Version History: Guitar Hero

The Vergecast

Vox Media Podcast Network

News, Tech News, Technology

4.4 • 4.1K Ratings

🗓️ 26 October 2025

⏱️ 80 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Millions of basements have fake plastic guitars in them thanks to the 2005 smash hit Guitar Hero. Chris Grant and Ash Parrish join David Pierce to rock out with a game created over a matter of months by a niche developer and a peripheral manufacturer, fueled by word-of-mouth and viral videos on a nascent YouTube. You probably don’t play Guitar Hero anymore, but you might still find it in surprising places. If you like the show, subscribe to the Version History feed⁠ to make sure you get every new episode. Let us know what you think: 866-VERGE-11 or [email protected]. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Vergecast. I'm your friend David Pierce, and you're about to hear another episode of our new show, version history.
0:05.9	Before we get into it, one reminder, send us all of your feedback about the show, everything you like, everything you don't like, everything we should do differently. And most importantly, go subscribe to version history, wherever you get podcasts, because it will not be on this feed forever. Let's get into it.
0:19.5	Would you like to be a rock star?
0:21.1	Here's the deal.
0:21.9	You don't need any skills.
0:23.6	You don't need to skills. You don't need
0:24.0	to know how to play a musical instrument. You don't even need to be willing to get up on stage
0:28.0	in front of people and do something. All you need is $70, PlayStation 2, and probably a whole
0:34.5	bunch of time on your hands, because there's this game you might have heard of called Guitar Hero
0:38.4	that is going to, if not make you a rock star,
0:41.4	at least make you feel a lot more like one.
0:44.1	From the Virgin Vox Media, this is version history,
0:46.7	a show about the best and worst and strangest and most interesting products
0:51.1	in the history of technology.
0:52.7	I'm David Pierce, and today it's time to talk about what is almost certainly the most
0:57.4	important guitar in video game history.
1:10.4	Support for this show comes from Aramis fragrances.
1:14.3	Aramis is back.
1:15.9	Reintroduced for a new generation.
1:18.4	The next chapter of a legendary brand reimagined and refreshed with modern energy.
1:23.6	Now you can discover intuition by Aramis, a bold new fragrance for men.
1:29.1	Be bold, be magnetic, be unstoppable.
	...

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