Rock Band 4

[Tom Servo]

4/13 DLC


New Order - Bizarre Love Triangle
Kaleo - Glass House

[Tom Servo]

4/20 DLC


Lynyrd Skynyrd - Free Bird
Oasis - Champagne Supernova

[Tom Servo]

Also, Oculus should be here tomorrow, though I don't have the Oculus Touch. I'm toying around with the idea of dropping the extra $100 to get those and getting RBVR. Reviews are kinda mixed though, so that's making it a tough call.

[Tom Servo]

I got the touch, but still haven't gotten RBVR. Work got in the way. Stupid work.

Also, update from Harmonix. Short takeaway - they're changing Rivals to be "seasons", which appear to take about two months. Depending on how you finish a two month season, you get in-game rewards (like outfits and such). Demotion will no longer be a thing, you can only gain rank.

The current Rivals stuff counts as season zero and will get you in game stuff, so they're saying now's a time to push for ranking. Pretty stoked that we ignored the past couple of weeks and are now ranked down in silver. We're having a cakewalk this week, though, and will have no problem being promoted to gold next week.

Here's the full text.





It’s been a little while since we’ve drawn the curtain back to give you an idea of what we’re working on behind the scenes. We’ve got a bunch of fun stuff to talk about for the next update, and we’re kicking it off by revealing some major improvements to something that many of you are enjoying every week.


Rivals Mode has been a great way to play with old friends (and make new ones) in Rock Band. Today, more songs are played in Rivals mode than any other and each week the level of competition kicks up a notch as crews compete to climb the ranks and reach Bloodstone. Today, we’re psyched to introduce you to Rivals Seasons – recurring collections of challenges with unique rewards and a handful of major changes to the way the Rivals system works.


Each season, your Crew will compete to get as far as you can over the course of an 8-week season. At the end of that season, rewards will be doled out based on what tier you end on, as well as where you stack up in that tier (being at the top of Bloodstone will offer better rewards than just being in the tier!). Every season will start with every crew in Bronze, for a level playing field. With Rivals Seasons, we want to switch focus to the thrill of promotion, rather than the fear of demotion. So, no more demotion. We’re also changing the percentages for promotion each tier to balance the lack of demotion.


This is a major change, and we’re bringing this to you early partly so we can gather feedback to potentially tweak some mechanics. After all, the goal is to make Rivals Mode as much fun as it can be for as many players as possible.


For the transition between current Rivals Mode and seasons, we’re considering every challenge from the launch of Rivals in October through this update as part of “Season 0.” To reward you for your hard work in Season 0, we’re going to introduce some sweet gear for your characters to wear based on which tier your Crew finishes in. If you’ve been on the cusp of getting into Diamond or Bloodstone, there’s no time like the present to rally your crew together and make a final push before the first Season begins and these rewards disappear forever! (Shameless plug: have you tried the Rock Band Companion App yet? It’s a great way to chat with your Crew and keep them motivated.)


With these changes it’s pretty important that we keep a level playing field, so let’s talk exploits. The next update is going to be addressing the following exploits that previously allowed people to achieve higher-than-should-be-possible scores:

Calibration settings affecting sustains
Calibration settings affecting drum fill timing
Pause rollback extending vocal overdrive


We’re also adjusting how pausing over notes works so it will no longer remove notes on guitar/bass (Behavior will go back to how it was before the patch that changed this behavior). This will continue to remove notes on drums, although it will now break your combo if you pause directly on top of a note (Not if you pause during a break between notes).


With these exploits fixed, some leaderboard scores will be unattainable and thus impossible to beat. We’ve got a few options and are really looking for feedback on how to approach this leaderboard integrity issue (knowing full well that everyone will feel differently about this):

1) We don’t touch the leaderboard. The current leaderboards remain as they are, and all new scores will be posted without exploits, knowing that some songs will have unbeatable scores.

