Rock Band To Allow Independent Artists To Add Their Own Songs

Bakkster writes "Independent artists will be able to use the XNA Creator's Club to produce the Rock Band note-charts for their music and sell them in game later this year. Bands will use their original song masters and generate a MIDI file that produces the game 'gems' to which players can follow along. Tracks must pass a review process with other XNA members, and then a final approval from MTV Games. Songs will be sold for between 50 cents and $3, with the artist getting a 30% cut after MTV and Microsoft take their cut. The best tracks will also make their way to the Wii and PS3 after a 30-day exclusive period."

Re:Nice business model

[jordapatrick]

According to TFA, artists receive a "30% cut of all sales" not the ambiguous percentage that the summary implies...

As a side note, I see this as a win for all involved, especially the artists. This service will provide indie groups an opportunity to reach a large market, for very minimal costs, and a source of income in and of itself (albeit relatively small).

Re:Where did the figures come from?

[oboreruhito]

It's from the interview with Harmonix and MTV Games.

Songs submitted through this process must then be reviewed by other developers to check for playability, inappropriate lyrics, copyright infringement and so on. Harmonix will post approved tracks to an in-game download store separate from its existing "Rock Band" store where creators can set their own price (50 cents to $3 per song) and receive 30% of any resulting sales. Gamers will also be able to demo 30-second samples of each track.

The Billboard article is extremely detailed, with info on training the review community; Microsoft's development of a Harmonix-hosted subset of the XBL Creators Club, with special rules just for Rock Band; details on the software to be used by artists and and HMX; record label Sub Pop announcing that they're already moving content onto the network, including all of their fall releases; and MTV saying they may eventually combine the RBN and existing Rock Band Store markets if RBN is successful.

frets on fire did it first

[Anonymous Coward]

frets-on-fire [sourceforge.net] has been doing this for a long time. Although, its nice to see the commercial market has caught up with its open source counterpart.

Re:Nice business model

[Sparton]

There's also a $100 per year fee to be in Apple's store.

Lies. The fee for Apple developers is one-time. Comparing the expenses for the two, and they're even, but every year you want to stay a part of the respective gong show, XBL Marketplace gets you paying more and more.