The reason Rock Band 4 won’t release on PC

Music labels worried about piracy

In October of this year the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 will be getting Rock Band 4, but PC players will be sitting out on the rock-fest. Why aren't PC players getting in on the game? Because music labels still aren't over the whole music piracy since it reached its height in the early 2000's.

We got a glimpse at what Xbox One and PlayStation 4 players will be jamming out to last month, but more recently Rock Band 4's Project lead Daniel Sussman spoke with Eurogamer on the reasoning behind the lack of development for a PC version.

"The library is not there on PC," Sussman said, referring to the songs released for previous Rock Band games. "The library is there on Xbox and PlayStation. So, for players who want it on PC, really you're looking at a new audience that hasn't played before, and I don't know to what degree there is an audience for new players who have never played Rock Band before on the PC. That's one piece of it."

Half of the issue is the developers not knowing if anyone would want it on the PC and the other half is the fear of music piracy.

"The other piece is all the security issues, to be perfectly frank," Sussman said. "There's something comforting about the closed network that comes along with the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. That's important to our partners in the music industry. Not to say that's an unsolvable problem."