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Rock Band DLC song licenses expiring

  • 09-04-2013 10:16pm
    #1
    grimm2005
    Registered Users Posts: 2,890 ✭✭✭


    Harmonix recently posted on Facebook that certain songs licenses are and will be expiring soon. The only songs affected so far are those in the Metallica Pack 01, released in November 2007. It seems any songs that have been available on the store for over 5 years are at risk of disappearing although they plan to give advance warning in the future:
    We wanted to give you a heads up on an upcoming change to a limited number of older legacy DLC songs currently available in the Rock Band library. When licensing songs for release for any platform, including DLC, agreements include term limits on how long the content may be sold on a given platform. This isn’t specific to Rock Band – it’s something that exists in pretty much all licensing agreements. Now, over 5 years since the release of the first batch of Rock Band DLC, we’re reaching the end of some of the earliest licenses we secured. Our Music Team has been hard at work extending these licenses to make sure that this has as small an impact on the community as possible, but there may be a very limited number of songs that will no longer be offered for new purchases in the Rock Band store.

    What does this mean for you, Jane and John Q Rock Band? Read on:
    • If you’ve already bought these tracks, nothing changes. Tracks that you’ve purchased/downloaded are yours. Relicensing should not affect content already in your library.
    • Select legacy tracks, primarily from the earliest DLC releases, may no longer be offered for new purchase in the Rock Band Store. Again, if you’ve already purchased these tracks you should be entirely unaffected.
    • If for any reason you need to redownload this content (i.e. in cases of console transfer, hard drive space management, etc.) you should be able to do so even if that content is no longer available for new purchasers in the store.

    As of right now, the only content affected is Metallica Pack 01, the tracks “Ride The Lightning”, “And Justice For All”, and “Blackened”, all of which were released on November 20th, 2007. This content has already been pulled from the RB Store and will be pulled from 1st party marketplaces in the immediate future. After that, they will no longer be available for purchase.

    We’ll post as more information becomes available, with relicensing updates likely coming in on a quarterly basis. We’re hard at work to minimize the impact on the RB catalog and RB community, securing extensions for an overwhelming majority of content and, most importantly, making it a priority to give you advance notice if songs are expiring and have to come down. We’ll do our best to make sure that you have one last chance to buy these legacy catalog tracks!

    Rock on,
    Harmonix

    Hopefully this won't affect the catalogue too negatively and they'll re-license as much as they can but it seems to me to be another nail in the coffin for the Rock Band franchise.


Comments

  • #2
    calex71
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,126 ✭✭✭✭calex71


    whats more concerning to me is whether or not dlc and games and equipment will be compatible with next gen consoles, I'm thinking not based on current speculation :(


  • #3
    Banjo
    Registered Users Posts: 10,485 ✭✭✭✭Banjo


    You all mocked the Wii for it's lack of processing and graphics power, it's weak online offering, it's inflexible OS, it's non-existent storage options.... but my WiiMote connects to the WiiU. And my guitars and keyboards connect to the WiiMote. So in your face!


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