Surprise! Rock Band 2 announced

by Ross Miller { Jun 30th 2008 at 3:33AM }

One of gaming's worst-kept secrets is now official: Rock Band 2 is coming. IGN has the scoop and an interview with lead designer Dan Teasdale, who reveals that all the current and future DLC will be compatible with both versions of Rock Band, as well as the same instrument controllers.

While details were scarce, Teasdale said to expect improvements for band and character customization as well as the navigation system and Band World Tour. Citing the current issues with random set lists, Teasdale said, "Nobody wants to play Green Grass and High Tides in their first random set list." Visually, the few images seen show the game has changed very little from its predecessor (and yes, it turns out the box art from a leaked survey was accurate).

As for what songs to expect, Teasdale said, "we've also secured what I can easily say is the best set list I've ever seen in a music game." He provided no examples, although we wonder if The Beatles fall onto that list. Rock Band 2 is set to debut at E3 next month.

Tags: breakingnews, ea, electronic-arts, harmonix, rock-band, rock-band-2

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

Moorio - XBL: peacebyanymeans @ Jun 30th 2008 3:42AM

"all the current and future DLC will be compatible with both versions of Rock Band, as well as the same instrument controllers."

HELL YES!!

Moorio - XBL: peacebyanymeans @ Jun 30th 2008 4:08AM

Oh, and also: Guitar Hero, go fuck yourself!

MarkHawk @ Jun 30th 2008 4:14AM

This cant be official, HMX only leaks official news. Im going to go over here and look for clues to see who made up this official announcement.

Seriously though (w0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000t!)

Sam Earl @ Jun 30th 2008 6:54AM

HELL YES!!! indeed. That's exactly what I wanted from them.

Obie @ Jun 30th 2008 8:41AM

I have to say that is rather brilliant, that way the consumer doesn't get screwed over. And yes Guitar hero dropped the ball .

tooPrime @ Jun 30th 2008 10:14AM

I’d just like to call out “Rock Band Fanboys” for a second on Joystiq in general. It’s just really annoying after awhile, every time I read a comments from a Guitar Hero or Rock Band article, the same remarks show up every time regardless of what information is being shared. Seriously, the story could be “Rock Band Kills 2 children” and the some would say its Guitar Hero’s fault. I own both games and they are both fine. Rock Band has the whole band going and DLC, but game is sort of pointless after awhile. DLC is great, but if I have to blow 10 bucks every 2 weeks or so to keep the game interesting to me, then I rather not play. Guitar Hero is a little more focused and has more long term challenge and is better from a single player perspective but can’t compare on the other fronts.

The point here is, dude what are you all excited for? I read this entire article and there is nothing of note. You already knew Rock Band 2 was in existence. What else, the game will support DLC? I don’t know, where you really expecting the contrary? The game looks that exact same and every detail given was incredibly vague. I contrast, a week a ago there was a very detailed filled and rather interesting sounding GH:WT preview, and people just read the title and said it sucks.

Boffo the Sock @ Jun 30th 2008 10:36AM

@tooprime

"The point here is, dude what are you all excited for?
...
What else, the game will support DLC?"

The article says that existing DLC will be compatible with RB2. That is the big deal regarding DLC. For your consideration, it has been confirmed that GH3 DLC will not work with GH4, seeing as how new charts would need to be added and all. This means you and your friends don't have to switch discs and sit through more startup screens to play your old RB favorites.

FSK405K @ Jun 30th 2008 10:40AM

Our worst fears are quelled.

JJ Rooster @ Jun 30th 2008 10:58AM

"if I have to blow 10 bucks every 2 weeks or so to keep the game interesting to me"

I stopped reading your complaint after this.

WTF? You don't "have" to buy anything, but I sure appreciate the option to do so every week (GH fails here). You're dumping on the very feature that has led to RB's success? I finished GH3 and it's been on the shelf ever since. RB has offered 4 ways to play a song, weekly DLC, no mandatory 3-packs and no Guitar Hero has without shame copied everything in an attempt to stay relevant.

tooPrime @ Jun 30th 2008 11:26AM

I understand, I just thought that was something obvious. Harmonix is a very progressive company and it was just something I expected them to do. I was kind of hoping they would find a way to integrate DLC into World Tour mode in RB1, that said what I am really interested in is if RB1+2 DLC will work with games on future consoles and if so will they work cross platform. Like I have an Xbox 360, but let’s say the next Xbox sucks, so I get a PS4. When I get Rock Band, err… I dunno 5, will I still get the DCL I bought on my 360?

tooPrime @ Jun 30th 2008 11:58AM

JJ, let me put it this way, after playing Rock Band for a 2 weeks, several things happened that dampened my long term experience with the game. First, I learned to hate the set list. The world tour mode makes you play the same songs over and over, and you can’t pick what song you want to play in ranked matches, so basically I listen to that Foo Fighters song about 40 more times that I would have liked, so it got to the point where the only songs I liked were DLC. When I stopped buying DLC I stopped playing the game.

In regard to your other points, I wasn’t dumping on DLC, I was illustrating the intrinsic fun of the package largely rest on DLC. I’m saying the package gets old quick without new songs. Maybe it’s because I don’t like the gameplay like other people. I don’t like drums, I can understand why others do but I can’t stand them, singing is fun but lacks depth, the guitar charts are boring and don’t get me started on the bass tracks. I understand why people can get board with Guitar Hero, I think the fun lies more in the challenge of the game, rather than the song list, that why I don’t care about the lack luster DLC.

