PS3 Music Peripheral Compatibility Update

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Hi everybody, Michael Shorrock, here. I’m the Director of Publisher Relations here at SCEA. I work closely with all of the publishers and developers who create games for all PlayStation platforms. While SCEA had a ton of great announcements at E3, I’m excited to say, we have one more for today, one that I know a lot of you have been asking about:

For the past several months, we have been working closely with Neversoft and Activision, Harmonix and Konami to ensure that PlayStation 3 guitars and drum sets will all feature a basic level of gameplay compatibility.

For the most part, this means that the titles with musical peripherals will work with the other’s software. A few specific examples include: Guitar Hero: World Tour’s guitars and drums will work with Rock Band 2 and Konami’s Rock Revolution software.

And yes, you guessed it, Rock Band 2’s guitar and drum set will work with Guitar Hero: World Tour and with Rock Revolution.

Conversely, Rock Revolution’s drum set will work with both Guitar Hero: World Tour and Rock Band 2.

In addition, Guitar Hero: World Tour and Rock Band 2 will both support the SingStar microphones.

We’re still working hard to ensure compatibility between the Guitar Hero and Rock Band titles currently on the market, and we hope to have an announcement on that shortly.

Of course each of these great games have their own specific cool features that may not be compatible with the other controllers, but this is our first big step in bringing a level of compatibility to music games that is sure to benefit PlayStation 3 consumers.

Keep an eye out here for more information in the future.

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169 Comments

  • YAY! NOW ALL THAT MONEY WE SAVE ON INSTRUMENTS CAN GO TOWARD: R2, SOCOM, KZ2, LBP, GOW3 AND MORE…

  • finally, thats how it should have always been… i got a guitar hero guitar and a rock band guitar so i would like them to work for both games… especially in rock band cause i already got a friend who plays the drums and a singer, i play the guitar and a friend of mine could play the bass if we had a second guitar…

  • Thank you for working this out. I wasn’t going to purchase any music game (except for singstar) until this was sorted out.

    At first when I read the title I thought it was about MP3 players. I was hoping for iPod compatibility. Yes, it read files form it as a disk. But I want full support as it should be.

  • good news!!! Thanksfor the update!

  • Awesome news… thanks!

  • Awesome! Can’t wait for World Tour! Some of my other family have Rock Band, although they will be switching to GH World Tour when it’s released, it would be nice to have compatibility between both games :) Excellent work!

  • I hope I get a response. I’m concerned about this. Does this still mean that Rock Band still won’t support Guitar Hero III guitars? There’s no detail on Rock Band [1]…. :(

    “We’re still working hard to ensure compatibility between the Guitar Hero and Rock Band titles currently on the market, and we hope to have an announcement on that shortly.”

    I hope that is a sign of good things to come!

  • Thank you! Nothing more just thank you! ^_^

  • that is really great news thanks for looking out for us

  • Great work Michael Shorrok, I’m guessing you and yours are responsible for the actual negotiations?

    Are there any plans to incorporate mp3’s into singstar?

    I know the premium content is music video/digital singbars… but if you made an mp3 scanning system akin to that of ‘beats’ on the psp… you could create an interface for singing along to your own mp3’s.

    If there are some copyright issues needing a workaround, I’d start by talking to both the creators of Beats… and Singstar… collaboration would be an excellent legal way to perform the work-around.

  • yes! thanks guys!

  • They only lame part is that all the “rock star” games are totally gay… why dont you posers get some real instruments and play…stop living in a fantasy world…just because you beat the game doesnt mean you are a rockstar…in fact your pretty lame…

  • Thats good to know, im also glad to hear they’re still working on the compatibility issues between the current GH and RB versions…

    Its been keeping me from getting rockband, GH, GH2 and rock the 80’s for a while now..

  • This is a year late. Delaystation 3 strikes again!

  • @Zorox

    Can you sound any more silly. Some people will complain about anything.

  • thatsmartguywiththefro

    Way to step up to the plate! (This is Sony exclusive, right? :P)

    This Spring I just bought into the Rock Band phenomena, so I would be ecstatic if I didn’t have to buy any more equipment until I really need an upgrade! I might actually get world tour after the price lowers, since I won’t need to pay another $200 for drum sets and guitars.

  • @MidnightBlues

    Dude, you are totally right! Something else that’s gay is all those first person shooters. All those posers playing those games should go out and get real rail guns and kill real aliens and stop living in a fantasy world. Just because they beat the game doesn’t mean they could go out and defend the planet from invading aliens. In fact, it’s pretty lame.

  • Sounds like a Plain to me ;)

    Thanks agian for the Updated News!

    This Message with Self Destruct
    IN
    5
    4
    3
    2
    1
    BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!!!

  • Great work Sony! Two thumbs up!

  • This has been all over the internet but nice of you for doing this Sony.

  • this is cool, i hope you guys have more surprises for us as the week goes on! :)

  • two weeks to go for lifewithplaystation whoo whoo! lol

  • uhh this wasreally cool. but do you have any dates for home or playstation life.

  • when will it be possible to play GH2 with the Wireless GH3 Guitar on PS3…I like some of the songs on GH2 and I can’t play it on the PS3 because the game will not work with the gh3 guitar.