2) We target only the very top entries on each song’s leaderboard and, rather than wipe them out, we lower those scores to a “safe” non-exploited value. This ensures that all leaderboard scores can be beaten without exploits after the patch, and the full combo laurels, percentage, and stars for these records will remain. This approach will only affect a small number of players, and all scores other than the very highest will be unchanged. The number of records targeted may vary per song, based on our projections of the exploited scores for that song.

3) We do a full wipe, and the leaderboards are cleared for everyone.


We’re genuinely interested in your thoughts on each of the above, as well as any options we might have been missing. Unfortunately, “just wipe the exploited scores” isn’t really an option as there’s no way to identify if a now-higher-than-possible score was attained maliciously or not.


Phew, that’s a big info dump. Take some time, mull it over, and let us know what you think! We’re committed to keeping Rock Band fun and exciting, but also fair and rewarding without cheaters gumming up the works for all the people playing legitimately.


We’ll be back with more info on upcoming content soon. In the meantime, let us know what you think!

[Rare White Ape]

4/20 DLC


Lynyrd Skynyrd - Free Bird
Oasis - Champagne Supernova


I'd LOVE to download a few songs to add to my library, but the game always errors out when I try and buy them using RB4.

I've done it before via the MS Store website, however today it's also throwing up stupid errors.

I guess Microsoft doesn't want my money ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Tom Servo]

I've had a ton of errors over the years with XBL and trying to buy things. That's a bummer though, we could definitely use you on our Rivals team!

[Rare White Ape]

Thanks, but to be honest I don't play all that much so I don't think I'm any use to anyone. This is despite laying out $150 to play the game :P

For me it's a drinking nights/party game when we're on the scotch and in a silly mood. Other times it's too loud or obnoxious a game to play when the house is in chill time.

[Tom Servo]

Any playing at all on the right songs helps!

And with that:

4/27 DLC - One relicense and one new.


Avenged Sevenfold - The Beast and the Harlot
The Pretty Reckless - Heaven Knows

[Tom Servo]

Rivals challenge this week is just some songs picked by this one dude. From what I gather, 1,200 songs were picked to be eligible for the XP part of the program, so I can't imagine there'll be a shortage of stuff to play. Spotlight songs are *all* DLC, and I own none of them, so we'll see how this goes. Then again, we're only gold tier right now, so chances are we'll do pretty well no matter what, those always seem to be easier weeks for us.


Marilyn Manson - The Mephistopheles of Los Angeles
Soundgarden - Jesus Christ Pose
Green Day - Jesus of Suburbia

[Tom Servo]

5/4 DLC - One "song"


Montell Jordan - This Is How We Do It


Not a great sign.

[Rare White Ape]

Fuck yeh! That's actually a pretty good song!




*gets coat

[Tom Servo]

Seems like it'd have intensely dull guitar and drum charts, but the bass is probably entertaining.

[Tom Servo]

Rivals challenge this week is '90s songs. Spotlight songs are:


Gin Blossoms - Follow You Down (On Disc RB4 song)
Montell Jordan - This Is How We Do It (this week's sole DLC song)
Pearl Jam - Jeremy (DLC from 2009)


(Thought I might start adding in info on DLC/disc origin for songs)

We own two of this and got demoted after last week's all DLC fun, so this should be a cakewalk.

[Tom Servo]

5/11 DLC - Two songs!


MGMT - Kids
Tracy Bonham - Mother Mother

[Tom Servo]

5/11 Rivals Challenge - Mother's Day themed


MGMT - Kids (This week's DLC)
Tracy Bonham - Mother Mother (This week's DLC)
Brandi Carlile - Mainstream Kid (RB4 On-Disc)


Not sure how much time I'll have for this this week as I'm going out of town for the weekend, but we'll see.

[Tom Servo]

5/18 DLC - I missed this one 'cause I was on vacation.


The Isley Brothers - Shout

[Tom Servo]

5/25 DLC


blink-182 - Bored to Death
The Hunna - You & Me

[Tom Servo]

5/25 Rivals - "The Sun Will Come Out Today". Dunno what that means. Anyway, here are the spotlight songs.


