XBLA - Rock Band Blitz - Out Now - 1200 Pts - Compatible w/All RB3 DLC!

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MeUvHz1rZc

The official announcement has happened along with the official site on RockBand.com going up, so here's the summary of the game and its features:
Take Control Of The Whole Band
Rock Band Blitz brings the excitement of a full band experience right into your hands! Music gaming pioneers Harmonix are introducing an all-new way to experience your favorite songs with an over the top, addictive, controller-based gameplay experience – no instrument peripherals needed! Rock Band Blitz comes bundled with over 20 songs, and works instantly with any of the 3500+ Rock Band songs. Get your controller, load up your favorite power-ups, and get rocking!

Features

You Control The Action!

fullBand.jpg


Rock Band Blitz is an all new way to experience your favorite Rock Band tracks - no instrument peripherals required: it's just you, the music, and a controller.

Insane Gameplay-Changing Power Ups

insanePowerUps.jpg


Take your scores to the next level with over-the-top, arcade-style power ups! Fire off the "Bottle Rocket" to explode gems in the distance, or chase down the "Flame Notes" for valuable bonus points. With over 10 unique power-ups, there are dozens of combinations to choose from for endless replayability!

Compete With Your Friends

competeWithYourFriends.jpg


Take your former bandmates on to prove your dominance on the best songs music has to offer! Grapple for position on the leaderboards and chase your friends’ scores as you play on the in-song dynamic leaderboard ladder!

The Largest Music Library in Gaming

largestMusicLibrary.jpg


Rock Band Blitz comes with over 20 songs new to the Rock Band franchise, from some of music's biggest artists! Rock Band Blitz is also instantly compatible with your existing Rock Band music library, including content from the Rock Band Music Store, as well as tracks exported from Rock Band, Rock Band 2, and more!

Added Value For Rock Band 3 Players

rb3Value.jpg


Rock Band Blitz's songs are also immediately compatible and playable in Rock Band 3, where players can experience these hits as a full band, using compatible guitar, microphone, drum, and keyboard peripherals!
Click to expand...

Soundtrack
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’”
Foster The People – “Pumped Up Kicks”
Fun. ft. Janelle Monáe – “We Are Young”
Great White – “Once Bitten Twice Shy”
Iron Maiden – “The Wicker Man”
Kool & The Gang – “Jungle Boogie”
Living Colour – “Cult of Personality”
My Chemical Romance – “Sing”
P!nk – “Raise Your Glass”
Quiet Riot – “Metal Health (Bang Your Head)”
Rick Springfield – “Jessie's Girl”
Shinedown – “Diamond Eyes (Boom-Lay Boom-Lay Boom)”
Tears for Fears – “Shout”

http://www.theverge.com/gaming/2012/4/4/2924768/rock-band-blitz-xbla-psn

They explain here why they went with two gems instead of three from the Frequency/Amplitude games:
So if Blitz isn't like Rock Band, is it another skin on the classic Frequency gameplay? Not exactly. Notably, Blitz uses just two gems on each runway instead of three. "We went through a lot of prototyping, many different ways of beat matching with a controller," Nordhaus said. "That included three gems; that included some ideas of shifting the stick back and forth while you smashed gems, almost copying what you do with a guitar controller on the joypad controller.

"There were two reasons we settled on two: one was that the modern controller is better suited to two instead of three, as you mentioned with Frequency and Amplitude. But I think a more fundamental reason is that the choice was to let you focus a measure or two down the track as you play through and let you strategize about what your'e doing to do. And we found that if we took a little mental load off the beat matching and made it just a little bit easier to comprehend, you had the mental space to think about the strategy of what you're going to do to maximize your score."
Click to expand...
 
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The official announcement has happened along with the official site on RockBand.com going up, so here's the summary of the game and its features:
Take Control Of The Whole Band
Rock Band Blitz brings the excitement of a full band experience right into your hands! Music gaming pioneers Harmonix are introducing an all-new way to experience your favorite songs with an over the top, addictive, controller-based gameplay experience – no instrument peripherals needed! Rock Band Blitz comes bundled with over 20 songs, and works instantly with any of the 3500+ Rock Band songs. Get your controller, load up your favorite power-ups, and get rocking!

Features

You Control The Action!

fullBand.jpg


Rock Band Blitz is an all new way to experience your favorite Rock Band tracks - no instrument peripherals required: it's just you, the music, and a controller.

Insane Gameplay-Changing Power Ups

insanePowerUps.jpg


Take your scores to the next level with over-the-top, arcade-style power ups! Fire off the "Bottle Rocket" to explode gems in the distance, or chase down the "Flame Notes" for valuable bonus points. With over 10 unique power-ups, there are dozens of combinations to choose from for endless replayability!

