Rock Band Blitz

Mr E · 04-04-2012 11:05am #1

New harmonix game announced last night. It's a Rock Band game in appearance (allegedly - no screenshots yet), but it is controlled using a standard controller.

The series' traditional 'runway' perspective survives but the peripherals have been ditched in favour of frantic controller-based gameplay, Harmonix told G4TV.

You use power-ups to explode gems and chase down blast notes for big bonuses.

It comes with over 20 new tracks, though almost the entire 3500 song-strong Rock Band library is also compatible. Similarly, Blitz's new tracks will be playable over in Rock Band 3.

Sounds like... not the Rock Band we know and love, but I'll reserve judgement.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-04-04-rock-band-blitz-announced-for-xbla-psn

D4RK ONION · 04-04-2012 1:38pm

Gameplay here. If you stay on the text video is a trailer too.

http://www.g4tv.com/videos/58009/harmonix-announces-rock-band-blitz/#video-57996

Looks like it could be a lot of fun. And I love that all the songs go back and forth between the main RB titles and this. That's a really nice touch. Given that, it'll be a nice song pack anyway, even if you don't like the actual game!

EDIT: The fan reaction on FB is not too pleasant, but then these are the same people I see request *the worst bands EVER* for DLC so who cares what they think.

calex71 · 04-04-2012 2:27pm

Was just going to post this, while any new RB game is welcome and the fact I can use my already massive collection of songs is a great thing, it does look very like the PSP unplugged games and the earlier HMX stuff like amplitude and frequency, or even DJ hero without the decks maybe?

On the plus side I liked what little of the setlist they revealed in the trailer, and it will make a change, also with the new rules for achievements etc that would make for some fun.

Still this could be the future for them as releasing disk based games that needed expensive peripherals was killing them.

I'm thinking this won't be cheap though with the costs for licensing and export of tracks, normally the upper mark for xbla games is around 1600? I would see this being more 2100-2400 ????
Though that said they usually charge for export so that might keep the initial price down somewhat.

Mr E · 04-04-2012 6:57pm

Just watched the trailer. Looks pretty, but not really fun. Looks like Rock Band on the DS (I think?) - you had to switch between drums, bass and guitar and I didn't really like it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X85ycsb7Nhk

SeantheMan · 06-04-2012 7:05am

I'll save for Rocksmith instead. This looks awful

Burning Eclipse · 06-04-2012 10:53am

Harmonix have never let me down, so I'm almost certainly going to pick this up. I have no reason to believe this will be anything less than great. Looks like you have to switch between lanes to maximise your score for each instrument?

Also:

Jessie's Girl /SOLD!!

calex71 · 06-04-2012 3:48pm

Burning Eclipse wrote: »

Harmonix have never let me down, so I'm almost certainly going to pick this up. I have no reason to believe this will be anything less than great. Looks like you have to switch between lanes to maximise your score for each instrument?

Also:

Jessie's Girl /SOLD!!

Ha, was pretty pleased to see that in there too

calex71 · 13-04-2012 4:51pm

Some additional info here http://www.trueachievements.com/n8353/pax-roundup-4-rock-band-blitz.htm

As promised in the initial announcement, the full DLC catalog for Rock Band 3 is available in this title. Also, the Harmonix rep I spoke to did confirm that there will be no export fee for the 25 tracks included in Blitz. This means that there will be no extra fee to transfer the tracks to your Rock Band 3 catalog. For the price of an arcade game, you get 25 new tracks AND a pretty awesome title that will certainly challenge you. This seems like it will be an insta-buy (at least for Rock Band players) come its release this summer.

Well that's good news, even if the game turns out to be a lemon we still get 25 new songs for RB3

calex71 · 28-05-2012 5:38pm

More news and songs announced http://www.destructoid.com/preview-rock-band-blitz-new-songs-and-power-ups-228160.phtml

All-American Rejects – "Kids in the Street"
Barenaked Ladies – "One Week"
Collective Soul – "Shine"
Elton John – "I’m Still Standing"
Fall Out Boy – "A Little Less Sixteen Candles"
Great White – "Once Bitten Twice Shy"
Iron Maiden – "Wicker Man"
Living Colour – "Cult of Personality"
P!nk – "Raise Your Glass"
Shinedown – "Diamond Eyes"
Tears for Fears – "Shout"

A few crackers there

calex71 · 18-07-2012 5:01pm

Dated and Priced

August 29th for 1200 MSP.

