The team quickly recognized that "the controller really was the kind of magic sauce for what we wanted to do". They identified three aspects of gameplay that they felt made the game stand out. These aspects included the note-matching aspect and the showmanship created by the use of the whammy bar and tilting of the guitar within the game. The third key aspect was the use of Star Power "to provide a little more depth to the game — some replay value, some interest for people as they were playing beyond just hitting the notes". Harmonix used third party controllers made for "GuitarFreaks" that were already on the market for development of the game until RedOctane had prepared prototypes for the "Guitar Hero" controller. The controller initially had pressure-sensitive fret buttons to mimic the playing of a real guitar, but the idea was dropped as it made the gameplay too complex. The idea of using the whammy bar to boost Star Power, in addition to altering the pitch of sustained notes was only realized about a month before the completion of the game. The team had spent "precious development time and resources" into creating a free-style model that would have allowed players to improvise during songs but ultimately cut it as they could not work the feature into the existing gameplay.