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Rock Band To Allow Independent Artists To Add Their Own Songs
Bakkster writes "Independent artists will be able to use the XNA Creator's Club to produce the Rock Band note-charts for their music and sell them in game later this year. Bands will use their original song masters and generate a MIDI file that produces the game 'gems' to which players can follow along. Tracks must pass a review process with other XNA members, and then a final approval from MTV Games. Songs will be sold for between 50 cents and $3, with the artist getting a 30% cut after MTV and Microsoft take their cut. The best tracks will also make their way to the Wii and PS3 after a 30-day exclusive period."
This is great, but it should be even more open. Anyone should be able to add their music to Rock Band, whether they are selling the songs or distributing it for free. Even if the corporate overlords don't make money off of the deal, simply having the option would increase the value of the game and lead to increased sales. Everyone wins!
You write your music. You play your music. You convert your music into the game. We take the profit.
Note also how it says they get a 30% cut AFTER mtv and microsoft take theirs. So if they both get X% and Y% then they arent getting 30% of the revenue. They are getting .3*(R-X-Y)% and who knows what that really is.
By the time an artist sells a song, they'll owe Microsoft money.
Do you have ESP?
That sounds... fun?
About time, people have been asking for this since Gutiar Hero 1 I believe, that said, they are requiring that you get the premium subscription to the XNA creators network ($100 per year) according the link.
Comparing the summary, article, and official site:
Summary and article: prices range from 50 cents to $3 per song
Official site: Final pricing has yet to be determined
Summary: Artists get 30% after MTV and MS take their cut
Article: Artists get 30% of each sale
Official site: Artists get "a cut" of each sale
Where did the figures in the article and summary come from?
This is a HUGE win for everyone: Harmonix the company, Rock Band the games, all of the musicians, and us as players. It's a blend of the iTunes music store and the iTunes app store, both of which were ground-breaking, genre-defining, and they both remain hugely profitable to everyone involved. This is going to let them build up their music library to be even bigger, and it was already large compared to Guitar Hero: World Tour's.
So far, both RB and GH:WT have been founded on songs sequenced by the game creators. While they've done a good job, and I can't really see another way to get started, it can never scale. There's so much music -- even when you limit the pool to music that can be fairly accurately portrayed by the combination of guitarist, bassist, drummer, and vocalist -- that this approach can only ever be a tiny, tiny drop in the bucket. Releasing the sequencing tools allows for crowd-sourcing, which scales very well indeed. There is going to be so much music available now that never was and never reasonably could be expected to have been made available via the old model.
I expect that indie musicians, and the savvier mainstream groups (I'm thinking of Radiohead here), will be the first ones in the door. If the record labels know anything about anything (which might be an unreasonable expectation), they'll eventually get in on this too.
I see two potential problems with this. One is that this could possibly limit their future expansion plans. Presumably there will be a Rock Band 3, and I would expect it to add features from RB: Beatles like multi-part harmonies. If songs are sequenced for RB2, will they be updated to take advantage of newly features in the future? It's very easy to imagine idiotic record labels getting all their stuff in once, with mediocre quality, and then never updating them. Harmonix is going to have to exercise its veto power a lot -- both to keep quality high, and to delay songs that really need upcoming improvements to be played the way they deserve to be.
The other problem I see is that the Wii and PS2/3 platforms are getting screwed. It'd be one thing if there were ONLY a delay between releasing on the Xbox and releasing on the other platforms -- that'd be ok. But releasing on the Xbox, and then maybe sometimes releasing on the other two, depending on some vaguely-defined metric? That's completely the wrong approach, and sounds like holdover thinking from the old way of doing things. Who's going to judge which tracks are eligible to be transferred to the other systems? At some level, that's always going to end up as judging the song, and more importantly imposing that judgment on the users (the paying customers!) of the other systems. I can't think of a valid reason to segregate the fanbase this way, and I think if they stick to this plan it will come back to bite them.
Still, based on the initial announcement... huge, HUGE win.
This might just be the tipping point into investing in Rock Band 2 for the Wii.
Smart move in any case.
Ask 8 slackers a question, get 10 awnsers (a citation, but I can't remember from who)
This just shows how the music 'industry' works and how it protects its artists. They protect them from making money for their hard work.
Its about time America live up to their 'free country' slogan and kill monopolies like RIAA & MPAA and create a real free market.
What about artists who don't want to charge money for their work?
Request your free CD of my piano music.
You mean the music the "unwashed masses" want/get because they don't know better?
frets-on-fire has been doing this for a long time. Although, its nice to see the commercial market has caught up with its open source counterpart.
What about the copyrights for the songs? Do you maintain total control over your work? Are you signing your songs over to them? Are you granting them an exclusive contract to redistribute your songs in perpetuity? Can you revoke the agreement later and pull your music off their service? If you later "make it big", can they hold this agreement over your head to force you into further contractual agreements with them?
Judging by the experience Valve has had with Microsoft, you either charge for your content or you don't put it up on Xbox Live.
What if I want to play my interpretation of "sympathy for the devil"? I'm more than happy to give the Rolling Stones their cut, per the copyright law...
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
There's a lot of really good independants out there (I know, captain obvious just called...), and a 30% cut, while not the best thing in the world, is still better than a lot of what these artists would make otherwise in the current environment (so lets call it "baby steps", or "progression"). That will encourage the bests to do even more, and even bring some independants into the mainstream spotlight. Whats not to like?
If there's some good stuff that pops in there, Ill happily burn hundreds of dollars on this. Im a sucker for good, original music.
What about artists who don't want to charge money for their work?
You have no choice. MSN charges to host the song, so they will want their money. Same for Harmonix. I suppose you can give your cut to charity.
The only thing worse than a Democrat is a Republican.
I would kill to have some TMBG in Rockband
What about artists who don't want to charge money for their work?
You have no choice. MSN charges to host the song, so they will want their money. Same for Harmonix. I suppose you can give your cut to charity.
Ok, so why can't I cut MSN and Harmonix out of the loop and download the song directly from the internet and then put it in using a CD?