Why Rock Band is never coming out in Australia UPDATED

[chitoryu12]

I've never played RB, but I own and really enjoy sucking at GH3. With the new Guitar Hero coming out in a short while and being basically the same thing as RB, could someone 'splain the areas where the two upcoming titles really differ?

With GH IV, you have all the instruments that RB does, but they do some things differently. In GH IV guitar has a touch pad on the upper neck for tapping, sustained notes, and slides (I think string bending too), the bass has a sixth note for open string playing (no frets), the drums add an extra pad and put the cymbals up high like a real kit, and has a song creator and guitar customizer.

RB is supposed to have new playing modes that "let you transition from Expert to real instruments", compatibility with the ION Drum Kit, some new controllers for the guitar (Including a full-sized Stratocaster with the controls imbedded), and I believe a mode that allows the drummer to play over songs to practice his drumming. Also, all the original RB downloaded songs are useable in RB II, whereas GH IV has its own set of downloads seperate from GH III.

[Losonti Tokash]

I've never played RB, but I own and really enjoy sucking at GH3. With the new Guitar Hero coming out in a short while and being basically the same thing as RB, could someone 'splain the areas where the two upcoming titles really differ?

With GH IV, you have all the instruments that RB does, but they do some things differently. In GH IV guitar has a touch pad on the upper neck for tapping, sustained notes, and slides (I think string bending too), the bass has a sixth note for open string playing (no frets), the drums add an extra pad and put the cymbals up high like a real kit, and has a song creator and guitar customizer.

RB is supposed to have new playing modes that "let you transition from Expert to real instruments", compatibility with the ION Drum Kit, some new controllers for the guitar (Including a full-sized Stratocaster with the controls imbedded), and I believe a mode that allows the drummer to play over songs to practice his drumming. Also, all the original RB downloaded songs are useable in RB II, whereas GH IV has its own set of downloads seperate from GH III.

There's also the fact that the devs behind GHWT are idiots. The UI is terrible (let's have the bass note be a purple line on a dark purple background!), if one person fails the whole band fails instantly (as opposed to Rock Band, where they can be saved twice by other band members), and the retarded boss battles.

Of course, the worst thing about GH is the overcharting. Which is to say they make the songs unnecessarily difficult. On guitar you'll play notes that don't exist or play a rapid set of 3 note chords when in reality it's all played on one string. On drums, they'll turn a snare triplet into something you play on the snare and both toms for no reason. On vocals, you will have to sing lyrics that don't even exist.

At any rate, here's some comparisons:
GHWT: 85 songs, plus the album Death Magnetic.
RB2: 104 songs, plus 55 songs from RB1, along with the 197 songs that have been released for download already. Harmonix has promised that Rock Band will have over 500 tracks by the end of the year.

GH tends to charge more for downloaded songs, and only allows you to download them in packs.
Rock Band sells songs individually or at a discounted rate in packs.

Guitar Hero has announced the terrible new Metallica album which will be released in the game at the same time as when the album hits stores. The GH version has two extra versions of Suicide and Redemption with extended solos.
Rock Band has released, in their entirety, Screaming for Vengeance by Judas Priest, The Cars' self-titled album, and Doolittle by the Pixies, along with a "Best of the Who Rock Band Edition" album with 12 songs selected by the band itself. They've also announced plans for Blood Sugar Sex Magik by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Colour and the Shape by the Foo Fighters, Peace Sells by Megadeth, Texas Flood by Stevie Ray Vaughn, Nothing's Shocking by Jane's Addiction, Moving Pictures by Rush, and a No Doubt Best Of album in a vein similar to the one by The Who.

Instruments between the two games are completely compatible. Initially the makers of Guitar Hero were being dicks and refused to let Rock Band guitars work with GH3. They also blocked a patch by Harmonix that would have allowed the GH3 guitar to work in Rock Band on the PS3 (though on the 360, the GH3 guitar was compatible with Rock Band). Recently Sony and Microsoft put a stop to that and forced them to make their game and peripherals compatible with those of Rock Band.

