A Big Shout-out to Rockband DLC

[Big Yoshi]

Rockband as a franchise is probably past its prime and will never have the popularity that it once had, but its DLC is both fair and amazing due to all the licensing going on to make it possible. All rockband dlc you ever bought is foward compatible across your sony/microsoft account, eith very few delistings across the 2500+ availible songs to buy.

Just look at the availible artists

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_downloadable_songs_for_the_Rock_Band_series

You have everything from John Lennon and U2 to Paul Mcartney and Iron Maiden, complete meme songs like The Touch to super critically acclaimed indie stuff like Sleater-Kinney, Even a good amount of non rock artists like Snoop Dogg, Johnny Cash,and Lady gaga. Even with the slowdown of DLC lately you still get occasional winners like La Bamba and Protomen despite a decline in popularity since its height, I gotta respect the commitment.

Even with the somewhat steep price of 2 dollars a pop, you gotta respect whats gone on to maintain and continue to grow/relicense over 2000 songs from so many bands.

 

[Deleted member 17643]

I'm amazed they never had a subscription service.

 

[Jawmuncher]

Birds is still stuck only on Rock Band VR?

 

[Big Yoshi]

I'm amazed they never had a subscription service.

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Rockvand is already in licensing hell, recently they have been doing a spotlight pass where you can get x weeks dlc cheaper, but it really doesnt save mucb money and your buying blind.

GH live tried to do a straming thing but it bombed so it never really took off.

 

[Jimnymebob]

Yeah, even though the genre of plastic instruments is all but dead, they've still been doing a fantastic job to support it.

A Blitz sequel/something I can play without the instruments would be one of my most hyped announcements of the gen/next gen, if it were to happen.

 

[Deleted member 21255]

Rockvand is already in licensing hell, recently they have been doing a spotlight pass where you can get x weeks dlc cheaper, but it really doesnt save mucb money and your buying blind.

GH live tried to do a straming thing but it bombed so it never really took off.

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It bombed because they kept playing the same shit on every "channel" to force you into using the coins to play something different, which you would need to buy when you ran out (or grind for a while). Good idea that was terribly executed.

 

[Deleted member 1627]

The Touch is most certainly not a meme song. It is an ageless 'banger' from the greatest cynical marketing ploy of a movie ever put to celluloid.

Good day, sir.

 

[Big Yoshi]

The Touch is most certainly not a meme song. It is an ageless 'banger' from the greatest cynical marketing ploy of a movie ever put to celluloid.

Good day, sir.

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Meme song doesnt mean bad in any way, it more means low appeal to most but extreme appeal to some.

Whats up by 4 non blondes would have been a better answer for a meme song imo, or maybe unwritten.

 

[Thrill_house]

I actually picked up a few guitars and a mic for when friends are over and its still a blast! I'm shocked all the songs carry over from last gen. Big effort and I'm glad the series is still alive

 

[TheRuralJuror]

Just grabbed a couple guitars locally and redownloaded all my stuff like two weeks ago. Game is still a blast.

 

[Kromeo]

Shame it looks like it's impossible to get a new guitar without spending obscene money, I wouldn;t have minded going through this again

Wonder if my old 360 guitar hero controller still works.. Probably hasn't been turned on for 8 years

 

[Deleted member 18742]

I probably would have kept playing and gotten RB4 if they put out more stuff I liked more consistently. I just checked the newer stuff and they still have yet to put out some of my favorites which would be fun songs on every instrument

🤷‍♂️

 

[I KILL PXLS]

Yeah, I haven't been interested in most of the DLC in the past few months but I'm sure other people are and I have to admire their ability to keep the DLC train going and their dedication to sticking to their vision for RB4 as a platform. I couldn't have asked for a better approach. Definitely a game of the generation for me.

 

[MrNelson]

Shameless plug for the community OT: https://www.resetera.com/threads/rock-band-series-ot-welcome-home.403/

Birds is still stuck only on Rock Band VR?

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Yep

Shame it looks like it's impossible to get a new guitar without spending obscene money, I wouldn;t have minded going through this again

Wonder if my old 360 guitar hero controller still works.. Probably hasn't been turned on for 8 years

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Best bet is to keep an eye out on Craigstlist for used gear.

Also, you'll need to track down an adapter to use 360 gear on Xbox FYI.

 

[Strangelove_77]

I'm still surprised RB4 has never been dirt cheap to buy. It's 35.99 on PSN right now and I think that's the lowest I've ever seen it. Waiting til it's under $20.

 

[StudioTan]

Unfortunately RB4 ruined the series for me in terms of how I played it. In RB3 I play songs in practice mode on drums but instead of triggering the game sounds I just play for real on my electronic kit using the RB charts to know what to play.

