The Design Failures That Led To Rock Band

CNN is running an interview with Eran Egozy and Alex Rigopulos, founders of Harmonix, about the long road that eventually led them to the creation of Guitar Hero and Rock Band . It wasn't an quick or easy process, and the two worked on a number of unsuccessful concepts before arriving at the games that redefined a genre. Quoting: "I was watching people interact with our product, and the realization came crashing down on me — we had spent 18 months on a music system that was fundamentally flawed. Karaoke isn't about personal expression. It's about people reproducing the songs they know as accurately as they can. The whole notion of adding improvisation elements just wasn't connecting. So I retreated to my hotel room and was depressed for the next two days. The company was on the rocks. We had zero revenue. We had been trying for four years to make something work. We were out of ideas. Those first four years had been a graveyard of mis-starts and product concepts that never made it anywhere. Worse, there was adequate information about two years into those four years to realize that our big concept was fatally flawed."

Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

CNN is running an interview with Eran Egozy and Alex Rigopulos, founders of Harmonix, about the long load that eventually led them to the creation of Guitar Hero and Rock Band.

What, were they making C64 games?

Re:How to do rock band without "Rock Band"

[regular_gonzalez]

I've seen people play Crysis. I've never played it. I'm not sure exactly what it is. I think that there are some kind of weapons and enemies displayed on a monitor and you try to use the weapons to shoot them. Allow me to suggest an alternative. Buy a real gun and go to the shooting range. Buy a selection of guns, and practice until you're good. When you feel good and up to it, consider joining the Army so you can shoot real life people in the middle east. I've seen people play Forza. I've never played it. I'm not sure exactly what it is. I think that you take a plastic controller and maneuver a car around a racetrack displayed on a monitor, avoiding other vehicles at the same time. Allow me to suggest an alternative. Buy a sports car and go to your local track. Practice driving a lot, trying to avoid accidents. When you feel good and up to it, consider joining organized races at the racetrack. Wait, that sounds stupid.

Re:How to do rock band without "Rock Band"

[chip_s_ahoy]

We know the next part. You don't even own a television.

Re:How to do rock band without "Rock Band"

[El_Muerte_TDS]

I've seen people post on Slashdot. I've never posted on it. ...

D'oh!

Re:How to do rock band without "Rock Band"

[b1t r0t]

I've seen people play World of Warcraft. I've never played it. I'm not sure exactly what it is. I think that there are some kind of weapons and enemies displayed on a monitor and you try to use the weapons to kill them. Allow me to suggest an alternative. Buy a real sword and practice on a pell. Buy a selection of swords, and practice until you're good. When you feel good and up to it, consider joining the Crusades so you can kill real life people in the middle east.

I've seen people play Pac-Man. I've never played it. I'm not sure exactly what it is. I think that there are some kind of dots and enemies displayed on a monitor and you try to eat the dots before you get killed. Allow me to suggest an alternative. Buy real pills and eat them until you're good. When you feel good and up to it, consider becoming a hypochondriac.

Re:I don't get it...

[The Ultimate Fartkno]

Oh. My. God.

I know that "LOL" and "new keyboard" are pretty much the most worn out cliches on the intarwebs, but when I saw the "Autism Rocks!" logo I came within an inch of spewing coffee across my computer and LOLed so loudly that my cat flew out of the room like someone had tased him. What's next, "I have EXTREME cancer!" t-shirts?

Re:It isn't about learning to play a guitar

[mdwh2]

Learning to play a guitar = Writing and designing a game.

Which has given me a brilliant idea for a new game: Programmer Hero.

You play a geek programming a computer. Using a specially designed custom "keyboard" that plugs into the console, you have to press differently coloured buttons in sequence at the correct moment, in order for the computer computer programmer to complete the game he is writing.

Choose from endless classic games just waiting to be programmed by you: Quake, Doom, Halo.

Everyone wants to play a computer games programmer, don't they?

Yes, but:

[Mongoose Disciple]

The genius of what they did is that they made DDR for fat or lazy people.

Unsurprisingly, a DDR-like game where you're required to get much less exercise is much more popular in America.

(Yes, there are other reasons for that, too -- but that one's the funniest.)

Should be practicing at all times on the tour bus

[Tetsujin]

He's wasting his time then. He could be practising.

Yeah, in the old days the tour bus would bring along a slave-driver - any band members who did anything apart from practicing for their next show while in the tour bus would be flogged.

Nowadays they tend not to bring the slave-driver, and band members indulge in other activities and "relaxation" between the shows. They've gone soft!

Re:Rock Band isn't about playing a guitar

[MikeBabcock]

You know, that's what always annoys me about Ratchet & Clank -- people can't be bothered to jump through real lava fields and blow each other up with electric field weapons anymore. They just sit on their lazy backsides and do it on a TV instead of getting out there and really blowing stuff up! Come on people, get up and torch something with your plasma weapons instead of just pretending to on TV!

Not gonna feel bad for you jackoffs...

[tengeta]

Seriously, you should expect these things to happen when you sell out to EA. Sucks to be you.