[quote name='Mojimbo']Umm, this news story broke the day before GD:RB leaked.
http://www.joystiq.com/2009/12/10/restructuring-layoffs-hit-harmonix-the-band-plays-on/[/QUOTE]
Believe it or not, I was aware of it when I said that. "Quality assurance" usually means "testing," which is something that can be outsourced, and usually
is by most other developers. It's not good that they did it, but I'd be a lot more concerned if they were cutting development positions.
The timing makes sense, too - what does Harmonix need a testing staff for when they don't have any titles announced for the immediate future? What would they be paying them to do, other than sit around on their asses all day? The testing staff you need for two games (assuming they handled Lego Rock Band too) is obviously bigger than the one you need for zero games, right?
Don't believe me? Look at
the followup that was linked to from your Joystiq article. It's from MTV Games so there's definitely a PR filter in place, but I think we would have heard if they'd laid off a significant amount of their development staff instead of the "at least one" Joystiq cited in the first article.
[quote name='Mojimbo']Also, Dhani Harrison was full of shit.
http://wii.ign.com/articles/105/1052964p1.html[/QUOTE]
How many times have we seen developers issue flat denials for stories that eventually end up being true? This would definitely not be the first time, and I don't think Dhani Harrison would have a reason to be making up lies about a video game that hasn't been announced yet.
[quote name='Trakan']I think this game will tank as bad as Guitar Hero: Van Halen.[/QUOTE]
Really? You're comparing the sales of the game to a Guitar Hero title that doesn't come out for another week?
Between the timing of the release, the fact that Van Halen hasn't been relevant for years, and the impressions from people who got it free from the GH5 promotion, I wouldn't be surprised if it
did tank...but it's a little early to be citing sales figures for it, isn't it?
[quote name='KingDox']It kind of makes sense to release greenday rockband. The rockband 2 SKU is kind of old and there must be plenty of stores that don't cary it any more.
So if you take the "core" rockband 2 game out of the equation you are left with:
Lego Rockband: for the kids
Greeday Rockband: for the teens (and girls*)
Beatles Rockband: for the adults
Without that middle sku you have the DLC that haromix push out that can't really be used by all SKU levels. Some DLC doesn't work with Lego and none works with Beatles. You need that middle SKU. I like greenday, but don't love greenday. I'm sure I'll be able to score it cheap, considering how fast you could score a copy of Lego for 25 bucks these past few weeks.
*And yes girls love greenday, I went to a greenday concernt and had to say at least 70% of the fans were girls.[/QUOTE]
The theory does make some sense, but the problem is that by the time the Green Day game ships - whenever that is - there's a chance that the Lego and Beatles games will be on clearance or gone from shelves already. The DLC argument doesn't work well either; I'd be surprised if the game was compatible with anything other than the handful of Green Day songs that have been released so far.
It wouldn't surprise me if Green Day is a summer or early fall release, leaving room for a Rock Band 3 announced at E3 to come out in time for the holidays. Even though I'm not convinced the game will fail like a few of you already are, putting all of their eggs into this one basket isn't the best idea.
[quote name='RichMeisterMan']If you're going to go with a punk band, why not go with the

ing Offspring?! And if they did make an offspring game I would have to insist they go for the M rating as I don't want them to slaughter the songs and leave out ones with iffy subject matter like spare me the details.[/QUOTE]
Probably because they've released two albums in the last decade, and have fallen off the radar for most people.
I wouldn't mind an Offspring game, but I don't doubt it'd be a complete failure in sales.
[quote name='CoffeeEdge']No way, he's a flip-flopper, just like that commie John Kerry![/QUOTE]
I prefer "waffling."