Rock Band - YOUR PLASTIC TOYS USE BATTERIES? PERVERT.
 

Well, Rock Band 3 has been out for a while and we've never really had a proper discussion thread on any of the Rock Band games. Rock Band 3 has been out in the US since October 30th and those of you who have been following and anticipating its release have probably already gotten a chance to play it.

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What are the impressions so far? How are you guys liking the addition of the keyboard? How many of you are gonna pop the $279 for the Squier Stratocaster controller?

So far, I've only played the demo but I'm really loving what I'm seeing. I'll be picking this up on Thursday night.

Edit: I was talking to Omagnus on Facebook and, after he noted that there's a Dire Straits song in this game (I've been straight up jonesin' to have "Sultans of Swing" in this game. It's one of my favorite songs of all time), it occurred to me that I haven't seen the set list for this game AT ALL yet. So I hunted it down. Hopefully Wikipedia isn't fucking with me. List is, of course, in alphabetical order:

Amy Winehouse – "Rehab"
Anthrax – "Caught in a Mosh"
At the Drive-In – "One Armed Scissor"
Avenged Sevenfold – "Beast And The Harlot"
The B-52s – "Rock Lobster"
The Beach Boys – "Good Vibrations" (Live)
Big Country – "In a Big Country"
Blondie – "Heart of Glass"
Bob Marley & The Wailers – "Get Up, Stand Up"
The Bronx – "False Alarm"
Chicago – "25 or 6 to 4"
The Cure – "Just Like Heaven"
David Bowie – "Space Oddity"
Deep Purple – "Smoke on the Water"
Def Leppard – "Foolin'"
Devo – "Whip It"
Dio – "Rainbow in the Dark"
Dire Straits – "Walk of Life"
The Doobie Brothers – "China Grove"
The Doors – "Break On Through (To the Other Side)"
Dover – "King George"
Echo & the Bunnymen – "The Killing Moon"
Elton John – "Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting"
Faith No More – "Midlife Crisis"
Filter – "Hey Man, Nice Shot"
The Flaming Lips – "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 1"
Foreigner – "Cold as Ice"
Golden Earring – "Radar Love"
HIM – "Killing Loneliness"
Huey Lewis and the News – "The Power of Love"
Hypernova – "Viva La Resistance"
Ida Maria – "Oh My God"
INXS – "Need You Tonight"
The J. Geils Band – "Centerfold"
James Brown – "I Got You (I Feel Good)"
Jane's Addiction – "Been Caught Stealing"
The Jimi Hendrix Experience ˆ"Crosstown Traffic"
Joan Jett and the Blackhearts – "I Love Rock 'n Roll"
John Lennon – "Imagine"
Juanes – "Me Enamora"
Lynyrd Skynyrd – "Free Bird"
Maná – "Oye Mi Amor"
Marilyn Manson – "The Beautiful People"
Metric – "Combat Baby"
The Muffs – "Outer Space"
Night Ranger – "Sister Christian"
Ozzy Osbourne – "Crazy Train"
Paramore – "Misery Business"
Phish – "Llama"
Phoenix – "Lasso"
The Police – "Don't Stand So Close to Me"
Poni Hoax – "Antibodies"
Pretty Girls Make Graves – "Something Bigger, Something Brighter"
Primus – "Jerry Was a Race Car Driver"
Queen – "Bohemian Rhapsody"
Queens of the Stone Age – "No One Knows"
Rammstein – "Du Hast"
Ramones – "I Wanna Be Sedated"
Ravonettes – "Last Dance"
Rilo Kiley – "Portions for Foxes"
Riverboat Gamblers – "Don't Bury Me... I'm Still Not Dead"
Roxette – "The Look"
Slipknot – "Before I Forget"
Smash Mouth – "Walkin' on the Sun"
The Smiths – "Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before"
The Sounds – "Living in America"
Spacehog – "In the Meantime"
Steve Miller Band – "Fly Like an Eagle"
Stone Temple Pilots – "Plush"
Swingin' Utters – "This Bastard's Life"
T. Rex – "20th Century Boy"
Tears for Fears – "Everybody Wants to Rule the World"
Tegan and Sara – "The Con"
Them Crooked Vultures – "Dead End Friends"
Tokio Hotel – "Humanoid"
Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers – "I Need to Know"
The Vines – "Get Free"
War – "Low Rider"
Warren Zevon – "Werewolves of London"
The White Stripes – "The Hardest Button to Button"
Whitesnake – "Here I Go Again"
The Who – "I Can See for Miles"
Yes – "Roundabout"

Frankly, I'm pretty happy with the range I'm seeing here. We have a bit more variety than the last couple of games and, fuck year, WARREN-FUCKING-ZEVON IS IN THIS GAME. I was also under the impression that Rush was going to have a song in the game disc set list but I guess I heard wrong.

