Rock Band Network rolls out fully in early 2010

by Alexander Sliwinski on Nov 26th 2009 1:15PM

Harmonix's Rock Band Network is still working out the kinks and will launch in "early 2010." In a statement to Kotaku, the developer explained that it's working on getting the public beta tools out "before the end of the year," with the store front to launch sometime at the beginning of next year.

Musicians with ample time and high computer proficiency can begin preparing their tracks now with the creator tools, but the open beta will grant access to the private website where all the RBN community stuff will occur. If you're a musician or programmer (or ... procisian?), let us know what you think about the tools in comments.

Rock Band Network

Source

Tags: harmonix, Microsoft, mtv-games, rock-band, rock-band-2, rock-band-network, Xbox-360

Reader Comments (44)

"Procisian"? I think "prosician" is the word you were looking for.
Can't wait for RBN, even though I was stupid enough to buy RB for the PS3. That means I won't get RBN at all. Just a 'selection of some of the' RBN songs :(

I also have Rock Band for the PS3 and I don't think it was a "stupid decision". Your platform can't grow unless developers start putting things on it that are supposed to be MULTIPLATFORM. Customers don't just magically show up to your console,you need developers to take a fucking chance and actually put something there.

As cool as RBN sounds, I'm still wary of non-Harmonix employees ability to chart. Especially for some of the name music that hits RBN. Anyone know if creators can touch-up and republish their work on the service?

What makes Harmonix employees better than anyone else at charting?
You aren't gifted some magical abilities to chart when you join HMX.

The charts will be fine.

@Wormania

Being paid to do things does wonders for motivation. Plus, there's someone breathing down your neck if it's bad!

Harmonix employees are all very musically involved, with many of them playing in bands for years. Thats what makes their charts superior as opposed to neversofts.

wormania obviously hasn't played Guitar Hero: Smash Hits...

Have you played Neversoft music games? Have you played Rock Revolution? The former is often overcharted (though they've definitely gotten better since III, it is still a persistent problem with the Hero titles), the later had severe timing issues in addition to charts all over the place. Not saying Harmonix does a perfect job, but their fudgy charts are few and far between.

RBN is pretty much amateur hour (also open to gifted professionals, mind). 99% of Frets on Fire and Guitar Hero custom charts are batshit dyslexic.

Wor... there are several reasons why it's a logical to believe HMX would produce better tracks.

1) They're paid to do it, so it has to be good. Or else many people will be very upset with them.

2) HMX has been charting tracks for YEARS... almost a decade, and that's just talking professionally, they could very easily have been doing stuff like this long before Frequency and Guitar Hero.

3) HMX has incentive to do it good. A marketing team that just a basic understanding of music/computers could churn out a track in a couple hours just to get the band's name out there, and maybe even turn a buck or two. Because honestly, if you're say, a huge fan of Taylor swift, you don't care how accurately it depicts her song, you just want to hear it, so, you buy it.

If anyone is concerned about the quality of the charts, I'd strongly recommend doing some reading over at the Rock Band Network site/forums. Harmonix themselves are providing training programs for people and/or companies to perform the charting and work with the authoring tools. There are also professional organizations who can author the music on behalf of a musician or group. There's even been talk of major record labels hiring dedicated staff within their own company to perform authoring for their signed acts.

I think, all-in-all, Harmonix knows what they're doing, and they aren't likely to shoot themselves in the foot by releasing a program that will be sub-par in terms of quality. Have faith, folks... it'll be fine. And if you don't have faith...then just go read the forums and other information out there and have some facts, instead. :-)

Simply, the internet has shown us time and time again that community developed things can often far surpass the work of paid developers (Machinima, for instance, springs to mind.) No, not every RBN song will be incredible, but they certainly won't be universally bad. With some proper popularity and rating options, the shit will sink to the bottom, and we'll get to play the best of the best.

All aboard the fanboy comment train.

HMX charting has been hit and miss for a while now. People who will be charting these songs will be doing it due to either a passion for charting, or a passion for the music. Sure, some of the charts may not be great, but the same can be said of HMX charts.

@B3astofthe3ast
Listen to the songs from Neversoft bands. I don't really think you can doubt the musical talent of members of An Endless Sporadic.

i am just hoping that this program will be cracked in a way allowing you to import whatever song you want into RB... wishful thinking i know but i would actually buy the game if i could import any song from my collection.

Being in the closed beta I can tell you that the charts must be HMX quality or they will be rejected,several times .... My song has been rejected around 7 times so far,once because an apostrophe was in the wrong place on vocals.

Creators can't go back and edit anything after its been loaded onto the store,hence the reason it has to be correct to begin with.

