Will Preston

Ah music games. My one obstacle to getting up and learning a real instrument. Still, they are a great way of wasting time, if a bit expensive for a plastic guitar. But recently music games have been selling poorly. Games in the Rock Band and Guitar Hero series have been declining every year.

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It’s that time again! Time to trade in your old copy of Rock Band for the latest one with go faster stripes and go faster…keyboard. As of October 26, 2010, all downloadable tracks released will not be compatible with the older Rock Band games.

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There were two major opinions to the whole Rock Band/Guitar Hero gaming series; The ‘Gamer’ and the ‘Musician’. The ‘Gamer’ plays the plastic guitar, gets into the songs and spends time improving on his five-fret technique. However, the ‘Musician’ plays the plastic guitar, wonders why he is wasting his time on a cheap imitation of the real thing and goes back to learning Freebird in it’s entirety.

There is a middle ground to this, but you really have to question a musician who takes time out to play on a video game version. I’m a rather big fan of plank spanking a five-freter, but at the same time I learn to play the bass guitar. Those aren’t fence marks on my trousers, they’re Levi’s new Ripped Indecisive™ range.

What shocks me about Rock Band 3 isn’t the long release time since the last one, it’s the new guitar featured. Rather than keeping it at just a plastic imitation, the new model features 6 strings and plenty of frets, with the option for the game to teach you to play guitar. For real. What a fantastic idea, if buying a real guitar and learning to play that wasn’t already the logical option. Not only this, but a brand new instrument offers the exact same function.

Now you can play keyboard if you fancy some tinkling over some widdling. The new keyboard is completely functional as a MIDI instrument, as well as having the option to play on a stand or strap to yourself as a ‘keytar’. Now you can be Jan Hammer and bash out some eighties ivory madness. So that’s five people playing the game together. Can your room hold that many people? Well we’re not done here yet. The backing vocals from The Beatles Rock Band is being featured as well.

That’s about seven people playing a game on one Xbox. That’s almost enough for a Slipknot tribute act.

So it could be the ultimate party game, or the ultimate waste of time. Already with a good set list and not much change to the game’s core set up, is this more than just an add on pack? I mean, the reason for the long time waiting is there is no real need to update the core game. Rock Band 2 got it perfect. And now they are attaching bells and whistles the size of Humvees at the risk of overloading the formula. Mind you, I had the same reaction when I saw them add a drum kit and microphone to the mix.

It’s out next week and I’m only buying it once I have the room the size of an amphitheatre and I need something to distract me from playing a real instrument.