Compete With Your Friends

competeWithYourFriends.jpg


Take your former bandmates on to prove your dominance on the best songs music has to offer! Grapple for position on the leaderboards and chase your friends’ scores as you play on the in-song dynamic leaderboard ladder!

The Largest Music Library in Gaming

largestMusicLibrary.jpg


Rock Band Blitz comes with over 20 songs new to the Rock Band franchise, from some of music's biggest artists! Rock Band Blitz is also instantly compatible with your existing Rock Band music library, including content from the Rock Band Music Store, as well as tracks exported from Rock Band, Rock Band 2, and more!

Added Value For Rock Band 3 Players

rb3Value.jpg


Rock Band Blitz's songs are also immediately compatible and playable in Rock Band 3, where players can experience these hits as a full band, using compatible guitar, microphone, drum, and keyboard peripherals!
Click to expand...

They're also going to be having a livestream tonight to show off the game:
Rolling along with the excitement of our Rock Band Blitz announcement, today we will be running a TWO HOUR livestream show focused exclusively on Rock Band Blitz!

Project Director Matthew Nordhaus (HMXMister_Game) and Lead Designer Brian Chan will be giving a full demo of Rock Band Blitz, followed by a rip-roaring tournament for an actual, physical championship belt. Contending for the prize will be HMXHenry, John Drake, Nick Chester, and Eric Pope (me!). There will be oodles of crap talk, I promise it. Amongst that jibberjabber, we will also be announcing next week's DLC!

We'll also be giving you all a sneak peek at what we've got in store for those of you who will be making the trek to our booth on the PAX East show floor.

Perhaps most exciting of all, our old friend HMXSean will be hosting the entire thing!

Details:
The show will happen here: http://www.twitch.tv/harmonixmusic
Showtime: 6PM EST - 8PM EST
Click to expand...

http://www.theverge.com/gaming/2012/4/4/2924768/rock-band-blitz-xbla-psn

They explain here why they went with two gems instead of three from the Frequency/Amplitude games:
So if Blitz isn't like Rock Band, is it another skin on the classic Frequency gameplay? Not exactly. Notably, Blitz uses just two gems on each runway instead of three. "We went through a lot of prototyping, many different ways of beat matching with a controller," Nordhaus said. "That included three gems; that included some ideas of shifting the stick back and forth while you smashed gems, almost copying what you do with a guitar controller on the joypad controller.

"There were two reasons we settled on two: one was that the modern controller is better suited to two instead of three, as you mentioned with Frequency and Amplitude. But I think a more fundamental reason is that the choice was to let you focus a measure or two down the track as you play through and let you strategize about what your'e doing to do. And we found that if we took a little mental load off the beat matching and made it just a little bit easier to comprehend, you had the mental space to think about the strategy of what you're going to do to maximize your score."
Click to expand...
 
I don't understand what is going on in this game. Why are they moving left and right and what's the connection to the music, because I'm not seeing any. I presume there is, but to my eyes they are just moving around randomly and shooting for no obvious reason, while music plays. Somebody explain it to me, please. :)
 
[quote name='crunchewy']I don't understand what is going on in this game. Why are they moving left and right and what's the connection to the music, because I'm not seeing any. I presume there is, but to my eyes they are just moving around randomly and shooting for no obvious reason, while music plays. Somebody explain it to me, please. :)[/QUOTE]
You're playing each instrument track for the song, which are laid out next to each other. You're main goal to is play a section of an instrument's highway and that track autoplays for a bit, so you move to the next instrument and do the same in a similar fashion to spinning plates. There are power-ups with various effects that can be used to help you manage things more easily.

Here's a full song in Amplitude so you can see where they're coming from:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fj6X4VV0GWE
 
Yeah, for those who didn't have the pleasure of playing Rock Band Unplugged (or the older Amplitude and Frequency games), you will not understand how fun and natural the concept is until you play it. Most people would probably think "how complicated can pressing X, A, or B actually be?", but when you add in switching from instrument to instrument, and long presses mixed in with short presses, it gets pretty frantic.

And there most definitely is reason to the madness. The instrument charts alternate from one to the next to task you with keeping the "full band" playing. Depending on the length of the phrase you play, you may go from guitar to drums, then back to guitar, then to keys, back to drums, then to bass, keys, guitar, and so on. From what I remember of Unplugged, I think you even have to keep the vocal track going. It's kind of an odd experience at first, but once you get used to it, it's very fun.