4 more songs announced

Avenged Sevenfold – “So Far Away”
Fun. ft. Janelle Monáe – “We Are Young”
Kool & The Gang – “Jungle Boogie”
My Chemical Romance – “Sing”

calex71 · 13-08-2012 5:21pm

Full setlist, and 2 songs making a return to the game after they were blocked from export from RB2 into RB3

The All-American Rejects – “Kids in the Street”
Avenged Sevenfold – “So Far Away”
Barenaked Ladies – “One Week”
Blink-182 – “Always”
Collective Soul – “Shine”
Elton John – “I’m Still Standing”
Fall Out Boy – “A Little Less Sixteen Candles, A Little More ‘Touch Me’”
Foo Fighters – “These Days”
Foster the People – “Pumped Up Kicks”
Fun. ft. Janelle Monáe – “We Are Young”
Great White – “Once Bitten Twice Shy”
Kelly Clarkson – “Stronger (What Doesn’t Kill You)”
Kool & The Gang – “Jungle Boogie”
Iron Maiden – “The Wicker Man”
Living Colour – “The Cult of Personality”
Maroon 5 – “Moves Like Jagger”
My Chemical Romance – “Sing”
P!nk – “Raise Your Glass”
Queen – “Death on Two Legs”
Quiet Riot – “Metal Health (Bang Your Head)”
Shinedown – "Diamond Eyes (Boom-Lay Boom-Lay Boom)”
Soundgarden – “Spoonman”
Red Hot Chili Peppers – “Give It Away”
Rick Springfield – “Jessie’s Girl”
Tears for Fears – “Shout”

calex71 · 17-08-2012 9:22am

Achievements list http://www.xbox360achievements.org/game/rock-band-blitz/achievements/

This is going to be an expensive one to complete if you don't already have a substantial and varied library of songs / all the other games exported :eek:

Party at Your Place 20
Played at least 300 unique songs. Harmonix thanks you! :eek:

Burning Eclipse · 17-08-2012 9:35am

calex71 wrote: »

Achievements list http://www.xbox360achievements.org/game/rock-band-blitz/achievements/

This is going to be an expensive one to complete if you don't already have a substantial and varied library of songs / all the other games exported :eek:

Party at Your Place 20
Played at least 300 unique songs. Harmonix thanks you! :eek:

Dude, we'd both be able to complete that twice over

(Perhaps not something to be proud of

)

Mr E · 27-08-2012 6:03pm

So I'm happy to see that reviews are trickling in, and RBB doesn't suck!

Looking forward to trying it out anyway.

calex71 · 29-08-2012 12:43pm

It's a 2 stage download, 350mb for the game which then scans your hard drive for dlc......... that took a while. It then downloads a 766mb file which contains the Blitz songs.

Nothing worse than booting up a game all ready to go and then be made wait an hour while it downloads content

Had to go back to dashboard a few times so far after it lost connection to the serves and booted me back to the title screen and just sat there not scanning dlc again.

Edit: After playing it all day I'm just not feeling it. It's ok but not great. Very difficult to get any better than 4 stars in a song too.

Burning Eclipse · 30-08-2012 11:04am

calex71 wrote: »

It's a 2 stage download, 350mb for the game which then scans your hard drive for dlc......... that took a while. It then downloads a 766mb file which contains the Blitz songs.

Nothing worse than booting up a game all ready to go and then be made wait an hour while it downloads content

Had to go back to dashboard a few times so far after it lost connection to the serves and booted me back to the title screen and just sat there not scanning dlc again.

Edit: After playing it all day I'm just not feeling it. It's ok but not great. Very difficult to get any better than 4 stars in a song too.

Ya, that threw me a bit too. Strange stuff.

I didn't play a lot of this last night (The Walking Dead was my priority). Don't even think I played any of the songs included with the game, but can't wait to try some of them in RB3.

What I did play in RB Blitz was this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0EC4vV7PoE

and it was glorious. I instantly felt like the purchase was worth it. Perhaps Anamanaguchi is made for the kind of arcadey game this is... I'd be willing to be that Joe Satch would suit this down to the ground too.

What I did, almost immediately, was change the control scheme to Freakish (bumpers to hit notes, sticks to change lanes, x to deploy powerup). Found that much more intuitive.

Again, because of TWD, I didn't play a lot of this, but I could see it becoming a game that I love.

Jerichoholic · 30-08-2012 2:42pm

It's not bad though is it? I still haven't bothered learning how to score high, but from what I've played so far it makes a nice change from the norm.

calex71 · 30-08-2012 8:06pm

Jerichoholic wrote: »

It's not bad though is it? I still haven't bothered learning how to score high, but from what I've played so far it makes a nice change from the norm.

