Anyone who thinks using the standard Rock Band bass isn’t authentic enough ::cough:: should check out what Mad Catz is offering. They just started shipping the Fender Precision Bass for the Xbox 360. The bass, which will also work with the game’s upcoming sequel, Rock Band 2: Laughing Out Loud, lacks a whammy bar, just like the real bass. Instead, gamers get to fiddle with the volume knob to get the whammy effect. So, despite what Amazon says, she’s shipping today. → Read More
Looks like an update for Rock Band will be available for Xbox 360 owners today. The PS3 update “will follow and we’ll let you know when we have an idea when it will drop,” according to Harmonix. The patch fixes some scoring wonkinesss and, perhaps more importantly, will allow you to export your Rock Band songs to Rock Band 2. It was unclear which songs would NOT be able to be exported, but now we have the list: Paranoid (Black Sabbath), Run to the Hills (Iron Maiden), and Enter Sandman (Metallica). → Read More
And now, the details about how you’ll be able to transfer the tracks from the first Rock Band game to Rock Band 2, which will be released for Xbox 360 on September 14th. → Read More
If you find yourself feeling like half a man while using the sorta-cheap standard-issue Guitar Hero and Rock Band guitars BUT you don’t think you’re quite ready for the responsibility of owning and learning to play a real guitar, here’s a nice little baby-step along your path to self-realization. It’s a real-feeling, full-size guitar for Guitar Hero and/or Rock Band (the PS2 or PS3 versions only). It’s called the “Starpex” – huh? — and it features “an instrument-quality, high-gloss lacquered finish with a hardwood body, neck, and headstock handcrafted by a leading guitar manufacturer giving the authentic guitar experience that Guitar Hero and Rock Band enthusiasts crave.” → Read More
Here’s an update to today’s earlier post — just got this press release. It’s the full track list for Rock Band 2. Peace Sells by Megadeth? Where’d You Go by the Bosstones? Livin’ on a Prayer by Bon Jovi? Looks pretty sweet. I can’t wait. → Read More
Shacknews reports a handful of newly-announced bands for Rock Band 2. So far we’ve got Dream Theater, System of a Down, Foo Fighters, The Muffs, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Motorhead, Cheap Trick, Elvis Costello, Journey, and The Who. Add to that list, the following bands: Pearl Jam, Metallica, Allman Brothers, Devo, Jane’s Addiction, Megadeth, Paramore, Modest Mouse, AC/DC, Bob Dylan, and Guns N’ Roses. Hot damn, I like what I see. Don’t get too excited about Guns N’ Roses, as the in-game song will be “Shackler’s Revenge” from the band’s Chinese Democracy album, which has been in development since, like, 1968. The AC/DC song will be “Let There Be Rock” and the Dylan song will be “Tangled Up In Blue.” Other songs aren’t known, but Megadeth? Hell yeah to Megadeth. I likes me some Megadeth. UPDATE: Full track list here. → Read More
Flickr’d, a real rock band Konami has sued Harmonix, alleging that Rock Band infringes on several of its music game-related patents. Karaoke Revolution first came out in North America in 2003, several years before both Guitar Hero and Rock Band. Now Konami wants Harmonix to pay up. Apparently Harmonix hasn’t received the official complaint yet, so it hasn’t said anything in its defense. Fact: I still see kids playing Dance Dance Revolution in malls. via Next Generation → Read More
Hey, look at that fancy guitar there, wouldja? That’s what you’ll get if you buy Rock Band 2 when it comes out in the fall. If you already own the first Rock Band and you purchased any songs for it, they’ll all transfer over to Rock Band 2. Glory be! Kotaku tells us that you’ll also get new drums with “a metal reinforced pedal, quieter pads, velocity sensors” and it’ll also be wireless. The guitar itself will also be wireless and feature a “sturdier strum bar” and “quieter buttons.” → Read More
We’ve got prices, people. For the standalone instruments, anyway, and only for the Wii at that, but it helps give a ballpark. At $70 the guitar is 20 bucks more expensive than what the year-old guitar is going for right now, and the drums at $90 are similarly more than the current ones. Looks like the pricing is more or less analogous with the old setup, and this is for pre-order, so it’s not counting day-of-release deals, bundles, and so on — although it’ll still be a grip of cash no matter how you look at it. You who are about to go into debt to afford this game and all its accessories: we salute you. → Read More
