If you’ve downloaded and played the new Green Day Rock Band demo, you were treated to a teaser screen. This is what it looks like:
Everything looks so fami- wait a second…
Yes, you saw that right. Between the huge “3″ logo and the Vocals (now featuring 3 mics, implying that there will be vocal harmonies, similar to The Beatles: Rock Band), you get a Piano icon. Holy crap, that is awesome, right? Now, nothing has been confirmed yet but some speculate that it won’t be a keyboard but the Keytar, a keyboard held like a guitar. Some also speculate that the keyboard will be missing a few buttons, which could be true due to the fact I can’t fathom where you can put the keyboard’s note highway in an already cluttered screen when playing a full band. EA is keeping their mouths sealed though and will be revealing everything in E3 2010 which is just a few weeks away.
Keyboard goes where now?
That’s not all though. Earlier news than this, Harmonix said that they will take Rock Band 3 to a whole new level wherein you can actually learn the instrument you’re playing. Then there’s the news that Mad Catz will be the one handling the instruments now while EA will only distribute them. So, new instruments perhaps? And how far can you take the franchise to to make it even more revolutionary? I mean, drums are already close enough to the real thing, sans the hi-hat pedal and some cymbals which could easily be integrated seeing as the Rock Band 2 set already had the cymbal add-ons (not to mention the Ion Rocker which is a real drum in its own) but what about the guitar and bass? Will there be more buttons? Maybe they’ll feature more than one strum bar now to replicate multiple strings.
So you think you’re hardcore now?
Then there’s the keyboards/keytar. You can’t really learn that instrument with only 7 buttons now can you? Then there’s the impending recharting of the old songs. If the new instruments will have new buttons and whatnot, the old charts will absolutely be obsolete. This innovation just strings together problem after problem. There’s also a rumor floating around that there will be a “Pro” mode wherein players, quote: “require proper technique, and may lead to actual skills on guitars and bass.” But who knows? Let’s just wait for E3 2010 and see what EA and Harmonix have in store for us.
