Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Guitar Hero 4 v Rock Band

I'm very surprised that we haven't talked about this yet.

If the Guitar Hero 4 Drum Kit is any indication then Guitar Hero 4 is going to be Rock Band. And I have no idea what happens when both Guitar Hero 4 and Rock Band are in direct competition with virtually the same product. If Guitar Hero 4 has online multiplayer and downloadeable songs (a safe bet) then...what happens? We have two versions of basically the same game? What about music rights? Can Guitar Hero 4 and Rock Band share songs? It'll be interesting if only because this will be one of the few true "Pepsi v Coke" situations of gaming.

Personally? I really hope that the "add more drum pads" approach to one-upmanship between the two continues with each new version until we get to the point where players have to be lowered into their drum kids just like the guy from Rush.

Also, I fucking hate Rush.

4 comments:

Mike Lewis said...

i saw this a day or two ago...but was waiting for it to be more than a rumor.

I think it is a really bad idea. Guitar Hero does one thing really good. Super Complex Guitar rhythms. Rock Band, on the other hand, has an interesting multiplayer thing....

if they are the "same" they are going to try (and have begun to try) to lock bands or labels into exclusive deals, which is good for no one. My Name is Jonas is on Both Rock Band and GH3, but they play very differently.

This seems like a grab on GH4's part...and i think it is going to fail. At this point there are very clearly GH people and RB people.....and GH people want nothing to do with the rest of it.

Mike Lewis said...

also - 3 drum pads and 2 cymbals....if the yellow = hi-hat...it is going to break really quick. It does not look like it is well built.

_J_ said...

My assumption is that Rock Band made more money than GH3, which is what brought about the interest in making Guitar Hero similar to Rock Band.

I don't think it is necessarily the case that adding a Drum Kit and microphone will make the Guitar Tracks less interesting. But it would be nice to know what the Guitar Hero folks think they are doing.

What I want to know is how people will assess GH4 v Rock Band. Because you know that someone will say "Adding a drum kit and mic do not turn Guitar Hero into Rock Band" even though, historically, that's where Rock Band came from. So you'll have two companies offering virtually the same thing and, presumably, consumers will only pick one.

It'll be interesting to watch.

_J_ said...

"It does not look like it is well built."

Prototype.