Rock Band 2

September 14,2008 - When Rock Band’s price of $170 was announced in the middle of last year, many people wondered whether anyone would be willing to put up that kind of money up front for a game. With a consistent spot on the top sales charts, the answer was apparently yes. Why did Rock Band do so well? It’s simple really; music brings people together, and Rock Band is a game all about forming a band and making music. It had all the elements in place to be a huge hit and it turned out to be just that. Since the game’s release though, many fans have been giving feedback on what could have made the game even better. We’re roughly a year from the release of the original, and most of these requests have been taken to heart in Rock Band 2.

What you get in Rock Band 2 is a more refined and streamlined experience. This is most noticeable in the game’s brand new menu system. There is no more Solo or Multiplayer menu. Now you simply select what mode you want to play and populate your band with either people in the same room or across the country over Xbox Live. If that were all that had been changed in Rock Band 2 it would be very hard to recommend shelling out another $60 for it, but thankfully, that’s only scratching the surface.

One of the most requested features from fans of the original game was the ability to play the game’s Band World Tour mode online. This is now possible with Rock Band 2 and it works very well. Another request along the same lines was the ability to play the World Tour mode in Single Player mode. Harmonix has listened to the fans and now the Tour mode is now the main Career mode for both Solo and Multiplayer. The old linear career mode for each instrument has been done away with.

The way the main Tour mode works has also been tweaked a bit. You’ll still be going from city to city and venue to venue acquiring fans and scoring Tour Stars, but there will now be some random events that will pop up which will give you various rewards like double the money or quadruple the fans for meeting a specific condition. You’re still playing music, but these random events do keep things interesting.

You can now also hire Staff members to help your band out. This is an aspect of the Tour that could have possibly been done a bit better. The Staff act effectively as bonuses, giving you boosts or penalties depending on whether you succeed at a song or fail it. You can only have one hired Staffer at a time, so you’ll mostly likely end up just picking one and staying with them. A band needs a team of people to keep things working smoothly, and a bit more refining on this element might’ve made it something a bit more worthwhile. It doesn’t hurt the game for being there, but it certainly could have been a lot more.

The Tour mode also has a Challenge sub-mode. This is similar to the game’s old Career mode where you play several songs and then move onto the next set. This time though, there are multiple events in each Challenge Tier and some of them require a full band to play. It doesn’t matter what instrument you play or how many people you have around there will always be something to do in the Tour mode.

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