September 24, 2009
Hey, how about customized
track lists?
By Michael Lafferty
Could a voucher system allow
players to create own song lists for rhythm-genre games?
Whether you are a Rock Band fan, or one of the
Guitar Hero faithful, you know that at the heart and soul of the games are the
song lists. After all, the game mechanics are quite similar (discounting the
three-part harmonies brought in by The Beatles: Rock Band) and someone who has
played one certainly will not have to fumble to understand the other.
The note highways are the same, the fundamental
game modes are similar and while there are minor differences, the games are much
like any other game in a particular genre. First-person shooters, for example,
are more or less the same mechanics. There are some innovations, but the core
elements are the same. What sets those apart are the story arcs, for the most
part – which are designed to draw a player into the world and give him or her a
reason for moving forward.
Which brings us back to the music-rhythm genre,
and Rock Band and Guitar Hero in particular. If the track list does not resonant
with gamers, chances are they will not care much about the game. And with so
many releases now coming down the pipe, focusing on bands, there is a chance
that the genre may become saturated to the point that gamers stop rushing out to
buy the next iteration. After all, why buy game 7 in the series when chunks of
the song list have appeared in games 1, 2 and 4.
And there is little doubt that when the
developers are creating the track lists for the game that they are trying to
appeal to as broad a range of people as possible – with both demographics and
geographical location coming into play. Something that is well received in
Southern California might be a total miss in Montana. Gamers in Topeka might not
care about emulating the Seattle grunge sound in a game.
So what is the solution?
Well, here’s a thought … Instead of developers
trying to find common appeal, why don’t they focus on improving game mechanics,
moving it forward and coming up with new ideas to propel the game play.
Certainly they have to consider songs and chart the songs for the game, but
rather than go with 45 songs (like the recent Beatles’ release – and you can bet
that the catalogue of songs recorded by the band, which is quite a few more than
45, will be revisited often in the form of purchased downloads), or 75 tracks,
why not put together a song list of 200 or so songs, including songs from
previous iterations of a certain franchise. But instead of putting those songs
in the actual game release for the PlayStation 2 or Xbox 360, put the songs into
the marketplace via PSN or LIVE. Then allow players to use a voucher code
contained in the purchase of the game to choose the tracks they want from the
available library.
Say you pick up GH 7 or RB 4 and the voucher is
for 50-60 songs from a catalogue of more than 300 songs – which runs the gamut
from classic rock to modern rock, country to punk, from one-hit wonders or from
a mini-catalogue by the band (say five songs from The Who, or the latest album
by The Killers). Allow players to customize their song list to suit their
personal tastes in music.
If they dip into the catalogue and snag three
songs, from eight offered (hypothetical), for the Rolling Stones, or Arctic
Monkeys, and fill out their song list, it would seem reasonable that after that
voucher is used that additional songs can be purchased independently for a set
price. Chances are that you might not find two track lists that are the same.
What would that mean to online multiplayer? Quite
a lot, actually – because you couldn’t just log in and join a band or battle
against someone who didn’t have the same songs as you, but that might be where a
more detailed match-making system comes into play, or the whole idea of
multiplayer is revised.
If you have paid attention to forums of late, you
will see that some people are very happy to buy a game that contains a couple of
songs they really wanted to play. How many more would buy a game if the track
list was completely customizable and they could tailor the game markedly.
There are other logistics to iron out, and this
is merely tossing a notion out there. Still, stagnation will kill the genre
quickly and if a game wants to ring true with as broad a demographic as
possible, then the developers have to start to think outside of the box
(figuratively and literally).