Yeah I think the actual shock to the system of the new format where RB feels more like the later GH games knocked me for six in the beginning I'm still not loving it but don't hate it either.

Also switched to Freakish controls just makes it more playable than default

calex71 · 30-08-2012 11:08pm

Well the gold stars are starting to roll in now!!!!

Bottle rocket is excellent for building up the other lanes and use the power up for the busiest instrument in the song , and bomb if you can but don't chase the bomb notes,

Burning Eclipse · 31-08-2012 12:00pm

The only criticism I have of the game at this point is that without the right modifiers, you can forget about a decent score. It removes the idea of a level playing field, and that disappoints me a little for a game based on high scores.

For example in most songs, Calex, your score is ahead of mine. I beat your score by a huge amount in one song, and instantly realised it could only be because you played it without any power-ups, thus removing any feeling of achievement. Same when you beat me by a few thousand points, but I play the song without 3 power-ups... I find myself thinking, did he win because he had the right power-ups, or maybe you had none and were still better?

This is what I mean about a level playing field being gone. It's not a deal-breaker, but it bothers me right now. I stuck Rock Band 3 in when I first bought it and instantly gold-starred songs because of skill. Here, you need to play for ages to unlock the right modifiers first.

calex71 · 31-08-2012 8:25pm

Burning Eclipse wrote: »

The only criticism I have of the game at this point is that without the right modifiers, you can forget about a decent score. It removes the idea of a level playing field, and that disappoints me a little for a game based on high scores.

For example in most songs, Calex, your score is ahead of mine. I beat your score by a huge amount in one song, and instantly realised it could only be because you played it without any power-ups, thus removing any feeling of achievement. Same when you beat me by a few thousand points, but I play the song without 3 power-ups... I find myself thinking, did he win because he had the right power-ups, or maybe you had none and were still better?

This is what I mean about a level playing field being gone. It's not a deal-breaker, but it bothers me right now. I stuck Rock Band 3 in when I first bought it and instantly gold-starred songs because of skill. Here, you need to play for ages to unlock the right modifiers first.

You can take it my high scores where done with modifiers and not becasue of skill, It's pretty difficult to do better than 4 stars without the modifiers, and then the ones i've played without are likely played without because i've run out of coins, I mean if they want you to use them ok but having to grind out a few songs without them to get the coins is a little annoying now.

D4RK ONION · 03-09-2012 2:30pm

I want to pick this up but this coin/power up lark is really putting me off, it smells of a weird cross between a zynga facebook game ad GH6. If I do get it, I demand high score no power up threads

calex71 · 03-09-2012 8:34pm

Try the demo and see what you think, I have too say though it took me a few nights to get into it but now im hooked.

Burning Eclipse · 04-09-2012 10:22am

D4RK ONION wrote: »

I want to pick this up but this coin/power up lark is really putting me off, it smells of a weird cross between a zynga facebook game ad GH6. If I do get it, I demand high score no power up threads

Hey Onion, worst case scenario is this: You're getting 25 songs (of varying quality) for 1200 msp. That in itself is a deal if you still like to throw on RB3 every once in a while.

I thoroughly recommend the game, coins/powers notwithstanding.

calex71 · 04-09-2012 9:31pm

Burning Eclipse wrote: »

Hey Onion, worst case scenario is this: You're getting 25 songs (of varying quality) for 1200 msp. That in itself is a deal if you still like to throw on RB3 every once in a while.

I thoroughly recommend the game, coins/powers notwithstanding.

I like that these can give varying results but hate wasting my time playing songs with no powers on to farm bloody coins ,its a music game not a bloody rpg.

I've just ploughed nearly 4000 coins into trying to gold star spoon man as progress towards the precious metal achievement....... and I'm still 50k off the gold standard :mad:

Burning Eclipse · 05-09-2012 2:28pm

calex71 wrote: »

I like that these can give varying results but hate wasting my time playing songs with no powers on to farm bloody coins ,its a music game not a bloody rpg.

