Today, we begin a two part series about the future of band-centric video games. In this first part, we will examine the band games that have already been released (or announced), in order to determine what characteristics they share.
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We don't usually announce DLC for music games, but in this case, we felt it newsworthy. Legendary band The Who is playing the halftime show at the Super Bowl (which is touted as taking place in South Florida, not Miami, for some reason). Perhaps Pete will be smashing his guitar on stage as millions make a run for more chips, dip, and tasty beverages.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the Rock Band Network will launch tomorrow. I guess the rumors of "Early 2010" should have been "Extremely Early 2010". Rock Band Network is a service by which any user can create and upload their own music into the Rock Band store. I'm sure all sorts of smaller bands are anxious to get started with this, but bigger bands like Creed and Evanescence are rumored to make their music available via Rock Band Network. The official Rock Band forums have a fan-made list of confirmed bands and songs, and it's well worth a look.
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Microsoft has launched a brand new dedicated music store section to Xbox Live featuring all the music downloads for Rock Band, Guitar Hero and the Lips franchises.
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The Rock Band series of games is arguably the best in the genre. The first Rock Band pioneered the full band experience. The sequel brought us the disc export feature, allowing you to play previous disc-based songs using the latest and greatest game engine. The Beatles Rock Band is the best band-centric game ever. And LEGO Rock Band is far from just another easy cash grab, full of features that make it appealing to gamers of all ages.
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If there was one thing holding Rock Band 2 back from being the perfect music game, it would have to be the lack of support for wireless microphones. A patch has just been released that fixes this problem, allowing rockers to use the Lips microphones (also recently released seperately) in a fully wireless environment. We're pleased with the addition of this feature, but curious as to why it took so long. After all, wireless mic support was announced last year!
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Just in case the four gazillion tracks available for download aren't enough for you, Harmonix is up to something that will bring even more tunes your way. MTV is launching the Rock Band Network later this year. The network is a way for any artist to upload their songs so they can be enjoyed in video game form. How about some details?
We normally don't cover Rock Band or Guitar Hero DLC on the site, because frankly, there's just too damn much of it. But every once and a while something comes along that simply a crime not to mention. This weeks' Rock Band DLC is such an item.
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Lets face it, music games are pretty much the ultimate party co-op game. They are also the most expensive games out there thanks to their plastic peripherals and yearly refreshes. The biggest problem with them for retailers are the large boxes taking up valuable shelf space. So what's a retailer to do? Sell them cheap!
Justin Heeren, Colony of Gamers editor pseudopseudo, posted this pic on Twitpic -- it's the entire set list of the currently released Rock Band series on a banner.
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MTV Games and Pepsi are teaming up for big summer promotion for Rock Band. Beginning June 2, Rock Band fans will have the opportunity to become winners of an MTV Video Music Award. All you have to do to take home your own prestigious Moonman trophy is shoot a music video of you and your friends playing Rock Band in co-op! There is a catch however, you'll need to be playing along with one of the contest's predetermined songs. Videos can then be submitted to the contest website, where users will vote on which band totally melts faces and will be walking the red carpet at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards.
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In Part One of this editorial, we looked at the strengths and weaknesses of disc based content delivery in music games. To summarize that discussion, disc based games are portable and keep resale value, while swapping discs and flooding the market are problematic. Let's consider the pros and cons of DLC, followed by a some final thoughts on the matter.
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