A modest (and quite long) proposal.

[stiper327b]

First of all, a disclaimer. There will be no suggestions of baby eating in this post (at least not ones forwarded by myself) nor will there be wit and satire in the level of Mr. Jonathan Swift, but what there will be is a proposal that many might not be all that thrilled with, yet I feel is important to the success of this game.

Do not reveal all of the songs.

I know the temptation is great, both on the part of the disseminator and the disseminatee, to share as much information on this project as you possibly can. You guys have been carrying this little baby for well over nine months now, and when the birthing hour draws closer, you will hear a cacophonous shout from us huddled masses. We will whine and commit to some rather intimidating gnashing of teeth, and it will all be for one reason. We want to know if "X" band is in the game. And you will want to tell us. You will want to talk of your little bundle of labor and shout to the rooftops, letting everybody know just how amazing the track-listing will be.

Well, this is one of the few instances where I implore you to be coy. Play hard to get, tease us if you will. But do not divulge all the information before we get our hands on what is sure to be a wonderful game.

Why do I advocate such chicanery? Because I'm selfish.

You see, when the original Guitar Hero came out, I must admit I was late to the party. I did not pick this game up until March of '06, well past the initial release date. When I finally did play the demo at a Best Buy, much to the embarrassment of my roommate at the time, I was sold. And you know what? That was just after playing one song, Symphony of Destruction, on Easy. I had no idea what was in store for me. I had no idea if that would be the only song of note in the game, or if I was buying a game comprised solely of metal classics. I knew none of that, all I knew was that the feeling I got from playing that demo was like any other I've felt in my long years of videogaming.

And you know what? When I finally got my own copy, the feeling just got better. Each tier I unlocked led to an ever increasing flurry of excitement as I saw the songs. I had no idea that I would get to play Killer Queen, More than a Feeling, I Wanna Be Sedated, Iron Man, Smoke on the Water, etc. That first few nights with your original GH masterpiece was transcendent. It was a night of almost constant surprise and elation.

I'm sorry to say that the experience for GHII was a little less...impactful. I'm sure some of that had to do with my familiarity with the game. I no longer had to slowly work my way through easy, curse the advent of the blue button, curse the unwillingness of my pinky to even acknowledge the presence of the orange button. And chords? Forget about it. No, I came in an accomplished player who know the intricacies of the game. Unfortunately, I also knew all there was to know about the tracklisting. I knew what songs were in what tiers. I knew about the encores, and what songs were encores. I even knew about the bonus songs. And I've got to admit, when I got past Tier 1, and saw the songs in Tier 2, I didn't get that rush of excitement and giddiness that I got with GH1. It was all expected, nothing surprising.

Now, I'm not going so far as to intimate that me voraciously consuming all information pre-GH2 release is in any way your fault. Hell, I'm sure most of the tracks for GH1 were announced well before the release of that game, I was just too ignorant to notice.

All I'm saying is we live in a world of instant gratification. If we don't know everything about a certain product, even if we're 90% sure that said product will be ground breaking and genre defining, we still want to know everything, surprises be damned. And you guys have a chance to, not necessarily end that desire, but at least quell it.

Everybody on this board will be buying Rock Band. I'd reckon that nearly everybody who's played through GH2's hard mode will be buying Rock Band. You might not reach the level of saturation that GH2 did or GH3 will (which will have more to do with peripherals and cost than the quality of your game), but you guys are going to be huge. And we're gonna buy the game whether or not you announce all 180 (wink wink) songs, or keep it at the four already announced. And the average consumer doesn't really pay attention to these things anyway. They're gonna go into the store and see the artists listed on the back of the box, which I might add is also a truncated list. They're not gonna miss the lack of announced songs.

And if all of this is just making your PR/marketing people faint at heart, then I propose a compromise. Announce the artists only. I guarantee, if you simply announce "Metallica" then we, and many other net denizens, will be buying this in droves. And as long as you don't pull a quick one on us and put Mama Said on there instead of *Insert oft requested Metallica song here*, we'll come to appreciate the game even more.

So, in short (too late, haha, I get it), give us something to get excited about after we buy this game. I know that once the game is released, the mystery will soon (instantaneously?) be demystified, but I can't tell you how cool it would be to be playing along, and about halfway through open up a tier of songs only to find "R.E.M. What's the Frequency Kenneth" listed.

Oh, and we should eat all the babies. Sorry, Mr. Swift, I couldn't resist.

[the_spike]

Well personally, I'd want to know all the songs.

I'll most likely be doing the singing on guitar or bass (if it supports it) and since it's too hard to look between the guitar notes and lyrics, I'd have to know the lyrics well beforehand.

[stiper327b]

I understand your concern. In fact, when the tracks were announced for GH2 were announced, I immediately made a GH2 playlist on my Zen. And that was all I listened to for the month leading up to the release of the game.

But I'm telling you, while I might have been more equipped to conquer those games more quickly, it just was not as fun. Even the songs I hadn't heard of were old hat by the time I actually got to play them. I never felt like I got to "learn" the songs, but rather just remember the rhythm and match up the notes. Throw in the fact that I watched a bunch of videos before hand as well, and there were some songs that were not surprising in the least.

But I remember playing GH1, and being kind of confused when an "Exies" song came up. I had no idea who the Exies were, nor had I ever heard their song. In fact, I'm going to say that I had only heard about half the songs on GH1, the others were new to me, or at least new enough that I had to pay attention to what I was doing.

