Most of us are looking at the performance of titles like DJ Hero and wondering if the Sun's starting to set on squeaky plastic instruments. If you're Harmonix, however, that's the last thing you're thinking. In fact, the Rock Band developer believes that the music game genre is yet to peak at all.
"I absolutely do not believe that rhythm-action gaming has reached its peak," protests CEO Alex Rigopulos. "Of course, 2009 was a tough year with the recession, which especially affects music games given the relatively high price point of instrument bundles. But in the long term, people’s passion for music isn’t going away, and rhythm gaming will continue to provide people with a deeper level of engagement with the music they love. So, yes, I do think that future music games will exceed the sales success of the last generation"
Guitar Hero project director Brian Bright also denies that music games are in trouble, and believes that user-generated content will revitalize them: "If you can’t create or edit licensed music due to copyright laws then you’re limited to pretending to play someone else’s music. I think the key is to create music, but make it compelling to create, so the game is in the creation, not the playback."
Call me old fashioned, but I think not releasing ten Guitar Hero games a year might make customers a bit more willing to buy music games when they launch. Or maybe that's just silly talk.
Harmonix: Music Genre Hasn't Peaked [Edge]
Contest:
2:00 PM on 01.25.2010
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The problem isn't that the games or the genre has peaked. The problem is no one is doing anything to advance them. And no one will until somebody grows some balls and takes some risk. Take music games out of this plastic instrument kick and do something radical.
User content is a nice touch but the gameplay and the awful shelf distrubution business model still stands. Somebody needs to show music games are more than plastic instruments and falling gems.
Dammit I swear if I were Alex Rigopulos...
1. GHIII was awful. The only well done GH not by Harmonix was GH5 which is unfortunate because so many people have dismissed it already.
2. There is currently only one GH announced for 2010. There are four Rock Bands. Rock Band 3, Project Pearl Jam, Green Day: Rock Band, and Rock Band Unplugged 2.
3. Have some faith with Harmonix and Natal. We don't even know anything yet. If you think they're going to have air guitar or some shit I think you're overthinking it. Wait until they announce something before shitting on them. Natal isn't bad as long as devs are smart about it.
I mean they have experience with the EyeToy and that was terrible so if nothing else they know how not to do the camera motion control thingy.
As Xzyliac mentioned, I think the music genre in general hasn't peaked but am a bit wary to say the same for the fake plastic instrument genre. Oh, I'll buy Rock Band 3, but I don't think it'll ever dominate (or even create the need for) social gatherings like Rock Band 1 or Guitar Hero 2 used to.
Do we really need a Rock Band for every trendy band in the world? This is what DLC was made for, people. And yet, this crap still sells.
It's like me paying another 60 bucks for Modern Warfare, but with a different set of weapons in place of the current.
I'm probably the only one loves that game, but what didn't you like about GH3? I rarely go about playing RB2 without a few sessions of GH3 right after, since it's so much. I really don't understand all the hate for it.
As for the music genre peaking, he can't put the blame on the economy. Like many have said, DLC is the way to go about it. releasing three or four expensive sets a year is not attractive to consumers.
The charts. The charts for all NSoft GH games were so bad until GH5 although I gotta say Aerosmith was an exception. Too bad no one else bought it. :/
And the only songs I really went back to play in GH3 are in Rock Band. Kool Thing FTW.
The only game that Harmonix has officially announced thus far is Green Day: Rock Band. Rock Band 3 is probably an inevitability (i.e. fall project), but the Pearl Jam project has been very quiet since originally discussed, and I'm not sure if there will be a Rock Band Unplugged 2.
Then we got The Beatles: Rock Band. Alright, it's the Beatles. I'll let you guys have that one.
Then LEGO Rock Band.
Then they announced Green Day: Rock Band.
If they didn't have the magic that was Rock Band Network, I'd have jumped ship from the Harmonix fanboy boat long ago.
They announced and they have a website for it.
I've been on their forums. They've "talked" about it. By talk I mean they've told people they can't talk about it. So something in a Pearl Jam form exist my friend. You'd be blind to not see it.
Think about it guys/gals though for a minute... We would have even more awesome mucisians and prodigy's would outshine all!!!