I think this game is a very smart move for Harmonix. You have to wonder if they saw this coming the entire time, anticipating that people would eventually grow tired of plastic instruments. Now, they go back to the type of games they were making ten years ago, but with a ridiculously huge library of music in their back pocket. It probably also lessens the resentment some people may be feeling about having "wasted" all that money on DLC, now that it's usable in a completely different way. Just seems smart all the way around.

It's hilarious looking back and remembering when Red Octane thought they were the brains of the operation. I do wonder if this is basically the writing on the wall for Rock Band 4 though. I suppose there's a chance this game could revive the genre, but I think it's more likely for people to just enjoy the music they've purchased while playing a game that's not so peripheral heavy. That said, I will welcome these songs into my RB3 library (and PRAY that they've added a few names that have been missing/barely used: Eagles, Beach Boys, Clapton, Dave Matthews, John Mayer, Meat Loaf, Elton John, Journey, etc).
 
Ok, now I can see that in that game it shows you which track to go to, but I don't see that in the RBB clip. There seem to be notes in every track. What's causing them to jump from track to track? Is there some indicator on there that I'm missing?
 
n8: I don't think they had this in their pocket the entire time, but I bet that making Rock Band Unplugged gave them a lot of inspiration for what they could do next once the bubble popped. The gameplay still works, but it was sort of doomed by the lack of compatibility with all of the DLC PS3 owners had purchased. Despite not having same tracks as the main games, they've figured out whatever process they needed to make the DLC work.

[quote name='crunchewy']Ok, now I can see that in that game it shows you which track to go to, but I don't see that in the RBB clip. There seem to be notes in every track. What's causing them to jump from track to track? Is there some indicator on there that I'm missing?[/QUOTE]
That's because the trailer gameplay isn't necessarily being played perfectly like you'd want, so that's what it looks like when you're not doing that well. You push buttons to move left and right, which are probably d-pad/analog stick.

You should definitely check out the livestream since they'll be demoing the game itself and you'll get a better idea of how it looks when it's played without the many cuts that a trailer has.
 
Notes from the livestream:

-There are a number of control options (Default: Left T/RB = Move Left, Right T/RB = Move Right, Left Stick/Left d-pad = Left Note, Right Stick/A = Right Note, and B = Power-up)
-One of the power-ups is a pinball power-up that bounces a pinball around that you hit with your paddle to give you points for the gems it hits, sort of like makeshift Arkanoid.
-There's a rocket power-up to destroy upcoming phrases.
-Another power-up enables a bandmate that automatically plays an instrument for you for a bit.
-It seems like you aren't really completing phrases so that track of the song continues playing for a bit so there's kind of a best way to play songs. The main goal seems to be about moving quickly between tracks to maximum your potential point earnings from that song.
-You're still earning star power for each instrument to use for double points.
-When the game ends, you earn coins to spend on power-ups for the next song and Blitz Cred for some upcoming Facebook thing that they're working on.
-There's a Recommendation section that recommends songs to play that you may or may not own based on what you've played and enjoyed.
-There will be challenges and such that Harmonix can enable for special events.
-There aren't difficulties, as that will come into play when you play the harder songs and going after high scores.
-No local/online multiplayer, as it just has asynchronous multiplayer where you're competing against your friends on leaderboards like EA's Autolog feature. The Recommendation feature also feeds into that aspect to suggest songs where friends have beaten your score.
-The Power-ups are configured pre-song in a similar manner to perks in Call of Duty.
-There are Gold Stars to earn for each song like in Rock Band.

The Harmonix guys are doing a tournament amongst Harmonix people during the stream and they cut promos for this tournament.
 
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Tried the demo, had no idea of what was going on or what to do. The music selection for it sucks, nothing to do with 'rock' band style, as most are techno like pop songs. The few exceptions (such as Modest Mouse) are a few songs that have been on rock band previously already. Only selling point for me is that you can play these songs in RB3...and of course, achievements I suppose.
 
There have only been five songs announced for it and they're all new songs, so an old Modest Mouse song wouldn't be one of them. It sounds like they had a bunch of DLC included for the demo you played, which is the only way it would be mostly techno and pop songs.
 
Today some songs for Harmonix‘s upcoming XBLA/SEN title were released, bringing the total up to 15 (out of 25). Is this enough to get you to buy the game yet? Let’s find out.

Rock Band Blitz will include:

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”
Iron Maiden – “Wicker Man”
Living Colour – “Cult of Personality”
P!nk – “Raise Your Glass”
Shinedown – “Diamond Eyes”
Tears for Fears – “Shout”


These songs join the previously shown songs:

Blink 182 – “Always”
Foster the People – “Pumped Up Kicks”
Great White – “Once Bitten, Twice Shy”
Quiet Riot – “Metal Health”
Rick Springfield – “Jessie’s Girl”
Keep in mind that with the purchase of Rock Band Blitz all of these songs will be playable in Rock Band 3 instantly. So what songs are you looking forward to?

