Through the Fire and Flames

Through the Fire and Flames
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As Performed By	[[DragonForce]]
Year	2006
Appears in	Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock, Guitar Hero: Smash Hits
Tier/DLC	Bonus (Guitar Hero III), Quebec City (Guitar Hero Smash Hits)
★★★★ (Expert)	404,670 Expert; 296,676 Hard; 203,132 Medium; 123,504 Easy
★★★★★ (Expert)	566,538 Expert; 415,347 Hard; 284,385 Medium; 172,906 Easy

[[Category:Songs by DragonForce]]

Through the Fire and Flames , also known as TTFAF for short, is a song written and recorded by DragonForce, appearing as the first track (and single) on their third studio album, Inhuman Rampage (2006). It is widely considered to be among the hardest Guitar Hero songs in the series.

Because of its inclusion in the game, DragonForce's sales greatly increased following its announcement in the game.^[1]

Walkthrough

The intro is generally considered the hardest part of the song. Many people find that upon its completion, the rest of the song is passable. The intro is all pull-offs, but its speed results in many players failing at less then 5%. A common method for passing the intro to the song is Tapping, but many find it passable while sticking with one fretting and one strumming hand. Some common tapping methods include tapping blue and orange, or tapping yellow blue and orange. Another way is to hold green with any right hand finger, leave it there, and quickly hit the hammer ons in the second (RYBO) hand position. Either way all notes higher than green should be hit and released to green very quickly.

Piano style players could try holding green with their pinky and their pointer finger above red. Their other hand could go above Yellow, Blue and Orange. They could then strum the first note with their foot.

This is often considered to be the hardest song on the PS2 and Wii version of Guitar Hero III and competes for hardest song on the XBOX360 and PS3 versions with "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" (downloadable content - Boss Battle Track Pack). It is almost always considered the hardest full combo in any Guitar Hero game, along with Bark At The Moon (GH1 Version Only), Jordan, Free Bird, Satch Boogie and TDWDTG. The song involves intensive strumming and fret work and contains the "Red Snake" (within the section of the song entitled So Far Away 3 in Practice Mode) which has been calculated at about 26.6 notes per second, with ludicrously rapid hammer-ons and pull-offs from red to orange, back to red, down to red, and back to green. Shortened up it would be RYRG around 6.5 times per second. It can be FC'ed by anchoring and releasing the red notes right after the YBO taps.

However, this song was Full Combo'ed by Chris Chike long before The Devil Went Down to Georgia was by Danny, although this may be due to the fact that more time was devoted to TTFAF than TDWDTG.

Hint

During the real song it is played on the clavichord. Simply hold down the green button and ignore it, focusing on the melody played on the red, yellow, blue and orange buttons and remember to release them to "pull off" to the green note. Many people prefer to tap this section. A trick is to put a rubber band around the green note for the intro. This is not considered "cheating" but more of a cheap trick (no pun intended) used to propel farther. As well, a player could hold the green note down with his left big toe, should he be able to play like that. He could also have a friend hold down green.

Technically, the intro is actually full of pull-offs, since in the game and real electric guitar, the ability to pull off makes the green note automatically play and is what propels players through this intro. Had the first note been green, and then the second red, rather than the reverse, then the whole intro could be termed hammer-ons due to the notes approaching from left to right. This would also make the intro very slightly easier due to the ability to hammer on the first note then pull off to green.

Appears In

Guitar Hero III (Bonus Tracks)

This song appears as a Master Track.

Guitar Hero: Smash Hits (Quebec City)

A Full Combo

On June 3rd, 2008, Chris Chike (Known as Iamchris4life) posted a video of his first full combo (FC) run of the song. It was the first recorded FC of the song. On October 1st, 2008. Baseballkid7 scored the third FC, which also was the last song he had to FC. JPrez44 has also managed to FC it. On July 15, 2009 Guitarherodude2008 also got a FC on this song, and holds the unoffical world record.

GuitarHeroPhenom, Danny Johnson, has now FCed this song 27 times and is now currently in 1st place. He did the Guinness record on February 26th, 2009, breaking Iamchris4life's 8-month streak of holding the title.Danny and Frank (known as oddballzfrank) are the only people to FC the song on Guitar Hero: Smash Hits.

Trivia

Herman Li, the lead guitarist for DragonForce, failed the song on Hard with 2% completion and has stated that it is impossible. Since then a few players have FCed it and Danny Johnson has done so 27 times and Noah9000 16 times.
This is one of only three bonus songs that does not have to be purchased in order to be played. (Along with King and Queens and Joe Perry Guitar Battle)
This is also the final encore song, which is playable in the end credits. When played in the credits, this song cannot be failed. There is also no star power or rock meter in the credits. This also happens in Kings & Queens in Guitar Hero: Aerosmith and Pull Me Under in Guitar Hero: World Tour.
On the 360 version of the game, if the song is completed on Expert, the player achieves the "Inhuman" achievement. This is a reference to the DragonForce's album Inhuman Rampage, in which the song is on.
When you start up this song on Expert on either the Wii or Playstation 2, the loading screen will always say "Good Luck."
This song was FCed on Expert difficulty before it was FCed on Hard.
This is the only song contained on the original disc that the "Now That's Impressive" Achievement can be obtained on.
In Expert and Hard, the note difference is 999 notes. This is possibly a reference of Studio 999, which is a reference of Neversoft.
This song has 32 different sections, more than any other song in this game.
This song is the Only Bonus Song to Appear in Guitar Hero: Smash Hits.