  • Sony rules now if I buy that 300 dollar Drum set I have my eye on I can use it on Guitar Hero World tour if they don’t crap out the game. That is awesome. This helps so much. I hate Guitar Hero guitars they are so short and… crap but the Rock Band (which my model is kinda startin to crap out) is much easier and more enjoyable overall.

    Thanks Sony for making sure that Activision plays nice with the other guys. I still don’t think I’ll be getting Rock Revolution or what ever Konami’s doin, they’ve screwed up their Dance Dance Revolution forever in my eyes.

  • Nice Job Sony :)

    Now I know I can get the GH Software as well as the Rock Band 2 bundle..

  • This is a relief for many. Thanks for the good news!

  • Thanks guys, I’ve had a GHIII controller sitting unused since the game came out, hoping Activision would grow up and let me use it in Rock Band.

  • Guys, if I’m going to buy GH4 on PS3, I want trophies, otherwise the 360 is getting my buy. I have both and if I’m missing out on a feature with the PS3 version (ie trophies), I’m sticking with the one that records my accomplishments (no matter how many lame haters hate it lawlizzle).

  • I know this has nothing to do with the music peripherals but i just had to to say thx to sony for the great service that ive recived since i got my ps3 thanx for keeping me at the topp of my game ya know

  • Finally, I thought they had forgotten about this. This is a good reason to go with other platforms for these music games. Sony make this happen, not only for Rock Band 2 but Rock Band 1 and all the music games. It’s kinda bad that we have to play catch-up, but I guess we should be used to it by now.

  • Amazing!
    keep up the awesome job guys!!!!

  • My comment must have been too devastating for you sony guys thats why you deleted it…what is with this horible cencorship? we dont have a right to an opinion ? its either I agree with you or you delete my comment?

    bull…

  • that’s really awesome, though I do have a concern

    Rockband has 4 pads and a bass, making for 5 inputs, GH:WT has 3 pads, 2 cymbals, and a bass, making for 6 inputs. How will the compatibility work if the two drum sets have different make-ups?

  • THIS [DELETED] RULES!

  • Saweet…now I will drop some cash on these in the fall!

  • MidnightBlues | August 18th, 2008 at 3:55 pm

    They only lame part is that all the “rock star” games are totally gay… why dont you posers get some real instruments and play…stop living in a fantasy world…just because you beat the game doesnt mean you are a rockstar…in fact your pretty lame…

    THE* only lame part is that all the ‘weblogs’ are totally gay… why DON’T* you get some real friends, and talk to them, debate with them, stop living your life on the internet/weblogs… just because you can type to people on the internet doesn’t mean you’re good at talking or debating with people in the real world,… it in fact actually makes you quite lame.

    but ok now that I’ve made fun of your completely ridiculous statement by mocking it perfectly given the circumstances.

    There is an age-old rule that I strongly dissagree with, “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say it all” I think people should tell it how it is… However your comments are hardly believable when 90% of them are negative, and/or neglectful of the facts at hand, I believe your momma’ would not be proud if she seen this side of you.

    Now Midnight, put down the keyboard and go debate with real people in the real world, because living in the fantasy of ‘you still thinking we give a crap’ makes you pretty lame, just like the rest of us… right?

  • How about getting the current guitar hero 3 and rock band working together?

    Patch, anyone?

  • Glad to know that SCEA has folks such as you that is working on issues like these. It makes me feel assured SCEA actually cares what the customer are having to deal with with the PS3 peripherals. Not only that, it’s a lot of plastic hardware that we consumers don’t have to buy over and over again if just to play a game, so it’s also an environmentally concious issue.

  • That’s good to know!

  • I was looking forward to news like this!

    Could you give the guys and gals at London Studios a call as well? Would be nice if the Singstar mics could be used too.

  • That is GREAT NEWS!.. keep up the good job!
    GH:WT & RB2 are all mine now!

  • if this is something that others dont do this is really amazing. if others do it, then its obligatory!

    Make sure it works with the new wireless singstar mics (wich should be out well before “lips”) as well!

  • I’ll play with your guitar if you play with mine.
    And you think were nuts? Be a fly on that wall.

  • Pretty great news. It sucks getting ripped off you know :P

  • I got so angry when I found out this is not an update that will allow In -Game Music for virtually all PS3 titles. DARN! :P We have to wait and see.

  • I’d made a decision to hold off on buying any more music games until this issue got resolved, so I’m glad to see that Sony has addressed it.

    Also, it would be great to see Sony help get some instruments to market that use the PS3’s Bluetooth interface so that users can stop dealing with all of the USB-wireless dongles.

  • No official responses? About 30% of the comments have asked about GH3 .vs RB1 guitars. How can this not be relevant?

    We all know Harmonix had a patch ready about 2-3 weeks after RB1’s launch to let the GH3 controller work, but that was actively blocked by Activision, and subsequently not allowed to be released by you guys (Sony).

    It’s been almost a year & it’s only the PS3 user that’s gotten the short end of this stick. (the 360 guys have been just fine on compatibility) Does this recent announcement mean that you will finally release this patch now?

  • MidnightBlue:

    Gaming is about having fun (not mastering a musical instrument) and few games create as much fun as Rock Band and Guitar Hero (especially when playing with a bunch of people).

    Now, isn’t it time to change to one of your other user-names and write a comment agreeing with yourself to make it seem like more people share your ridiculous opinions?

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