Riccitiello: EA backing away from big acquisitions, not buying Harmonix

@Teancum
I still don't understand this argument. My original Rock Band Stratocaster still works just fine with all band games.

@Lucky The Fox - Yeah, but that depends on the system and game. For example, you can't play Guitar Hero World Tour with a Rock Band 1 Strat on the Wii, and with Rock Band 3 there's the keyboard.

@Lucky The Fox

Stil have to buy the keyboard. Granted you don't 'have' to. But by that logic you don't 'have' to buy a guitar. You can play with the controller.

@TheBatman4141

I'm not entirely sure how Kotick relates to this post. Harmonix was a subsidiary of MTV Games, not of Activision. Are you perhaps confusing Harmonix with Red Octane?

Harmonix / MTV Games are responsible for Rock Band.

Red Octane / Activision (Kotick) are responsible for the most recent [Music] Hero games.

@Uphillbothways

Some people think Activision killed music games but it reality it would have died just on it is own. The music games fad of 2008 is over and the games will never be as popular is they once were. Both Rock Band and Guitar Hero franchises were properly milked to cash in on the trend and both are scaling back as the fad is dying.

@Uphillbothways

He's talking about how Guitar Hero flooded the market with mediocre games, where Rock Band tried to innovate the genere only failing because of the surplus of other music games.

@Uphillbothways

Now that I've thought of it, I suppose that you might mean that Kotick is responsible for the death of music games because of his oversaturation of the genre, and Harmonix is an unfortunate casualty.

In that case, I'd agree but would argue that he's been steadily beating it to death since 2008.

@dudes113

Thanks for the clarification. I agree, but would go further and say that Kotick has been steadily beating the genre to death since 2008.

@Uphillbothways

Shit.... I thought that first reply didn't go through.... What I'd give for the ability to edit / delete comments. I'll be back tomorrow to assess my downvotes, I guess.

@dudes113 doesn't account for the fact that GH games sold better. let's face it, this, like any other genre will naturally peak, fade, and become a niche. same thing happened to ddr. people get tired, it goes away until a new generation emerges. that new generation is dance central.

I'm with FriedConsole. Whether you guys deny it or not, Rock Band 1 is the same exact game as Rock Band 3 but with different songs. And that's how average consumers see it too. You guys can bash Activision, Call of Duty, Guitar Hero, etc all you want. But they are not the only one's releasing the same game every year. It happens all over with every publisher, but you people fail to realize that. Back on topic of music games, yes, it was a fad. Just like Wii Fit. There is only so much you can do before people get bored.

@onlysublime

No, I definitely agree, the music genre is just a fad. I also do admit that GH sold more. While the gaming community would probably agree that RB is the better of the two (at least I hope so) the main stream community sees GH as the original and most popular, and also the cheapest with the focus on the guitar as opposed to the whole band.

And if Dance Central is the new thing, I'm growing older than I thought.

You guys will travel far out on any limb to relate something to Bobby Kotick. He's the CEO of a company who has nothing to do with this.

Oh yeah, and for the record, GH drum charts are 1:1 and RB "Pro" charts are still "sonically" mapped. RB3 was a let down for this drummer, so I won't be sad t see Guitar Hero the only kid on the block next year.

More people to play online with for GH7. Eat it, haters.

@New Waster
I'm in utter shock.

@milliniar

Unlockable Final Fantasy/Dragon Quest characters and/or clothing in Rock Band 4? I'm down for that.

@milliniar

At least the Black Mages would have an easy time getting their music in the game.

@milliniar My money's on ZeniMax or THQ.

@Joeybeast

Harmonix developed Dance Central so they own the rights to it. I guess Microsoft could buy the rights if Harmonix closes but Microsoft's steadily been getting out of the developer business over the past few years. I think they only own 343 right now and that studio's going to be busy with the Halo franchise.

I just don't see room for Rock Band, Guitar Hero, DJ Hero and Dance Central in the market. I know DJ/DC are different types of games but at their core they're still music games. IMO DC's future is still up in the air because we don't yet know if Kinect is going to be a long term success or if it's going to end up gathering dust like many people's Wii's do. IMO DC is probably the "Wii Sports" for Kinect that will get people playing even if they don't use it for much else.

I think the music genre will survive but I'm not sure all of the games in it will survive. Gamers seemingly have moved on.

@wcarnation

I played the crap out of music games. I own Guitar Hero II, III, World Tour, 5, and Van Halen and I own Rock Band and Beatles Rock Band.

It was still a fad.

@Chilly P slapperonlyblogspotcom as much of a fad as videogames themselves.

@wcarnation

I played and loved a bunch of the music games.

Fad (fd) n. - A fashion that is taken up with great enthusiasm for a brief period of time; a craze.

Seems to fit the definition. People don't want to admit they participated in a fad. I have participated in many fads through out the years going back to Transformers in the 80's. Nothing wrong with it. I guess people don't want to admit that we are all really just sheep.

@FriedConsole i've been playing harmonix music games since way before guitar hero. they are fantastic developers and i still have a blast playing frequency, amplitude, gh/gh2, and the rock band games. following good developers who have a knack for merging music with games is not a fad. only the fakes and copycats who can't innovate buy someone's work and try to cash in. i'll still be following harmonix into the future.

@Hoops
Agreed here. Harmonix is not a once-trick pony. They're a hugely talented and creative studio. It's a bit disgusting to see EA and Viacom discarding them like this, but hopefully they'll get picked up by a publisher who actually appreciates talent rather than just giving it lip service while continuing to whip the sequel mule.

@Hoops

It's actually not that bad of an analogy. Buying out a developer is risky, especially if their products underperform, which I'm guessing is the case with Harmonix. But seriously Viacom dumping Harmonix was kinda silly in my mind. Dance Central is probably set to be the Just Dance of this holiday season. Meaning it'll sell a crap ton.

@libregkd
There are people out there that don't like the best games HMX has ever produced? What kind of world am I living in?!?

@Hawaii Jeff

How much of this is EA's poor performance with Medal of Honor and Dante's Inferno leaving them without the cash to make any acquisitions? This could just be a case of sour grapes.

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Music games may be a "fad", but they still make new DDR games every damn year. They just make them with the expectation that they're selling into a niche market. Given that the real strength of Rock Band in particular is the DLC catalogue, it makes the most sense to stick with that, and push that market more than anything. What they should do is release a version of "Rock Band" that is basically just a DLC engine. Hell, put it up on XBLA/PSN/Wii store for $0, and just include the Harmonix band free stuff to get people started. That will get the newer DLC engine in place so people can start buying the RB3 tracks without any significant outlay on their part, since "number of people who can buy DLC" is the biggest driver for Harmonix profits.

And that's the thing, it's not like Harmonix isn't profitable. It's just that they aren't *as profitable* as Viacom wants them to be.

The best, but saddest, would probably be if Activision re-bought them, which would at least consolidate the music licensing so we wouldn't have these dumb problems with band exclusivity. Then they could release Guitar Hero: Rock Band which would allow you to pick your gem style and import all your old DLC for every game.

The question there is if Kotick could bother to pull enough Franklins off his toilet paper roll to make the acquisition.

@onlysublime As a PS3 Rock Band player,

Please, no.