Saturday, September 13, 2008
Undead Presidency
I am at work right now, sitting behind the A/V counter in a suit. My only real responsibility left is to man the soundboard while the wedding party gives their speeches. Dull. But what am I thinking about?

Pitch lines scrolling across the screen.

Colored rivets flying towards me in tune to the music.

The thunder of constant (and I do mean constant) bass beats.

That's right, Rock Band 2 is out tomorrow. Or, to be more specific... Rock Band 2 is out at midnight tonight and will be picked up by me on the way home from work. I mentioned in Wes' Spore thread about making a band, and some interest was expressed. So let's get this shit organized:

According to what I've read so far, the Band Leader thing is gone... I don't know how that works. As annoying as it was to have the band tied to one person (made even more annoying by having each person tied to an instrument, a problem that doesn't exist anymore) it certainly made things easier. Leader was on, band was on. Almost certainly they're going to allow you to add new band members though. I don't know how it's going to work with more than 4 people (which we almost certainly will have).

Regardless, when I get home I'm going to create the Undead Presidents (unless we want a different name now) and start unlocking songs solo. If anyone else has picked up the game and wants to help, just let me know.

The first question is obviously, instruments. Since you can switch (and some forumers who have the game early have said you can switch quickly and easily on the fly, very good news if true) I don't think there's any reason not to have multiple options on the table.

In Rock Band 1 I mostly did vocals. I can pass songs on expert and I racked up a few gold stars on the way. I even had a couple of my scores in the top 20 for a while. I also enjoyed playing bass guitar, and more rarely took on lead guitar. I recently bought the Fender precision bass controller, so I'd prefer bass... But I can use it as a guitar too. So really, the only thing I can't do is drums. I'm not that interested in them anyways. Of the three parts I can play, though, I'm fine with any of them at pretty much any time, depending on who else is around.

The second question is a pretty simple one: Songs. The more songs the better, in my opinion!

There's 84 songs on the RB2 disc. Another 20 will be released for free online in the near future. All but three of the songs on the Rock Band 1 disc are exportable (for a small fee) And then there's DLC.

I certainly don't expect everyone to match my DLC habits. (I've bought them all. Yes, all of them. That entire list.) But I wouldn't mind tossing up an Undead Presidents playlist of songs each of us likes. At some point I might put up a list of all the songs I play repeatedly and enjoy (but be warned, that is pretty massive). For now though, I'll just list a few of my must have artists who haven't really done any wrong:

Nine Inch Nails (obvious!)
Smashing Pumpkins
System of a Down
Weezer (but especially Troublemaker and Buddy Holly)
Red Hot Chili Peppers
The Police (especially Synchronicity II and Message in a Bottle)

Most of these artist have a pack or two, but a few just have a couple of singles out. I like having the option of extra songs, but it's certainly not necessary for anyone else to buy anything, especially right now since we have the whole new setlist in RB2 to keep us busy. It also stands to point that many of the "Battle of the Band" weekly challenges and "World Tour Challenges" will be based on things like playing all songs by a certain artist, certain theme, etc which doesn't necessitate DLC, but is vastly enhanced by it.

There's a couple of free songs out there too, namely Still Alive and Charlene (I'm right behind you), so those two at least can add a litte variety for free. And really, who doesn't love Portal and Stephen Colbert?

So yeah, leave your instrument(s), good times to play, extra song selections, or whatever else you feel might be relevant to this endeavor in the comments and I hope to see you all online for some jamming soon!

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