I certainly want to pick up the nicer guitar, but I don't know at the moment.

Although, looking at the regular controller is kind of intimidating. Holy shit, that's a lot of buttons. It's definitely an expensive, but needed addition to the game. The fad had died with the sequel and this is what they needed to keep it going.

Not to mention it's actually teaching you something for a change.

Well, that was kind of the idea with the first game and the drum kit. The idea was that you could (theoretically) become really good at drums in Rock Band, replace the drum set with a real one and you'd be a semi-decent drummer. The one thing I'm really liking about this is that, yeah, it actually has an extensive lesson system for all the instruments (sort of like what the fill tutorials for drums were in Rock Band 2) and it's giving you a step-by-step walkthrough of it.

I really wanted to try it first hand in the demo but the demo really only has a couple of songs to play in there. (fuck yea, Spacehog!) In any case, come Thursday we're gonna need to get some peeps on Xbox Live to play this shit.

This sounds like a fun game, but I don't have enough people coming over on a regular basis to justify getting it, since I've heard its much better multiplayer and in the same living room with other people.

I also have to tip my hat to their shrewd business decisions regarding DLC: Because I can't believe they're getting away with selling people tracks that ONLY work in that game.

I picked up Rock Band 3, but without the keyboard for now. I tried it out while I was at Nutty's place and can wait on it.

The way Career mode and unlocking clothes/instruments works is a neat change from past installments. Career seems shorter, but that doesn't really matter since everything runs off of goals now.

Um, why? It makes sense that DLC for a new Rock Band with a new instrument wouldn't be backwards compatible. Support for Rock Band 2 had to stop sometime, and I'm sure future games will use some if not all RB3 DLC like Lego did. The only thing to complain about as far as DLC is the $10 charge to export tracks from previous games, but I don't know anything about licensing fees that may be involved with that.

I preordered the keyboard+game combo. My roommate has been trying to learn keys so I figured he'd be all over that shit. I've been playing pro drums (fuck you, blue cymbal, for constantly double-hitting) while I wait for my Mustang to arrive. Once it arrives, the drums will collect dust.

I really like a lot of the changes they made to the game. For example, being able to drop in and out of songs at will, and also the ability to change difficulties between songs without having to start the entire setlist over. It was rather annoying to go through a 7 song setlist, only to fucking fail hard on the last song and have to start over in order to drop a difficulty level.

What I don't like is how All Instruments Mode is implimented. This has been a topic of conversation for awhile on the rockband forums. Basically, if you have Guitar + Bass + Keys, you're forced into AIM even though you only have 3 players. They (Harmonix) did not design it to trigger if you had more than 4 players, just if you have that combo. In fact, you could do Guitar + Keys + Drums + Vox + Harmonies and it would not trigger AIM.

For those of you that are curious, the Fender Squier (the actual six string guitar that will be usable on RB3) is coming out in April. Pre-orders start in January. It'll be going for $280, compared to the Mustang's price of $150 for a midi-guitar.

EDIT:

The DLC has been an interesting debate as well. Since the tracks from RB, RB2, L:RB, Beatles:RB, and GD:RB do not have any of the advanced things (other than pro drums, and beatles:RB having harmonies), they're not directly compatible with RB3 unless using strictly legacy instruments. Between that and the old DLC not having any of the extras (other than pro drums), a lot of people are inclined to not export the songs from the old games. Harmonix HAS said they're reviewing ways to get the legacy tracks updated with new charts, but it'd take awhile, and it isn't even 100% that they'll do it yet.

I've got RB3 and have enjoyed what little I've played it so far. I like a lot of the cheesy 80s songs too, which was a nice surprise. I'm liking this game's version of career mode, challenges, and goals as well. I've dabbled with pro drums (I have the Ion kit), so as I get back into the game, I expect that I will play pro drums a little more frequently. I'm still trying to get my stamina back after having barely touched RB2 in months.

I'd definitely be down for some multiplayer with some people from around here, though I'm really only decent at drums at this point.

It's the same shrewd business decision that the Guitar Hero guys made when they added drums and shit to their franchise, the old tracks not having the drum or vocals lines in meant they weren't compatible with the new system. If you want to play those, you have to get off your couch and swap the disks over (Or own a copy of Guitar Hero Greatest Hits).

