The latest news on the Rock Band 2 front covers the instruments and a few confirmed song tracks. There have been rumors flying around the Internet about the “leaked song tracks” for the next release with absolutely no confirmation. Now, however, we have solid proof on some tracks and some equipment changes.
First, all instruments are backwards compatible. That’s key to the success of Rock Band because fans of the original ponied up a lot of bones to grab themselves the original Rock Band kit. However, there is an incentive to upgrade your equipment in some regards.
If you like the original Rock Band guitar you’re going to love the new one if only for the color updates, wood grain and actual look and feel of a real guitar not a “toy.” As you’d expect (or hope) the new guitar will be wireless, finally, and will have a sturdy strum bar with even quieter buttons. Wireless alone is a great selling point but quiet buttons is important for folks like me who play the guitar like it was a jackhammer and can easily interrupt the drummers concentration during a difficult set.
The drum kit has been improved as well, with a re-enforced foot pedal to avoid the ease of breaking the plastic “toy” version of Rock Band original. As a person who’s busted up their drum petal and forked out cash on eBay for a wood solution, this is more great news. The drum kit will also be wireless which is great for those of you, like myself, who have kids that run through your line of site or dance while you’re playing. Nobody likes their Xbox 360 being flung off the shelve due to tripped cords.
The drum kit will have quieter pads and a velocity sensor; again, your old kit is still usable without these enhancements but the desire to upgrade if you’re a dedicated fan will be high.
The song tracks currently confirmed:
- “Panic Attack” — Dream Theater
- “Chop Suey” — System of a Down
- “Everlong” — Foo Fighters
- “Kids in America” — The Muffs
- “Give it Away” — Red Hot Chili Peppers
- “Ace of Spades” — Motörhead
- “Hello There” — Cheap Trick
- “Pump it Up” — Elvis Costello
- “Anyway You Want It” — Journey
- “Pinball Wizard” — The Who
This is a great indication to where Rock Band 2 is going, mixing up a great selection of artists with classic hits like Anyway You Want It and Pinball Wizard to newer late generation X music like Give it Away and Chop Suey. Talented artists like Dream Theater are sure to keep Rock Band 2 a challenge to all gamers.
Other great improvements being a World Tour mode now accessible online and the removal of the “Band Leader” concept which always locked you into an instrument once you created a band.
NOTE: Xbox 360 will have a timed exclusive on Rock Band 2, arriving later in the year for the Nintendo Wii and PlayStation 3.
Checkout the full feature set so far explained at Kotaku.
Hi guys great episode, nice to hear Dan again 🙂
@Noriega sues: Yeah I thought like Jordan that generally former Dictators are dead ones. He should just be happy to have made it to 80.
@Sims 2 Ultimate Edition: My wife and I both got our CD versions redeemed for the digital Ultimate edition and I have to say I’m pretty happy to have access to all those packs and expansions I never bought. I still find myself spoiled for some mods, and I had to tinker with special settings to get a resolution other then 800×600. It is nice to play this game digitally and not have the hassle of some 20 cd’s to go through when wanting to install the game to a new computer. I don’t know if it’s nostalgia glasses or not but I swear the game looked better than what I started up in Ultimate Edition.
I remember you mentioning in regards to Sims 2 not liking that your Sim ages while a neighbor doesn’t and you’d have to go to their lot to age them. For me it’s the inverse in what they do in Sims 3. I like to jump from lot to lot controlling multiple families and creating Dynasty Legacy families. I didn’t like in Sims 3 if I was playing a family and went to another house, only to find the first family had moved, split up or had a baby without me. This happened to my wife who was trying to get one sim with someone else and she went to another house and when she game back he was gone, he had moved out. So for me I like the “rabbit holes” or “hamster cages”. If you couldn’t tell I like gameplay that allows me to feel like a god controlling the lives of these mere digital blips on my computer.
@Codemasters respond: Yeah people need to realize that giving money to companies promotes them to make more of what your buying. Vote with your wallets people, this is why I backed Pillars of Eternity, to show my support for the types of games I want to play.
@Ex-Call of Duty found new studio to make more FPS like we need that. I don’t think people are going to want to play with a big headgear thing on their head. I’m sure they will make a game with Ninja mutant Zombie Nazi Robotic terrorists for all the kiddies to play. Okay bored now next topic
@Adam West playing himself. I’ve been entertained by his role of being “himself” like in Family Guy, I appreciate when an actor embraces a role that made them famous, as opposed to being resentful about it.
@Civ Beyond Earth: I am looking forward to playing this game, I’ll probably be Harmony since you get Sand worms, I look forward to assimilating Dan with the Mother Brain Flower.
@Sony Remakes: Yeah I’m not sure about remakes for PS3, now if they remake PS1 or PS2 games that might interest me. Namely Suikoden, need more Suikoden.
@Spore: “Install spore and see if I like it again” See that’s just an incorrect statement, that game is completely unlikable.
@QotW: I think I am looking forward to Pillars of Eternity the most since it’s a spiritual successor to Baldur’s Gate of which I want more of. I also am looking forward to Civ Beyond Earth as well for MP with my Polycast/craft friends. My family is looking forward to LittlebigPlant 3 and my wife wants Sims 4 but I’m very cautious of it, I didn’t like the “buy next expansion pack merry go round” with sims 2 and 3. I have to admit I am tempted by the Dragon Age Inquisition as well, I really enjoy the open world gameplay and not being handheld or railroaded from point A to Z. I like taking my time and savoring the game.
Looks like Alphashard had a slow work day 😉 Good job with the comments!
@Sims2 – I never played the game as I’m not that interested in endless titles and I also hate interior design and decoration. However, I saw online somewhere that the Sims2 are being given out for free to anyone who has an Origins account and enters a special code in there. I’m not sure if it includes all the expansion packs or not. I redeemed the code and maybe one day I’ll look into that or have my wife try it out.
@Sony Remakes: I don’t think all the remakes are such a bad idea from a money making standpoint. They have the numbers and they probably see that a lot of people how didn’t own a PS3 jumped on the PS4 and they want to accommodate them by remaking some really great games (TLoU). As a PS3 owner since 2009, I managed to play through most of the recent hits so I don’t really care that much about those remakes.
Obviously, I would prefer to have new titles to play, especially new IPs, but I’m so far behind with my backlog, I don’t mind the ‘drought’ so much. I just finished Bioshock Infinite so that says something. On the other hand, I understand I might be the minority and there are thousands of gamers hungry for new and exciting experiences. Well, 2015 is the year to look forward to.
@QotW
Looking at the list of fall releases I don’t think there’s anything I’m particularly excited about. Maybe the Infamous DLC. I enjoyed the game and I liked the Fetch character so this could be cool. There’s also NHL15 – the first PS4/XBone title in the series. I might give it a go. Far Cry 4 had an interesting demo at E3 and people seem to be excited about it. I haven’t played any of the Far Cry games but I’m not sure I want another open world game from Ubisoft just yet.
By the way, Alphashard’s LittleBigPlant could be amazing 😉 What kind of plant are we talking about? Nuclear?
Hey Pawel the Ultimate edition give away does include all expansions and stuff packs.
I obviously did a typo and meant LittleBigPlanet 3.
Hey Alpha.
Sure I knew it was a typo but LittleBigPlant sounds so much cooler 🙂 Even though I really like platformers, I never got into LBP that much. I beat the Vita version but I didn’t spend endless hours playing user-generated levels.
Thanks about the Sims tip.