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.
It’s contest time again! This time, we’re giving away the Xbox Live Arcade version of Defense Grid: The Awakening, a great tower defense title. You can read GameStooge’s review here, which has gameplay videos.
Activision’s Dan Amrich
I first started following the TD Podcast back in 2007. My buddy Luke clued me in that TD was doing a ‘cast, and said I should start following it.
So I did.
Boring story.
I actually only started about 3 weeks ago. I got sucked into pod-casts actually only 4 weeks ago also by podcasts on retrowaretv.com So I seeked out new and diffrent pod-casts. I do have to say this is one of my favorite because of the format that it’s been put in. Also i’ve sorta cherry picked previous episodes in the back log of pod-casts. It’s always so intresting to look back and see what we believed would happen today. Even it was only three months ago.
I started getting addicted to you lovely chaps, when i was reconmended by the lovely bird known as twitter. Its interesting to listen to you guys and see how wrong you got the future 😀
This is actually my first one, the Defense Grid cross-promotion pulled me over here. I guess that was the point of the cross promotion huh? 🙂 I had no idea you guys did a podcast. I regularly listen to the 2o2p one and majornelson and oxm and I love your common man cocktails video podcast, very professionally done. But now that I know you also have a gaming podcast, i’ll add this to my weekly listening pleasure.
@Bushmaster2000 Hey hey! Welcome to the show, this one isn’t as explicit and does prove to be unique and different than the other casts, so you probably won’t get too much redundancy and a completely different perspective (esp. considering we’ve got three folks and one being a women, you can get a bit of a different perspective on things)
@David: Wow, glad twitter got you hooked, promoting a podcast is tough with all the other audio shows getting in our way. At least I know twitter has done us good!
@Jareske: Our format is a bit different than other “professional” shows because we’re not in the industry and we’re not living and breathing it everyday, we’re taking it more from a gamers perspective and the reactions of what a gamer might say when they hear the weekly news… or so I think 🙂
@Stephen: Glad you’re still on board. You’ve been around awhile and we’re used to hearing more from our newer listeners. Ya never know who still sticks it out for the long run, considering the audience is growing I guess we’ve got to be doing something right.
Same thing as Bushmaster 2000. I listen to some of them in french (quebec) but also the GT and Screwattack one. Planned on listening to this one for sure 🙂
The truth be told, up until a link from gamestooge.com about a contest brought me here, I had never heard a TD Podcast. BUT, I am now currently listening to one of the newer podcasts and I must say that it’s pretty good. I like the mix of content covering multiple services and consoles and the banter between the hosts.
It’s refreshing to hear the opinions of people that have no direct affiliation with a big media outlet or game company. I feel I’m getting a more honest opinion of the gaming community as a whole, and not just the highlights from a group that wants me to buy into their product(s).
Thank you. I will definitely be returning to listen to the TD Podcast.
Hey im from cooktown & listen to da cast today…… Give me, Give me Give mee!
I got hooked after a friend told me about it. If I’m not gaming at least I can listen to a podcast about it.
The contest is over, and the winner will be announced soon.
The winner is VanIslePimp. Everyone had great comments, but only one can get the code.
Thanks everyone for entering!
Thanks for holding the contest! I look forward to your next podcast. Now I’m off to play some Defense Grid: The Awakening. Thank you again.