Hammer-Ons

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Hammer-ons are notes that are playable by playing a first note normally then "hammering on" to a note higher on the neck (Ex: hammering on from green to red). In essence, this means that you can play a hammer-on note without strumming, provided you have hit the previous note correctly. It is therefore possible to play an entire sequence without strumming, provided all the notes are hammer-ons (and you do not miss any).

The reverse of hammer-ons are pull offs which are fundamentally the same thing except for that instead of pushing a lower button without strumming you push a button lower on the neck (Ex from red to green). Hammer-ons and pull offs are fundamental in the process of tapping where the hand you would normally use for strumming comes up to the neck of the guitar to fret.

You can identify a hammer-on/pull-off (or a "hopo", as they are collectively known) in the following way:

On Guitar Hero 1, 2 and 80's, the note will have a white ring around the top instead of a black one. These can be hard to spot at first, but become more obvious with practice.
On Guitar Hero 3, Aerosmith and On Tour (...possibly), the note will have a white glow. This differs from the above in that there is actually an effect added rather than simply a slight graphical change to the note itself.
On Rock Band 1 and 2, the note will simply be a significant amount smaller than it otherwise would be.

In Guitar Hero 1 (though none of its successors) these notes are notoriously hard to hit without strumming. While it is possible to hit them, you have to be extremely precise and play them as you would on a real guitar; that is to say, you must hold the lower fret before pulling off or while hammering on the next. The timing window in Guitar Hero 1 is also much stricter, leading most players to strum almost every note in Guitar Hero 1.

Although it is possible to strum hammer-ons in the later games, just as one would with a normal note, it can often be harder when the sequence of notes is fast (for example, the intro to Song_GH3_ThroughTheFireAndFlames Through the Fire and Flames∞ by DragonForce on Guitar Hero 3). However, it can sometimes be more reliable to strum when the sequence is extremely slow, such as the first half of Song_GH2_Freebird Freebird∞ in Guitar Hero 2.

Hammer-On Chords

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Hammeron Chords first appeared in Rock Band 2, in songs such as Song_RB2_Bodhisattva Bodhisattva∞ and Song_RB2_PsychoKiller Psycho Killer∞. They function very similarly to normal hammer-ons. Song_RB2_RobThePrezODent Rob the Prez-O-Dent∞ is the first song to have 3-note HO/PO chords. If a DLC song has a HO/PO chord it will show up as a normal chord in Rock Band 1.

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Category: CategoryGameMechanics, CategoryTerminology