Lit - My Own Worst Enemy (RB2 on-disc song, re-released as DLC on March 2, 2017)
Slydigs - Light the Fuse (RB4 on-disc song)
Staind - Outside (DLC on March 2, 2017)

[Rare White Ape]

Haha, Lit.

What a terrible band. What a terrible and awkward era in the pseudo-punk genre.

[Tom Servo]

Haha, Lit.

What a terrible band. What a terrible and awkward era in the pseudo-punk genre.

Then you understand my pain having to restart that song 3 times after breaking combo. My ears are sad.

[animalica]

New update online:

http://www.harmonixmusic.com/blog/june-update-details-and-patch-notes

[Tom Servo]

This overall sounds good to me. I found that our Rivals team is basically good enough to get promoted from gold but was lucky if it could maintain platinum, so we would just vacillate between the two. The lack of demotion is really nice, otherwise if you take a few days on vacation you're basically screwed for that week.

Curious to see how much mileage I get out of the missions, that kind of thing usually keeps me pretty occupied.

[animalica]

The update is whopping 7.76 GB big.

[Tom Servo]

I took a look at the missions this morning, saw that I've got a few done already, I assume as part of the Rivals stuff, though I don't totally understand exactly what I got. Did a few songs and made progress on a few of the missions, they seem entertaining enough. Be interesting to see how long they're interesting for.

[Tom Servo]

No new DLC this week, but they're teasing some of the songs for June.


Dream Theater - Pull Me Under
Fleetwood Mac - Go Your Own Way (re-license of RB2 disc)
Permaband - Killing is Just a Means...
Permaband - Wrecking Machine
Pierce the Veil - Circles
Rush - Freewill

[Tom Servo]

6/1 Rivals Challenge - Countdown to Summer Break

Spring has a lot to offer: mosquitoes, allergies, screaming kids...Let's stay inside and play Rivals.

Spotlight songs:


Queens of the Stone Age - My God Is The Sun (RB4 on-disc)
Blind Melon - No Rain (DLC 8/8/2009)
Tigerman WOAH - Alone Time (DLC 3/16/2017)


I don't have either of the DLC songs, so might be a rough week.

EDIT: Sweet, one of the randos at least has Blind Melon, so that'll help.

[Tom Servo]

6/8 DLC - Two new songs


Dream Theater - Pull Me Under
Pierce the Veil - Circles

[Tom Servo]

6/8 Rivals Challenge - Zero to Hero

"It's the last week of Season 0, which means it's time for your last stand. Your final placement determines your reward." They are not messing around with this one.


Dragonforce - Through the Fire and Flames
Dream Theater - Pull Me Under
Soul Remnants - Dead Black (Heart of Ice)


The XP songs will be any song with a five dot or devil dots rating for band difficulty. RIP my fingers.

[Tom Servo]

I feel only slight shame at having to go to hard on guitars for Dragonforce, but we're actually looking really solid on the spotlight songs for this week. If we get bumped to platinum, we'll get some swag for anyone in the crew.

[Tom Servo]

6/15 DLC - Two songs from Permaband.


Permaband - Killing is Just a Means
Permaband - Wrecking Machine


Note: They are free, as in beer. No cost to DL. Never heard of the band, but the kids seem excited about it.

Also, we are currently right on the bubble of being promoted this week. We need to be at 80 or higher, we're at 82. I'm going to just throw together some shitty vocals scores to get us a little higher on that and then crank on guitar for a while to see if we can make it this week.

[Tom Servo]

Woot, got Platinum. I think everyone on the crew so far gets the swag.

[Tom Servo]

First week of the new season. Theme is "rock songs". Spotlight songs are:


Permaband - Killing is Just a Means (This week's free DLC)
Wolfmother - Joker & the Thief (Nov. 20, 2007 DLC)
Tenacious D - Tribute (Sep. 15, 2009 DLC)

[Kchrpm]

I will not buy this game just to sing for your band. I will not buy this game just to sing for your band. I will not buy this game just to sing for your band...

