As someone who is and was genuinely obsessed with every aspect of these games, including making my own custom note charts, making my own custom GH2 DVDs on PS2 and so forth, this has to be the worst and illest informed article I've read in a long time.

Believe it or not it takes time talent and skill to translate a real song into 4-5 different instruments across multiple difficulties.  There's around 20 charts that need to be created for each song that includes all instruments.  You need to be trained in game development, you need to know musical theory and so on.  These are NOT micro transactions in the traditional sense and generally when a new pack of songs are released each week they are bundled together at a discount or offered a la carte for a flate rate of $2.00.

On iTunes, you can listen to the song. That's it.  That's your interaction with the song, that's where it starts and that's where it ends.  Not so much the same on guitar hero or rock band. Because these games don't sell anywhere close to the amount of songs that major store fronts like iTunes sell, they're probably getting less of a deal when securing licensing rights that allow them to sell DLC in the first place.  Honestly this article is stupid and doesn't know what it's talking about

Oh and BTW, Harmonix is one of the BEST developers out there. If you've followed their history, if you've played their games, if you've grown with them then you know EXACTLY how well they've treated their fans.

Uh... Did anyone here play the other Rock Band/Guitar Hero games? This is literally the same thing. And no, it's not a big deal. No one wants to buy every song. They've got music from a ton of different artists to meet everyone's individual tastes. I don't like the price of each song, but I think it's a licensing thing. Plus they're just as much as they were before, so with inflation they're technically cheaper. XD

Really weirded out that no one else (on the front page of the thread at least) is realizing that this is the same thing as before.

EDIT: Okay, granted, it's got sixty something songs on disc instead of eighty something. Yeah, that's less. But the dollar amount on the DLC combined is what seems to be freaking people out, which makes no sense.

A game that doesn't require the audio to beat the game isn't a rythym game. Using screen prompts is the very definition of QTE.

You  can easily make a platformer based on rythmic platforming with the music providing you hints on when and where to jump. Those are an example of rythmic games (see Rayman Legends or some levels in Mario games). As it stands right now, there are barely any real rythmic games in the game industry because of a severe lack of creativity and originality.

At least with karaoke you're ACTUALLY singing.

rockband 4 - fully BC with instruments and dlc.

http://attackofthefanboy.com/news/rock-band-4-backwards-compatibility-fully-confirmed/

guitar hero live - no BC

http://www.vg247.com/2015/04/14/new-guitar-hero-costs-99-isnt-backwards-compatible/

lovely!,.. i love feinted indignation!!

Our prayers have been answered. #TYHM

I ask you to define what you mean by beating the game.  This definition will vary by the player.  Beating it in the sense of Full Comboing each song on expert on a specific instrument? Beating it in the sense that you BARELY 3-starred the setlist on guitar? What do you mean.

And to say that you don't need the sound in this game is an absolute joke.  As someone who's got a number of #1 spots on the leaderboards for Rock Band 2, I can assure you that you do not reach these kinds of levels without learning to listen to what you're playing just as much as visualizing it.

For some reason, every time you talk, I find it extremely ignorant.

News flash, beating the game doesn't equal being number one on some ranking.

Every time you talk you sound extremely elitist. ;)

So then as long as I play the game on easy, on one instrument, and pass all the songs with 3 stars I guess I beat the game (:

Yeah, no.  These games are a love letter to music enthusiasts and add way more variety to a world full of first person shooters and indie games.  The DLC model is perfectly acceptable and just about anyone can find music from their favorite artists.  Harmonix does -NOT- expect anyone to buy all DLC. But FYI, there are players that do and they take incredible pride in it.  

The hardware from the last games are forward compatible, DLC that was purchased in the past is forward compatible, and you can even import the older games' library.... it's all forward compatible.  This is unprecedented in the modern world.  

And I'm not an elitist... I'm an expert (who sees what I did there?), and I'm pissed that a company like Harmonix is being compared to the likes of Activision or EA (who they escaped from to become independent, actually).  Someone who doesn't understand the model should not be writing a 'professional' article on the matter. 

Surely that depends on why you play. Rhythm games have their roots in the arcade. In the arcade high scores is what drives the motivation. For others its the enjoyment of doing the actions to a song. As plastic as the guitar is, it is incredibly satisfying the first time you nail a really tricky section and it is pure terror trying to 100% perfect a song!

As for elitist, that's exactly what you're trying to be towards the genre calling them glorified QTEs. Guess what, real musicians do that too.

Guess what, they produce actual music. You actually need a sense of rythym to make good music.