only like, 120. Granted, it was three years ago and it's a genuine P.O.S, but still.

That being said though, would I buy this? Probably. Guitar's not my 'real' instrument of choice, so I'm free to purchase as many useless plastic doodads as I please.

It's considered a bad investment when you spend more money on a fake guitar than a real guitar should cost.

Seriously, I paid $150 for my guitar. It's acoustic, but it's a real one.

@Ace Fibble: I've played many gigs on my sub-$400 guitars. My Ibanez RG series guitars have an awesome sound and can be picked up from $250-$400. Don't get me wrong, they are no where near the quality of PRS guitars or higher end models, but they are very versatile. What most people are not factoring into the cost equation are the amp/strings/effects pedals cost.

I love the RB/GH games, but it is starting to get out of hand when it comes to instrument pricing.

When I bought an acoustic for $200, Les Paul, and an Electric Les Paul faded cherry for $900. I learned I can now play with musicians, I can learn a new talent I can pass time and enjoy playing whatever song I want on demand instead of waiting for a company to release it for a video game at their leisure.

Your favorite songs on demand played by you is priceless. If you don't see that then you shouldn't be playing a music game, as you clearly are not into music.

So all these defenders of the game over real music are phonies. And you're a stereotype if anything.

If you guys really want to push the envelope on cheap guitars, you can buy a really bad one for less than it costs to buy a PS3 game, so isn't the price of a guitar irrelevant to the price of this controller?

Where talking about controller costs, not instruments, seeing as its not one. I wouldn't think of buying a $200 controller, no matter what it was for, not even a $200 keyboard for my PC, when I use it all the time.

With that said though, people who do want to buy this controller probably wouldn't want to touch an acoustic or electric guitar in the first place. So again, I think it not really worth bringing up. Besides, its just a regurgitated topic thats been gone over already.

People who play RB or GH, are playing it because they want to play GH or RB. People don't play those games because they want to play an instument. I think its a misconception that people who play those games think they can really nail out the same song on an actual instrument. Even though I could be entirely wrong, I just don't feel people really think that.

Second, I don't see why you need a truss rod. You don't have any strings on the controller to actually apply pressure to the wood, so its not like it will bow completely out of shape in a couple of years making it entirely unplayable. I have cheap furniture, that isn't made out of solid wood, so if that can withstand years of heat from the summer, I'm a wood controller neck can withstand a couple months. The controller isn't going to warp completely out of shape and break.

I have a banjo-mandolin that my grandmother gave me that has been laying up in her extremely hot attic for years untouched. It's not cracked nor as bad as you make out the controller to be. Nice looking instrument too. Got some good age on it, even though it wasn't take care of. I think it dates back to the 20s. I'd really like restore it.

I bought a Paul Reed Smith (a dinged-up SE series, but it's still a PRS) in a pawn shop for $250 once.

This is insane.

Then again, this is a company that sells boatloads of universal remotes at $300 a pop.

@ Greylocke: truss rods are more to balance out the natural expansion of the wood during use and changes in temperature. It has little to do with string tension after initial adjustment and setting, despite popular belief.
Also any rosewood on instruments from earlier than 1970 is going to be deep Brazilian Rosewood, that can survive a longer time. That costs a premium though - $300+ for a piece the size to make a fretboard from - and isn't likely to be what this controller will use. Logitech will much more likely use the much cheaper Indian Rosewood which dries up, cracks and splits very quickly.

I'm actually really quite intrigued now how this controller is made and how it'll fare. I may have to buy one just to experiment with. Damn my wood obsession! [insert homoerotic innuendo here].

Well, it's less expensive than a Fender Stratocaster or a Gibson Les Paul, but not by much. I don't really play enough Guitar Hero or Rock Band to want to spend the money on this, maybe if I played more (or participated in competitions), I might consider it, but only in those circumstances.