Rock Band was incredibly popular, and remains to be so for parties and gatherings with people having fun pretending to be Rock Stars. While it’s been many years since the game has been at the forefront of anyone’s mind, it seems that a new generation version of the game may not be as far off as we’d originally thought.
Recently, developer of the series, Harmonix, had released two new packs of DLC songs. This broke their streak of almost 2 entire years of nothing, when previously they had released content on a weekly basis. This made speculation rise, with fans hoping for a new entry to the franchise. While the first content pack that seemed to be added just increased the excitement, the speculation exploded with the most recent pack, due to the names of the songs. Tenacious D’s “Rise of the Fenix” and Weezer’s “Back to the Shack” were taken almost literally, spelling out the return of the famed franchise.
Not to mention at the beginning of the month, a developer had tweeted about being told by Nick Chester, who works at Harmonix, to not throw out his Rock Band instruments. This just adds to all of the rumours that not only will a new game will be released, but that the developer may be trying to figure out who these old instruments could work with the new consoles.
Now, there’s seems to be a report that Harmonix are actually making current gen versions of the game. Citing a source who is “familiar with the plans”, a Bloomberg Business report seems to confirm that the current gen appearance of Rock Band is actually already in development. Over at Polygon, Harmonix actually replied to the report with the quote below.
“We’re excited by how enthusiastic our fans have been in regards to our most recent DLC releases, and we think it’s awesome that people are speculating about the future of the franchise!
While we don’t have anything to announce, hundreds of thousands of unique users are still actively playing Rock Band games each month. This passion our fans have shown for Rock Band over the years suggests that rock truly hasn’t died, and we’ve always been clear that we’d love to return to the franchise when the time is right.”
All in all, the evidence is piling up, and it seems that within a few months (E3 anyone?) we may have total confirmation about what’s actually going on with the Rock Band franchise. The last release was Rock Band Blitz, a game not unlike Harmonix’s original games that didn’t use the instruments, while the last full release of a Rock Band game came as Rock Band 3 in 2010.
So what are your thoughts on this? Are you tired of music games or are you excited to pick up those plastic instruments and rock out again?
Source: Polygon
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