I remember Paco getting quite upset about the commercialism of the Guitar Hero franchise about the time they did that so it'll be interesting to see if his love for Rock Band survives this transition.

I suppose you're right, but I figured they would just have the newer tracks in the older games just sans the new instrument parts. See I was thinking that if someone picked up RB2, and they wanted to play a song on RB3, they could DL the song, and then play it again on RB3 later on, with the added instruments that RB3 has.

Just seems like they missed an opportunity there to me. Anyway, does RB3 have multiplayer online now?

That's not the same at all, though. The old songs are all still playable on Rock Band 3. You just can't play the new songs on old games which seems reasonable enough to me.

Of course. Only the side games lacked that for whatever reason.

Even side games had online multiplayer. I don't remember Lego RB lacking it :o

Nope, Lego RB didn't have online. Whoever made that decision was hopefully fired, because it was an otherwise fun game.

Oh really? In which case, what could possibly be anyone's problem then?

It didn't have online for the same reason the Wii has a million barriers to online play: it's all about the kids. Since Lego Rock Band was supposed to be their kid friendly entry in the series they removed the online functionality. I can understand not liking that they did that, but I also sort of see why they did do it.

There are two problems with how they're doing DLC.

1) Anyone who doesn't play rock band 3 can no longer get DLC (rock band, rock band 2, L:RB, etc) because it'll contain information that the older rock bands don't understand.

2) The old DLC is not being directly updated for RB3, which means as it stands now, you have to pay for the same DLC again if you want newer instruments to work. The only thing that works with old DLC is pro-drums, because the cymbals have been charted since the beginning, just not mapped to anything prior to rock band 3.

#2 is a valid concern for the bit about having to rebuy content I already own. I'd love to have keyboard support in the old Bon Jovi songs rereleased today, but I'm not going to pay full price for something I already own.

#1 is a necessary evil of upgrading software. Companies don't support old versions of software forever, and eventually the consumer has to upgrade or be left behind. Rock Band 1 & 2 had a hood long run, but I don't have a problem with the lack of backwards compatility.

In response to Omagnus' point, the Wii argument doesn't hold much water when you have games like Viva Pinata that go online for 360. If they were that concerned, it wouldn't be hard to just block the under-13 accounts from taking the game online, instead if crippling it for everyone.

Has anyone actually confirmed that new DLC doesn't work with the older games? Because all the DLC that came out for Rock Band 2 continued to work with Rock Band 1, so even though there's additional information I don't see that causing a problem. Hell a few small title updates and it definitely wouldn't be a problem.

Difference here is that rock band 2 didn't have anything new charted into the DLC that rock band 1 wouldn't understand, whereas rock band 3 has keyboard, harmony, and pro instrument support that rock band 2 will not support.

I don't remember the source, but I'm pretty sure they discontinued support for rock band 2 DLC. You can still get the legacy stuff on rock band 2, but they're not developing for it anymore.

I'm certainly happy with the tracklist on disc for RB3, though, like Paco, I wish Sultans of Swing was in here and not Guitar Hero. Sigh.

Since I don't have a keyboard yet I feel as though I'm missing out on a considerable part of the game. Does anyone here have the keyboard and enjoy it a lot? I know I won't be playing "Imagine" unless I get to do some plastic ivory twinkling.

I like the keyboard. It's well made.

The real trick is that to do overdrive you have to learn to play one-handed, and while the charts definitely assume that you're playing one handed, it's a huge learning curve.

The nice thing is that you can play guitar and bass parts on it, so if you end up going to a song that doesn't have keys, you're not forced to switch to a new instrument to keep playing.

My roommate is absolutely insane over the keyboard. Its the only instrument he plays. I've only sat down with it a couple of times, and its a crazy learning curve for someone who hasn't touched a keyboard since 6th grade.

I think the problem people are going to have with the DLC is that all the new DLC that will be coming out will have a part of it that will only work with RB3. As far as I know, all the new DLC being released from this point on will have the regular instrument and vocal parts for the legacy hardware as well as the pro parts for the Mustang and Stratocaster guitars, but only the pro parts will work in RB3 which, you know, is perfectly understandable.

But, yeah, all the DLC that I've bought (a lot of it) works with both Rock Band titles and a large portion of them work in LEGO Rock Band as well. I think it has something to do with lyrical content on some of the tracks and the ones that are deemed "parental guidance suggested" don't work in the LEGO version because it's a "family" game.