WHIP CRACK WENT HIS WHOOPY TAIL

I will not buy this game just to sing for your band...

[Tom Servo]

6/22 DLC


Cyndi Lauper - Girls Just Want to Have Fun
Paramore - Ain't it Fun

[Tom Servo]

6/22 Rivals Challenge - Season One, Week 2 - "Harmonix's Choice Cuts"

We went around the studio asking for song suggestions this week, and turned it all into one big list! Enjoy!

Spotlight songs are:


Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe (DLC Nov 27, 2012)
The Cranberries - Zombie (DLC Mar 15, 2016)
Imagine Dragons - I Bet My Life (RB4 On-disc)


It's like they purposely found three songs I absolutely loathe. This'll be a bad week for us, I think.

[Tom Servo]

6/29 DLC


Rush - Freewill (Vault Edition)
Fleetwood Mac - Go Your Own Way


Go Your Own Way is a re-license.

[Tom Servo]

6/29 Rivals: "Let the Music Set You Free"

"Celebrating freedom is always in season, but especially this week. Check out all these songs about freedom!"

Spotlight songs:


Fleetwood Mac - Go Your Own Way (RB2 on-disc, re-release as DLC on June 29, 2017)
Johnny Blazes & The Pretty Boys - Cold Clear Night (RB4 on-disc)
Rush - Freewill (Vault Edition) (DLC on June 29, 2017)


Unlike last week, where I owned only one song and actively avoided playing it, I have all three of these and am only annoyed by one. So, hopefully this week we'll advance to the next tier.

[Tom Servo]

7/6 DLC - One re-release and one new


Disturbed - Down with the Sickness
Ghost - Cirice

[Tom Servo]

7/6 Rivals Challenge - "Not Microwave Safe"

"Test your mettle with this week's meddled metal challenge" I guess that means Metal songs. Not sure what "meddled" means there, but whatever. Spotlight songs:


Disturbed - Down with the Sickness (On disc RB2 - Re-licensed DLC on July 6, 2017)
Ghost - Cirice (DLC from July 6, 2017)
Worshipper - Black Corridor (Free DLC from December 14, 2016)


My extensive Iron Maiden collection should help with this. Oh, and we demolished last week, so we're up to gold tier now.

[Rare White Ape]

I know you might've explained this before and excuse me for my ignorance, but how do I join your rivals crew?

[Tom Servo]

Heh, I'm not exactly sure, there's gotta be a way to search for it. It's either under my gamertag, or the band name ("Big McLargeHuge").

[Tom Servo]

Pretty nice now that points are dependent on song length. Rime of the Ancient Mariner is worth a ton.

[Tom Servo]

7/13 DLC - One song, and it's really long and costs a dollar more than normal


Iron Butterfly - In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida

[Tom Servo]

7/13 Rivals - "Long Way to the Top"

"A long climb to Bloodstone is best finished with the longest songs you own"


Gorillaz - Clint Eastwood (DLC from Aug 11, 2009)
Iron Butterfly - In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida (DLC from July 13, 2017)
Judas Priest - Halls of Valhalla (RB4 on disc)


I see another round of Rime of the Ancient Mariner in my future. Looks like the cut-off may be 6 minutes, so any songs you have longer than six minutes (The Camera Eye will be fun too) should be part of the challenge.

[Rare White Ape]

Hip hop just died this morning
And she's dead! :sing:

I'd head it was going to be more expensive but I expected it to be four song's worth. But a dollar! I'm sold.

[Tom Servo]

7/20 DLC - Three songs, and I think they're all new


The Black Keys - Gold on the Ceiling
Wilson Phillips - Hold On
Legitimate Front - She


The Legitimate Front song is $0.99 vs. the normal $1.99, and proceeds go to Defy Ventures, a non-profit that tries to help the formerly incarcerated find jobs and assimilate back into society.

