Rock Band, Guitar Hero Drive Digital Song Sales

In the two months since MTV Networks and Harmonix released the music-based videogame "Rock Band," players have purchased and downloaded more than 2.5 million additional songs made available after the game's initial distribution.

Activision, meanwhile, said it has sold more than 5 million new songs via download for "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock" since it began adding downloadable content in early November.

By comparison, it took wireless operator Sprint four months to sell 1 million songs on its over-the-air full-song download service. While new digital music services competing with iTunes and free peer-to-peer services have struggled to convince music fans to pay $1 for a single, downloadable tracks for games like "Rock Band" and "Guitar Hero" are flying off the digital shelves.

"With such a low installation base, we didn't think that there'd be 2 million songs sold in eight weeks," MTVN Music Group/Logo/Films division president Van Toffler said. "We live in a rough time around music where our audience struggles to pay $20 for a CD but don't hesitate to pay $50 for a game. The notion to pay 99 cents or $1.99 to have a song and repeatedly play with it apparently isn't a big hurdle."

The original "Rock Band" and "Guitar Hero" games shipped with more than 50 licensed songs each, a mix of master recordings and covers. Since then, "Rock Band" has made new music available every week as either singles or in three-pack bundles that can be added as new playable levels for between 99 cents and $5.50. "Guitar Hero III" did the same, focusing on three-song bundles of new music and music featured in previous versions of the game.

Read more at Yahoo! News

Comments

[petey gunnz]

we need some more modern songs in rock band

[MrGtD]

We have enough Modern songs, they need to add more songs from the 60s. Monkees and Stones are definately not enough, we need Hendrix, Cream, The Doors, Frank Zappa, Yardbirds, and dare I say it, The Beatles.

[metdethslaythrx]

hah i find this pretty funny. i have a friend who has only guitar hero songs on his iPod xD

[cam_sampbell]

Guitar Hero annoys me so much

[Sylvanus]

The only reason people are actually buying the game songs is the fact that they're not on limewire... yet

[echofreak]

all this means pretty much is they will be raising the prices for the downloadable songs im guessing

[fender_bender12]

i like rock band and guitar hero, don't hate me fellow guitarists, but i hate it when guys obsess over it, i mean it's just a game but it's the way people obsess over it. i also think houses of the holy by led zeppelin keep away by godsmack and grind by alice in chains would be good songs on the game.

[petey gunnz]

i mean its just a game but i know a couple of guys who play guitar hero and think there like gods of real guitar now that pisses me off, just cause you can beat guitar hero doesnt mean your awesome at real guitar

[blackoctober119]

well they are idiots for thinking that they ae gods and i agree that its just a game and doesnt really require any skill so muchas it does practise, but i think its pretty fun. and also, i apologie if i seem ignorant but...does anyone know HOW to download songs onto guiar hero?

[Emo_Guitars]

I dont understand why not the government just shuts down limewire and make all other downloading sites illegal

[Scorge]

blackoctober119 wrote:

i apologie if i seem ignorant but...does anyone know HOW to download songs onto guiar hero?

check out scorehero.com
you may have to figure out some things for yourself, though. so i hope your pretty handy.

[g-tarist]

fender_bender12 :
i like rock band and guitar hero, don't hate me fellow guitarists, but i hate it when guys obsess over it, i mean it's just a game but it's the way people obsess over it. i also think houses of the holy by led zeppelin keep away by godsmack and grind by alice in chains would be good songs on the game.

i think submerged in boiling flesh & f**ked with a knife by cannibal corpse would b a great track for rock band because the would go down well at partys

[tim311mahoney]

has anyone else out there had their bass drum pedal snap in half on them?! everything else in the set is pretty solid except for that damned pedal.

[TylerPTH]

MrGtD wrote:

We have enough Modern songs, they need to add more songs from the 60s. Monkees and Stones are definately not enough, we need Hendrix, Cream, The Doors, Frank Zappa, Yardbirds, and dare I say it, The Beatles.

who wants to play that boring stuff

[RFer]

Emo_Guitars wrote:

I dont understand why not the government just shuts down limewire and make all other downloading sites illegal

That a difficult task to do, since many countries that hosts pages like that doens't consider illegal to track torrents and stuff like that, and I wouldn't like that to happen, I just don't like to buy CDs because I stop listening to them in a few time, so I rather buy concert dvds, I never get bored of that.
PD: "Emo_Guitars"?? Come on...

[guitarhead93]

emo_guitars lol.



rock band needs more metal ^^

[matt03803]

i think everyone who plays guitar hero and thinks they can play guitar can go **** themselves. i mean. some of the songs on guitar hero suck. who the **** listens to matthew sweet? anyone? well i think if you wanna hear that sweet guitar sound learn to play.

[Vykk Draygo]

MrGtD wrote:

We have enough Modern songs, they need to add more songs from the 60s. Monkees and Stones are definately not enough, we need Hendrix, Cream, The Doors, Frank Zappa, Yardbirds, and dare I say it, The Beatles.

For sure.

Also, why must every Guitar Hero/Rock Band news post be filled with wankers? Go get a life, stop complaining about a game.

[Vykk Draygo]

tim311mahoney wrote:

has anyone else out there had their bass drum pedal snap in half on them?! everything else in the set is pretty solid except for that damned pedal.

Actually, my drum pedal is still fine, but the whammy bar on my guitar broke after a little while (my brother is too tough on them). I should probably try to fix it, but I'm thinking it's not as easy to operate on as the original Guitar Hero controllers.

[GuitarplayaMD]

Zappa? I love that idea! I wonder what songs would be good for the game. How about Muffin Man or the solo for Packard Goose? Make the little suckers work for it.

MrGtD wrote:

We have enough Modern songs, they need to add more songs from the 60s. Monkees and Stones are definately not enough, we need Hendrix, Cream, The Doors, Frank Zappa, Yardbirds, and dare I say it, The Beatles.

[Alpha_Wolf]

JOHNNY CASH FOR ROCK BAND!

[Mr.poison]

MAN!