and understand their music in a totally different way than they've ever experienced it before." They also had requests by artists to include master tracks within the game. In addition to working more directly with artists, RedOctane and Activision worked with various musical instrument and equipment companies to provide in-game product placement. Such vendors include BOSS Effectors, DW Drums, Eden Bass Amplification, EMG, Epiphone, Ernie Ball Strings, Gibson Guitar Corporation, Guitar Center, Hofner, Kramer, Krank, Line 6, Mesa Boogie, MusicMan Basses, Orange Amplifiers, Randall Amplifiers, Roland, Vans and the Vans Warped Tour, VHT, and Zildjian. Guitar Hero II was originally announced for the PlayStation 2 on April 17, 2006. A demo version of the PlayStation 2 version of Guitar Hero II was released with issue #110 of Official PlayStation Magazine on October 5, 2006. Features of the demo included four playable songs on four difficulty levels for single player and co-op modes. Demo releases do not feature the ability to flip the notes for left-handed players. Demo versions feature the songs "Shout at the Devil", "You Really Got Me", "Strutter" and "YYZ". The retail game was released for the PlayStation 2 on November 7, 2006, in North America, November 15, 2006 in Australia, and November 24, 2006, in Europe. It was released as both a stand-alone game, and as a bundle containing the game with a cherry Gibson SG guitar controller. Xbox 360 version When Activision purchased RedOctane in 2006, the company expressed strong interest in bringing the Guitar Hero series to "every significant new format" in order to take advantage of the next generation of consoles. The Xbox 360 version was announced on September 27, 2006, at Microsoft's X06. Dusty Welch of RedOctane stated that the Xbox 360 "provides an incredible platform for facilitating downloadable content" due to the integrated hard drive on the console. The Xbox 360 version of the game included 10 exclusive songs and additional content available for purchase through the Xbox Live Marketplace. The Xbox 360 version was released on April 3, 2007, in North America and Australia, and then on April 6, 2007, in Europe (only as a bundle containing the game and a wired Gibson X-Plorer guitar controller). It was released as a stand-alone game for the Xbox 360 in the UK on January 25, 2008. The arrangement of the songs were also altered, and the graphics were slightly improved. Gameplay Gameplay is