With RB4 they changed it so that if the game didn't get any input from the drums it would play stick clacking sounds meaning I couldn't play along. So I've stuck with RB3 on my Xbox 360. Sucks because I own RB4 and there is a lot of DLC I would like to play.

 

[LuigiMario]

Unfortunately RB4 ruined the series for me in terms of how I played it. In RB3 I play songs in practice mode on drums but instead of triggering the game sounds I just play for real on my electronic kit using the RB charts to know what to play.

With RB4 they changed it so that if the game didn't get any input from the drums it would play stick clacking sounds meaning I couldn't play along. So I've stuck with RB3 on my Xbox 360. Sucks because I own RB4 and there is a lot of DLC I would like to play.

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Don't have the game in front of me now, but Rock Band 4 has added lots of modifiers since launch and I think that option is there? Otherwise if all the sound is coming from your ekit you could probably just disable sound effects and play that way, it'd just play the song without any drum track.

 

[MrNelson]

Don't have the game in front of me now, but Rock Band 4 has added lots of modifiers since launch and I think that option is there? Otherwise if all the sound is coming from your ekit you could probably just disable sound effects and play that way, it'd just play the song without any drum track.

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Nope. They changed it from how it used to be because the labels didn't like how you could essentially get each stem by silencing the others, so they just grouped them all into a single slider and made the game play miss noises if you stop playing for a few seconds. IIRC at most you can silence the crowd and the other sound effects (overdrive, etc).

 

[LuigiMario]

Nope. They changed it from how it used to be because the labels didn't like how you could essentially get each stem by silencing the others, so they just grouped them all into a single slider and made the game play miss noises if you stop playing for a few seconds. IIRC at most you can silence the crowd and the other sound effects (overdrive, etc).

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Ah, that's a bummer. Sadly makes sense but still sucks a lot.

 

[StudioTan]

Nope. They changed it from how it used to be because the labels didn't like how you could essentially get each stem by silencing the others, so they just grouped them all into a single slider and made the game play miss noises if you stop playing for a few seconds. IIRC at most you can silence the crowd and the other sound effects (overdrive, etc).

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Yeah I figured it was a label issue because they introduced that with The Beatles RB. I did buy the MIDI adapter to use my e-drums as a controller but it's not as much fun as playing along myself. It's also harder to improve as a drummer when you're not actually hearing your playing.

 

[808s & Villainy]

Back when you could buy exactly what you wanted as DLC and it wasn't this randomized, exploitative, bullshit

 

[Hetz]

I still regularly play RB4, but the DLC has gone WAY downhill in the last year. The majority is now RBN Metal or indie bands. It's really a shame. It clear they do not have the licencing budget they had when they first introduced the Spotlight Pass. There was some great stuff when that first came out.....now it's very rare that there is anything that was commercially successful released as DLC. I guess the one major exception is Old Town Road, that came out a couple weeks ago. Forget about classic rock or anything popular from the 80's/90's anymore. The last time I was excited about a Season Pass was when week one featured La Bamba and (500) Miles. The rest of the pass was complete trash though, talk about a bait and switch!

 

[arts&crafts]

Wait they are still releasing new songs? Old Town Road!?

 

[Big Yoshi]

Wait they are still releasing new songs? Old Town Road!?

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Most of what they release now is only new stuff or old RBN songs ported after RBN closed down.

Old Town Road, Harmony Hall and H.E.R. are probably the most well known recent additions, not that much else that is suprr main stream

 

[Pyccko]

I'm dreading the day whenever my RB4 drumkit breaks. It's gonna be impossible to get another one for a decent price

 

[MrNelson]

I'm dreading the day whenever my RB4 drumkit breaks. It's gonna be impossible to get another one for a decent price

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At this point I'd recommend getting a midi pro adapter and a cheaper e-kit like an Alesis Nitro to future-proof your setup.

Unless you're on Xbox, then you have my condolences.

 

[Joe]

I always get these urges to play this again, because I used to play it constantly back in the days of RB2 and RB3. But I don't have the instruments anymore, so it's just so prohibitively expensive. If next gen does have a Rock Band 5, I'm gonna make sure to grab it early so I don't miss out.

 

[Dead Man Typing]

I still boot this several times a year.
Fantastic game and support from the devs.

 

[IsThatHP]

I got a full set for pretty cheap off of amazon around the time Rivals came out. The guitars fold? It's pretty cool and we still play often but I need to put down some cash to build out the library, feel like my group has grown bored with our picks.

ALso feel like we just can not get the drums to feel right no matter how many times we calibrate it. The red one always feels off, but its responsive so not sure what's up.

Going through the DLC last here is really taking me back. I remember being so pumped when "Siva" came onto the service, same with "The Perfect Drug".