[Arthur_Tuxedo]

So to summarize, the makers of the Guitar Hero series act like you'd expect a game publisher to, greedy and shortsighted, while the makers of Rock Band make surprising breaks with convention to build a franchise over the long haul. I bet most of us can guess which is going to end up the better game.

[Alferd Packer]

Well, right now, I'll be purchasing GH.

I read up a bit on the song creator thingy, and have concluded that infinite content > finite content. Fiddly, obessive-compulsive nerds slavishly creating downloadable content in the game for my perusal sounds just fine by me.

Moreover, this game is a party game, I intend to use it as such. If the game plays weird on Expert, no one I know is gonna care(myself included), because they'll all be farting along on Easy and having a great time doing it. Hell, the best I can do is play horribly on Hard, but again, I have a great time doing it.

I guess I'll compare the tracklists of the two games and see if one or the other blows me away. Right now, though, the song creator feature takes the cake for me.

[Losonti Tokash]

I guess I'll compare the tracklists of the two games and see if one or the other blows me away. Right now, though, the song creator feature takes the cake for me.

Hahaha what

Even leaving out the fact that there's no vocals allowed, and all the sounds you can put in are pre-canned, have you seen the custom charting community for Guitar Hero yet? It's the most retarded bullshit ever. Almost all of it is Dragonforce songs and has impossibly difficult charts for no reason.. Enjoy your five button chords, buddy.

For reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VBfDfgi ... re=related

[Alferd Packer]

Hahaha what

Even leaving out the fact that there's no vocals allowed, and all the sounds you can put in are pre-canned, have you seen the custom charting community for Guitar Hero yet? It's the most retarded bullshit ever. Almost all of it is Dragonforce songs and has impossibly difficult charts for no reason.. Enjoy your five button chords, buddy.

For reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VBfDfgi ... re=related

Your point? As I understand it, each user is limited to a certain amount of song uploads. You need to actually have people download your shit and like it to be allowed to upload more. Further, since the charting program is offered through the game, it'll probably prevent you from doing the more idiotic things seen in those custom charts, like five-note chords. And if not, oh well. I don't have to download those crappy songs.

Finally, what does it really matter if the vocals have been removed? Only three people can play the custom songs instead of four?

[Losonti Tokash]

I thought my point was pretty obvious: it's a terrible idea. The few decent tracks are going to be drowned in an absolute avalanche of total and utter shit. I guarantee the vast majority won't even be songs so much as they'll be people trying to make the most difficult chart possible.

The game itself is also likely to be glitchy as fuck, if Aerosmith was any indication. The A/V lag in that game needs constant adjustment after every 2-3 songs, regardless of what tv you have, the framerate stutters, the charts got even more retarded than in GH3, the whole thing is just a mess.

Then there's all the assholish remarks directed at Rock Band by Activision, along with blatant lies ("guitar hero world tour is the first music game to have all four instruments!" or accusing Harmonix of imitating the game that they themselves created in the first place). They don't have a direct impact on the quality of the game, but it definitely turns me off to the idea of supporting a company that's clearly run by douchebags.

[Stark]

So to summarize, the makers of the Guitar Hero series act like you'd expect a game publisher to, greedy and shortsighted, while the makers of Rock Band make surprising breaks with convention to build a franchise over the long haul. I bet most of us can guess which is going to end up the better game.

This is really obvious in everything I learn about WT. When I heard it was 'GH goes RB, with different instruments' I was pretty interested, but everything I've learnt over the last week has made me shake my head. At the most basic, the GHWT UI is balls, and it's pretty much a re-arranged GH UI. The band shares star power! If anyone fails, the team dies! Because when you play a party game, you want to be able to lose - that's why you can fail out of a song in Singstar, after all! And let's not forget that if a musician drops too many notes during a performance, the band just gives up and walks offstage. That's why in no GH game can you get less than 3 stars, lol!

