Rocksmith

Guitar Hero is dead and Rock Band faces an uncertain future, but for game company Ubisoft the music genre is still very much alive.

It's just announced Rocksmith, a game that comes with a real electric guitar and features songs from the Rolling Stones and Nirvana.

"Guitar Hero is a party game. Rocksmith is a music experience," Ubisoft senior vice president of marketing Tony Key told The Hollywood Reporter.

Ubisoft reckons Rocksmith will teach players how to play the guitar – this, it says, makes it a game with "benefits". It is said to play like Guitar Hero and Rock Band, but you're strumming and picking actual notes and chords on real strings. The game learns your abilities as you play and "adjusts gently" to help you learn.

It comes with a standard input jack that can plug "most" electric guitars into a PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360. The Nintendo Wii is not supported.

Apparently Ubisoft is negotiating with Gibson and others to sell a $200 (£124) version of the game that would come bundled with an electric guitar.

45 songs are expected on the disc, including tracks from the Rolling Stones, David Bowie, Nirvana and the Animals. Game's due out in September.

Ubisoft hopes Rocksmith will fill the music gap that emerged following Activision and Viacom's exit from the genre.

Activision killed the Hero franchise last month following poor sales of Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock, a move that followed MTV Games owner Viacom's decision to let Rock Band maker Harmonix buy its independence.

"The dream of playing guitar compared to how many follow through - there's a big gap," Key said. "We will create a new generation of guitar players."

Rocksmith is due to be released Sep 2011 on PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360.