Activision Pulls the Plug on Guitar Hero Franchise

[jaketheripper]

Good. Guitar Hero ceased being able to compete with Rock Band years ago.

That makes about as much sense as LBP being able to compete with Mario. Try again. (Hint: Other way around)

OT: GH6 was the perfect swan song for the franchise. If it weren't for oversaturation, GH could've been an amazing thing. Instead, it's just a great thing. Hopefully RB dies as well, as it's still a few years away from being able to match GH3, let alone GH6. We don't need such a downgrade continuing in GH's place.

rock band 3 is better than any other music game. due to the fact that i can actually play a guitar... so no it isnt a downgrade. better tech. better(and more) songs. i think rockband has some life left.

 

[rembrandtqeinstein]

I hope this brings more exposure to the open source alternative, frets on fire [http://fretsonfire.sourceforge.net/]



Also where the industry failed, they needed to develop an algorithm that would take any mp3 and instantly make a game track out of it. Instead they tried re-sell the same game with different songs. Or tried to sell old song as overpriced dlc.

There is no substantial gameplay difference between guitar hero 1 and 4, only different songs.

 

[infernovolver]

Reiterating what's already been said; thank god, took long enough, about time, Activision's own fault, shouldn't have done what they did, etc.

Harmonix > any lap dogs Activision can scrounge up to make another 'Hero' sequel.

do you think this will make that bloodsucker Kotick see what his business plan does?
Doubt it, man has the brains of the leech he so closely resembles.

Haha! That's gold right there.

 

[Andronicus]

Never mind Guitar Hero, they cancelled True Crime: Hong Kong for god sake. I don't care about a musical game series that has been milked to death and should've died a year ago, I care about a game with actual potential and fun gameplay more original than the crap Activision's been producing for the past few years. Activision cares only for milking the profits out of existing game franchises and considers any game that can only exist by making a few less million dollars a failure.
So I declare war on Activision and its pants-on-head-retarded CEO. I'm uninstalling all Activision games from my computer and I'm refusing to buy any more until Bobby Kotick either steps down or gains a conscience.

On the bright side, the cancellation of True Crime: Hong Kong finally convinced me to upgrade my avatar.

Hehe, you should read the financial report [http://investor.activision.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=548900].

At the same time, due to continued declines in the music genre, the company will disband Activision Publishing's Guitar Hero business unit and discontinue development on its Guitar Hero game for 2011. The company also will stop development on True Crime: Hong Kong?. These decisions are based on the desire to focus on the greatest opportunities that the company currently has to create the world's best interactive entertainment experiences.

Sorry if it seems like I'm just rubbing it in, but it cracks me up.

Also from the same report:

In 2011, the company will allocate the majority of its resources and focus toward opportunities which we expect will afford us the greatest competitive advantages and the greatest potential for best-in-class quality, high-margin digital growth, and long-term success. These opportunities include Blizzard Entertainment's games currently in development, robust investment in forthcoming Call of Duty titles, the development of a best-in-class digital community surrounding the Call of Duty franchise, a new property from Bungie and an innovative new universe with broad appeal that will be revealed at Toy Fair later this week and will bring the world of toys, video games and the Internet together in an unprecedented way.

Direct from the Kotick dictionary!
Robust investment: "I'm going to run this brand into the fucking ground!" [http://art.penny-arcade.com/photos/228852564_ebkPQ-L-2.jpg]

I'll be interested in seeing what this new universe with apparently broad appeal will be though.

 

[Cursed Frogurt]

I couldn't care less about the GH franchise, but I hope DJ Hero continues.

I used to download DLC for Rock Band almost every other week, but I think I downloaded under 10 songs in all of 2010. Still waiting on Goo Goo Dolls... (I heard Name came out for GH, but I would never buy a whole game for one DLC song)

 

[ProfessorLayton]

That's a shame that people are going to lose their jobs for this, but dang... there were just too many Guitar Hero games. Sure it was great when it was brand new because it was a fresh idea, but releasing two games every year with the same exact formula was too much. It's a shame, but rhythm games are pretty much over and this proves it.

 

[Scizophrenic Llama]

Good. Guitar Hero ceased being able to compete with Rock Band years ago.

That makes about as much sense as LBP being able to compete with Mario. Try again. (Hint: Other way around)

OT: GH6 was the perfect swan song for the franchise. If it weren't for oversaturation, GH could've been an amazing thing. Instead, it's just a great thing. Hopefully RB dies as well, as it's still a few years away from being able to match GH3, let alone GH6. We don't need such a downgrade continuing in GH's place.

