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Rock Band 4: Rivals
Prior to the launch of Rock Band 4, Harmonix announced its strategy would be to release title and content updates as post-launch support. The studio has kept true to its promise, releasing free updates like the punishing Brutal mode, as well as requested features like Playlists in addition to the franchise's trademark weekly DLC. As the game approaches its one-year anniversary, Harmonix has announced its plans to kick off year two of Rock Band 4 with an expansion called Rock Band Rivals.
Rock Band Rivals is Rock Band 4's first paid expansion. While the first thing you'll probably notice when you install Rivals is the visual redesign of the front-end, Harmonix has added two meaty new modes designed around letting you experience your music library in new ways.
The first mode in the update is Rockudrama. In this new offline campaign mode, you follow your band through a VH1 Behind The Music-style mockumentary. As you progress through the mode, you watch cutscenes that splice full-motion video of musicians talking about the influence your band had with in-game footage of your band rocking on-stage. The cutscenes I saw had just the right amount of campiness for it to work.
| What About New Songs? |
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Rock Band Rivals doesn’t add any new songs to your library, but those who pre-order Rock Band Rivals will receive a set of 10 free songs. The team tells me that these songs will all eventually make their way to the standard DLC store, but those who pre-order the expansion will be the first to play the following ten songs:
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When you first start your Rockudrama career, you choose your band name and the genre of music you want to be known for. The genre decision shapes the narration during the cutscenes, but not the songs available when you choose your setlist. That means it can be jarring when you listen to all of these musicians talk about how heavy and aggressive your sound is, and the game cuts to you playing Cake's "Short Skirt/Long Jacket." Thankfully, from what I saw, you can choose your setlist from a list of songs if you want to follow through with the canon that the narration creates. Since it pulls from your entire library including all DLC and exported tracks from previous games, you shouldn't have any shortage of tracks to choose from.
In between songs, dynamic narration calls out the best player. Though it was just a small touch, hearing the narrator praise me for my 99% performance on Mumford & Sons' "The Wolf," with a line like "The guitarist was really on fire that night, and the crowd definitely noticed" was really cool. I only experienced a glimpse of the Rockudrama mode, but what I saw and played looked promising. I'm a big fan of the Rock Band series' offline campaigns, so I'm looking forward to investing a lot of time into this mode. Based on your performance, you earn fame points, which contribute to your overall progress in the Rockudrama mode.
The Rivals expansion also includes a new mode by the same name. In Rivals mode, you join a clan of up to 10 players called a crew. In your crew, you complete goals to contribute to your team's overall score to earn rewards.
Crews can be made up of all kinds of players. For example, if you want to form a crew of all expert guitarists, you can do that. Even if you're an expert guitarist and you form a crew with a drummer who plays on medium, that doesn't mean they won't contribute to the goals. According to Harmonix players of all skill levels count toward the objectives. The mode's asynchronous nature also means players in a crew don't necessarily need to be online at the same time to complete the goals.
In addition, those who purchase Rock Band Rivals will have access to the upcoming synchronous online multiplayer mode coming this December, as well as the other continuous monthly content updates. Unfortunately, those who decide to not upgrade to Rivals will be unable to access the new updates when they hit.
Rock Band Rivals is set to launch in October. Those who want to buy it digitally can do so for $29.99 from the digital storefront of the platform they play on. You can also pick it up as part of a digital bundle with Rock Band 4 for $59.99. If you've yet to pick up Rock Band 4 or any of its instruments, or you want the new PDP Fender Jaguar guitar controller, you can buy it in a bundle that comes with Rock Band 4, Rock Band Rivals, and the new guitar controller for $89.99. The full band kit, which includes all of what is found in the guitar bundle, plus the improved PDP drums and a microphone, will set you back $199.99.
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