Wow, it’s a great time to be a gamer and a music lover. A few weeks ago, “Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock” made its debut, and now along comes the series’ first competitor, “Rock Band.”

“Rock Band” takes the guitar-based rhythm game and expands it into a full band, complete with guitar, bass, drums and vocals.

Playing alone in solo mode, “Rock Band” isn’t much different from “Guitar Hero” except for the instrument options. Differences in core gameplay are mostly superficial: Notes are colored bars floating toward you instead of circles, Star Power becomes Overdrive and is represented by a meter below your fret board, etc.

The solo mode is fun, but people who only play alone will be missing out. “Rock Band” is meant to be played with a full band.

Band World Tour is the main mode in the game. It begins with creating the characters you want to form your band. The character creation has a nice number of options, from hair styles and clothes to creating tattoos and a band logo.

Once your band is formed, you pick a city and begin playing small gigs. When you perform well, you earn both money and fans. As you gain more fans, you move to larger venues and get more money. Eventually, you’re playing arenas.

The game keeps a running total of how many stars you’ve scored on each song (five being the max), and some venues are only available after you earn a certain number. Other stages require having a specific number of fans. Along the way to stardom, you’ll do things such as buy a tour bus and hire a bodyguard.

The way “Rock Band” is set up is both realistic and annoying. For one, once you create a character on a certain instrument, that’s it. You can’t switch the character from instrument to instrument. Also, you better make sure the band leader is on an instrument someone will always want to play because the band can’t play without the leader (the other members can drop in and out as they please).

There’s also quite a bit of repetition in songs at the start. It isn’t like “Guitar Hero,” where you play down a list of songs. In “Rock Band,” you’ll see the same songs over and over again as you move cities and build your fame. That makes sense as far as realism goes, but after the 10th time playing Weezer’s “Say It Ain’t So” or Nirvana’s “In Bloom” in one night, it can get old.

However, as you get farther into the game, you unlock more songs, which helps dilute the repetition. Even better, if you start a new band with a character from another band, any songs that character has unlocked will be available from the start.

The songs are not as hard as in “Guitar Hero,” in part because the buttons on the “Rock Band” guitars are closer together, making it easier to hit that elusive orange button. Also, the game is meant to be a “get together with your friends and jam” experience, so the difficulty has been toned down a bit.

One cool thing, though: As you get farther into the game, you hit “fan caps,” which limit how far into the game you can gain fans on easy difficulty, or medium, etc. Eventually, every band member will be forced to play on expert (although the other difficulties are always available).

One thing “Rock Band” really improves over “Guitar Hero” is the atmosphere. The stage and crowds are livelier, and the sound is just amazing. The crowd even will start singing along when you’re doing well. It really looks and feels like you’re in a rock band.

While it has its niggling little annoyances, “Rock Band” manages to create a group game that rocks hard and adds a ton of depth to the music-game genre. It may not be a “must-buy” for solo players who would be more challenged by “Guitar Hero III,” but anyone with friends, or an urge to play drums or sing, should not miss it.

Do your ‘Duty’

The “Call of Duty” series has always been a great single-player experience, and the new one adds in a robust multiplayer mode as well.

"Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare” brings the first-person shooter series out of World War II and into modern day, in which terrorists are threatening the world and the United States and Britain must stop them.

The single-player story mode is extremely short (maybe six hours), but it’s well worth the time. Not only are there more than 70 modern weapons and accessories to use, the story itself is fascinating and always told from the player’s point-of-view - such as at the beginning, when the player sees the assassination of a president through the president’s eyes. It adds a whole new emotional context to the story. I especially like how the game ends, though I obviously won’t spoil it.

The story mode may be short, but the online multiplayer gives the game a life well beyond that. At its basic, it’s much like other online shooters, with deathmatches and the like.

“CoD4” kicks it up a notch with leveling. Each time you get a kill or assist online, you earn experience points, which help you level up. What’s really interesting is that you have to level up to unlock class types (such as sniper and demolitions), weapons and even game features.

I do wish the matchmaking system was a little better. In my first attempt online, the game threw me into a match with a level 59 and three 40+ players. Needless to say, I got slaughtered.

“Call of Duty 4” offers both a dramatic experience in single-player and a deep and exciting multiplayer game. Fans of first-person shooters must check it out.