Additionally, a list of powerups that can be used in Blitz was also revealed:

Shockwave – sends out a wave that scores on all notes it touches
Bottle Rocket – explodes and clears notes it hits on tracks
Point Doubler – 2x points
Bandmate – takes over a track and plays all notes for you
Jackpot – play absolutely perfect to earn 3X points, but flub up and lose it all
Pinball Note – keep a pinball bouncing to clear touched notes
Blast Note – blows up any notes it touches
Synchrony – switches tracks without breaking your note streak
Flame Note – burn everything with fire to keep
Runaway Note – chase a note to get a bonus
No release date or price has been announced yet. What are your thoughts? Are you more interested in the game itself? Or will you be treating it as a large track pack for the main Rock Band series?
 
YOUR TIME WILL COME!

Never owned a playstation until way late so never got to experience Amplitude and such, but I am anxiously awaiting the demo for this.
 
I'm glad to see this comes with a variety of songs, because I don't have a big RB library. I had thought it was just going to use songs in your RB library. This is a definite download of the demo, probable purchase.
 
Four new songs announced for the soundtrack:

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

Since they're saying it has over 20 songs and we're at 19 right now, they still have a few more to announce.
 
http://www.rockband.com/forums/showthread.php?t=231000

The last six songs from the soundtrack have been revealed:
Harmonix is excited to announce the complete soundtrack for their upcoming PlayStation®Network and Xbox LIVE® Arcade title, Rock Band™ Blitz!

Rock Band Blitz will come complete with 25 tracks from music’s hottest artists when it hits PlayStation Network on August 28th and Xbox LIVE Arcade on August 29th. These tracks will not only be playable as part of Rock Band Blitz’s frantic, controller-based arcade experience, but in Rock Band 3 with full instrument support at no additional charge!

In addition to previously announced tracks by Avenged Sevenfold, Blink-182, Foster the People, Fun., Iron Maiden, P!nk, and more, today Harmonix is confirming the remainder of this exciting and diverse song list. To round out the soundtrack, the following songs were announced today:

• Foo Fighters – “These Days”
• Kelly Clarkson – “Stronger (What Doesn’t Kill You)”
• Maroon 5 – “Moves Like Jagger”
• Queen – “Death on Two Legs”
• Red Hot Chili Peppers – “Give It Away”
• Soundgarden – “Spoonman”

“We spent a lot of time making sure the Rock Band Blitz soundtrack was just right,” Chris Rigopulos, Harmonix’s Vice President of Music and Strategy, said. “There are a handful of artists that are new to the Rock Band catalog, as well as solid tracks from fan favorites and classic artists. These are handpicked tracks that we made sure are not only fun to play in Rock Band Blitz, but make an awesome addition to your Rock Band 3 music library at a great value.”

In addition to these great tracks, Rock Band Blitz is also compatible with most your existing Rock Band music library, including content from the Rock Band Music Store, as well as tracks exported from Rock Band, Rock Band 2, and more!

Check out the full 25 song setlist for Rock Band Blitz!

• 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)”
• Red Hot Chili Peppers – “Give It Away”
• Rick Springfield – “Jessie’s Girl”
• Shinedown – Diamond Eyes (Boom-Lay Boom-Lay Boom)”
• Soundgarden – “Spoonman”
• Tears for Fears – “Shout”

Rock Band Blitz is scheduled for release on PlayStation®Network on August 28th for $14.99 and Xbox LIVE Arcade on August 29th for 1200 MS Points.
Click to expand...
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0MI_Zx_lNc

Giant Bomb's Quick Look attempts to explain the game, but there's a lot to it.

http://blog.us.playstation.com/2012/08/27/rock-band-blitzes-onto-psn-tomorrow/

The PS Blog post (Sorry) about the game with a launch trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMeN2WyhNeE

There’s a moment during game development when you have to let go of your game and release it to the world. You’re sitting in your office, thinking about all of the choices you made, wondering whether people will find it fun, engaging, beautiful, scary, funny. Is your vision going to be realized? And then you take a deep breath and let it go.

How do I know? I’m the Project Director for Rock Band Blitz, and for me that moment came about two months ago. I guided the development of the game over the course of the last year. The creative, smart, talented team that made Rock Band Blitz can’t wait for you to play the game on your console and see, at long last, the result of all of our hard work.

