The guy I know for sure that they hired, Chris Vance, made some of the worst customs ever. I would post a chart he made that had random 4 note chords during all the "boring" parts, but I can't find it anymore.
Going back to this for a second, I looked around and found ChrisVance's youtube page.
He's still got his Guitar Hero 2 customs on there as well as the charts he apparently worked on in GH3. Aside from the one instance of four-button chords I saw for his "Anyway You Want It" chart, he made some songs easier than they could've been really. Jack and Diane has a shit-ton more strumming than he put. He also mentions that Anyway You Want It was the first custom chart he made. I'd imagine that when you're starting out making something to impress the scorehero community, I'm sure you would feel almost required to put in a couple bullshit items.
None of the articles currently available define the coolest, most pro-consumer features of the product, so that must have been the secret stuff I judiciously avoided discussing.
None of the articles currently available define the coolest, most pro-consumer features of the product, so that must have been the secret stuff I judiciously avoided discussing.
...
...
!!!
I am hoping for a dance pad add on, so my band can have go-go dancers.
I can't help but think that this exact debate has been going on within the Harmonix fortress for longer than any of us know...
Probably. However, I'd like to hear more about this Indie music initiative before I start cursing HMX and God for not putting music creation tools in the hands of the people. I'd honestly trade all the custom music in the world for some Jonathan Coulton DLC.
None of the articles currently available define the coolest, most pro-consumer features of the product, so that must have been the secret stuff I judiciously avoided discussing.
...
...
!!!
I'm finding it hard to think of anything more 'pro-consumer' than somehow getting the RB1 songs put into RB2. I know that's been a mine-shaft around here lately though, and surely Tycho would've noticed if it had been mentioned, and then pulled, and being the smart-ass he is he probably would've at least vaguely referenced that.
What else could there be though? Pro-consumer makes me think of things like instrument compatibility and a plethora of bundling options, but it seems to be something bigger than that...or 'cooler' at least than just 'hey you can buy the game, or the game+mic, or the game+guitar, etc, etc...'
Tons of little nuggets of great info to chew on. This freaking week can't go by fast enough. :x
EDIT: Oh shit, details in the comments. The writer expounds on the section about the "surprise get" in the artists featured in RB2:
Actually [Elvis Costello] surprised me too, but one of the artists they haven't announced yet struck me as not the kind of person who I thought would get excited about a music video game. I'll be interested to hear what people think of the full setlist (and I haven't seen more than a few of the unreleased titles either - tried to catch them when they were scrolling through the menu, but my short term memory is poor).
To juxtapose that with the leaked track list, could he be talking about the Bob Dylan track on said list? Combine that with the fact that the Costello track announced today is the same one on the list, and I wonder about its authenticity.
It also comes with an automatic calibration system with a built-in mic and light sensor, which looks neat and which you'll use exactly once, unless you work at Harmonix and go batty every time you have to set up a demo on a new screen and sound system.
I'm gonna have to go find my post where I outlined that exact device and questioned why it didn't exist yet... LOL
About the music editor, I may be being way to cynical, but does anyone else feel that this is Activision's way of making outrageous claimes and getting DLC?
They hired people from Scorehero to do GH3. Now, with the music editor, they can claim to have "the most DLC of any game, ever!" because now everyone from Scorehero will be generating stuff. Only now, they don't have to pay them.
I just really think they're going to market this music creator as the 'unlimited DLC machine'.
mxmarks on
PSN: mxmarks - WiiU: mxmarks - twitter: @ MikesPS4 - twitch.tv/mxmarks - "Yes, mxmarks is the King of Queens" - Unbreakable Vow
Hey quick question: I've been having issues with my RB disk for 360 since the day I got it. It'll stop playing and say that the "disk is unreadable", not possible because I havent taken the disk out of the 360 since the day I bought it a couple weeks ago except to clean it of course. When I clean it it still saves disk is unreadable. All my other games play fine and when I clean the disk it still doesnt play. Im looking on EA's warranty and I think you can only send controllers back, not the actual software. Help?
About the music editor, I may be being way to cynical, but does anyone else feel that this is Activision's way of making outrageous claimes and getting DLC?
