Guitar Hero II DLC goes multi-platinum
by Kyle Orland 
{ Sep 11th 2007 at 3:57PM }
Apparently some of you are not sufficiently outraged at paying $6.25 for three new Guitar Hero II songs. Activision announced today that 2 million individual tracks have been downloaded via over 650,000 downloadable Xbox Live packs. The number includes 50,000 downloads for the recent My Chemical Romance pack in its first week of availability and 300,000 sales for the three original Guitar Hero packs through early July.Activision also used the opportunity to talk up the impending release of Guitar Hero 3 and its "vast array of downloadable content including songs from some of the most popular European bands." Do we smell an ABBA song pack in the works? We can only hope and pray.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
AstroZombie @ Sep 11th 2007 4:05PM
So there are at least 50,000 people out there with absolutely no musical taste?
syco @ Sep 11th 2007 4:57PM
Oh, there's a lot more than that. Waaaay more.
AirIntake @ Sep 11th 2007 5:12PM
I got my 400k award with Famous Last Words on hard, so I'm happy with my purchase. I don't particularly like emo shit, but MCR stuff is catchy and fun to play in GHII.
Fernando Rocker (NDF - Water Ring) @ Sep 11th 2007 4:11PM
Why people like Chemical Romance? All the new music kinda sucks.
I prefer a lot better the 80's Edition and the first one.
As a guitar player, I can tell you: Chemical Romance doesnt apport nothing, musically speaking. Neither Nirvana.
J-Guy @ Sep 11th 2007 4:20PM
...They try to look cool? I really don't have an answer for that.
Raikage @ Sep 11th 2007 4:34PM
Ok, I understand that you play a (Real) guitar, but come on. At least listen to their old stuff before you diss them, it's much better than this new crap.
I suggest Cubicles or Skylines and Turnstiles(their first song, written about September 11, ironic hmmm...)
I won't even touch Nirvana, because everyone that lived in the 90's disagrees with you...(although I'm not a huge fan myself) You don't have to like them, but you should respect them. (Same with games!)
vinny @ Sep 11th 2007 4:48PM
aren't you banned yet?
Fernando Rocker (NDF - Water Ring) @ Sep 11th 2007 4:49PM
Im not trolling =(
Victor @ Sep 11th 2007 4:59PM
You're a guitar player?
Yet you diss Nirvana?
Oh come on, for crying out loud, you shouldn't even call yourself a musician. You may not like Nirvana, that's your opinion, but Nirvana being a great band is a fact.
No. Don't argue. As a musician you have to be able to discern quality from personal taste.
See it this way: I like The Used, yet musically speaking, they are a shitty band.
No offense meant (:
Raikage @ Sep 11th 2007 4:54PM
Thank you Victor...
Come on Fernando! LOL
Fernando Rocker (NDF - Water Ring) @ Sep 11th 2007 4:54PM
Nirvana was one of the first bands in not include virtuos guitar solos, and thats why new bands doesnt even botter in create amazing solos (MTV shitty rock bands)
Try listening other bands, even bands that are not americans or english, like rata Blanca or Mago de Oz. Check ths video of Mago de Oz.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amHsAm1TXFk
Victor @ Sep 11th 2007 5:00PM
What? So solos now define a band as a good band?
Please. Music is not only about playing guitar.
And before you question my musicals skills, I'm not a musical genious, and I'm not even that good at what I play (guitar, electirc guitar, bass guitar), I just try to learn about stuff so I don't say stupid things.
Fernando Rocker (NDF - Water Ring) @ Sep 11th 2007 5:02PM
Victor... we are talking about a game called GUITAR Hero
Victor @ Sep 11th 2007 5:06PM
No, we're talking about musical quality, because that's what you brought up the moment you dissed Nirvana :P
And GH create's it's own solo for songs that doesn't have them.
Ever listened to Ziggy Stardust before the first GH?
Farseer @ Sep 11th 2007 5:10PM
Nirvana didn't just happen to "forget" to include "virtuoso" guitar solos, the band actively stepped away from the obligatory section of "look how fast I can play scales" in the middle of the song that somehow pushed its way into and pissed all over the 80's rock scene, alongside synthesizer overkill.
Had the grunge movement not stopped the onslaught of hair bands... I don't even want to think about it.
AirIntake @ Sep 11th 2007 5:14PM
Yes, if it wasn't for the genius of Nirvana, we wouldn't have the wonderful music of Nickelback today! Man, I don't even want to think of a world without Nickelback...
The Boo @ Sep 11th 2007 5:45PM
I think you best keep your mouth shut about Nirvana, Ferny. Even people who don't like their music know better than to dis 'em.
Farseer @ Sep 11th 2007 5:48PM
lol @ Nickelback - I'd like to see that one diagrammed back to Nirvana, a la 6 degrees
Snukadaman @ Sep 11th 2007 4:20PM
And these people cemented the idea of having too pay 6.25 for 3 songs....way to go douchebags.
Farseer @ Sep 11th 2007 4:58PM
Thank you sir.
I surely did my part to boycott the outrageous pricing on these song packs, but some apparently I'm almost the only one out there who feels insulted about being ripped off.
Snukadaman @ Sep 11th 2007 6:01PM
sadly we are the minority in boycotting since the dl content was so successful...now it gives rockstar the chance too also charge as much or even more for whole albums...some people just dont have the patience too wait.