Viacom Profit Beats Estimates as `Jersey Shore' Bolsters MTV - Bloomberg

Harmonix being sold.

The saturation and relatively quick death of this genre is neither surprising nor unexpected when you consider how quick the turnaround on these games are, especially after how poorly GH6 and RB3 have been doing, but it's none-the-less a sad thing.

In before Activision buys them and makes them make COD map packs.

I dunno if RB3 has been doing poorly. I think Harmonix's low sales comes from the fact that they hadn't really released a major title in awhile. Sure, there was Green Day Rock Band and Beatles Rock Band, but they weren't major titles like RB1, RB2, etc so they were likely to sell less, since not everyone wants band specific stuff.

RB3 just came out, so it'd be interesting to see the numbers after this quarter.


On a different note, I just got the Mustang and holy crap pro guitar is hard. Gonna take forever for me to get used to it.

To be fair, I didn't even know this game was coming out until the week before it was released. And even then, I'm waiting til after Christmas to pick it up because I'm broke. Dropping $60 on a game, and then $150 or so on a new guitar controller is rough. Or $80 for the keyboard. It's kind of a big investment--especially this close to Christmas. Looks like a ton of fun, though. I can't wait.

Although, I think sales will go up slightly once it's deeper into the Christmas shopping season. Maybe.

Rock Band 3 debuted in 26th place in the UK charts, with sub-8000 units sold. Guitar Hero 6 did 10 times that. Which is WAY DOWN from the one and a half MILLION on an opening week that they have done in the past.

Without NPD numbers anymore, we can't have a completely accurate barometer of US performance. But it has been fuck awful, and when the relative charts come out soon enough we'll how low it placed.

The genre is in decline for a whole variety of reasons, but to assume Christmas is going to change the thing's fate by a large margin, especially one THIS CONSIDERABLE, you're being completely ignorant of the facts and just how front loaded sales tend to be in this industry. First week sales are extremely telling of how well a title is going to do, this one is no different.

Harmonix should have smartened up post Beatles, but by going and doing Green Day they certainly didn't do themselves any favours. That's certainly true.

Part of the problem is that the main new features in the game are things that many people might not care about. Not everyone is going to care about the keyboard or pro guitar/bass, so they will just look at RB3 as a big song library expansion, filled with songs that they may or may not know or care about. I can see where a lot of people regard the idea of the new game with a big "eh, I'll get it when it's $30....maybe". With the huge DLC library already available, I can easily see where a lot of people will look at what they already have with RB2 and their DLC library and be satisfied with that.

Jesus christ Harmonix, code your site better (link to forum response to selling of Harmonix).

For those curious about the whole thing. Harmonix being sold will not affect rock band, and DLC will continue. Harmonix being sold does not relate to sales figures, but from Viacom wanting to turn away from video games.

Harmonix doing awful in the UK relates to a) the news about certain songs being banned from export strictly in the UK and b) from lack of instrument availability. Getting instruments is tough in the US, let alone anywhere else in the world, so anyone who is interested in doing pro guitar/keys/drums in the UK is SOL for now, and thus won't buy the game until the instruments are better produced (FU madcatz).

Their products are no longer profitable. Of course it has to do with sales figures. Don't believe everything you read in a corporate PR statement. "Company abandons positive revenue stream; shareholders rejoice" is not often a headline.

The bit about ongoing support is neither here nor there, considering.

RB3's lackluster sales have to do with a tonne of factors, but to assume they will pick up further down the line to an extent that makes the venture not a resounding failure is naive and silly. In any country.

They picked an odd time to release it too. All the hype at the moment is about Kinect and Black Ops, I've literally not seen a single ad for Rock Band, in fact I didn't even know it was coming out until I saw this thread.

The market is over-saturated now. For more casual gamers there are a ton of Sing Stars and dancing games and the completely over the top guitar is never going to appeal to people who want something to play with their mates when they're pissed up. Essentially they've released a game aimed at "Hardcore" guitar game fans and there simply aren't enough of those to make the sales they expect from the series. Maybe if they released it a couple of weeks later once the Kinect hype had died down and in time for Christmas purchases they might have done better. maybe not. I think also, looking at the set list, for me at least there's not enough on there I'd want to play to warrant buying the game. Basically I've got enough guitar game tracks from Guitar Hero 3, 4, Hits and Metallica to keep me going forever and the only game I'd be likely to add to my collections would be a Guitar Hero (Or Rock Band) Guns n Roses which lets face it, will never get released.

*sigh*... :(

I guess it was only a matter of time. Oh well! It was fun while it lasted!