14 DAY TRIAL // The Rock Band franchise, with its plastic instruments and complex simulations of popular music, was one of the biggest in the video game world, but at the moment, no new game associated with it is in development and the entire music game genre seems to be dead.
The development team at Harmonix says, in a new Reddit Ask Me Anything session, that it does not believe that it will be long before the series comes back to life and that Activision is not to blame for the problems that it has previously faced.
Alex Rigopulos, the current chief executive officer and co-founder, states, “Of course I was sad when Rock Band passed its (first!) peak, but one way or another, it will be back. Music games need to evolve just like every aspect of pop culture. The band game boom was followed by a dance game boom, which will be followed by some other manifestation of music games -hopefully some of the new stuff Harmonix is working on.”
The developer believes that music is an important part of our lives and that companies will find a way to link it to interesting gameplay mechanics in the near future.
Rigopulos also sought to dispel the idea that the classic Rock Band experience was stopped because Activision launched too many of its own Guitar Hero titles and overwhelmed the market.
He adds, “Reality is always more complicated than this. For example, it didn’t help that GH and RB were the most expensive video games on the market during a brutal recession. I also don’t think that either GH or RB delivered enough (or the right kind of) evolution of the experience in the years that followed the initial releases – something we hope to address at some point in the next outing.”
Harmonix has experience working on both Rock Band and Guitar Hero and has the knowledge required to make music-based titles appealing again.
At the moment, the company is seeking money from fans to create a new version of its classic experience Amplitude, which will be launched on the PlayStation 4 from Sony and the PS3.
At the same time, it is working on Chroma, a shooter that is linked to rhythm and allows gamers to perform better when they are in sync with the beat.
Harmonix has also hinted that it has at least another next-gen experience in development.