OH WAIT! They're just slavishly staying 'true' to the formula of GH1, which Harmonix sensibly abandoned once they worked out what they wanted to do with the game concept. All the instrument gimmicks in the world (and Tool tracks) aren't going to make up for what is clearly uninspired.

And this is coming from an Australian, who is unlikely to ever see a release for anything Rock Band related. I'd rather not play any silly musci games than play a shit, ugly, clunky, pile of crap.

[RRoan]

I'm going with GH:WT because the guitar hero series actually has challenging songs, which isn't something that rock band can claim. And when I run out of challenging songs in the stock game, well, then I can make my own. I don't think most of you understand just how big a thing the custom song creator is to those who can accurately claim to be extremely good at the games.

It's the most retarded bullshit ever. Almost all of it is Dragonforce songs and has impossibly difficult charts for no reason..

For reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VBfDfgi ... re=related

You post a song made as a joke as evidence that the custom community is retarded? For every song like that I can find several customs that are easy as shit.

*Waits for inevitable flood of angry posts*

[Stark]

Sorry, GH series is hard in stupid ways. As Los says, they add notes for no reason, overchart the songs, and mix parts for no reason. I actually find RB's style of 'simpler note tracks, but timing is much more important' far more rewarding than 'stupid huge wall of notes where you can be a quarter-beat off and still score'. And again, it's a party game - after a few beers with my mates, I don't want to be doing GH-style mash wank nonsense.

The song creator is probably going to be complete shit for reasons outlined by Los. Sure, it might not be, but when even the regular GH songs are fucking horribly tracked, letting random fatty metal idiots do it is hardly likely to IMPROVE the quality.

I actually think it's hilarious that people can say shit like this. 'Oh I'm HELLA LEET at GH, so RB is FOR TEH NOOBZ'. Sorry, most of the market isn't fatty nerds who can play everything on expert, so RB is both more accessible AND more compatible with the party format AND less wanked out with 'extra' shit just to make it harder. We should all care that the top 1% of GH players think RB is too easy, right?

[chitoryu12]

I'm going to be getting both simply because the both intrigue me, though without a doubt I'll be buying RB2 first because I can still play with my downloads, as opposed to GHWT where none of my downloads from GHIII work.

And the overcharting has just gotten hilarious in GH. Apart from the ones you've mentioned (Yay for keyboard on guitar!), they've even had you play notes for open strum, as in no frets. The machine gun guitar on "One"? Those green notes can be open strummed and the three-button chords played with one fret each. I'd love to see how they would do "Smells Like Teen Spirit". On a real guitar between the chucking you just move to the next string with your chord. They would probably have you going halfway across the fretboard.

A final gripe I had was the sheer sensitivity of the strumming. I've played with four different guitars from the GH series on GHIII and the strumming is too sensitive. Just hitting it too hard causes it to play up to three notes at once.

[Elessar]

This is really obvious in everything I learn about WT. When I heard it was 'GH goes RB, with different instruments' I was pretty interested, but everything I've learnt over the last week has made me shake my head. At the most basic, the GHWT UI is balls, and it's pretty much a re-arranged GH UI. The band shares star power! If anyone fails, the team dies! Because when you play a party game, you want to be able to lose - that's why you can fail out of a song in Singstar, after all! And let's not forget that if a musician drops too many notes during a performance, the band just gives up and walks offstage. That's why in no GH game can you get less than 3 stars, lol!

I didn't hear about this until now, but those are some rather annoying decisions to make. Honestly, did the game go through no play-testing? It made sense that you could help your teammates through a song, even if that meant they sat out for a portion of it. What kind of fucking party game stops the moment one player screws up?

I guess Activision is still pandering to the so-called 'hardcore' crowd. Overcharting and inane difficulty settings they've got down pat, now to piss off casual gamers completely by making it impossible for new players to ever complete songs without practising on their own!

[Stark]

A final gripe I had was the sheer sensitivity of the strumming. I've played with four different guitars from the GH series on GHIII and the strumming is too sensitive. Just hitting it too hard causes it to play up to three notes at once.

Shit yeah, strumming and having it count as once down and once back up is fucking annoying as shit.