Rock Band Blitz is a downloadable PlayStation Network XBLA game. It’s the latest entry in the Rock Band family, and rather than using plastic instruments you play with a standard DualShock 3 Xbox 360 controller. At its core, it’s still a rhythm beat-match game: you smash notes in time with the music. But in contrast to the full band experience of traditional Rock Band titles, Blitz is fast-paced — with over-the-top visuals and a wide range of crazy Power-ups that you can use strategically to increase your score.

For only $14.99, we’re shipping Rock Band Blitz with 25 tracks. That alone is a great value, with hours of gameplay right out of the digital box. Even sweeter, the game lets you play all of the music in your Rock Band Music Library – including songs you were able to export from previous Rock Band games and songs downloaded from the Music Store – in an entirely new way. And if you’re a fan of the full-instrument experience, the 25 songs that come with Rock Band Blitz can be played with a full band in Rock Band 3 at no additional cost!

Over the past week here at Harmonix, we’ve been running a company-wide Rock Band Blitz tournament, and it’s obvious that all of those tough game design choices are starting to pay off. We’re seeing employees tweeting about how they can’t stop playing, even though it’s 2:00AM on a weekday. They’re challenging each other to asynchronous Score Wars, and talking friendly smack to one another over who has the top spot on leaderboards for their favorite songs. Lunch conversation is now dominated by folks whispering strategy secrets to one another as they exchange their favorite Power-up loadouts for specific songs.

They liked it! They really, really liked it! (Hey, I’m as insecure as the next guy…) Some of the common themes I head last week:

The game looks simple to play, and it is. You can pick it up and bang out a song, and starting having fun in minutes. But what looks simple on the surface is, in fact, deceptively deep and strategic. There are multiple “AHA!” moments as you learn to effectively use the different Power-ups, then combine them in different ways to use on different song types, and finally apply all that knowledge moment-to-moment as you play through the songs. I’d suggest starting with Blast Notes and Bottle Rockets as you’re learning to play; they’re easy to use, but super effective… and they make stuff blow up!

Rock Band Blitz is instantly compatible with every Rock Band DLC track, giving people huge libraries of music to choose from. Getting those tracks to work in Rock Band Blitz is simple: you don’t have to do anything – any Rock Band music content you have on your hard drive will show up in the song list at no additional charge.

Rock Band Blitz sounds absolutely killer on headphones, like the official wireless PS3 Stereo Headset. You’ll be hopping around tracks and playing all the instrument parts, but we accentuate the track that you’re playing on, so you can groove along to your music like never before. Settle in to your armchair, strap on your headphones, and lose yourself in the music and the world of Rock Band Blitz’s “Rock City.”

We really hope you give the game a shot when it hits PlayStation Network XBLA tomorrowWednesday. There will be a free trial available, so you’ve got nothing to lose trying it out. But fair warning: we’re hearing people are getting addicted, so get a good night’s sleep before the game’s launch.

The Rock Band Blitz team here at Harmonix is really proud of the final game; we hope you enjoy it as much as we do. Let us know what you think!
Click to expand...
 
Add me to your friends and/or Facebook for RB Blitz. I'll put you anyone who adds me in a special group to minimize spam and such.

Alexander Roberts on FB.
 
If you want to get more out of this, check out the Rock Band World FB app that has goals that you can complete within Blitz for extra coins to spend on power-ups and such. The GB guys were pretty spot on in likening it to the Giant Bomb quest system in that some goals will give you a goal that's more than just "Earn X Stars on Y Genre Songs". Though there are a number of those types of goals in there.

http://apps.facebook.com/rock-band-world/

In case you missed them, these are the free songs that are on Xbox Live, from the XBL DotW thread:

"Rock Band Network Megamix 01"

"Still Alive"

"Am I Crazy"

"Dreaming of Love"

"Headphones On"

"Charlene (I'm Right Behind You)"

"Promised Land"
 
I finally tried the demo today and while after the first song I played I was WTF??? After the next two I went back and replayed the demo songs and then bought it. :) Great game!

So a question. If I buy a RB track pack, can I export the songs without having RB2 or 3? Also if I buy RB2 can I export without needing RB3? And is there a fee to do the export beyond the cost of the pack itself?
 
I love this game. Really great. I exported Lego Rock Band (which costs 800 points) and now have 45 new tracks to play. Also ordered a copy of track pack vol. 2 as it was cheap on amazon. If I was reading that info right (thanks!) it's free to export track packs.

What combo of power ups have people been having success with? I have been getting a lot from runaway notes. Indeed got 50k and an achievement for that tonight. I like band mate for maxing the multipliers easier. Then an instrument bonus. One I've had no luck with is the one about switching tracks on a measure.
 
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