Thursday, May 22, 2008

Neversoft – “Guitar Hero IV will crush Rockband”

By Tiberius Jonez

Game Informer Senior Associate Editor Matt Helgeson appeared on Minneapolis Radio’s KFAN last night for their weekly video game show and talked about Guitar Hero 4, which he wrote this months Game Informer cover story about.

He talked about his recent visit to the game’s developer Neversoft. According to Helgeson, the Neversoft guys flat out stated that they plan to crush their primary (and only) competition Rockband by totally reinventing the franchise this year and that they know they can do the guitar better and they think they can come up with a better drum design as well, including cymbals.

Another juicy tidbit he revealed was the fact that Guitar Hero 4 will feature ONLY master tracks. No cover tunes will appear on this game at all. While they wouldn’t go into the list of songs or bands that will appear on the new game, they did say that we can expect some big name bands that will surprise everyone. The KFAN host tried to get Helgeson to reveal a deal between Neversoft and Led Zeppelin or AC/DC. While Helgeson conceded those would be two of the biggest “gets” any developer could achieve for a game like this he didn’t see either of those bands doing a game in the next year – not that Neversoft hasn’t tried.

According to Helgeson, Joe Perry of Aerosmith told him the Boston-based legends expect to make more money and get more exposure from their Guitar Hero game than their next album and tour combined. Where it was once nearly impossible for a developer to get a big name band on board for these titles, bands are beginning to see the huge rewards they can reap from licensing their music and likenesses for games.

Helgeson also said the Neversoft guys admitted they really dropped the ball on downloadable content with the last game and that they plan to make up for that the next time around in a big way – although no specifics were revealed.

Here’s hoping Neversoft can deliver on the huge promise and bring Guitar Hero back to its rightful place atop the music game throne.

Do you prefer Guitar Hero or Rockband? Comment and let us know.

1 comment:

  1. that's awesome. I like guitar hero but not all the songs so I am looking forward to hearing something different and I think having different instruments like Rock Band will make it a real competitor.

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