[Losonti Tokash]

I'm going with GH:WT because the guitar hero series actually has challenging songs, which isn't something that rock band can claim.

You're either an idiot or a liar if you seriously claim that Green Grass & High Tides, Run to the Hills, Afterlife, Bodhisattva, Visions, Panic Attack, Constant Motion, or Sleepwalker aren't difficult songs.

For chrissake, it was only Tuesday that anyone managed to FC RttH, even though Rock Band has been out for almost a year. GG&HT has yet to be conquered by the likes of men.

[chitoryu12]

I'm going with GH:WT because the guitar hero series actually has challenging songs, which isn't something that rock band can claim.

You're either an idiot or a liar if you seriously claim that Green Grass & High Tides, Run to the Hills, Afterlife, Bodhisattva, Visions, Panic Attack, Constant Motion, or Sleepwalker aren't difficult songs.

For chrissake, it was only Tuesday that anyone managed to FC RttH, even though Rock Band has been out for almost a year. GG&HT has yet to be conquered by the likes of men.

Hell, except for Through the Fire and Flames, GG&HT is the only song in GH or RB which I've never beaten. And Run to the Hills, actually, isn't that hard on drums or guitar. For drums, it's more just endurance and speed, as the song is very repetitive. The chorus and verses are 90% a fast drum roll with a constant bass beat throughout most of the song. I've failed only due to my broken pads. As for guitar, except for several seconds of the solo, there's nothing that's really challenging, so it's a song I can go wild on and do perfectly while still being entertaining.

[Brother-Captain Gaius]

So I have to wonder... do the people complaining about RB not being hard enough actually challenge themselves with the game or just play a few songs on guitar and say "lol"? 'Cause, y'know, there are drums and singing. Singing in particular I almost never see anyone talk about, as if it's somehow beneath them.

And yet, I would be willing to bet anyone complaining about the guitar tracks in RB would get massacred on even Medium for singing, especially on those Bruce Dickinson / Rob Halford "I want to commit suicide for my vocal chords" gems.

[DPDarkPrimus]

I play with one of the top-ranked singers on X-Box Live, and I don't know how he does it. He even actually sings well, not in some odd falsetto like a lot of people have to do for high notes.

[Losonti Tokash]

arrgghhhh this fucking song


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRDquEQf99w

P.S. The game is awesome go play it already.

[Stark]

I play with one of the top-ranked singers on X-Box Live, and I don't know how he does it. He even actually sings well, not in some odd falsetto like a lot of people have to do for high notes.

It's called 'having vocal range'.

[DPDarkPrimus]

Which some people simply don't have, Stark.

Interesting note: Some of the more recent DLC is actually different in RB2, with HOPO chords (which, not existing in RB1, were not present). I only know that Skullcrusher Mountain and Rio have them so far, but I'm intrigued as to how far back Harmonix was charting DLC for both games.

[Losonti Tokash]

It's possible that they'd charted hammer-on chords in anticipation of the feature in RB2, but it's also possible that the engine automatically decides that they should be hammer-ons. IIRC, pretty much all notes faster than 1/8, unless explicitly designed otherwise, were HOPOs.

[Stark]

Which some people simply don't have, Stark.

Oh yeah, I was just saying that it's not magic that makes you a good singer. My range sucks, but Flash has killer range.

Los, if RB2 treats chords like single notes for purposes of HOPO determination, that could well be it if they wanted a workaround. It doesn't really involve much complexity for there to be rb2-specific markup in the note tracks however.

[Losonti Tokash]

Oh yeah, especially since Rio and Skullcrusher Mountain are recent so it'd be pretty easy for them to do that.

[DPDarkPrimus]

Oh yeah, especially since Rio and Skullcrusher Mountain are recent so it'd be pretty easy for them to do that.

Hence my wondering as to how far back they go.

I know broken talkie songs like There Goes My Gun were fixed, too.

[Losonti Tokash]

So, now that there's online band world tour, anyone interested in making an SDN band?