I want to know how Rock Band is a downgrade from Guitar Hero. If Harmonix(who I'm going to hope you do know created Guitar Hero and all) hadn't made Rock Band, there is a very good chance that you'd probably just now be getting drums and whatnot in Guitar Hero. Rock Band also set the precedence to import songs from previous titles, as well as DLC carrying over.

Quite a lot that Guitar Hero has, infact was on Rock Band first.

Rock Band now boasts a musical library of 2,500+ songs, has pro-modes which allow people to get a start on learning instruments and songs within the game, and one more instrument over Guitar Hero.

Quite frankly I was expecting an announcement on how they were going to fail at attempting to top Rock Band this year, but instead they just gave up. Rock Band totally sounds like a downgrade.

 

[thenoblegaunt]

I'm sure this has been said already, but why did they release a Guitar Hero every year? They could have kept this going longer if they... i dunno... paced themselves better.

 

[tautologico]

Why couldn't they have gotten Stairway to Heaven BEFORE this happened? Now I'll never get to play it on Guitar Hero.

You know Stairway to Heaven will never (or at least not in the next decades) be in a music game, right?

 

[tautologico]

That's how the free market works I guess, no profit, no product. Still, Harmonix seems to be doing fine, I wonder if it has anything to do with them making games instead of money.

Also, I wonder if when we look back on the '00s in 20-30 years, if Guitar Hero will be one of those iconic decade specific trends that just kind of disappeared...

Harmonix is not doing too well either. Viacom/MTV put them up for sale, no one wanted to buy them. They bought themselves out, and recently laid off some people. The news were here on the Escapist, but I'm too lazy right now to look for links.

 

[invitationofchaos]

I feel sorry for those who lost their jobs, but indeed, as it is kind of the key point stated here, Activision's to blame. Liquidation of a company has been the MO of the company recently [http://www.gamezone.com/news/item/activision_true_crime_guitar_hero_no_more_plus_firings/], but Guitar Hero lost it's way between Harmonix leaving, and the DLC swag-fest that was Guitar Hero 3.

 

[Emo-Hawk]

This makes me sad

 

[Mogule]

That's how the free market works I guess, no profit, no product. Still, Harmonix seems to be doing fine, I wonder if it has anything to do with them making games instead of money.

Also, I wonder if when we look back on the '00s in 20-30 years, if Guitar Hero will be one of those iconic decade specific trends that just kind of disappeared...

Harmonix is not doing too well either. Viacom/MTV put them up for sale, no one wanted to buy them. They bought themselves out, and recently laid off some people. The news were here on the Escapist, but I'm too lazy right now to look for links.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/107593-Harmonix-Layoffs-Confirmed

 

[SinisterGehe]

About fucking time.

Whole heartly seconded that. I was very much sick of it after just 5 minutes, I don't know how that game is enjoyable. It's a minigame put together with music, there's a billion other games worth more than the game that was so ..yeah you get where I'm goin' with this.

I third this, or something like that.
But yeah, I was amazed this thing got wings to fly to begin with.

 

[GamerRelic]

I'm hoping that other kinds of music games,namely indie ones such as turba,beat hazard,and audiosurf keep getting made.

OT:This took way tooo long.

Why couldn't they have gotten Stairway to Heaven BEFORE this happened? Now I'll never get to play it on Guitar Hero.

You know Stairway to Heaven will never (or at least not in the next decades) be in a music game, right?

damn we need a bitches dont know bout my beat hazard.

 

[MrJinks]

Ok Activison, before you pull the plug, please release "Stairway To Heaven" as DLC?

How about just buying a guitar? I don't understand any of these games, why not learn something instead. The exception to this that I'll make is DJ Hero because you could ruin a decent set of turntables and vinyl to find out that you're still crap at doing it.

 

[Dimensional Vortex]

About fucking time.

Whole heartly seconded that. I was very much sick of it after just 5 minutes, I don't know how that game is enjoyable. It's a minigame put together with music, there's a billion other games worth more than the game that was so ..yeah you get where I'm goin' with this.

Really? Because I played it with 3 friends and we all had lots of fun, far more than we would when playing Call of Duty and mindlessly shooting at one another, or far more than we would grinding our way to level 85 in Wow. Personally I think that Guitar Hero is really fun when playing it with friends, but by your self it gets old fast.

 

[Assassin Xaero]

After Guitar Hero 3 the track lists were pretty crappy anyway. I would have liked a metal one, something like the Brutal Legend sound track. Yes I know there was the Metallica, but I'm not really that big of a fan of them and they were the majority of the songs on it...

 

[senobit]

With 23 game since 2005, Guitar Hero must be one the most milked games in history.