AstroZombie @ Sep 11th 2007 4:30PM
Rocks the 80's is a ripoff, too. I can't believe they're selling an expansion pack as a full-priced game.
jason adair @ Sep 11th 2007 4:47PM
If you really want to tell them to go f*ck themselves Don't buy the game.
Tony @ Sep 11th 2007 6:03PM
Guitar Hero II DLC is the biggest rip off I've ever seen. What a colossal letdown. This braggin about 2 million downloads just adds insult to injury. They would have sold 10 million packs if the content was there, that was one of the biggest selling points of the XBOX version. There are probably thousands of people out there that had the PS2 version and bought the XBOX version for the DLC. They surely were screwed. I'm glad I waited (once I heard it was wired). MS--you suck!
copa @ Sep 11th 2007 4:51PM
Talk about killing the golden goose. Activision has been incredibly lazy and incompetent in the way they've handled DLC, and they are just pleased as punch with themselves for grossing $3 million in revenue.
I wonder if any of the execs ever thought about how much they could have made if they had chosen a distribution platform that didn't involve bending their users over, and firmly inserting the DLC without lubrication.
Count me a user that would happily spend $50 - $75 a year on quality, reasonably priced DLC, but who has spent zero dollars on GH2 DLC because of the way that Activision has gone about this.
Thank God for competition. I strongly suspect that Harmonix will show everyone how to do this, and make significant amounts of money in the process.
Farseer @ Sep 11th 2007 5:01PM
Rock on!
I second every word you said. Here's to hoping that Harmonix continues to respect their user-base.
Jamie @ Sep 12th 2007 7:44PM
*Thinks back to the good old days when Amplitude DLC on the PS2 was completely free*
Harmonix > Activision
Sean @ Sep 11th 2007 4:54PM
You can danceeeee, you can jiveeeee, HAVING THE TIME OF YOUR LIFEEEEE.
João Gonçalves @ Sep 11th 2007 7:47PM
I would totally pay for an ABBA song pack.
Victor @ Sep 11th 2007 5:01PM
What? So solos now define a band as a good band?Please. Music is not
only about playing guitar.And before you question my musicals skills,
I'm not a musical genious, and I'm not even that good at what I play
(guitar, electirc guitar, bass guitar), I just try to learn about
stuff so I don't say stupid things.
Victor @ Sep 11th 2007 5:01PM
oops
KEFIOX @ Sep 11th 2007 6:05PM
Im still lost does this mean we still have to pay $6.25 for the songs or not, personally I don't care but I wouldn't mind if it was cheaper
umm....hello??? @ Sep 11th 2007 7:22PM
well, I did my part in not paying for stupid overpriced DLC. the one downside of RockBand is the DLC that they're already planning for full albums...talk about things that should be included in the original full game...especially at $200.
Justin @ Sep 11th 2007 7:28PM
Activision handled the GH3 DLC very badly, months between releases, no release schedule, over priced and not very good. They never addressed any questions we had about DLC, it just infrequently appeared in XBMP.
I did buy the pack with Bark at the Moon and Ace of Spades and I like it, but I would have bought loads more if it had have been cheaper and more choice.
They could had quadrupled their sales but they fucked right up. There is nothing for Activision to feel proud about here.
UkuleleSHIMA @ Sep 11th 2007 8:09PM
Activision has spun this story to make it look good for them when in fact the TRUE numbers show that only about 15% of all players playing the game on LIVE bought each pack. It even less for the 4th pack and only about 5% for the MCR pack. (if you own the game, it shows on the leaderboards how many players have played each song. No, I personally haven't bought any.)
Activision KNOWS they could have sold over 3x that amount had they priced the packs more reasonable. Say $4.25 instead of $6.25. THey would have made MORE money AND, more importantly, kept a better repoire with the 85% of players that "voted with their wallets" that were pissed and insulted by the prices.
If Rock Band takes this into account and has a more reasonable pricing plan for their DLC, it will give one more reason for gamers to give their money to EA instead of Activision.
U-B @ Sep 12th 2007 6:24AM
Indeed, it's just more spin. Packs 1-3: 15% sales, pack 4: 9% sales, MCR pack: 6% sales - those are absolutely dismal figures, and no amount of spin will change that fact. You have to wonder whether these futile efforts to make it sound like a success are because they're intending to repeat exactly the same pricing model for GH3 - and if that happens, then there's no way in hell I'll be buying GH3 at all.
Daniel @ Sep 11th 2007 8:30PM
$6.25? And you complain. We pay more than that for singles here in the UK (~£4.50+), and two of the three songs on them are generally crap.
tcc3 @ Sep 11th 2007 9:05PM
Yeah, you're getting ripped off there too. $0.99 itunes tracks are bad enough.
But you know what? I don't care what music singles cost. The fact remains that with the exception of the MCR tracks, all those tracks were rehashed GHI tracks. Worst case scenario, all those tracks shouldn't cost more than $80. And I'm being generous seeing as how it originally came with a guitar controller.
Conbus @ Sep 13th 2007 2:13AM
People, people- I think you're all missing the point here. Who cares if you like MCR or not- these prices are still a joke. Truly outrageous.
Someone suggested boycotting the game- the problem with that is we like the game, a lot. We just hate that they are ripping us off.
Angry letters must be written!