They hired people from Scorehero to do GH3. Now, with the music editor, they can claim to have "the most DLC of any game, ever!" because now everyone from Scorehero will be generating stuff. Only now, they don't have to pay them.
I just really think they're going to market this music creator as the 'unlimited DLC machine'.
No vocals. Copyrighted works will likely be removed with moderate speed.
Oh they'll definitely count the number of user generated DLC into their "We've had X number of DLC downloaded since release" statements. That's why the Rock Band DLC numbers always include the word 'paid DLC', as Activision always likes to claim better numbers, but has released a bunch of theirs for free, which does not reflect success...it just reflects the fact that people like free shit.
About the music editor, I may be being way to cynical, but does anyone else feel that this is Activision's way of making outrageous claimes and getting DLC?
They hired people from Scorehero to do GH3. Now, with the music editor, they can claim to have "the most DLC of any game, ever!" because now everyone from Scorehero will be generating stuff. Only now, they don't have to pay them.
I just really think they're going to market this music creator as the 'unlimited DLC machine'.
No vocals. Copyrighted works will likely be removed with moderate speed.
This is the reason why I think GHWT's music creator (or any music creator) isn't gonna gain a lot of traction in the end. Without vocals, you're basically removing a fourth of the gameplay. I'd also like to note that it's not exactly a new problem either--when creating a mix in Amplitude, the only part of the song you couldn't mess with is the vocals.
Nova_CI have the needThe need for speedRegistered Userregular
edited July 2008
Okay, using the drum kit to play drums along with any mp3 in Rock Band 2, to me, demolishes the music creation tool in GH:WT. Not that I play the drums, but I wish and Rock Band 2 seems like Harmonix is trying to provide the steps for wanna be drummers to actually learn.
Nova_C on
0
JC of DII think we're fucked up.I know I am.Registered Userregular
edited July 2008
I wonder how they'll set it up for the drums making different sounds though.
I use that program that came out forever ago to use the Rock Band drums on your computer to do that already - but I have to pre-determine what the three pads that aren't bass-snare will be. Open or Close hi-hat, splash, crash, ride cymbals or should I reserve it for some tom-toms?
If they can work around that seamlessly somehow I'll probably spend more time with that than the actual game.
About the music editor, I may be being way to cynical, but does anyone else feel that this is Activision's way of making outrageous claimes and getting DLC?
They hired people from Scorehero to do GH3. Now, with the music editor, they can claim to have "the most DLC of any game, ever!" because now everyone from Scorehero will be generating stuff. Only now, they don't have to pay them.
I just really think they're going to market this music creator as the 'unlimited DLC machine'.
No vocals. Copyrighted works will likely be removed with moderate speed.
Oh I know, but I doubt that will stop them from counting all this as thier big DLC, and the amount of work its going to take to create a set of rules that will differentiate between a blatant copyrighted song, and a copyrighted song with 2 notes changed so that its not EXACTLY the same, is going to be killer.
mxmarks on
PSN: mxmarks - WiiU: mxmarks - twitter: @ MikesPS4 - twitch.tv/mxmarks - "Yes, mxmarks is the King of Queens" - Unbreakable Vow
0
JC of DII think we're fucked up.I know I am.Registered Userregular
edited July 2008
Possibly. Though that would only work with the new drum kits, and if they did that I would hope it would just be reserved for loud vs. quiet hits on the cymbal or drumhead, instead of having toms/cymbals be set a certain volume no matter what you're playing.
Maybe back button could change between configurations mid-song but that would still be kinda tricky to pull off. Though it's not like you'll be using it to actually perform for a crowd or anything to where that would be a big detraction.
You don't need to be able to change it on the fly... you could do part of a roll on 2 toms, then go back, switch the sound bank to some lower toms, and add the second half of the roll. This isn't a performance, it's composing... it will be tedious, time consuming, and nothing like playing a real drum set ;-P
A rock blog about rock band 2. My computer won't load ANYTHING off this guys page, so Im dying of frusteration, and have no idea what it says.
mxmarks on
PSN: mxmarks - WiiU: mxmarks - twitter: @ MikesPS4 - twitch.tv/mxmarks - "Yes, mxmarks is the King of Queens" - Unbreakable Vow
0
JC of DII think we're fucked up.I know I am.Registered Userregular
edited July 2008
For the Rock Band 2 "Play along to an MP3" feature?
