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Green Day Getting Its Own Version Of Rock Band
Following in the footsteps of the Beatles, the band Green Day is getting its own version of Rock Band. Before you start collecting pitchforks and looking up Harmonix’s address on MapQuest, it’s important to note that this appears to be more along the lines of a track pack with extras than a full-fledged Green Day experience.
“We’ve worked with the Rock Band team in the past year to enable our fans to play tracks from 21st Century Breakdown, and we’re excited to now be working on a game, spanning our entire career,” said Green Day's Billie Joe Armstrong. “We want people to fire this up, choose their favorite Green Day tracks, and play along with us as Rock Band avatars so they can feel what it's like to perform on stage as Green Day."
The game will feature the likenesses of the band and some of the important venues from their career (Gilman Street anyone? OK, probably not.) It’ll be fully exportable to Rock Band and Rock Band 2, too, unlike the segregated experience that the Beatles: Rock Band provides.
“This game will feel like a natural extension of Green Day and their music that will deepen the fans’ connection to the band and their history,” said Alex Rigopulos, CEO and co-founder of Harmonix Music Systems. “Fans will be able to enjoy some of the greatest songs from the Green Day catalogue in this standalone game or via Rock Band due to full export capability. We are thrilled to work with Green Day to revisit key moments from their career, including their likenesses, content and imagery, through our innovative form of musical interaction.”
It’s an interesting approach for Harmonix and Warner Bros. to take. While there was an exception with the AC-DC track pack, Rock Band has focused more on major releases and DLC than competitor Guitar Hero, which embraces band-specific offshoots, as with Aerosmith, Metallica and Van Halen. It certainly lends credence to Roger Daltrey’s earlier comments that the Who would be getting its own version of Rock Band next year.
Are you excited about getting what seems to be an intermediate step between regular DLC and something more ambitious? Is Green Day a logical starting point for such a move? Are there any other artists you’d like to see get similar treatment in the future?
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