I'm really impressed with how much support Rock Band 2 has received. With official DLC and RBN, I don't see how I'm gonna stop playing it...

Rock Band 3, perhaps?

Don't forget Rock Band 4.

Rock Band: The New One

New Super Rock Band Wii

Looks like you're limited to working in Reaper, which is kinda lame. They should release a tool to allow any multitrack song to be transferred.

Well, as a musician, I guess I have to buy a 360 now...

Along with memberships for Xbox LIVE Gold and XNA Creator's Club. Not to mention a license for Reaper.

I think I'll just wait until I actually have the money to do so... :(

*ahem*

Why don't you buy a real instrum...

I mean, Why don't you learn to play a real ins...

Er, How about you learn to record real mu...

Aha! Why don't you find an effective tool to help you release recordings and market your's or your band's mus... You win, good form.

You know its out for PS3 as well?

@The Pirate RBN is NOT on PS3, unfortunately. The whole thing requires XNA Creator's Club membership and Studio to publish. It is only directly compatible and available for Xbox 360. Harmonix themselves will be porting the best of the best RBN songs for download on PSN and maybe Wii, and of course, there is no guarantee your song will be among them. If you want to take advantage of this, you'll have to buy an Xbox 360, otherwise you won't be able to test your work.

Ahh i remember now. I found an old article. the WII is not supported and Microsoft blocked the creating process on the PS3. So if you want your song on PS3 you'll have to go through Harmonix and ask them to put it on. Microsoft are assholes.

Microsoft didn't block it. It's just that only Microsoft has an open console.

Can't wait to give this a shot!

Are there going to be measures in place to keep me from making, say, the ultimate Pink Floyd collection (since Hmx is dragging their feet)?

Can someone publish charted songs that are copyrighted?

You must own the copyright to any works you publish. That should go without saying though. If you want to make any Pink Floyd songs, you'll have to clear it through their label, so in other words, no.

I don't think so. That's the meaning of copyright. You COULD publish you band's Pink Floyd covers (if you have the permission from the band, of course).

That's not true. You can cover any band or song you'd like, as long as you give the original copyright holder the profits. That's why you had a lot of covers of songs in previous itterations of music games.

can't wait to play I Fight Dragon on Rock Band I forget what song they mentioned they were going to try and put up

I don't have enough musical knowhow to use the tools, but they are really awesome. There is some learning to be done, but finding your way around the programs isn't too bad considering how much needs to be done.

Make no mistake though, authoring the tracks correctly does take some musical knowledge.

Harmonix Is a Great Company, But Damn They Take Forever to Roll Out New Stuff. RB2 Update Was Almost a Year Late, This Being Delayed, and Lord Knows When RB3 Will Come Out.

Why Are We Capitalizing The First Letter Of Every Word?

maybe it is a secret message

Higc, Bdttfrons. RB2 uwayl, tbd, lkw RB3 wco

no secret message, OP fails.

I've been working like mad on my own band's songs (megaphone if anyone's interested). Reaper has a few little quirks but overall the process is fairly easy if not a little tedious. I also started a "company" and am hoping to use my connections in the industry to get some fairly successful but lesser known bands into the game (company's Little Cow Dog...again if anyone's interested).

Overall the RBN is a HUGE opportunity for musicians and programmers alike. I just hope that a delay like this (from mid-october to mid-november to "before the end of the year") isn't indicative of how the entire network will run.

This (as long as the charts are vetted properly) is going to be such a win. HMX know how to look after their followers.

I just hope more non mainstream bands make it into the game now. I would like to see Less than Jake, Mustard Plug, Reel Big Fish, and more, in the game.

The label Fueled by Ramen has a bunch of bands in Rockband, so why not include the band whose member STARTED the Fueled by Ramen label?

Im kind of tempted to try and startup a company that deals with porting songs over to Rockband... unfortunately, I wouldnt know where to start.

I'm absolutely positive "third-party" authoring services are going to do a fine job, and perhaps even better than Harmonix within a significantly short amount of time. It's really not difficult to author RB songs if you have any DAW experience. Sure there will be a lot of "crap" being submitted, but there is going to be an approval process and crap will most likely be filtered out.

Third party authoring services are already in play, and I think eventually Harmonix will outsource these services that can produce these songs way cheaper.

I just submitted my first song to playtest, and wrote about the time and skillset requirements of authoring your own track here:

Rock Band Network for Dummies?

Let's try that again:

http://passivepromotion.com/rock-band-network-for-dummies

Brian Hazard
http://colortheory.com

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Rock Band Network rolls out fully in early 2010

Rock Band Network

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