I was assuming it was just like it's called. You get an mp3 going and then it's just like the fills and pre-chart parts of the note section, so you can freeplay along to it.
If this is something where you build a note chart over an mp3 then I'm now wondering why they wouldn't allow guitar and vocals over it.
A rock blog about rock band 2. My computer won't load ANYTHING off this guys page, so Im dying of frusteration, and have no idea what it says.
Q&A Responses, Part 1 Tuesday, July 8, 2008 - 7:16pm | 27 comments | Leave a comment
I wrote up this big post and took a lot of screenshots about one of our new features, and realised that I couldn't show it just yet because it relies on songs - and we hadn't officially announced any yet when I sent this off for approval. Awk-ward.
So, NEXT week you'll see that blog post, which will be good because I will be at E3 and usually wouldn't have time to do anything but a photoblog.
In the meantime, I've gone through the questions below and answered the ones that I'm allowed to talk about. Onto the questions!
---
Q: "If your Rock Band 2 instruments are better, if I wanted to switch disc over to play Run to the Hills or something can I use the new instruments?" - quinaking
A: Yes, all Rock Band instruments work on all Rock Band games for that platform, as well as any other music games that adhere to the controller standards.
---
Q: "Will there be any improvements on vocals? Will there still be talky parts, and, if so, will they be fixed or easier to hit than they were in RB1?" - Lady Sia..
A: Yes, on multiple fronts. We've improved the balance for pitched vocals, and completely rewritten the non-pitched talky detection. Rock Band 2 has drastically more reliable talky parts.
---
Q: "Well, I'm going to go on record that this "limited time XBOX360 exclusivity" is total bull crap. Who does this benifit?" - killerew..
A: This benefits both gamers and Harmonix. Microsoft have been awesome in supporting us and have actually helped out on some of these things by visiting us and working hand-in-hand on new platform features. They've been a great partner on everything from development to marketing, and some of the features in the game would not have been possible without them.
As well as this, the other platforms are coming out really soon after the Xbox 360 launch. Trust me, if you're an other platform owner, you'll be surprised at how little you have to wait.
---
Q: "I was wondering if you could create a code or a option to shut off the vocal pitch meter? Singing the song and making it "your own" would be a great idea and make an interesting addition to the game!!" - jd506
A: I can't talk about specific features until E3, but I think you'll be very happy with one of the new features in RB2
---
Q: "Could you find Europe or Australia on a map? Only kidding. After the flamefest of the last European release hopefully you'll be more eager to talk about why there is a delay and such forth. So, why is there a delay and how long will it be?"
A: Trust me, I complain daily to everyone here about the release date in Australia (my home country). As soon as we can announce dates in other territories outside the US we will. Stay tuned for more info about this at E3! The window will be smaller this time around.
---
Q: "Cant wait for E3 and Harmonix's juicy details on Rock Band 2!" - Pamp
A: Me too! It means I can start posting screenshots and in-depth stuff.
As usual, if you have questions, post them below.
-DanT
Oh, and one more thing for people having issues getting gold stars: The gold star score threshold is now easier to achieve in Rock Band 2. No more cursing at impossible deploy paths!
Q: "I was wondering if you could create a code or a option to shut off the vocal pitch meter? Singing the song and making it "your own" would be a great idea and make an interesting addition to the game!!" - jd506
A: I can't talk about specific features until E3, but I think you'll be very happy with one of the new features in RB2
I don't get any argument (put forth either by Tycho or Activision) about a music creator's "infinite DLC" being immeasurably better than a concrete selection. Sure it's infinite, but are those songs going to be good?
Strato on
0
JC of DII think we're fucked up.I know I am.Registered Userregular
edited July 2008
Let me pose the question like this. There are two similarly good first person shooters coming out soon.
Both will have downloadable content released regularly by the creators.
But one will have the ability for user created maps built-in and an easy way to download them onto your own Xbox 360 or Playstation 3.
Which is the better value?
EDIT: I love the Rock Band series more than Guitar Hero personally but for someone who hasn't made up their mind one way or the other this is really all it boils down to.
