Post-Rock Band? finally I'll be able to play some Godspeed! You Black Emperor and use my star power on the twenty minute segments of static in between songs.

Torrim

@Scottendo:

Since this is Harmonix we're talking about, I'm sure if they make RB2, they'll let you redownload all the songs that you did for RB1 for free.

This is Harmonix... remember the Harmonix who had a patch ready for the PS3 that enabled the GH3 controller to be used in RB.

DigiMish

@katorok: THEY BETTER BE TALKING ABOUT BAND WORLD TOUR ONLINE!!

How about just finishing their world-wide release? I'm still waiting to see a release date for this in PAL countries.

Btw, is there any country where both Singstar and Rockband are out for PS3? I want to know if the microphones are compatible with both games. Not that I'm a big fan of Singstar (never played it, actually) but quite a few girls I know are. ;)

Doshu

@ZenGaijin: im with you there! What they need to add is a save multiple outfit option.

GUNLOC_MORIYM

I want an in game browser for purchasing tracks. It's a pain to browse through Live to find stuff.

eggfou

so...that means...THE NEXT ROCKBAND WONT SUCK!!!

TinyLightning

@katorok: Or Bass Solo Tour.

ZerozakiIshiki

I love Downloadable Content just like the next man, but thats just the point.

If, and when, they make a Rock Band 2.. my character, downloadable content, and work I put into it will be lost. I just splurged on buying some DLC for Rock Band, and I don't want to have to buy Rock Band 2 really soon.

I know i'm prolly just freaking out, especially if maybe 'Rock Band 2' will allow us to import our characters, bands, and stats, and even DLC!

If so, that would not be so bad. If I wanted to play an old song from Rock Band i'd just put the CD in.

On the subject of DLC, I hope they release new clothes, places, guitars, and other things.
And on the subject of Rock Band 2, please fix the character customization. Hats and coats should be in their own group!!

Scottendo

The only way it would happen is if you had to pay for conversions. Like if they had a $15 per month or $50 per year set up. Don;t get your hopes up for it to be free.

seasponge

Rock Band now with your own retractable STAGE!

Raziel3333

Does anyone here realize that this would not replace DLC. The songs would have to be master tracks for them to work the way you think. That is why if Harmonix doesn't get the master track of an Ozzy song then they must record it themselves. Make their own master track. What happens when you stop playing a song in Rock Band or GH? The guitar, drums etc stop. Without a master track the song would either keep going or completely stop.

This no doubt is a cool feature either way and if implemented would be a fix for songs that will never get in the game. I would welcome it with open arms.

PS: The smoke and effects pack is not a Harmonix or EA product for crying out loud.

Cartman86

I could finally play songs that for some reason are glanced over by GH like songs by Prince & Earth wind and Fire.

ZenGaijin

They could essentially have a pay-to-import system

tvo

@Zelyre: Just like Quiet Riot did, except they were talented.

Erwin211

Wouldn't this possibly decrease the number of song downloads from players?
@Darthearl: Certain stores sell those. They're not labeled as groupies though...
@Pr1vate_D0nut: I would love for them to come out with some sort of keyboard peripheral for Rock Band. Think of the song possibilities!

Erwin211

Huh. My friends and I were talking about this very possibility recently, and the general agreement was that Harmonix would never do that because it would put them out of a job and nullify all the DLC...Color us dead wrong, I guess.

WildKnightblazer

@Pr1vate_D0nut:

Heh, then we can Rock the Suburbs!

Zelyre

KEYTAR!!!

Pr1vate_D0nut

Eh. All this talk about improvements to Rock Band yet I never got to play it yet! Depressing.

Saint Anima (PSN = PoeticMassacre)

They're probably only talking about the smoke screen and lights pack we already know about. Maybe it's a new guitar controller that has a working downstrum and a click instead of a squish for each strum.

ceilingFANBOY: sponsor me for PBP, link in profile

Importing your own songs for a music game a la Beats for the PSP would be awesome, but like KCGIG101 said, no one would pay for any downloadable content.

But if Harmonix would be kind enough to do that... perhaps with some kind of a lock feature... like you can only import 10 songs per week and the next week if you want, you are free to replace any of the 10 imported songs. Yea, I think that's kind of fair.

DigiMish

Phase is nice as something to fidget with while listening to your music, but it's not a good game. It follows the time signature sometimes, but that's pretty much it, otherwise it doesn't really do much very well. Hopefully they'll make a better system to convert songs to game tracks.

Jim on the Wall

would be sweet to blow into the tin sandwhich on rock band

worthyexpress

Importing your own songs would be awesome, but then it would mean no one would buy the dlc so less money.It also wouldnt be like gh and gh2 were people bought the games for the new songs, since you would be able to import your own. it wouldnt be too good to teh sales of the next iteration.

kcgig101

**crosses fingers for blow up groupies**

Darthearl

"we're working on improvements that are obviously missing from the current version of Rock Band, as well as some crazy stuff that no one will expect, but promises to kick ass."

THEY BETTER BE TALKING ABOUT BAND WORLD TOUR ONLINE!!

katorok

Sure, It'll be like forge for Rock Band.