Is the music game genre overloaded? Fuck yes.
If we have American idol karaoke and Disney music titles. Yes it is.
Are there clear leaders in this genre?
Rock Band and Guitar Hero
Whats wrong with this genre?
Too many expensive expiriment that very few people were asking for. No one wanted Band Hero. No one demanded DJ Hero or Scratch.
We have developers and publishers looking to make a fast buck and did so poorly by trying to force expensive bundles on everyone.
What can be done to sustain this genre long term?
Stop with the bundles! No more. List on a game plainly that you will need a guitar controller, drums, and a USB mic. Let the third parties war out the plastic instrument minefield at this point.
Stop releasing single-band games. It's all well and good for Beatles Rock Band. It's the freaking Beatles. Not AC/DC, not Green Day, not Pearl Jam.
Stop dressing up Band focused titles as shitty comp discs of b-songs. Really. Neversoft. Looking at you. What the he'll was that Van Halen game? Awful. BAD. NO.
With what's out there already support the games with more content of greater value.
Harmonix is the ONLY COMPANY that has gotten this even halfway right. So if I'm to follow along with GH logic, I should have to buy music for your platform only to have you abandon it a year later for something new?
Christ. Why not just blow up the whole thing and start changing what color the buttons are every year?
Create something homogenous and symbiotic.
Rock Band 2 was so well received not for just being a new tracklist but an expansion and improvement on the gameplay of the original.
Guitar Hero World Tour, drums and mics aside, which was honestly just playing catchup to Harmonix, was a new setlist and not much else.
Any long term changes necessary to keep the formula fresh?
If there must be yearly updates give us something, take away nothing. If it's been a heavily used feature keep that shit in there. Otherwise drop it.
How many returned or unplayed copies will you have if the games lack the tutorial? Really. No one needs them anymore and they're just tacked on now for cheevos only unless you've been living in a cave for 40 years.
If they want to save music games they need to do all of this at a minimum.
He may well be right that there are possibilities are to give greater depth to the genre, but not right now. For all our sakes, give it a break!!
Well, tell Nielsen Co.'s SoundScan that. According to them, US sales of CDs fell almost 20% from 449.2 million in 2007 to 360.6 million in 2008, and this was the seventh drop in eight years.
You may be thinking, "We'll, that's because of online distribution". Not so. 85% of album sales are made up by CD sales, leaving a meager 15% in online sales. Now unless the masses are downloading everything illegally, (alot are, but I wouldn't say most), there is an obvious decline in people's "passion for music".
Why? because ClearChannel, among others, have cornered a market that used to be about freedom of choice and expression, and turned it into yet another lifeless shill of corporate propaganda and vehicle for consumerism. Music's passion is gone because we can see through the thin veneer, into the soul of fresh faced sixteen year olds spouting the injustices of their high school clique ... it's all bs. Music used to be for everyone, now it is squarely marketed at a peer group of tweens and teens who have more disposable income than adults who are more concerned with paying the bills, at least in the eyes of the corporate world. Just by listening to public radio a mere five years ago you might have heard music from 20 new bands a month. 20, and that was with hearing the same schlock repeated day in and day out. Now, you're lucky if you hear from a new artist, ONE, every 3 months! Exclude American Idol winners and teen Disney up and Comers ... these people have been pushed through the marketing gleam-o-tron to be perfection in front of a camera and push sales, not talent. Eddie Izzard said it's 70% how you look, 20% how you sound, and only 10% what you say, (I realize he probably wasn't the first to say it, but it's what come to mind during this rant).
The industry is in a downward spiral. Here were the top selling albums of the last few years:
The best-selling album of 2005 was The Emancipation of Mimi, by Mariah Carey.
The best-selling album of 2006 was High School Musical Soundtrack.
The best-selling album of 2007 was Noel, by Josh Groban.
The best-selling album of 2008 was Tha Carter III, by Lil Wayne.
The best-selling album of 2009 was Fearless, by Taylor Swift.
I don't know about any of you, but none of these were anywhere close to being picked up by me. Perhaps catering to top sellers is the shot in the arm Alex Rigopulos's company needs to "reach it's peak"....
... Jeebus help us all ...