| Mail |

You might also like: WoW Insider, Massively, and more

More Sites You Might Like

/ Register

Joystiq

EA: Rock Band deal with Viacom only through March 2010

by JC Fletcher on Feb 8th 2010 6:20PM

If you're wondering where Rock Band 3 is, a year and a half after Rock Band 2 and five months after the launch of The Beatles: Rock Band, it seems EA isn't sure it's going to get to publish it. During an investor conference call, EA execs revealed that the publisher's deal with Viacom (the company that owns MTV, Harmonix, Rock Band and maybe you as well) is only active through fiscal year 2010 (which ends March 31).

Presumably the deal somehow includes the yet-to-be-released Green Day: Rock Band -- but EA's unlikely to announce any more Rock Band games until it knows it has the license locked down for another year.

[Update: An MTV/Harmonix spokesperson has told us "The previously announced Green Day: Rock Band will be published by MTV Games and distributed by EA. Stay tuned for news of MTV Games' other titles soon."]

Tags: ea, Electronic-Arts, harmonix, Microsoft, mtv, Nintendo, rock-band, rock-band-2, rock-band-3, viacom, Wii, Xbox-360

Reader Comments (30)

I wonder who'd pick up the license if not EA. Hmnn

Sony most likely

I think you mean Microsoft most likely. 360 owners have typically gotten more perks than the PS3 has through the Rock Band franchise.

pleasenotactivisionpleasenotactivisionpleasenotactivisionpleasenotactivisionpleasenotactivision

nooooooooooooooo!

Oh Shat NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I don't want to play the shat that is guitar hero!

WTFack

Rock bands so much better than guitar hero!

So you wouldn't spend your Bison Dollars on Guitar Hero then?

http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=2hp4so1&s=5

and that, children, leads me to my next point.

don't. smoke. crack.

Sad as it may seem, It would be in Activisions best interests to pick this baby up. Then they would completly monopolise the Music Game industry. They could charge whatever the hell they liked for games and DLC because, lets be honest, its either get one of their games...or get "Rock Revolution"....

Then expect a Guitar Band or Rock Hero collaboration. The music game genre as we know it might fail epicly.

Yeah but doesn't the US Govt. prevent monoplies still?

Madden would like to have a talk with you

2K sports exists. There's still NFL 2k. Just because one is more popular doesn't mean it's a complete monopoly. Plus all the Football games that came out for the Wii.

If Activision got RB it'd have a complete monoply on the band base rythm games due to Konami no longer doing Rock Rev.

There is NO NFL 2K series, hasn't been for years. Madden's NFL license is exclusive. 2K Sports tried to make a non-NFL football game with All-Pro Football, but that bombed horribly. I remember seeing it at Best Buy for $10 within 2 weeks, maybe even 1 week of release.

Activision may want to get Rock Band, but why would MTV/Harmonix let them have it? They would be fully aware that Activision would simply bury the brand in favor of having their existing Guitar Hero brand fly with no competition. Kind of like when IBM bought Informix with full intent to just shut it down.

hamonix and activision were together and they split after gh2. i highly doubt (read: isn't going to happen) that activision will pick up publishing rights for rockband.

Get ready for a Jonas Brothers song on Rock Band 3.

you say this as though there aren't already things like iCarly songs in rock band

Yeah but those are DLC's, people have a choice to download them. If that crap gets on RB3, that STAYS in there.

Do we *need* RB3? I'm quite happy grabbing new DLC a couple times a month for my RB fix...

Well, word has it that Dhani Harrison (George Harrison's Son) is co-developing Rock Band 3 to make it "more realistic". So i actually have high hopes for Rock Band 3.

Yes, we do need RB3. There are still numerous bugs that can't simply be patched without breaking other features, so at the very least, they need to upgrade everything to the engine used in The Beatles RB. Plus, how many times do you find someone else online with paid dlc? I'd say only ~30% on buyers actually buy dlc. The discs are still where the money's at, unfortunately.

*of.

Also, Harmonix has already said that Dhani Harrison was pretty much talking out of his ass when he did that interview.

DLC search would be coo

Need? No. I agree the DLC is quite enough for continued game play, but updates that only a new disk can bring like, getter graphics, stronger online play, and better avatar building options (to name a few) wouldn't be all that bad to add on to an already great game.
There are a lot of tweaks I feel RB needs (most importantly to fix the bug that deleted my RB1 tracks), and a new sequel isn't necessary to fix them, but a new game wouldn't hurt either.

Wait, EA does not publish RB. Rock Band is published by MTV Games, EA's deal is for distribution.

You are correct. Everyone worried about Activision "snapping up" Rock Band can relax. Viacom, via MTV, owns Rock Band and Harmonix. Their deal with EA is through the EA Partners program, a part of EA that handles as much or as little of the publishing/distribution work as is required by outside developers. This is how they "publish" stuff like Rock Band and Valve's games. Since the air has gone out of the music game balloon these days, and EA is hurting hard in the wallet, it will be interesting to see if they re-up the deal with MTV.

IF this child is to be adopted by another, I see no better suitor than Apple. iTunes essentially replacing MTV would allow for Rock Band to not skip a beat. Im sure theres plenty of ex-Harmonix employees out there in this economy that EA can band them together into a new studio and crank this out. Before that ever happens though I think Viacom and EA will reach a deal.

High Voltage Software will publish it.

It should probably be noted that Viacom is one of those massive, hulking companies that doesn't actually do anything but purchase properties.
It's grotesquely big, shadowy - and simply put, when people talk about the Corporate Industrial Complex, they're talking about these guys.

All I really want is Green Day Rock Band. My favorite band gets their own game? Awesome. Rock Band 3? It would be nice, but unless it changes and there are significant improvements, I think I'll stick with Rock Band 2.

Sorry, you must be logged in to leave a comment.

Breaking News

EA: Rock Band deal with Viacom only through March 2010

Reader Comments (30)

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 6:24PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 6:35PM s ls said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 6:37PM merobb said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 6:27PM Ben Forbes said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 6:29PM chex said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 6:39PM Brysonial the Bison said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 6:48PM MrSpaceCowboy said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 7:24PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 6:47PM The Pirate said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 7:05PM Whoppinberg said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 8:28PM The Aquacharger said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 8:48PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 11:57PM The Aquacharger said

Posted: Feb 9th 2010 1:37AM killdash9 said

Posted: Feb 9th 2010 4:18AM sho220 said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 6:47PM Whoppinberg said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 7:25PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 9:17PM Whoppinberg said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 6:50PM Dr said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 6:57PM The Pirate said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 7:04PM edisinsane said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 7:24PM edisinsane said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 11:01PM Nap said

Posted: Feb 9th 2010 1:10PM Darkangel269 said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 7:27PM libregkd said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 8:47PM Mr Bungo said

Posted: Feb 8th 2010 10:20PM Nate Addison said

Posted: Feb 9th 2010 1:39AM Pirate Goomba said

Posted: Feb 9th 2010 1:24PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Feb 10th 2010 11:22AM Dragod said

Info

Description

MSRP

Release Date

Genre

Developer

Publisher

Rating

Breaking News

Double Fine Kickstarter passes $1 million in under 24 hours, breaking yet another record

Featured Stories

Frictional teases a new Amnesia project, possibly set in China

GameStop sees majority of digital sales from cash; won't pursue used PC game sales

The Joystiq Show - 024: Kingdoms of Double Fine

The most popular postsin the last 7 days

Engadget

TUAW

Massively

WoW

The most popular posts
in the last 7 days