Guild_Navigator

Hmmm...Maybe that beer bottle machine Witzbold wanted really is being made?

Kirbytheslayer: Punch the Penguin and Win a Prize!

@katorok: I certainly hope so. Every time I play online one of my friends (justifiably) bitches about this.

4dSwissCheese

Oh man, the first thing I'm going to do when they do this is put on some old Power Ranger themes.

JAcK0R

Hopefully, this 'kick ass' stuff will also include a steel or aluminum kicker this time around...

Hitokage

I haven't kept up on this, but is there a way to rip the tracks from Rock Band, as they did with GH2?

This is how those custom "spliced" DVDs were made from GH2 that you can run on modded 360's.

This would seem like the fastest way to get user-created content into RB.

Also, I'm so glad they're exploring new genres for DLC. One thing I've learned during my RB parties is that many females don't like singing classic rock.

topaz420

Interesting, they really are pulling out all the stops on Rock Band

Xanto5824

Unfortunately, I want Party Like a Rock Star. [www.youtube.com] Does that make me a bad person?

InsidiousTuna (XBL and PSN)

Please, Harmonix. I REALLY want to play Helter Skelter and The Immigrant Song. Please...

87th

@Cartman86: I was joking. Sheesh.

ceilingFANBOY: sponsor me for PBP, link in profile

Importing your own songs would be cool, but it won't be as good as the Harmonix songs. Besides the multitracking problem, Harmonix pretty clearly puts real care into their note charts---not just the placement of the gems, but also the points when overdrive is available, how your hands are moving playing it, and so on. It'd be cool, no doubt, but between the lesser quality, and the eating up of DLC profits, I just can't see them implementing it.

ThatFuzzyBastard

Are you kidding!! Jazz would be awesome. The reason most people don't listen to Jazz is because it's complex and takes either a trained ear or dedicated ear to deconstruct (even though nearly all of Rock, Hip-Hop..basically everything we listen to pulls from Jazz). Having Jazz on Rock Band would be amazing to play and would make Jazz fun to listen to for people who can't understand it now. You have no idea (a little, actually...think Jimmy and Stevie Ray from GHI) how much fun playing Jazz on Rock Band would be. The rhythmic possibilities would be awesome on the drums, and the guitars solos would be mind-numbing and challenging!

autonomous

Hey, speak for yourself! I'd kill for a good Jazz DLC.

DannoHung

"but interpreting MP3 data into Rock Band note charts is
something we'd definitely be interested in"

What about how all of us singers? :(. Otherwise I can't wait to see what Harmonix has planned next. I have a feeling EA and MTV Games don't want to cut into their profit, so I doubt we'll ever get that but it would be super sweet if we did.

Deltakiral

@InsidiousTuna (XBL and PSN): *puts you on list of bad people right under Hilary Clinton*

Furious_Liver:TF2 name i_have_fleas. Frag me!

Bass Solo tour, BWT online, and ensure that I'll be able to switch between Rock Band editions without losing access to my DLC (shouldn't be that hard....right?)

That's my top three requests for the actual hardware.

TRT-X

A keyboardist ^,^

MajorWedgie

I hope more bands open up to this format as a means to reach new listeners. Some bands just seem to be difficult; point finger at AC DC, Led, and Tool.

gogators88

I hope they can add international music to the mix. I want some new songs in here from like Japan. I want Maximum the Hormone and some other good things. I hope they are capable of doing and i want what they are bringing. Rock Band is great either alone or with friens.

Shindokie (psn and xbl)

As with all Rock Band DLC I ask for Tool. Please Harmonix? I've already suggested it on the site, but heres hoping.

Rurik

Keytar peripheral, please.

mindinrewind

No pretentious rants for Jazz here. I'd just like to play along with Allan Holdsworth for the first time in my life. Is that so much to ask?

Intellectualdiot

nate, you're analyzing this way to much buddy.

The point of custom soundtracks isn't so much of playing them with perfectly timed beats. The point of custom soundtracks is people just want to hear their favorite song and play a long with it.

There's a ton of songs that people love and will never come on DLC, and people just want to play them. Whether or not they're synched up to the beats right or not.

There's a couple games out there already that automatically sync beats up with songs, they're not perfect, but they get the job done. You're sitting here trying to act all professional and trying to drive home a point here, when in fact, that isn't the point of custom soundtracks.

Vots

Obviously we know that EA and MTV Games wouldn't be too happy as they're raking it in via DLC, but besides that - technically speaking it'd be either impossible to add your own tracks to the game, or the quality just wouldn't be there.

For example, when drumming in the game, each of the four pads and the bass pedal are separated into different audio tracks. This allows the player to hear the cymbal even if they miss the bass drum that goes along with it. (This is a reason why some songs are covers - most likely when the masters were recorded, the drums were filtered into one channel, which means Harmonix has to re-do the drums with recording into separate channels. It's why Number of the Beast is a master in GH3 and a cover in RB.) Now, how the heck would users throw an MP3 into the game and have it accomplish this feat?

