Rejoyce: Rock Band Instruments with Guitar Hero World Tour

Simply amazing news coming out of E3 last night, apparently the Rock Band instruments will work with the new Guitar Hero World Tour game.  This may only be true with the Xbox 360 version of the title, as Activision didn’t want to comment on Wii, PlayStation 2 or PlayStation 3 yet.

Activision deserves a cup cake for this strategic move, providing Rock Band gamers a money saving option and increasing their own sales. If you’ve listened to our latest gaming podcast episode, you’ll notice Jennifer changed her mind on World Tour because of the new Rock Band 2 news. In short, if you own Rock Band you can now buy Rock Band 2 game-only without having to re-purchase the equipment. Why would you then go out and buy more instruments for Guitar Hero World Tour?

Rock Band has solidified itself as the next-generation of rock gaming by showing us more than a simple guitar interface. Building a “me too” product after Rock Band and requiring us all to purchase yet more equipment is a deal breaker for a good portion of gamers.

Thank you Activision for making a product we’re actually going to purchase now, instead of passing on it due to limitations of the wallet!

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Battle of the Mega Powers: EA Wants Take-TwoBattle of the Mega Powers: EA Wants Take-Two

We’re already looking at the results of an Activision Vivendi union and now Electronic Arts is slowly working towards taking over Take-Two. Activision Blizzard is larger than that of EA but would the Take-Two buy-out grow EA into the number one publisher once again?

For gamers, it’s changing the map of the industry. We grew up with many of these seemingly big companies but their all clamoring together to make the next big mega-power. While they struggle for ultimate domination we, the gamers, are going to either benefit from the competition or become victims, or perhaps a little of both.

Let’s assume EA and Take-Two form one entity, similar to the the Destructicons forming “Devastator,” they can reign hell upon the earth and anyone under their mighty fist shall perish! That might be a bit of an exaggeration but it’s safe to assume they’ll wield mighty power, more than ever before and their epic foe will be Activision Blizzard and, perhaps, Ubisoft. In a battle for sales and consumer acceptance the companies will be willing to out do each other at every step with huge funds at their disposal.

As a consumer, competition is a great way to produce innovation, technological advancements and excitement in the industry. These giant development houses are only this large because we’ve given them our hard earned money in return for entertaining video game titles. World of Warcraft is a major player in sucking money from our wallets in a consistent, addictive, manner while Guitar Hero explores new possibilities in music and rhythm gaming and controller accessories.

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Microsoft Says 60 Percent of Wii Fits Collect DustMicrosoft Says 60 Percent of Wii Fits Collect Dust

Microsoft is on the attack, saying Nintendo has done a great thing with their Wii product line but Microsoft has a bit more “respect” for the new gamers they’re bringing into the industry. Xbox Europe VP David Gosen launched the shot over Nintendo’s bow at the GameFest UK keynote.

“We’ve seen some research that says 60 percent of people who bought a Wii Fit play it once and don’t play it again. So we have to get the balance right, because what we are doing is bringing new consumers into the market for the first time in their lives sometimes—and we have to treat them with respect,” Gosen told attendees. (shacknews)

In translation, developers should be building games with hot gameplay not quirky gimmicks. Basically, he’s of the opinion that Microsoft’s working towards creative unique game play elements and not really concentrating on niche products that are only fun for a week.

Nintendo and others are developing games to take advantage of the Wii Fit board, so not all is lost. As a matter of fact, statistics being gathered by Nintendo’s competitor really don’t hold any weight with us until they’ve references the third party statistics gathering who handled the facts. Otherwise, it’s just PR speak attacking their competitor (although they say Wii isn’t really a competitor) with no real facts or values.

Blu-ray Doesn’t Validate Your Console, SonyBlu-ray Doesn’t Validate Your Console, Sony

Is Blu-ray dead? Tech Sites around the Net are calling it a “death spiral” and we’re now looking at the downfall of the winning high definition format. Many non-PS3 Blu-ray players are still in the USD $200.00 range, a bit high for mass market adopters, and people aren’t planning to run out and buy a Blu-Ray player in our economic slump.

What’s the market share of the Blu-ray product? Four Percent. Blu-ray and the PlayStation 3 have a lot of battle scares after the fight with HD-DVD to “win” the format war. In the end, Sony won the battle but the war was not with the HD-DVD format, it’s with the average Joe consumer.

Does this effect the PlayStation 3? One of the up sells of the PlayStation 3 was the Blu-ray capabilities, it games and it’s an entertainment device all-in-one. It’s a great deal right?

“The advent of low cost up-sampling DVD players dramatically cut the video quality advantage of Blu-ray DVDs. Suddenly, for $100, your average consumer can put good video on their HDTV using standard DVDs. When Blu-ray got started no one dreamed this would happen.” (zdnet)

The obstacles against the Blu-ray format are huge, especially with NetFlix coming to the Xbox 360, high definition download options and licensing costs on the Blu-ray to movie creators. Blu-ray won’t die in this generation of PlayStation 3 consoles but many folks, including Apple, are pausing to see if it has any chance at all to break into the industry.

Four percent just isn’t enough to inpsire confidence.