Viacom is fighting an order to pay Rock Band makers Harmonix Music Systems $US383 million, or a bit more than half of the money sought by the former shareholders in a long-running legal dispute over unpaid bonuses.
The Holidays are upon us; Chanukah is underway, Christmas is almost here, and it’s time to get those last-minute gifts. We’ve given you ideas for people who already have all the games they want, for people who like science and other thinky pursuits, and for your teenage son who seems pretty normal but who you don’t talk to. All those lists, and so many more.
Rock Band celebrated its fourth birthday last week and, to celebrate, Harmonix has released some videos that go into detail on the process of creating the game, and the struggles involved in actually shipping to retail. As a huge Rock Band fan with over 400 downloadable songs on my PS3 hard drive, I find this whole thing fascinating. Last week was the story of how Rock Band came to be, but this story is about how hardware issues almost doomed the franchise to catastrophic failure.
In October of 2007, Rock Band hit rock bottom, crashing its car into a tree in an alcohol-soaked haze. It was then it knew it had to turn things around. On November 20, 2007, Harmonix introduced it to the world and changed everything.
Last year, Harmonix shareholders sued the Rock Band developer’s former owner Viacom for a ton of money. This week? Viacom sues them back. I am rubber, you are glue, etc, etc.