That's taking it a step too far maybe. Forget the drums, look at the bigger picture - how would any such engine even be "smart" enough to distinguish between the lead guitar, bass, drums, and vocals, and then separate and make charts for each one? What about songs that don't even have a guitar? What about songs with no drums? Acoustics? A capella? Rap? Hip hop? Songs with more than one singer? What about classical? Instrumental? Or would the game only recognize "rock" songs? And how would it determine which song is a "rock" song, anyway?

Overdrive charting would be an issue as well. It's a headache to even think about how such an engine would handle that.

Also, bitrate quality would be all over the map. Nothing like rocking out to some 64kbps tunes - blech.

Explicit lyrics to consider, too. Nothing like a nice content re-rating after a product's been on the shelf.

"Interpreting MP3 data into Rock Band note charts is something we'd definitely be interested in."

Interested in, yes. They're also probably interested in taking a space ship to the moon.

Some things just won't happen. This is one of them.

Nate128

As much as I would love to see MP3 support for Rock Band. I don't think EA would allow it. Number 1: it kills DLC. Number 2: It kills sequels. Guitar Hero and Rock Band sell their sequels partially (almost entirely in GH's case) on the whole "new track list" thing, so this would kill most sequels after Rock Band 2. And you know how EA loves their sequels.

Doomstink

Honestly, I think Harmonix is trying to avoid the backlash from people if they were to tell the truth... custom tracks aren't a way to profit from music games. It'll never happen because even if they were to come up with a way to do it practically, EA and MTV would shoot it down immediately.

@Rurik: I wholeheartedly agree on the Tool comment. They sound very chill at most points, so a lot of people would be totally blindsided by how difficult their music would be.

AbhorredParadox

I wish they would release Rock Band in Asia already. Stupid Xbox region locks *grumble*

scum2k1

@WildKnightblazer: Keep in mind that Harmonix has never really done the whole "sit around and milk a series for all it's worth" thing. They seem to be more in the habit of creating a franchise, making their money from it, and moving on. It wouldn't surprise me if they decided to do something like this towards the end of Rock Band's life cycle -- wait for DLC sales to slow down, sell a content-creation pack for $10-$20, and move on to the next game.

Weaselfingers

@Malidictus: Tell me about it...

Irenicus-the one and only

Bring it out in PAL regions already! How about they sort that out before designing new features.

Malidictus

@hgabriel: No.

Furious_Liver:TF2 name i_have_fleas. Frag me!

C'mon, enough news on RB & GH3 already ! !! !!!

hgabriel

"we're working on improvements that are obviously missing from the current version of Rock Band, as well as some crazy stuff that no one will expect, but promises to kick ass."
like a PAL release?

SaintEmpire

A Rock Organ peripheral!!!

Mommar

Other than a keyboard, what else could be mind blowing? Would they incorporate cams for dancers? More world music?

RPGr

@nate128 I see your points, but as I understood it, the plan was to let musicians create their own Rock Band tracks. Isolating a tracks would be easy in that case, and it's quite possible that you would use a PC to create the stuff, much like XNA developers do. From there, it's just getting it from one machine to the other. Maybe it's not smart as an all-inside-the-console solution, but there are other ways that make it feasible.

DanAmrich

@Vots: There's a couple games out there already that automatically sync beats up with songs, they're not perfect, but they get the job done. You're sitting here trying to act all professional and trying to drive home a point here, when in fact, that isn't the point of custom soundtracks.

Yes, sync beats. Synching a beat is done by analyzing the waveform and looking for the spikes created by drum hits, notably bass drum. How in the world are you going to do that for guitar riffs?

It's a wonder that more people don't know the failure that was Dance Factory on the PS2, a game that used music supplied by the player to create dance charts. The charts were spotty at best and often didn't fit the music at all.

So for player provided content to work, the player really must create their own note charts. I would guess that the majority of players would find this too much of a chore to actually warrant implementing it as a feature.

SinistarX

Something that's obviously missing from Rock Band? Would it be too hopeful to think of hyperspeed?

Smok3y

STFU Harmonix work on releasing the game in other regions, what you think only americans like rythm-based games..

HOVA

What if they create a 2-tier system to satisfy everyone on importing songs?

Tier one could be pay upwards to 50% of a normal single song and you import your own song, and create your own note chart (I'm thinking a pc-based utility would make this a LOT easier). The end result is that you can control the difficulty and ensure the right lyrics (with pitch) are used.

Tier two could be to pay between 50% to 100% of a single song price to import your music, but to have the Harmonix-created note charts added for you automatically from a database. This would be of benefit to note-chart challenged (*raises hand*) and those who just want to play quickly.

7ruthslayer

@Pr1vate_D0nut: Hah, yeah that will be the day.

yashichi8bit

When are we going to get The Doors expansion pack? A keyboard that fills the second guitar line, with the whole Doors' library. I'd buy that for a $100 easy.

Bohnc

@Smok3y: Yes. It'll never happen.

mindinrewind

"If publisher EA and MTV Games would be interested in biting into downloadable content sales is an entirely different question."

Let me answer that questions for you then, NO they will never allow that!!!!!

taomaster99