The Death of Rock and Roll

A lot happened today. D.I.C.E. (Design, Innovate, Communicate, Entertain) Summit is going on right now and the D.I.C.E. awards will be going on tomorrow. It's basically the "Oscars" for video games and it's what the Spike TV Awards should be, but probably never will be. Either way I will be watching the awards, which are usually hosted by Jay Mohr, a host who actually knows what he's talking about. They're a much better watch than anything you'll see on TV.


But that's not the big news! Today during an earnings called Activision-Blizzard announced several things. First they're planning on releasing a new Spider-man game despite the mediocre sales of Spider-man: Shattered Dimensions. 


Secondly, they canceled True Crime: Hong Kong. Personally I have never played the True Crime games so this doesn't bother me. As for the people who were making the game, I believe they are now being re-purposed to another project. 



Lastly, and more importantly, they have shutdown the Guitar Hero series. For the first time in as long as any of us can remember, Activision has finally realized that releasing a game every single year could be bad for a series. After six years of constant releases - some years including more than one game - there will be no more Guitar Hero games. 

That doesn't mean the series is officially dead of course. They simply said that the series needs to be "re-assessed". What I'm hoping that means is that we won't be seeing a Guitar Hero game for a long time. The interesting thing is that Harmonix (the studio behind Rock Band) is now in prime position to "dominate" the music game market. Unfortunately though, no one knows what's truly going on with Harmonix right now (after being sold for $50 no less), so it may be some years before we see either type of music game. 

Activision-Blizzard also announced a new studio called "Beachhead" to head up some sort of new "platform" for future Call of Duty titles. So far there's no more information on what any of that could mean except that it will be the "premiere area for the best Call of Duty content.". 


Very interesting stuff. Maybe? You tell me. Were you a fan of the True Crime series? Are you sad to see Guitar Hero go?