"Downloadable content released regularly" while technically true of the Guitar Hero franchise, they simply pale compared to the amount of content released regularly for Rock Band.
As a musician capable of playing many instruments, as well as someone that has spent time using many of the best tools for creating synthetic music,
I can't stress enough that the music editor in GH appears to be the most cumbersome method for music creation I've ever seen.
Due to the limited amount of keys, they can't enable the guitar controller to function exactly like a MIDI synth, as there aren't even enough to cover a single octave of a heptatonic scale, one of the more fundamental tools of Western musical theory. Even with the proposed ability to change octave by TILTING the guitar, physical input is clearly awkward.
Therefore, there's going to have to be the ability to adjust the pitch of "gems" outside of performing it as such.
Not such a grave issue, but certainly a bit tedius if there's no support for a mouse.
Then there's rhythmic issues. I imagine everything will have to be quantized to fit a given tempo/meter, otherwise they'll have to provide the ability to shift gems around, adjust dimensions of the fret board, include tempo enveloping, etc....
So now let's say the tool is functionally as powerful as something like Reason, just more difficult to use, and limited in the scope of the sounds you can use (as dictated by the medium, i.e. no 3gb installation of samples).
Does that sound like fun?
As fun as going out and making music with real instruments?
Rhetoric, sure.
But what Harmonix seems to be suggesting is that they're going to take the initiative to get independent musicians involved, and that sounds infinitely more exciting.
So while Little Timmy Tardbot can't upload his hella sweet chart of squelchy synth, we might be seeing DLC from some of the musicians here on the boards.
JC of DII think we're fucked up.I know I am.Registered Userregular
edited July 2008
Personally if they keep it at the same style they've had now for Guitar Hero World Tour then I'd say it evens out. Not as much but a fair amount is free. Sometimes shitty but sometimes it's the motherfuckin' Top Gun Anthem.
I don't get any argument (put forth either by Tycho or Activision) about a music creator's "infinite DLC" being immeasurably better than a concrete selection. Sure it's infinite, but are those songs going to be good?
It's the possibility of them being good that can/will be used by Activision's PR folks that is the real problem here. No one here doubts that it will be mountains upon mountains of crap with a tiny, tiny vein of gold running through it, but when the possibility of endless good is presented to the public, it could be the thing that prevents that 'inevitable' power shift from GH to RB that we've all been expecting would come along during this generation of rhythm game battles.
Let me pose the question like this. There are two similarly good first person shooters coming out soon.
Both will have downloadable content released regularly by the creators.
But one will have the ability for user created maps built-in and an easy way to download them onto your own Xbox 360 or Playstation 3.
Which is the better value?
Whichever one is more fun to play out of the box. Again, 95% of the stuff generated by the mod community for anything is crap, and the remaining 5% can be tough to find unless your dedicated.
Let me pose the question like this. There are two similarly good first person shooters coming out soon.
Both will have downloadable content released regularly by the creators.
But one will have the ability for user created maps built-in and an easy way to download them onto your own Xbox 360 or Playstation 3.
Which is the better value?
EDIT: I love the Rock Band series more than Guitar Hero personally but for someone who hasn't made up their mind one way or the other this is really all it boils down to.
I'm just not convinced yet that the user-created songs will be as good as rock classics. For one, they'll all lack vocals, and then there's the fact that they'll all be produced on a computer and plastic instruments, which should greatly limit the dynamics and expression of the music. I guess time will tell. To me, this seems more like a shooter including perfect replicas of real-life locations to play on by default, but allowing player to create their own levels using a vastly simplified creator if they like.