[Tom Servo]

7/20 Rivals Challenge - "You Got This"

"Keep Pushing Through This Week As You Stand Tall Against All Challenges"


Legitimate Front - She (DLC from 7/20/2017)
The Protomen - Light Up The Night (RB4 On-Disc)
Scandal - The Warrior (RB4 On-Disc)


Hey, two on disc songs, and the other one is only $0.99. Not so bad. We got hammered last week, despite some good scores, I think we may be topping out at platinum but we'll see what this week brings.

[Tom Servo]

For the couple of you who are on the crew, if you have any spare time before 9PM pacific (midnight eastern) to just get experience points, I'm pretty sure we can hit diamond. We need to be in the 70th percentile, we were at 72 this morning and I dragged us up to 80, but we basically just need playtime more than actual high scoring.

[8400RPM]

I'll give it a shot. I've had the itch to play some lately just haven't found the time but I might be able to get some in tonight.

[Tom Servo]

Clawed back to 80 again after falling to 77 while I was at work. There's 47 minutes left and I think I'm tapping out. If we get it, we get it, if not, it was a valiant attempt.

Also, I'm suddenly getting a flood of people trying to buy/coerce my gamertag. That's fun.

[Tom Servo]

Woot, we got it. I think there are two weeks left in the season, but considering how hard it was to hang on to get to diamond, I'm pretty sure we won't be able to get bloodstone. Still, highest our crew's ever gotten.

[Tom Servo]

7/27 DLC - One re-license from RB2 and one new song.


Rage Against the Machine - Testify (RB2 re-license)
The Temper Trap - Alive

[Tom Servo]

7/27 Rivals Challenge - Nick's Picks (whoever Nick is)

Spotlight songs are:


The Shins - New Slang (April 7, 2009 DLC)
White Denim - At Night in Dreams (RB4 on-disc)
Wilson Phillips - Hold On (July 20, 2017 DLC)


I don't have either of the DLC songs and the wife will be out of town, so I don't see me making nearly the push I did last week.

[Tom Servo]

8/3 DLC - Two LA based "modern indie whatever" bands


Blondfire - True Confessions
The Shelters - Rebel Heart

[Tom Servo]

8/3 Rivals Challenge - Deep Cuts

"The world's a big place. Let us help you find some music in it you'd otherwise miss."

Spotlight songs are:


Animal Flag - Sink (March 16, 2017 DLC)
Ministry - Stigmata (August 10, 2010 DLC)
The Shelters - Rebel Heart (August 3, 2017 DLC)


This is the last week of the first season. I don't think anybody played last week, but I can't say I'm exactly shocked by that. I have a feeling this'll be a bad week too, as I own none of the songs listed. Also, Ministry is an unknown band?

Also of note, they're introducing a "Season Season Pass" for the next season of 8 weeks. $13.49 for all the *new* DLC songs that are spotlight songs for the season (which will end up being 8 songs, presumably one per week). That'd normally run $15.92, so it's a little more than one of the songs for free. It won't include any older DLC that's a spotlight song. I'm not nearly enough of a score chaser to do this -- I learned my lesson when Rock Band first came out. I had no idea that DLC was going to be an "every week" thing, so I basically bought up anything they'd put out and now I can't escape the fucking Grateful Dead. Having songs in your library you hate is the worst.

[Tom Servo]

8/10 DLC - I'm late.


Parks - Sweater Weather
Spirit Kid - To My Romeo


Both songs are free and only available to Rivals owners.

[Tom Servo]

8/17 DLC


The Black Cheers - (You're) Breakin' Up
Arctic Horror - Black Seas


Both songs are free and only available to Rivals owners.

[JoeW]

Are you on Xbone or PS4?

[Tom Servo]

XBone

[JoeW]

Bummer. No one on my friends list plays RB4.

