OK, let’s be honest here. Who isn’t tired of the near-constant stream of music games? I realize that it’s a super-hot genre right now, but do we really need another music game? Yes, this also goes for Rock Band Beatles, or Guitar Hero: Twisted Sister, or whatever the next shameless cash grab may be.

Regardless of what we may think, Activision isn’t content to sit back and count all the money they’ve made from Guitar Hero so far. No, they’re going to release yet another iteration of the title.

Guitar Hero 5 will add some new functionality to the title, and strangely enough, it’s actually functionality that makes it a better party game than before. Chief among these new additions is the ‘Pick up and Play’ mode. This will allow anyone to grab an instrument, jump in, play for a few minutes, and drop out without failing or causing the rest of the band to fail. It’s perfect for those unscheduled bathroom breaks in the middle of a song.

They’re also including a RockFest mode to let you face off against four players locally, or up to eight online. Heck, you can even throw down with four guitars at once if you so desire. But the question remains: Do we really need another full game for this? Wouldn’t these features be awesome DLC for the folks who spent nearly $200 on Guitar Hero: World Tour? You could probably even convince those folks to pay for them!

Ah well, maybe I’m just a spoilsport. After all, at least they’re including 83 songs in this version, and all the World Tour DLC will carry over as well. Maybe I’m just sick of having all these plastic instruments clogging up my living room.

At any rate, there’s a brand new trailer showing off these new features. You can grab it over at FileFront, or catch the embedded stream after the break.

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As if two new Metal Gear titles at E3 weren’t enough, Sony’s now bringing the undisputed champ of the Metal Gear Series to PlayStation Network. Starting today, you can grab the PS1 classic, Metal Gear Solid, for $9.99. You can even get it for your PSP!

As usual, there’s a lot of other stuff in the update. Some of it is interesting, like Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter for the PSP. Some of it is mindless, like Qore (Seriously, does anyone actually watch that?).

You can also choose the demo for EA Sports’ NCAA Football 10, as well as the usual weekly song downloads for Rock Band and Guitar Hero. Rock Band gets Spinal Tap this week, something guaranteed to make people my age smile with nostalgia.

If you want to see a full list of what’s available this week, it’s available after the break.

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Guitar Hero Smash Hits brings out Guitar Hero’s Greatest Hits for your band. This one’s for the many GH: Would Tour fans of the series that have looked back at Guitar Hero, Guitar Hero II, Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s and Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock and thought man if only those tracks were out for the whole band! I’m really looking forward to my favorites from Blue Öyster Cult’s “Godzilla”, Queen’s “Killer Queen”, Heart’s “Barracuda” and Danzig’s “Mother”. Check out the full list of tracks to pick out your favorites after the jump. You can also visit the GH Smash Hits site to vote for Best Guitar Shred, Best Vocal, Best Bass Lick, Best Drum Fill and more.

While you’re out in stores grabbing GH Smash Hits make sure to pick up the new Guitar Hero On Tour: Modern Hits for your DS. There are 28 new tracks to be shared bringing the total to 75 for the GH On Tour series. Guitar Hero: never leave home without it.

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The Beatles: Rock Band debuted at E3 with a star studded lineup. Surviving band members Sir Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr were joined by Yoko Ono Lennon and Olivia Harrison for the premier. Here’s a look at the E3 2009 The Beatles Rock Band trailer.

EA also revealed a The Beatles: Rock Band Xbox 360 exclusive track, “All You Need is Love”. Proceeds from the DLC go to the Doctors Without Borders charity. “All You Need is Love” will be ready for download on Xbox Live June 9th.

For more details on The Beatles: Rock Band career mode and the new peripheral set styled after the instruments used by the band, see the press release excerpts after the jump. You can also watch the video of the E3 The Beatles: Rock Band Demo and see the new peripherals in action in case you missed the live streaming video coverage of E3 earlier today.
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I’m not ashamed to admit that the soundtrack for the REAL Transformers movie (not the crappy Bay films) was a key influence in my teen years so a few months back when the rumors that the theme song for the film – “The Touch” by studio musician Stan Bush was inbound for free it actually served as the straw that broke my back and convinced me that I needed to pick up the GH:WT band bundle.

Well the day has arrived and the song is now available on the download services along with the theme song to Guitar Hero On Tour: Modern Hits. The GHOT:WH (gotta love acronyms!) theme is composed by members of the Vicarious Visions dev team and is free as well.. but it can’t hold a flame to Stan.

Fans of The Touch can also participate in an online torunament starting today at 4PM EDT and concluding at 8pm EDT Sunday, May 31. Prizes for the competition include autographed Stan Bush CDs including a new remastered version of the song. Now if only they would bring some of the other songs like “Instruments of Destruction”, “Dare”, “Hunger”, “Dare to be Stupid”or “The Transformers (Theme)” to GH as well… my Transformergasm would be complete!

