Making Music Games Interesting Again
September 11th, 2009I bought Guitar Hero 1 and loved it. I got GH2 and liked it. I haven’t gotten anything since then, including Rock Band, nor have I much interest in the latest Beatles expansion. The reasons for this are numerous, but include the following:
- The songs are so mixed it can be hard to understand a game’s value. Guitar Hero 1 had, I thought, a pretty good mixture of songs, but since that point I have had a hard time finding a setlist that I thought was truly great. Rock Band has tried to fix this somewhat through DLC, but frankly, you pay so much up front that I don’t consider it worth it.
- The games are extremely uneven in terms of difficulty. Guitar Hero 1 was pretty accessible, but GH2 was shockingly difficult by the first game’s standards, and sequels in the genre fall all over the board (Rock Band has some very easy portions and some very difficult ones).
- The target audience for the games varies as well. Rock Band is best played with others, but since I don’t know a ton of people who have an interest in the genre, it doesn’t make much sense to pick it up.
- They’re expensive. Shelling out $60 - $200 for a new game - which is essentially the same game as before - is just hard to justify on a regular basis.
Rhythm game fanatics have probably enjoyed most of the entrants into the series, but I suspect more casual players have lost a lot of interest. What can be done to make these games more interesting? Lately, all the innovation has focused on changing inputs: adding devices or upgrading them to attempt to make them a closer simulation of real music. I’d suggest that we should focus a bit more on the mechanics of the game and how it’s sold. (I’m actually pretty interested in DJ Hero, mostly because it’s so different than what we’ve seen so far, both in terms of gameplay and musical style.
One idea I’d like to see: what about an iTunes-esque “build your own game” format? Games would come blank, but players could select a series of, say, 15 tracks to download that would become the standard tracklist for their game. This would ensure that players would only pay for tracks that they really liked, in a style they desired; since DLC right now seems reasonably successful, I don’t see this as being a licensing cost issue. I’d definitely pay for that.
Other thoughts?
Posted in DLC, Gear, Geoff |
September 11th, 2009 at 6:27 pm
DJ Hero looks cool, but the price is sort of steep for it I feel like… I’ve wavered back and forth about it, and the Daft Punk pack may seal the deal for me… though a more recent preview suggests that it may be too easy to play, and it’s obviously more of a solo affair than the band games.
As for the new band games, I’ve decided that I’m basically done with the Guitar Hero series until they’re at least cheaper… all of my music collection is in Rock Band anyway, and other than some of the exclusive stuff it seems like most stuff is eventually made available in both series (and to be honest, Guitar Hero simply feels and sounds a lot worse than Rock Band based on my experience with Guitar Hero: World Tour).
But, Rock Band: Beatles… that’s another story altogether. I gladly shelled out the cash for 45 songs from the Beatles catalog, and I’ll post something more about it later, but it was definitely worth it… There are, of course, some drawbacks, but playing the songs in the game (particularly later) is unlike playing songs in any other music game.
September 13th, 2009 at 11:04 am
Rock Band 2 is the way to go. It has a great selection of songs, is compatible with RB1’s tracks, the DLC system is ace, and it’s fun alone as well as with the whole band. The Rock Band PSP demo is compatible with DLC, so you could do the a la carte method you mentioned with that. Though it’s for the PSP only. RB2 ships with the best lineup for a rhythm game, though, no question.