[Tom Servo]

I take it you're on PS4? Yeah, it's hard to make the transition, especially if you're like me and have been buying DLC since RB1 on a single platform. It'd cost me thousands to switch. And believe me, I've thought about it, the fact that my drum kit will work just fine on the PS4 but I have to deal with shoddily made dongles that may or may not work on the XBox really made me consider biting the bullet and switching.

[Rare White Ape]

That's the reason I stuck with Xbox as well, despite me almost never using my Xbone.

[Tom Servo]

8/24 DLC


Garbage - Stupid Girl
Sugar Ray - Every Morning


I believe Rivals season 2 starts up this week. I really hope it's Garbage in the spotlight and not Sugar Ray.

[Rare White Ape]

Oh god that's an earworm and a half.

[Tom Servo]

I am way late on this, I think this week's challenge ends in like 28 hours.

8/24 Rivals Challenge - Season 2, Week 1

Story Time - All songs count, but your earnings are doubled in "Go On Tour" and "Rockudrama".

Spotlight songs:


Garbage - Stupid Girl
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Give It Away
The Warning Shots - Closer, Closer

[Tom Servo]

Thankfully, being season one, I played all of seven songs this morning to set guitar scores (and not even that great ones, I kept fucking up) and get some XP (Pearl Jam tribute in Go On Tour mode) and that got us in the promotion zone. Still might play a few more tonight to make sure, but at least it'll be easy.

I'll be able to set some scores for week 2, but won't be available at all for week 3.

[Tom Servo]

8/31 DLC


Catfish and the Bottlemen - Postpone
Ted Nugent - Strangehold


The Nugent song is part of the "Season DLC Pass", so that means it'll be a spotlight song next week. I kinda don't like the idea of the Nuge getting any money, so not sure I'll end up buying that.

[Tom Servo]

8/31 Rivals Challenge

Lord of the Strings - Guitarists, take your place in center stage. You're getting 1.25x XP for all your performances this week.

(Not sure if this means it's another week where essentially all songs count.)

Spotlight Songs:


.38 Special - Caught Up In You
The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Long Hot Summer Night
Ted Nugent - Stranglehold

[Tom Servo]

I got us *just* into the promotion zone, but I am soon headed to Barcelona. If any of y'all want to take the mantle and just put down experience points, you're welcome to it.

[Yw-slayer]

I met a dude at a (law themed) "Battle of the Rock Bands" contest who wants to play. When we move, maybe I'll be able to set it up. IT'S BEEN TOO LONG SINCE I FONDLED SOME PLASTIC INSTRUMENTS!!!!

[Tom Servo]

And I have been severely remiss in my duties posting DLC and such. Vacation just kinda killed the streak for me there.

[Tom Servo]

Okay, back on the wagon after two trips out of the country. Might even seen if I can put down some points for the Rivals challenge this week.

DLC since I last posted:


Vanilla Ice - Ice Ice Baby
Whitney Houston - I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)
The Who - Won't Get Fooled Again (previously on-disc re-license)
Avenged Sevenfold - God Damn
Rick James - Super Freak
Switchfoot - Float
Blue Oyster Cult - Burnin' For You
Shawn Mendes - There's Nothing Holdin' Me Back
Asia - Heat of the Moment
Survivor - Eye of the Tiger (previously on-disc re-license)
Alice in Chains - Down in a Hole
Alice in Chains - Man in the Box
Alice in Chains - Them Bones
Chuck Berry - Johnny B. Goode
The Jackson 5 - I Want You Back
Foghat - Slow Ride
Ramones - I Wanna Be Sedated
Wild Cherry - Play That Funky Music

[Tom Servo]

Rivals Challenge for 11/2: A Step Forward

Time marches on, as you move on to play all the songs from the 70's in Rock Band.

Spotlights:


Queen - Killer Queen
Rush - A Passage to Bangkok
Wild Cherry - Play That Funky Music

[Tom Servo]

11/9 DLC


Joan Jett - Bad Reputation
Violent Femmes - Blister in the Sun (included with Spotlight pass)
Steve Pardo - Super Beat Sports Big Baos Battle (Free)

[Tom Servo]

11/16 DLC


Ace of Base - The Sign
Radiohead - Karma Police
Weezer - Say it Ain't So


Forgot to do the rivals challenge last week, it was 80's songs. This upcoming will undoubtedly be 90's songs.