Check out a music video for The Touch after the jump!

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In today’s installment of ‘Yes, we’re milking the hell out of this’ news, Activision has announced that players of the upcoming Guitar Hero 5 will be able to construct their bands however they like in the upcoming rhythm game.

According to a press release we received here in our Gaming Today Volcano Lair™, you’ll be able to have a band with three guitars and a singer, 2 guitars and two drummers, or any other combination you can think up (Or more importantly, any combination you can afford enough plastic instruments for). The release also mentions new game modes like Party Play, which lets players jump in and out seamlessly, and RockFest, which will feature five new head-to-head modes for both online and local play. as well as allowing you to play the whole setlist as soon as you get the game home.

The other interesting piece of news is that GH5 will support DLC from Guitar Hero: World Tour, proving that Activision realizes how stupid it was to partition our GH3 DLC off from World Tour. Well, some of the DLC. There’s a worrisome asterisk in the press release that says ‘Does not apply to a limited number of songs.’

Now, I’m obviously not someone who hates Guitar Hero. Heck, I have every GH game (except for for GH: Aerosmith, but then, who does have that one?). However, even I question the logic of their release ideas. GH: Metallica hasn’t been out that long, and they’re already dropping GH5? Look, I know World Tour was a letdown. It tried to be different with how it handled setlists and whatnot, and it just didn’t work. But GH: Metallica brought you back! It was a slick game that was fun to play again. Shouldn’t you give us some time to enjoy it?

(Read more ranting, and see new screenshots and the actual press release after the break)

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WarCraft III: The Frozen Throne is debuting as the official game for World Cyber Games 2009. Gamers will battle one-on-one for the world of Azeroth in this real time strategy. WCG has announced the official tournament rules and regulations including changes for Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock, Starcraft: Brood War, TrackMania Nations Forever, and FIFA ‘09. This year’s Grand Final is scheduled for November 11-15, in Chengdu, China.
This year’s full lineup is listed in official press release following the break.

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In the past few years, games have become more and more tied to the music industry. Obviously, games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero have cemented this tie, but another publisher that is putting new bands in the spotlight is EA Sports. Each of the EA Sports titles includes a number of popular songs in the jukebox, and there are always a few in there that get some great exposure out of the deal.

This year, one of those bands is up-and coming British rockers Pint Shot Riot. Recently, we were afforded the opportunity to sit down and chat with the band, specifically bass player Baby Dave. We chatted about how they got involved with EA Games, and about what kind of gamers they are as well.

Gaming Today: To get us started, could you tell us a little bit about yourself and the other members of Pint Shot Riot?

Pint Shot Riot: We are a 4 piece British rock and roll band and we love making music and playing music together. We just try to write songs that come from the heart and mean something to us.

GT: How did you first become involved with EA Games? How do you feel about having your music placed in the Sims 3 and Fight Night? Do you feel these titles expose you to the type of people that might enjoy your music?

PSR:E.A and our publishers Artwerk were scouting U.K for some fresh artists when our name came up, we met, got on and the rest is history! We feel very happy about being in their games! Obviously, we knew all about what they do and it was awesome to be asked to be part of it. All kinds of people will be buying those games so we would hope to reach people who will like it and also some people who might not of found us otherwise.

You can find the rest of the interview after the break.

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Activision announced today that a new Nirvana track pack is now available for Guitar Hero: World Tour. This is the second time Nirvana has been featured in a GH:WT track pack.

This track pack will contain the following Nirvana songs:

• “Very Ape” from In Utero
• “Sappy” from the No Alternative compilation
• “Stay Away” from Nevermind

You can grab this track pack from XBox Live for 440 Microsoft Points, or on the PlayStation Store for $5.49. You can also pick and choose the songs as singles for 160 MS Points, 200 Wii Points, or $1.99 on the PlayStation Store.

If you’re a Guitar Hero junkie from way back, then I’m sure you’ve looked back at some of the songs from the older games with envious eyes. After all, who wouldn’t like the idea of getting some of those great songs back, and having a whole band to play them? I know I would love to get my hands on tunes like Thunder Kiss ‘65 or Cowboys from Hell.

Well, all of us that share this wish found out a few weeks back that our wish was coming true…sort of…when Activision announced Guitar Hero Greatest Hits. The upcoming game will be a compilation of songs from all the Guitar Hero titles prior to World Tour. I was hoping that this material would be available as DLC, not a separate game. However, this does not mean that I will not be looking forward to getting some time with this game.

Activision has already revealed the tracks from Guitar Hero I & II that will appear in this compilation, and they’re letting you vote to decide what gets revealed next. You can head over to the official GH website and vote on whether you want to see the tracks from GH III or GH Rocks the 80’s revealed next.

If you like, you can also grab the widget to share on your social networking site of choice while you’re there. If you haven’t checked out the trailer yet, you can see it after the break.

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