From the beginning of the meteoric rise in popularity of games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero people have clamored for a way to create and upload their own content. Valiant attempts have been made to fill the user created content shaped void in our hearts, some coming closer to a solid and easy solution than others, yet sadly, all have fallen short in their noble goal. Freshman effort Freetar Hero offered a way to create custom content but kept you locked to a keyboard and monitor; a Guitar Hero 2 hack brought us closer (and likely the closest we'll get) but was a fairly daunting task that, let's face it, a lot of people weren't up to facing. It seemed like the custom content dream had died.
However, in a recent interview, Harmonix's VP of Product Development Greg LoPiccolo, in response to a question regarding the feasibility of custom content coming to games like Rock Band said, "It is conceivable, and would be awesome. We continue to talk about this possibility. I can't commit to such a thing at this point, but would love to tackle it if we could find a way." And once again, our heartstrings are needlessly tugged.
While the ability to create and trade your own content for games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero would be simply amazing, the chance of it actually coming to pass seems incredibly remote. Considering the fact that downloadable content represents a good portion of profitability in this genre, and the fact that copyright hounds would have a field day with this kind of thing, the dream of user created content will likely remain just that. It's reassuring to know that Harmonix remains interested in the possibility of custom content in spite of it's seemingly remote likelihood. Thankfully the one thing we can bank on, confirmed or not, is that profits win ten times out of ten. As soon as Harmonix can figure out a way to make money from custom content, and avoid the highly likely lawsuits to follow, you can bet we'll see it. In the meantime I'm still happy with regular downloadable content and the ability to flail about like a retarded chimp as I work my way toward faux rock and roll glory.
[Via GameDaily -- Thanks, James]
Contest:
6:56 PM on 01.14.2008
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In Parappa and Lammy, you had to free style, and free style well, in order to truly excel at both games. In Guitar Hero and Rock Band, any note played off the sheet music is considered a wrong note.
There is nothing rock and roll about that.
You can play Freetar Hero with a Guitar Controller, either a USB 360 one or a PS2 one with an adapter. But like I said, it'll just be playing notes thrown on top of the songs like DDR, it's not the same. I made a hacked version of GH II also, but it was just a combo of the best songs from GH I+II.
This is key. Any corporation isn't going to give up control of it's content at this point. We can't even get legitimate rom hacks of 20 year old games (they are still hacks after all).
@ MaxVest: The mutual promotion thing would amazing.
Feel free to ignore me and not argue with me on the moral/financial implications; that horse is dead AND bruised enough.
And frankly I don't want custom songs. The musicians at Harmonix do a damn fine job. We need these kinds of people directing our notecharts.
It would be cool if you could upload your own songs that you owned the rights to but I wouldn't expevt that anytime soon because of the extreme complications that would incur. I'd go as far as to say to not expect it until the NEXT generation of consoles is around the corner.
I checked back not too long ago, and it looked like the number of users has at least tripled! Im wanting to get into it again, once you download the 5 freeware programs needed to rip a disc, it's really not hard at all, and I have a lot more fun playing many user created songs than the real game.
A message to Harmonix: develop a program that can accurately interpret drum and guitar tracks from an mp3 I have (a daunting task indeed) and you have my word to pay $200+ for such a console game.... In other words: your variety in included soundtrack for Rock Band sucks! The DLC does not have that much variety either. Welcome to the top 40 MTV crap! The metallica old-school package is the only gem in this group.
Any game that can tackle this idea for me has much, much more worth than Rock Band.