[Tom Servo]

11/20 will mark 10 years since the first Rock Band was released, and they're re-releasing 10 RBN songs as free DLC. All the bands either have Harmonix employees in them or have some other connection to Harmonix.


The Acro-Brats - Hair Trigger
Anarchy Club - Collide
Bang Camaro - Blood Red Rock
Bang on a Can All-Stars - Shadowbang (Head)
Dance for the Dying - Thug Love
Freezepop - Doppelganger
Graveyard BBQ - Cheat on the Church
Honest Bob and the Factory-to-Dealer Incentives - Soy Bomb
The Main Drag - How We'd Look on Paper
Symbion Project - Exploited and Exposed

[Tom Servo]

11/16 Rivals Challenge - Rebellious Phase

"We can't tell you what to do, but you should probably play your 90's songs this week."

Spotlight songs are:


Eagle Eye Cherry - Save Tonight
Spin Doctors - Little Miss Can't Be Wrong
Radiohead - Karma Police

[Tom Servo]

11/23 DLC


Big & Rich - Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy) (season pass song)
Jimmy Eat World - The Middle (pretty sure this is a re-license)


I am so, so happy I didn't get the season pass.

[Tom Servo]

11/23 Rivals Challenge - New Century, New Me

"It's the turn of the century this week (trust us on this, ok?) and we're here to show you the best the early 2000s had to offer."


Big & Rich - Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)
Cake - Short Skirt/Long Jacket
Papa Roach - Last Resort

[Tom Servo]

11/30 DLC


Amon Amarth - Twilight of the Thunder God (season pass)
The Killers - When You Were Young

[Tom Servo]

11/30 Rivals - Making Strides

As the 2000s evolved, so did the music. A surprisingly large shift within a decade spurs another week. (Songs from the second half of 2000s).

Spotlight songs:


Amon Amarth - Twilight of the Thunder God
My Chemical Romance - Famous Last Words
The Protomen - Light Up the Night

[Tom Servo]

Sorry to bring this one back up, but I believe there's a couple of you on here that are also on my Rivals crew.

I think we've actually got a shot at Bloodstone this season. We hit diamond this past week with only my wife and me playing and have two more weeks to try to go up. The second week will be easier than the first, just due to better crews getting promoted and lesser crews being brought up into diamond, but I think either is possible.

They've broken up the rankings into three categories - scores on the spotlight songs count for 1/3, XP counts for 1/3, and "LP" (which is essentially how well your crew ranks per song per week per tier) is 1/3. We're in solid shape as is on spotlight and LP, but XP is where we need it. Which just means, we need people in the crew playing songs.

If you've felt like picking the game up and playing some, the next two weekends would be great times to do so. XP is what we need more than anything, which means it doesn't matter how well you play, just play.

[Tom Servo]

Okay, maybe not this weekend, the spotlight songs are a) 2/3 new DLC and b) suck ass.

[Tom Servo]

Okay, it's on.

Spotlight songs are:


The Cars - Just What I Needed
David Bowie - Suffragette City
Fleetwood Mac - You Make Loving Fun


I have all three of these songs. Spotlight scores should not be a problem, we just need play time. I might be hitting people up over XBL - we had a strong showing with only two players for diamond, so I think we can get this if we just get a couple of people playing over the 3-day (in the US) weekend.

Week starts up tomorrow evening in the US and goes through Tuesday evening. If you have time to play, please do.

[8400RPM]

I’ll see if I can’t put some time in. I’ve had the itch to play lately and have all those songs as well.

[Tom Servo]

There should be a ton of other songs as well. The theme is bands that "have hit the pinnacle". Not sure what exactly that means, but just expect a ton of bands that have sold lots of records, or maybe it's all grammy nominated/winning bands. Either way, I'd expect a lot of songs to be available for XP/LP outside of the 3 in the spotlight.

