Acti ponders GH World Tour DLC subscriptions

by Dustin Burg { Sep 17th 2008 at 5:45PM }

Here's an interesting idea. Activision head Mike Griffith confirmed with Shacknews that they've been looking at various ways to release musical downloadable content for Guitar Hero World Tour, including a subscription service. According to Griffith, Acti has been kicking around the idea of an "annual pass subscription where players can subscribe and get a certain number of songs downloadable each month." Kinda sounds Zune'ish to us.

All said, we expect that a subscription service would please the renter crowd and doesn't sound like that bad of an idea. What say you?

[Via Joystiq]

Tags: activision, guitar-hero, guitar-hero-world-tour, world-tour

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Phil @ Sep 17th 2008 5:51PM

i quite like this idea. i guess it can save some microsoft points in mid year, although its only for a certain amount of songs, after that subscriptions gone, you'd have to buy tracks with ms points.
either way, i like this idea

Nick @ Sep 17th 2008 6:01PM

This sounds like an awesome idea but I think a Rhapsody-like service (Option) would be even better.

Caboose @ Sep 17th 2008 6:10PM

horrible idea, especially if they are as slack releasing songs as they have been.. and the crap they put out.. what if no one likes the songs put out in the month, they are screwed out of a month

Ryan @ Sep 17th 2008 6:12PM

This is a good idea in theory, but the "certain amount of songs per month" part worries me. What if nothing comes out in the span or four weeks that you like? Will your credited songs roll over to the next month, or do you just have to eat the cost?

Terrence Newton @ Oct 2nd 2008 8:19AM

we all know activision is greedy, with the way GH3 songs are so overpriced. i doubt subscribing will bring the cost per song down much. and even though they've promised to increase their DLC, they've made similar promises in the past, and never come through. let me see some regular, good, DLC releases, then i'll think about this subscription thing.

Jolard @ Sep 17th 2008 7:06PM

exactly, it is a bad idea. I buy a lot of Rock Band DLC, but I only buy the songs I like. I have probably bought a fifth of the available songs (It is actually a lot) but there are times when I buy everything in one week's release, and other times where I might go a month without getting anything.

Unless it allowed me to get everything, it would mean that on weeks where everything is good I couldn't get it all, and on weeks where nothing is good I would feel like I have to get something.

The reason that the Zune service and Rhapsody work is that they have thousands (millions?) of songs available at any one time, and you can pick a certain number of them to download each month. It wouldn't work if they had 100 songs, and released 6 new ones a month and allowed you to pick three of those each month.

Flex @ Sep 17th 2008 7:41PM

I dont like the idea at all due to how lax they have been with DLC in the past.
Adding in Subscription fees... very MMO like. Whats next being able to level up.
Having the current format where you buy the tracks you want and ignore the rest works best imo.

ccc @ Sep 17th 2008 8:38PM

I say they should first work on bringing my 40 or so songs of dlc from gh3 to world tour first.

There really great songs and I don't wanna let them go.

As far as the subscription goes, I'm sure it would only be an option if anything along side still being able to buy things as you see fit.

I wanna know if GHwt's dlc will try to seel at a price that is the same as RB or cheaper, or will they stay with the 500ms points for 3 tracks deal?

xenogears728 @ Sep 18th 2008 5:53AM

I think activision needs to take a good look at itself for a second. They're dangerously close to over saturating the market. That 300 % more guitar hero line by 2010 from activision is kinda scary.
At some point people are will get sick of this I assure you. I would say they should really think about not releasing 2-3 guitar heros a year to something like 1 guitar hero every 2- 3 years.

Gemini Ace @ Sep 18th 2008 9:03AM

It's always a bad idea to rent your content. I'll stick with Rock Band and avoid the money vacuum that GH is trying to become.

HazyCloud @ Sep 18th 2008 9:10AM

+1 for you, sir. Took the words out of my mouth.

XeonPro @ Sep 18th 2008 10:14AM

I think this would be a bad move. I have purchased well over 100 songs in Rock Band and plan to purchase many more as songs I like are released. But I have not spent a dime in the GH series because I can not get passed the thought that my investment is lost once they move on which happens very quickly.

I find myself looking at the history here and the facts that Activision/GH has not been able to provide a steady stream of DLC at any point in time. So with a track record like this, why would anyone but score whores purchase something like this when there is no guarantee in music availability or quality. Half of the stuff they have released contains one or two songs packaged with blah...

So in response, no, I would not waist my time or money on something like this. I buy what I like and only what I like. Prove to me that they can provide good music on a consistant basis and my response could be different.