Rock Band 2 will come out this year for the Xbox 360 in September, with other platforms—the PS3 and Wii—getting in on the fun later in the year. What that means, exactly? Your guess is as good as mine. But let’s focus: Rock Band 2 is coming. You’ll be able to use all of your Rock Band 1 accessories in the sequel, but new versions will be released alongside the game. You’ll also be able to use all your downloaded songs (DLC) in the sequel, which is awfully magnanimous of publisher MTV Games. Another secret: I never played Rock Band. Wanna see a picture of the new guitar and a few screen shots? Of course you do. → Read More
It is their music, after all. They’ve historically been pretty slow to take advantage of new avenues of distributing their music, probably because the world is already mostly saturated with it. But Beatles reps were in talks with both MTV Games and Activision, so you could be singing selections from their catalog in Guitar Hero or Rock Band some time soon. The thing is, it first has to be approved by the Apple Corps, made up of Paul, Ringo, Yoko Ono, and Olivia Harrison, and that’ll be a tough sell. I would imagine they’d be skeptical of the artistic worth of a game where their songs can be played any which way and modified far beyond their original state. Boy, if “I Feel Fine” was in the song list of one of these games, I might actually have to start playing. The drum parts should be pretty easy (take that, Ringo). → Read More
http://www.collegehumor.com/moogaloop/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1819976&fullscreen=1 Sure, it’s not the first all-home-made-robots rock band ever, but this one’s a little more sophisticated than most, and it has a robotic singer. Nice touch. What I’d like to know is this: How come there’s no video of robots playing Rock Band as a rock band yet? We’ve seen bits and pieces, but I want the whole four-piece. You heard me, robohobbyists, get busy. Thanks, Andy! → Read More
Yesterday we brought news of a desktop version of Rock Band for Facebook that was mediocre at best. And today, we have Frets on Fire, an open-source Guitar Hero clone that looks like it could actually be pretty badass. You can play along to the included songs, or you can import your own from Guitar Hero 1 or 2 discs, a neat trick. Or you can create your own with the in-game song creator. Or, and this is the part that’s fun, you can import songs from other instrumentoke sites like Keyboards on Fire. We haven’t tried it out yet, but apparently with some hacking it’ll work with a Guitar Hero controller, but because the Xbox 360 version is USB-based, and pirate drivers are already out for Windows and OSX for them, you should be able to tweak it to to work without too much hassle. Just keep your office shredding to a minimum, because that would just be dumb. → Read More
I love Facebook, and I love Rock Band, but I’m not sure about Rock Band on Facebook. The app lives in a Flash player and is a series of games that don’t seem to have anything to do with the real game Rock Band. To play drums, for example, you quickly click on drum set icons, whack-a-mole style. You invite your friends to join your band and try to rack up better scores than the other rock bands. Mine’s called Notorious Pervert. If you’re really bored or really enjoy repetitive, mind-numbing tasks with rock music in the background, try blogging. Or the new Rock Band game on Facebook. → Read More
If you’ve got a PlayStation 2 and you’ve been waiting to pull the trigger on Rock Band, then I can safely tell you to pull, dammit! Pull! Amazon.com has the PS2 Rock Band Special Edition bundle for $99.99, which includes free shipping. This same bundle sells for at least $140 just about everywhere else. Again, pull! via dealnews → Read More
Music games, like Guitar Hero and Rock Band, have been popular for awhile in Japan. And American rock has been popular in Japan as well, with the 80s bringing most American acts to Japanese audiences who ate it up. Thus it only seemed natural that Rock Band, the super-successful music game in the US, would find its way to the land of the rising sun. MTV will be porting the game to Japan later this year, and expects it to sell well. Given the Japanese appetite for American rock and their experience with this type of game, we have no reason to doubt them. For an example of a great American rock band playing to an enthusiastic Japanese crowd, check the video after the jump. → Read More
As if we don’t like hacks and Rock Band enough as is, here comes a heartwarming mod that hacks a Rock Band drum kit to allow those who can’t use their legs to still hit the kick pedal for the Monsters of Rock score. They disassembled the kick trigger and rewired it to a standard doorbell which was mounted to the drumsticks. It’s not just a concept, it’s specifically made for a woman who’s sadly wheelchair bound but, like us, loves Rock Band. Now she can tour with her entourage as if she was Tommy Lee and score the points. We like it for so many reasons, mostly because it brings more people to the arena. → Read More
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