[8400RPM]

Probably means bands that have hit #1 on the Billboard charts. Should be a large list.

[Tom Servo]

Just from my playing today (maybe 2-3 hours or so), we're at 49% (65.3% spotlight w/out vocals yet, 47.1% LP, 33.9% XP). 85% gets us Bloodstone. I hit up RWA over XBL to try to get him on board, but it's basically you, him, and my wife that aren't randos on the team. I may still hit them up as well and see if they'll play a few rounds. FWIW, the theme appears to be bands that are in the Rock 'n ' Roll Hall of Fame.

[Tom Servo]

Michele and I played a bit, up to 66% now. Getting closer.

[Tom Servo]

Aww yeah, VTEC getting us way, way closer. I sent a message off to RWA but haven't heard back.

[Rare White Ape]

Hey man!

You’ll never catch me on XBL coz I never use it. Sorry!

[Tom Servo]

Well, that explains that. Last I checked we were at 73%, 12 away from 85, but of course that's a moving target since the other crews are also playing. I'll be able to get some time in today, but I might not have any time Tuesday.

[Tom Servo]

Meh. Played about 15-20 songs, full combo'd most of them, ranked pretty highly on LP, and went from 70% to...70%.

Pretty clear we're not going to make it without more active people. So much for that.

[Tom Servo]

Haven't played since that last attempt took the wind out of my sails. That said, Slayer's Angel of Death just got released for RB4 this week, might be time to dust off the instruments again.

[Tom Servo]

Harmonix just sold to Epic Games. They say they'll still be releasing DLC for RB4 for the foreseeable future, and that there's no intention of turning off servers or anything like that. On the downside, they said there are no current plans to manufacture more instruments, which is probably the biggest problem right now.

The bigger downside is buried at the end of the post, that Harmonix will be "creating musical journeys and gameplay for Fortnite."

They managed to survive the Viacom years, but I don't think were ever the same after that. I feel like this is the beginning of the end for Harmonix, which makes me very sad. Their games gave me a lot of good times.

[JoeW]

I love RB4. I was never very good at the instruments but I loved to sing along with my favorite tunes. Bummer indeed...

[Tom Servo]

I'm not even sure how well the instruments work on the newer consoles, especially on the XBox side. I've still got some working ones, but we all know it's only a matter of time for the drum kits. I do have a Roland TD-9 kit, but that requires a MIDI adapter which then requires another adapter to work with the XB1, and of course both adapters are no longer made.

[Cam]

I am visiting my bro at the moment. We have been playing RB2 on his 360 over the past few days. Still a great game. Sadly, he only has one guitar. Lori likes playing guitar and Tim and I swap singing and drumming. It did not take long to get my mojo back. I played a couple of songs on expert guitar after I got warmed up. Drums will take a bit more practice to get back to my old proficiency. I can easily play easier songs on hard drums. We will probably play more later today, but we are back on the road tomorrow. Singing is easier for me. I went expert on my first croon and did just fine.

[Tom Servo]

Still sad I can't use my Roland kit, but we dust this off every once in a while. Our neighbor had never played it before and definitely had a good time.

I'm surprised that Harmonix is still actively supporting it with regular DLC releases and the Rivals competitions still going strong. Of course, the biggest problem is the lack of hardware and that shows no sign of being improved.

[Cam]

I have not looked, but are there no instruments available at all, like even cheap knock-offs from questionable sources?

[Tom Servo]

Pretty much nothing that's not second-hand through eBay/thrift shops. Nobody's making anything new anymore that I'm aware of. And we all know how non-durable those kick pedals are for the drums.

[Tom Servo]

Next week is the final round of DLC for Rock Band, at which point Harmonix will be pivoted completely over to Fortnite. Pour one out for a real one, about 9 years of DLC releases for a game where you couldn't even buy the controllers anymore.

[Yw-slayer]

I agree.