On The Button

The continued rise of music in video games

What?: The axe continues to fall (in a good way) on in-game music:

Konami is to enter the guitar-based videogame ‘fray’ with Rock Revolution. The game is set for release in October.

Guitar Hero IV is to add a microphone and six-piece drum kit, allowing players to create their own tracks and share creations. Van Halen and Linkin Park will feature.

As part of a promotion deal with Best Buy, hard rock band Disturbed are giving away two tracks for free via Rock Band.

Engobi, the caffeine snack maker, offers up its Don’t Be A Piano Hero contest, offering a customised Guitar Hero Fender game controller to the winner.

The iPod will appear as an ‘equippable’ item in the Konami game Metal Gear Solid 4.

A parody of the iPhone appears in the Grand Theft Auto IV game, alongside the following description: “No buttons. No reception. No storage capacity. All ego.”

Xbox LIVE Gold members recently got to play with (make that ‘shoot at’) Death Cab For Cutie in the Call Of Duty 4 videogame.

So what?: The old console battles (currently being won hands down by Nintendo’s Wii) have given way to a new breed of videogame standoffs.

Both Rock Band and Guitar Hero are vying for top position in the lucrative peripherals-based music game marketplace. Guitar Hero has sold over 14M units in North America, netting in excess of $1B since its launch in 2005. Guitar Hero now seeks to push its dominance by usurping Rock Band’s multidevice (drums and microphone) USP with Guitar Hero 4, as well as adding increased user customisation. Konami, an early pioneer of the rhythm video game (with titles such as Guitar Freaks and Drum Mania), is now also to rush to the crowded stage. On top of this, Gibson Guitars has filed suit against both Harmonix and EA, stating it has a patent that pre-dates both Guitar Hero and Rock Band.

However, with Grand Theft Auto IV pushing a massive music collection, and other games actively involved in musical tie-ins and in-game advertising, music goes deeper here than the virtual air guitar fad. The hills are alive with the sounds of buttons being mashed.

“It’s important for artists and record labels to find other ways of marketing and generating income. Revenue in the gaming industry is increasing just as fast as it is depleting from the music industry. They should be taking
a look at Rock Band and Guitar Hero and figuring out ways to integrate themselves into the world of gaming.”
Ifeoma Obi, Marketing Coordinator, Atari

www.rockband.com
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www.guitarheroontour.com
www.engobi.com
www.konami.com