* If You Wanna get to Heaven, Ozark Mountain Daredevils
* Gold Lion, Yeah Yeah Yeahs
* Possum Kingdom, The Toadies
* Black Betty, Ram Jam
* Don't Speak, No Doubt
* Black, Pearl Jam
* Drain You, Nirvana
* Farmhouse, Phish
* Santeria, Sublime
Apprentice
* You Oughta Know, Alanis Morissette
* We Got the Beat, Go-Go's
* Float On, Modest Mouse
* Kiss Me Deadly, Lita Ford
* Atomic, Party Animals
* Heartbreaker, (Could be so many artists)
* Piece of My Heart, Big Brother
* Holding Company
* Rock the Casbah, The Clash
* I Wanna be Sedated, The Ramones
Solid
* Panic Attack, The Paddingtons
* Chop Suey, System of the Down
* Give it Away, Red Hot Chili Peppers
* Everlong, Foo Fighters
* Kids in America, Kim Wilde
* Ace of Spades, Motorhead
* Hello There, John Prine
* Anyway You Want It, Journey
* Pinball Wizard, The Who
Moderate
* Machinehead, Bush
* Born to Run, Bruce Springstein
* What's the Frequency Kenneth, REM
* Want To, (not a clue)
* I Write Sins Not Tragedies, Panic at the Disco
* The Old Apartment, Barenaked Ladies
* When I Come Around, Green Day
* Zombie, Cranberries
* Soak up the Sun, Sheryl Crow (?!)
Skilled
* Waitin on the World to Change, John Mayer
* Man in the Box, Alice in Chains
* Ramblin' Man, Hank Williams
* One Step Closer, Linkin Park
* Misery Business, Paramore
* American Woman, The Guess Who
* White Wedding, Billie Idol
* (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction, Rolling Stones
* Folsom Prison Blues, Johnny Cash
Challenging
* Our Truth, Laguna Coil
* Are You Gonna Go My Way, Lenny Kravitz
* Bring Me to Life, Evanescence
* Spoonman, Soundgarden
* Head Like a Hole, Nine Inch Nails
* Aqualung, Jethro Tull
* Double Vision, Foreigner
* Rodeo, (your guess is as good as ours)
* Sultans of Swing, Dire Straits
Blistering
* Magic Man, Heart
* Bad Medicine, Bon Jovi
* Every Little Thing She Does is Magic, The Police
* Thanks for the Memories, Fall Out Boy
* Testify, Rage Against the Machine
* Kickstart My Heart, Motley Crue
* I Was Made For Lovin' You, Kiss
* Bad Reputation, Thin Lizzy
* Prodigal Son, The Rolling Stones
Nightmare
* The Bleeding, Five Finger Death
* Down With the Sickness, Disturbed
* Hyper Music, Muse
* Judith, A Perfect Circle
* TNT, AC/DC
* Rainbow in the Dark, Dio
* Anna Molly, Incubus
* November Rain, Guns 'n' Roses
* Comfortably Numb, Pink Floyd
Impossible
* Feed My Frankenstein, Alice Cooper
* Peace sells... but, Megadeath
* Fuel, Metallica
* Crazy Train, Ozzy Osbourne
* Forsaken, Dream Theater
* 2 Minutes to Midnight, Iron Maiden
* Hot For Teacher, Van Halen
* Cowboys from Hell, Pantera'
* (Ghost) Riders in the Sky, (any number of people)
Posts
I'm gonna let you in on a life secret. People are fucking retarded.
Going back to this for a second, I looked around and found ChrisVance's youtube page.
He's still got his Guitar Hero 2 customs on there as well as the charts he apparently worked on in GH3. Aside from the one instance of four-button chords I saw for his "Anyway You Want It" chart, he made some songs easier than they could've been really. Jack and Diane has a shit-ton more strumming than he put. He also mentions that Anyway You Want It was the first custom chart he made. I'd imagine that when you're starting out making something to impress the scorehero community, I'm sure you would feel almost required to put in a couple bullshit items.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5QBo6SIfKw
...
...
!!!
I am hoping for a dance pad add on, so my band can have go-go dancers.
Can I get a link to said article? I cannot find it for the life of me.
A good enough start, but I need more.
I'm finding it hard to think of anything more 'pro-consumer' than somehow getting the RB1 songs put into RB2. I know that's been a mine-shaft around here lately though, and surely Tycho would've noticed if it had been mentioned, and then pulled, and being the smart-ass he is he probably would've at least vaguely referenced that.
