Green Day: Rock Band (Follow-up)
I wanted to add a few notes to yesterday's post.First, GD:RB obviously can't be sold at full price, or even close. At $30, I think it will do fine. At $40, it's very borderline. Anything over $40 is delusional. So an important part of evaluating whether this game will "work" in a commercial sense is seeing where it's priced.
Second, of course The Clash would have been a better choice. With the exception of The Beatles, I think The Clash might have evolved more musically than any other group. Also, and I can't explain this any more precisely, The Clash just have an epic quality that really defies definition. Yes, they would have been the best choice (in my mind) for a project of this kind.
Finally, Peter Hatch sent me an e-mail that was so concise and lucid that I'm just going to use it in its entirety:
So a few things I think you've overlooked in your discussion of the game.
Green Day announced exclusivity with Rock Band back on June 11th
(http://www.rockband.com/news/green_day_exclusive) - I think it's clear that this game has been planned since then, and thus not a reaction to the sales of games released since then, like Lego Rock Band or Beatles: Rock Band. And the exclusivity has to have played a significant role in deciding to give them their own game.
There's an interesting article at Variety
(http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118012248.html?categoryid=16&cs=1)
about music games that includes this quote from Alex Rigopulos: "You don't have to swing for the fences with every artist-specific game." I suspect Green Day Rock Band is going to have a much smaller budget than The Beatles: Rock Band did, and that it won't occupy nearly as important a spot in their release schedule. According to Roger Daltry we'll also be getting The Who: Rock Band next year (http://www.rollingstone.com/rockdaily/index.php/2009/10/29/the-who-rock-band-on-the-way-daltrey-drops-a-hint/),
as well as a Pearl Jam... something - variously referred to as a "project", "compilation", and "game".
(http://www.pearljam.com/news/pearl-jam-rock-band-project-coming-next-year
& http://www.pearljam.com/content/pearl-jam-live-rockband-compilation-coming-next-year)
And Brian May mentioned they're in talks about doing Queen: Rock Band
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8304176.stm).
To me, all of those groups are better choices for dedicated games than Green Day, but as long as the songs are exportable back into Rock Band, I think they'll all be successful. There are very few groups (I'd say The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, and The Rolling Stones) that could be successful in a dedicated game with songs that can't be exported.
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