Guitar Hero Developer Announces Rock Band

figgen writes "Gamers and music fans have been waiting on details for the next Harmonix project, now that the company has been purchased. The development team behind Guitar Hero announced Rock Band via USA Today. The title is coming to the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, and will expand on the concept by adding singing and drumming into the mix. 'With MTV as a partner, Harmonix was able to sign deals with the major forces in the music publishing industry and has access to the master recordings of music from popular artists. Electronics Arts is also involved, and will use its global reach to help distribute the game.' GameSpot had a chance to sit down with Harmonix's Alex Rigopulos and EA Partners' David DeMartini to talk about the upcoming title."

Comments

Drummania comparison

[bugbeak]

I find it a bit sad that Konami's own GuitarFreaks and Drummania series hasn't seen much coverage at all. I haven't played Guitar Hero, but to those who have, how do they compare?

Genius way to develop this game.

[kinglink]

First they release Karaoke revolution, a game that's popular in Japan and now in America.

Karaoke revolution 2 introduces Duets for Americans.

Then they release Guitar hero, a game that explodes in popularity.

Then they release Guitar hero 2, introducing the cooperative guitar players.

And now they release Rock band, a game which takes everything they learned and adds drums into it. Plus working with EA probably helps them get online working which can only improve the game.

Hell I could even mention frequency and amplitude for timing and visualization but the point is that they essentially made every part of this game into it's own game except for drumming. Very cool Harmonix.

Hope it hits the WII

[mheddings]

I read a quote from one of the developers on Kotaku so I'm hoping this gets done.

Absolutely, we will at some time bring Rock Band to every console of significance and in doing so we will customize and tailor the play experience to take into account the weakness of the console and the strengths of the consoles," he said. "I think (the Wii) is something that holds enormous potential for music games.

http://kotaku.com/gaming/wii/wii-rock-band-likely- 248882.php

Drat

[aarku]

Drumming with the Wii remote and nunchuck ala Rayman Raving Rabbids would have been fun. Is the Wii not beefy enough for their intentions or something?

Re:As insightful as jello brand gelitan.

[starwed]

You do realize that many real life rockstars play GH, right? And that trained drummers are often better than guitarists at it? :)

Guitar Hero = PaRappa the Rappa

[illeism]

Playing guitar is entirely different than playing guitar hero. Guitar hero is rhythm based, and has nothing in common with real guitar playing other than the rough shape of the instrument. Comparing guitar hero to actually playing is like (insert OMG bad car analogy about hot grits on nat portman with a pony overlord named c.neil in soviet russia)
That would be why drummers do better... all they have to do is hit something...

Re:In a Dream World....

[RCSInfo]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who took issue with the singing in GH2. While I understand the great reviews for such a fun game, I couldn't believe how many reviewers actually liked the singing. For as much money as this series brings in, you think they could bring in the original artist for a few tracks. How much does Zack de la Rocha fetch for a performance these days? Matthew Sweet? The lead singer of Warrant?

Of course this doesn't work for Nirvana or Lynyrd Skynyrd. But at least they could do a little better covers.