What else could there be though? Pro-consumer makes me think of things like instrument compatibility and a plethora of bundling options, but it seems to be something bigger than that...or 'cooler' at least than just 'hey you can buy the game, or the game+mic, or the game+guitar, etc, etc...'
twit feed
http://www.avclub.com/content/blog/rock_band_2_the_av_club_hands_on
Tons of little nuggets of great info to chew on. This freaking week can't go by fast enough. :x
EDIT: Oh shit, details in the comments. The writer expounds on the section about the "surprise get" in the artists featured in RB2:
I'm gonna have to go find my post where I outlined that exact device and questioned why it didn't exist yet... LOL
They hired people from Scorehero to do GH3. Now, with the music editor, they can claim to have "the most DLC of any game, ever!" because now everyone from Scorehero will be generating stuff. Only now, they don't have to pay them.
I just really think they're going to market this music creator as the 'unlimited DLC machine'.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
No vocals. Copyrighted works will likely be removed with moderate speed.
twit feed
This is the reason why I think GHWT's music creator (or any music creator) isn't gonna gain a lot of traction in the end. Without vocals, you're basically removing a fourth of the gameplay. I'd also like to note that it's not exactly a new problem either--when creating a mix in Amplitude, the only part of the song you couldn't mess with is the vocals.
I use that program that came out forever ago to use the Rock Band drums on your computer to do that already - but I have to pre-determine what the three pads that aren't bass-snare will be. Open or Close hi-hat, splash, crash, ride cymbals or should I reserve it for some tom-toms?
If they can work around that seamlessly somehow I'll probably spend more time with that than the actual game.
Oh I know, but I doubt that will stop them from counting all this as thier big DLC, and the amount of work its going to take to create a set of rules that will differentiate between a blatant copyrighted song, and a copyrighted song with 2 notes changed so that its not EXACTLY the same, is going to be killer.
Maybe back button could change between configurations mid-song but that would still be kinda tricky to pull off. Though it's not like you'll be using it to actually perform for a crowd or anything to where that would be a big detraction.
A rock blog about rock band 2. My computer won't load ANYTHING off this guys page, so Im dying of frusteration, and have no idea what it says.
I was assuming it was just like it's called. You get an mp3 going and then it's just like the fills and pre-chart parts of the note section, so you can freeplay along to it.
If this is something where you build a note chart over an mp3 then I'm now wondering why they wouldn't allow guitar and vocals over it.
Go on...
EDIT: Reading Blind Psychic's version now, because dammit, if someones going to be that nice to me, I have to accept it. Thank you!
Fuck yes!
Both will have downloadable content released regularly by the creators.
But one will have the ability for user created maps built-in and an easy way to download them onto your own Xbox 360 or Playstation 3.
Which is the better value?
EDIT: I love the Rock Band series more than Guitar Hero personally but for someone who hasn't made up their mind one way or the other this is really all it boils down to.
Gamertag: PrimusD | Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
I can't stress enough that the music editor in GH appears to be the most cumbersome method for music creation I've ever seen.
Due to the limited amount of keys, they can't enable the guitar controller to function exactly like a MIDI synth, as there aren't even enough to cover a single octave of a heptatonic scale, one of the more fundamental tools of Western musical theory. Even with the proposed ability to change octave by TILTING the guitar, physical input is clearly awkward.
Therefore, there's going to have to be the ability to adjust the pitch of "gems" outside of performing it as such.
Not such a grave issue, but certainly a bit tedius if there's no support for a mouse.
Then there's rhythmic issues. I imagine everything will have to be quantized to fit a given tempo/meter, otherwise they'll have to provide the ability to shift gems around, adjust dimensions of the fret board, include tempo enveloping, etc....
So now let's say the tool is functionally as powerful as something like Reason, just more difficult to use, and limited in the scope of the sounds you can use (as dictated by the medium, i.e. no 3gb installation of samples).
Does that sound like fun?
As fun as going out and making music with real instruments?
Rhetoric, sure.
But what Harmonix seems to be suggesting is that they're going to take the initiative to get independent musicians involved, and that sounds infinitely more exciting.
So while Little Timmy Tardbot can't upload his hella sweet chart of squelchy synth, we might be seeing DLC from some of the musicians here on the boards.