I've just ploughed nearly 4000 coins into trying to gold star spoon man as progress towards the precious metal achievement....... and I'm still 50k off the gold standard :mad:

Have you come up with any magic formulas yet? I still haven't unlocked all powerups, but some are clearly better than others. I got over 65k in one use of Jackpot. Also, that one where you activate a runaway note is usually good for between 60 and 90k in a song? Pinball can be good, but I find I miss notes while concentrating on keeping the ball in play. Am yet to find a decent 3rd slot one.

johnny_ultimate · 05-09-2012 2:33pm

I really liked the demo for this (even if I was expecting something more along the lines of Unplugged - this is more abstract) but alas I'm too irked by Microsoft's magical mystery currency to buy it. I have 130 points, and I just feel really irritated I can't get this without spending more than I need to. (I also am always a bit suspicious about many of the cheap code sites online)

I do really want to pick this up, so I'll probably cave soon.

calex71 · 05-09-2012 3:31pm

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

I really liked the demo for this (even if I was expecting something more along the lines of Unplugged - this is more abstract) but alas I'm too irked by Microsoft's magical mystery currency to buy it. I have 130 points, and I just feel really irritated I can't get this without spending more than I need to. (I also am always a bit suspicious about many of the cheap code sites online)

I do really want to pick this up, so I'll probably cave soon.

Those sites are all I use , cheap live codes is 100% reputable, failing that gamesgnash will also mail you a code.

calex71 · 05-09-2012 3:42pm

Burning Eclipse wrote: »

Have you come up with any magic formulas yet? I still haven't unlocked all powerups, but some are clearly better than others. I got over 65k in one use of Jackpot. Also, that one where you activate a runaway note is usually good for between 60 and 90k in a song? Pinball can be good, but I find I miss notes while concentrating on keeping the ball in play. Am yet to find a decent 3rd slot one.

Runaway notes and Pinball I don't use at all........ but I'm getting desperate now, for the most part gold stars will come from [bottle rockets, bombs, and super guitar] where you essentially spam the bottle rockets, and stay on the Super track , usually guitar, only moving out of it to collect over drive power, then using it to fill the other lanes multipliers, I'll move a little to help them fill up but for the most part I'll stay on guitar, and stop using rockets if they are full and horde it until after the checkpoint.

I have also used road rage with good results, especially on 5 track songs, it works really well if you use it from the the keys or drum track.

3rd slot is always super guitar for me, unless there is little or no guitar , the long sustains are worth massive points if held, you can get maybe 20-30k from a double sustained note with a high multiplier and super guitar. Many songs end with long sustains.

Finally got gold on I'm still standing but I'm still miles of gold on some of the others, those seem to need more care and strategy when picking a path through the song.

Burning Eclipse · 05-09-2012 4:42pm

Quoting for posterity...

Found this on the Rock Band forums; some solid advice in here.

RyRobo wrote:

I've just cleaned up and finished golding the Blitz setlist, so I'll pass on some advice if you'd like. The big problem for me was Shout, which took many many tries and a lot of coins, but in my experience once you collect a gold or three you really figure out how to get the system working in your favour and things just slot into place from there. Remember, this isn't instrument Rock Band or even Unplugged, you've got a huge new skillset to learn, so don't get discouraged so easily.

My tactic was jackpot, blast notes and super *Most prominent instrument at the end of the song*. I just tried to stay in Blitz mode as long as possible (Which gives a huge chunk of points to your total, but it's a bit discrete so you don't really notice). To keep Blitz mode going I only swapped tracks when it was safe to do so, which can be difficult in some songs. I tried to use jackpot at times where there were a high amount of notes on the super track, but only if the other multipliers were full.

Multipliers are difficult, especially keyboard on songs like Give It Away. Truth is, you just got to learn how to push those up to max, and having a few goes without coins will save you from frustration. Believe me. The most important thing you want to do for the first 75% of the song is to get those multipliers to max at every checkpoint. This is because a huge, huge percentage of points come at the very end. At the last run when you've passed the final checkpoint focus on your super track, release jackpot and don't swap to add any other multipliers, the bonus you get on those tracks is not worth it (Unless you're rocking overdrive).

I'm constantly behind 'The Duke' when I play until that very last stretch, so don't be put off. If coins are giving you trouble... there's little advice I can give there because there's little you can really do, although Magnet just posted a great thread on how they work.

Hope this is what you were looking for. It's not too hard, and it's definitely not impossible, you just have to play by the games rules and learn how to bend them to net those shiny stars.

calex71 · 05-09-2012 6:16pm

Bolded that part in your post as that really is key.

I disagree with jackpot though, I've had limited success with it. Maybe because I was hopping lanes like a madman and not using it at the right time. I'll try it now on shout and see how I get on

...... Just got Gold on Spoonman :pac:

Rock Band Blitz

Comments