Mr. Picklesworth @ Jun 30th 2008 12:43PM

This is /also/ good because we don't end up with a hundred million fucking plastic instruments polluting our landfills. It's not just the fact that this is undeniably bad for the environment, but what will the next species think of us if the only remnants of our civilization they find are plastic instruments which make muffled clicking noises?!

Nice to see Harmonix gets it. As for Rock Band... this is getting out of hand. It's worse than the AOL CDs.

Hafk @ Jun 30th 2008 4:00PM

Mr. Picklesworth

You can use previous Guitar Hero instruments with GH:WT, and you can use previous Rock Band instruments with Rock Band 2

How is this a win in Harmonix's favor? I seem like something everyone is doing to.

And don't give me the whole "Harmonix cares about it's consumers." argument. They had EVERY FUCKING CHANCE to make the glorified classic controller aka Wii Les Paul work with Wii Rock Band. Sure, things may be different on the PS3, but they fucked us over big time by doing that.

EMaster @ Jun 30th 2008 3:54AM

Let`s see GH up the anty by allowing their GH II and 3 content to be allowed on World tour.

copa @ Jun 30th 2008 10:40AM

Not bloody likely. From the article:

"We've been working hard with Microsoft and Sony to develop a way to share content between games, and we're really happy that we'll be the first game to support fully functional cross-title DLC."

With GH:WT coming out before Rock Band 2 (and Activision not giving a fuck), you aren't going to see any cross-title support for GH3 DLC.

B3astofthe3ast @ Jun 30th 2008 3:57AM

YES! When do you want your blowjob Harmonix??!!

Srsly, RB was one of my most played games EVER.

Boffo the Sock @ Jun 30th 2008 10:30AM

Was? Rock Band still features heavily in my personal rotation.

Nick Ritch @ Jun 30th 2008 3:58AM

This is great news!!!
over $80 worth of songs and counting.
And I can play them on the next version!!

Now when do they announce the beatles??

Mixaboy @ Jun 30th 2008 4:01AM

So what exactly are they going to do to warrant a brand new SKU, because "improve Band World Tour" doesn't really sell me. My first impression here is they're bringing out a new game just to compete with the fact that people are constantly seeing new Guitar Hero branded games at retail.

Moorio - XBL: peacebyanymeans @ Jun 30th 2008 4:18AM

Read the article.

Besides Online World Tour is fucking worth it. They also said they'll have new modes, but wouldn't say what they would be.

zuburi @ Jun 30th 2008 4:35AM

I'd guess you're right, Mixaboy. They need something to keep it in the public eye and in weekly sales papers.

I wonder if they're going to add more drumpads on the new drumset, though. Like, maybe you can use the old set, but not on expert mode or something.

Would be cool with me if they offered it as a patch or something in addition to the new retail box.

I'm still gonna buy it, though!

Shaun @ Jun 30th 2008 10:25AM

You are absolutely right. Especially if you consider the fact that Harmonix originally said that they weren't going to make a RB sequel anytime soon and would treat it more as a separate console by giving consistent DLC to consumers....

Has everyone already forgotten about that?!?!?

Boffo the Sock @ Jun 30th 2008 10:43AM

Granted, they did say RB was a platform and claimed that they did not intend on creating sequels anytime soon, but they have to do something to compete with the GH franchise pushing out SKUs like a welfare mother.

I imagine they do alright with DLC, but not as well as they would do with a retail released sequel. Besides, by supporting the old peripherals and DLC they are doing a major service to their fans. Now if RB2 DLC were compatible with RB that would really be something, but that would ruin some incentive to purchase RB2, so I don't see that happening.

Boffo the Sock @ Jun 30th 2008 10:52AM

I should've read the whole interview before I made my post. From Teasdale himself:

"As far as Harmonix is concerned, there's no difference between 'Rock Band 1 DLC' and 'Rock Band 2 DLC' – we're just releasing awesome songs every week onto the Rock Band platform, all of which are playable by the Rock Band titles that support DLC."

So those of you upset about the whole "RB as a platform" thing seem to have nothing to worry about. RB2 DLC will be playable on RB. I guess that means no rhythm guitar, but hopefully I'm wrong.

Elko @ Jun 30th 2008 4:02AM

So now if i want to play the songs from RB1 I have to change discs and lose features that RB2 will introduce?

Ridgecity @ Jun 30th 2008 4:13AM

I don't think they are introducing anything... other than many songs as a new game. I would call this a song pack, like the ones coming for the Wii.

I think they just wanna distract a little for Konami's game and Guitar Hero.

MarkHawk @ Jun 30th 2008 6:11AM

HMX is usually pretty good with community suggestion. If you read the article in full, they touch on a lot of the suggestions made at rockband.com/forums and other places. While it's not re inventing the wheel, can you really consider GH2 a new game? None the less is was considered the best follow up release.

But I guess will find out more at E3.

Elko @ Jun 30th 2008 12:24PM

well if they are going to put out a RB2 with new songs, i just want to be able to play those songs plus the ones from RB1 all together without having to stop and swap anything. i want to go from a rb2 song to a rb1 and back again. i dont want to never play the rb 1 songs ever again because it has some great music.