All I want is that magical feeling back, that rush of adrenaline when I finally "figured" out a song. And what was even better was when I would go from not knowing a song to that song becoming my favorite in the game.

Hell, I still go back and play the bonus songs on GH1 for this very reason. I had no idea who The Slip were, or the Acro-Brats, or Shaimus, etc. It was cool to hear the songs for the first time, and then learn to play them as my appreciation grew for said song. I enjoyed it more because I was learning to play it, and I enjoyed learning to play it because I was enjoying the song. It was a win-win for me.

Of course, then I played Caveman Rejoice and that kind of fell apart. But still, I contend that discovering songs while learning to play them is nothing but good times. For me anyway.

[MurderSquirrel]

Cool thread! I'd like to begin by saying how impressed I am with the amount of punctuation and the level of spelling being used in this forum. It's almost enough to make me forget I'm on the Internet at all...

But back to this thread! I never really thought about it, but I think that the idea of not telling us all the songs in advance would be great. Upon looking at my iTunes Rockband playlist with the four announced songs already in it, I wholeheartedly agree with Stiper's ideas. How about they announce half of the songs to get us all pumped up, and then blow us away with the other half when we actually play it? Sounds good to me!

[Plekto]

I second, third, and well, whatever it gets to, I'll add another vote at the end...

Games need unlockable areas and stuff that is "oh wow - new stuff!!!" in them. You did this very well with Amplitude, for instance. We get to the bonus songs and it just says "access denied" - and it made it score/skill based - so say, in rockband, you would have to pass each song, then get a bonus song or two if you got all of the main songs at the B rating(4 stars in GHII equivalent). No info given - none at all on the extras, of course.

There should be a flurry of activity trying to figure out all of the hidden stuff. Better yet would be if the game is online, have players able to buy songs with their credits(like in GHIIs "shop" - but obviously not enough cash to ever get them all. Gotta get them, say, by playing with other peolpe in your band or online who have them and obtain them that way(simmilar to how my son's Pokemon game can't evolve or have certain creatures unless he does a face to face trade with his friend)

This would give a big incentive to play online - most of the good songs would require you to get out and find others who have access to it so that you can as well. And nobody would be sure of the entire playlist for months - and you can always add new ones online of course, so it's always changing.

[Brock_Landers]

As long as I don't know the encore songs, I'm good to go

[Kaboobi]

I think doing something like revealing a new song every week, but still leaving like 10-15 or so songs in the game unnanounced, so people know a general idea what kinda of stuff is in the game, but still leave a few nice surprises in there.

[the_spike]

I think doing something like revealing a new song every week, but still leaving like 10-15 or so songs in the game unnanounced, so people know a general idea what kinda of stuff is in the game, but still leave a few nice surprises in there.

Yeah, I agree. I was wishing they would do this forever, it would make continuous hype.

IGN does something like this with the WWE Smackdown games where they profile one wrestler per day, it's a great way to reveal info.

[Magnet]

I think doing something like revealing a new song every week, but still leaving like 10-15 or so songs in the game unnanounced, so people know a general idea what kinda of stuff is in the game, but still leave a few nice surprises in there.

That really is a brilliant idea. I like it a lot more than releasing them in batches of five or ten. You guys listening at HMX? This is a good idea. Please consider it.

[Archangel_of_Light]

I think you are right also, but (Yes there is a but) you must ask yourself this. If you were in the designer's position listening to all those whining and complaining people begging to know the songs, don't you think you would cave in a little? For say, you have children. They keep bugging, and bugging, and bugging for a new game or toy. What do you do? I'm pretty sure if they bugged enough you would get them that toy. In the same sort of sense that this game is to everyone here. So it is sort of obvious that they will indeed tell us atleast some of the songs on here. And more-than-likely if they do, it will the chart topping songs (or just really well known songs) within the last forty years or so. That way more people will be willing to get the game because they have that sense of familiarity to some of the game. And that is what gets people to buy things these days. I know you ask of them not to release the setlist, but in reality they will probably just keep releasing more and more info till the release date.

[c0nd0rd4myt]

well, considering the idea that chances are the marketing and publicity people have more say in what gets announced than the actual development team, i think your better off just living in a cave until it comes out

[Archangel_of_Light]

You're probably right, but still who doesn't like the tension of the wait? Isn't that why everyone is on this forum?

[stiper327b]

Oh, don't get me wrong, I don't want them to keep the entire set-list under wraps. I just want them to keep from pulling the curtain back on the entire set-list. Some songs are going to be announced, that's just common sense. You've got to give consumers a taste of what type of music they can expect. And even on the box there will be listed a good handful of bands. I'm just saying keep some songs back, give us a little surprise. Give us something that will make us say "wow" when we finally get this game.

And I'm fully aware that this idea falls under the purview of the marketing department. But really, what do they have to gain from revealing the entire set-list before release? Are they really going to convince a huge bloc of potential consumers to purchase this game if "x" band is on there or not? If there are 40 songs on this game, and they announce, let's say 25, that's just over half. And if somebody still doesn't want to buy the game after that, then I highly doubt the remaning 15 songs are really going to push them over the edge.

And don't think I haven't thought about the living in a cave idea. In fact, now that all the bears are done hibernating, my realtor says now is the time to BUY BUY BUY!!!