It's the possibility of them being good that can/will be used by Activision's PR folks that is the real problem here. No one here doubts that it will be mountains upon mountains of crap with a tiny, tiny vein of gold running through it, but when the possibility of endless good is presented to the public, it could be the thing that prevents that 'inevitable' power shift from GH to RB that we've all been expecting would come along during this generation of rhythm game battles.
twit feed
Whichever one is more fun to play out of the box. Again, 95% of the stuff generated by the mod community for anything is crap, and the remaining 5% can be tough to find unless your dedicated.
I'm just not convinced yet that the user-created songs will be as good as rock classics. For one, they'll all lack vocals, and then there's the fact that they'll all be produced on a computer and plastic instruments, which should greatly limit the dynamics and expression of the music. I guess time will tell. To me, this seems more like a shooter including perfect replicas of real-life locations to play on by default, but allowing player to create their own levels using a vastly simplified creator if they like.
Setlist:
* If You Wanna get to Heaven, Ozark Mountain Daredevils
* Gold Lion, Yeah Yeah Yeahs
* Possum Kingdom, The Toadies
* Black Betty, Ram Jam
* Don't Speak, No Doubt
* Black, Pearl Jam
* Drain You, Nirvana
* Farmhouse, Phish
* Santeria, Sublime
Apprentice
* You Oughta Know, Alanis Morissette
* We Got the Beat, Go-Go's
* Float On, Modest Mouse
* Kiss Me Deadly, Lita Ford
* Atomic, Party Animals
* Heartbreaker, (Could be so many artists)
* Piece of My Heart, Big Brother
* Holding Company
* Rock the Casbah, The Clash
* I Wanna be Sedated, The Ramones
Solid
* Panic Attack, The Paddingtons
* Chop Suey, System of the Down
* Give it Away, Red Hot Chili Peppers
* Everlong, Foo Fighters
* Kids in America, Kim Wilde
* Ace of Spades, Motorhead
* Hello There, John Prine
* Anyway You Want It, Journey
* Pinball Wizard, The Who
Moderate
* Machinehead, Bush
* Born to Run, Bruce Springstein
* What's the Frequency Kenneth, REM
* Want To, (not a clue)
* I Write Sins Not Tragedies, Panic at the Disco
* The Old Apartment, Barenaked Ladies
* When I Come Around, Green Day
* Zombie, Cranberries
* Soak up the Sun, Sheryl Crow (?!)
Skilled
* Waitin on the World to Change, John Mayer
* Man in the Box, Alice in Chains
* Ramblin' Man, Hank Williams
* One Step Closer, Linkin Park
* Misery Business, Paramore
* American Woman, The Guess Who
* White Wedding, Billie Idol
* (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction, Rolling Stones
* Folsom Prison Blues, Johnny Cash
Challenging
* Our Truth, Laguna Coil
* Are You Gonna Go My Way, Lenny Kravitz
* Bring Me to Life, Evanescence
* Spoonman, Soundgarden
* Head Like a Hole, Nine Inch Nails
* Aqualung, Jethro Tull
* Double Vision, Foreigner
* Rodeo, (your guess is as good as ours)
* Sultans of Swing, Dire Straits
Blistering
* Magic Man, Heart
* Bad Medicine, Bon Jovi
* Every Little Thing She Does is Magic, The Police
* Thanks for the Memories, Fall Out Boy
* Testify, Rage Against the Machine
* Kickstart My Heart, Motley Crue
* I Was Made For Lovin' You, Kiss
* Bad Reputation, Thin Lizzy
* Prodigal Son, The Rolling Stones
Nightmare
* The Bleeding, Five Finger Death
* Down With the Sickness, Disturbed
* Hyper Music, Muse
* Judith, A Perfect Circle
* TNT, AC/DC
* Rainbow in the Dark, Dio
* Anna Molly, Incubus
* November Rain, Guns 'n' Roses
* Comfortably Numb, Pink Floyd
Impossible
* Feed My Frankenstein, Alice Cooper
* Peace sells... but, Megadeath
* Fuel, Metallica
* Crazy Train, Ozzy Osbourne
* Forsaken, Dream Theater
* 2 Minutes to Midnight, Iron Maiden
* Hot For Teacher, Van Halen
* Cowboys from Hell, Pantera'
* (Ghost) Riders in the Sky, (any number of people)