The 411 on AC/DC's Rock Band Debut

Yesterday I got to play AC/DC Live: Rock Band, as the $40 standalone expansion disc has come to be known. I can confirm: It plays like a version of Rock Band populated with 18 live AC/DC tracks. You probably could have guessed that to be the case. Sorry, I think my brain is still in Japan. Anyhow, here in a news-you-can-use format are all the deets I picked up.

• Why isn't this a download? In the words of Harmonix community dude John Drake, AC/DC "likes things to be packaged in a very specific way." Since they also don't sell their music on iTunes, I took that to mean "they hate the Internet."
• What's the on-disc gameplay like? There's a very basic ladder where you play through all 18 tracks of Live at Donnington. No world tour mode, character creation, or anything like that.
• Is the band in the game? Nope, just the songs. This ain't Guitar Hero: Aerosmith.
• What's up with importing the tracks? Every copy ships with a single-use code that will let you pull all the songs into your Rock Band 2, at which point they'll function just like any other DLC. So they'll show up in world tour, you can play them online, all that jazz.
• Achievements? Yep, 12 of them on the 360, amounting to what looks like 200 points. No trophies in the PS3 version, sadly, because AC/DC Live is based on the first Rock Band, not the sequel.
• Great, but how are the songs, man? You could look up the Donnington album online and listen to some samples if you want to hear for yourself, but the recording was apparently very good at that show, because they practically sounded like studio tracks to me. I played "Back in Black" and the riff sounded 100 percent spot-on. If you've been waiting for AC/DC in your music game, I think you'll be happy.

I really don't want THAT much AC/DC, but I want enough of them to make me spend MORE money in Q4, sad face :(

I can understand this.  Not the best way of getting their music, but I will probably get it because AC/DC is awesome.

I'll probably get it, while knowing how big of a sucker I am for doing so...

This is more expensive than the DLC has been lately - if the songs had been DLC, it would've likely been much cheaper. This game is ~$2.22 per song, Blood Sugar Sex Magik was ~$1.33 per song, Moving Pictures was ~$1.43 per song, and Dr. Feelgood was $1.60 per song. The disc is more per song than the standalone songs. It is by far the worst deal in RB yet. I'd be more likely to buy it if we got something special, but more gamerpoints isn't incentive enough. Most people will likely just buy the disc and then import the songs, not even playing the game on its own disc, just playing it in RB2. Playing the disc by itself when you have the option to import it into the more feature-rich RB2 seems pointless. I'm probably going to buy the game nonetheless (I'm addicted to Rock Band, what can I say), but I won't be happy. It isn't a great deal unless you're a huge AC/DC fan.

Now, I understand that this isn't HMX's choice and that the extra price comes from the game being a retail disc. I'm just disappointed that AC/DC has to be so stingy about their music and not release it as DLC.

18 tracks? This better be no more than $20.

yes I will problaly get it. I like AC/DC enough that i will buy only after i have heard what the quality of the songs is like. Forgive me if i dont take the word of the guy trying to sell me the game. I like AC/DC but some of their live stuff isnt as good as studio IMO. This month and next month are going to kill me. Too many good games. anybody have some spare change?

I really don't like a number of things about this proposition. First of all the cost, forty dollars for 18 songs seems insane to me, especially given that this is AC/DC we're talking about and several of their songs are kind of hard to tell apart. I also don't really like this Wal-Mart exclusivity thing, why does the biggest, most soulless of stores get exclusive merchandise? Basically, only one band warrants this kind of special treatment and absurd cost, The Beatles.

Get with the times AC/DC, embrace the intertubes. No way I'm paying $40 for this. And I'd rather have the studio versions.

:(

Live at Donnington is probably the greatest rock concert ever. What a great decision to make this concert available at Rock Band. Most of you guys who are complaining probably have not heard or seen this concert, its absolutely amazing, and it sounds great.

I would rather this be DLC.

What can I say, I love AC/DC. Yeah, I know Im getting ripped, but money talks.

It's some Dirty Deeds Not Done Dirt Cheap, but if/whenever this sees the light of day in Europe I'm on it like a tight schoolboy uniform on Angus Young

I'm buying.

I don't care how good the live tracks sound, Brian Johnson singing the Bon Scott songs is blasphemy to me.

I think there's a big advantage to having the game at retail, if for no other reason than it has the potential to go on sale at some point, unlike DLC which (usually) stays expensive.

I dunno if I'll buy it.

It should be cheaper than $40


And why does ACDC hate the internet?

I like ACDC but I aint paying $40 for Cgame with 18 tracks. Ahooy amazon!

I find Giant Bomb's begrudging approval of this annoying.   For instance "the price of the disc seems pretty much consistent with the way Rock Band DLC tracks have been going anyway" is complete bull crap, this is way overpriced.  Ryan Davis ripped into Aerosmith like the game was made my Nazis.  It wasn't an offensive game.  Often he comented that is was a rip off at 60 dollars.  Well there was 42 songs, without doing the math I know that less than 2 dollars a song and ACDC is more than 2 dollars a song, also I could rent Aerosmtih for 8 dollars.   This ACDC game is offensive and if it receives anything more than 2*s * (if they even review it at all) I call boloney.   To elaborate further, whether you like the Aerosmith game or not ( I thought it was okay) there at least was the impression the people making it tried and gave a crap, while this seems complete half-ass and pain for the consumers.   This is a DLC pack is overpriced, you can't buy indiviudally and have to go to a store to get.  Also if it's based of Rock Band 1 does that mean you don't get hyperspeed?  Odviously you can import it but if I wanted to get the achievments could I not use hyperspeed?  That'd be lame.

I'll pick it up, although I'd also like some of the Bon Scott recordings like the track in RB2.  The extra hoops to jump through are annoying, but AC/DC have always been Luddites, and the fact that I can play some great songs is worth it.

I have finally resigned myself to the fact I'm going to have to set foot in Wal-Mart when this comes out.

The extra price per song on top of the fact that it is a package deal personally bothers me.  If they want to charge a bit more per song let me download what I want.  If they want to package a group of songs, offer the package at a discounted price per song.  This sets a bad precedent that other hold out bands will follow.  I'm not spending $40 for AC/DC, $40 for U2, $40 for Led Zeppelin, etc.  It's ridiculous.  If they felt so strongly about how their music was packaged why did they allow Let There Be Rock on the Rock Band 2 disc?   This isn't an artistic integrity issue; it's all about making the most money and bringing the most attention to their new album. 

There are bands that I'm dying to see make their way into Rock Band but if this is the only way that will happen, then I pass.  I personally think EA and Harmonix made too many anti-consumer concessions to get AC/DC on board and they've weakened their position in future negotiations with other bands.  I'm very disappointed.

It'll be great when Led Zeppelin jumps on board.  Too bad you'll only be able to purchase their music in a package that contains their entire discography (live performances only) for $1500 exclusively at Sam Goody.

My suggestion to everyone is to find out how much your local ebgames/gamestop/whatever is going to give if you were to trade the game back in.  Theorectically, if you're able to get $25-35 dollars back once you trade it in and you wouldn't mind paying 5-15 bucks for these songs, then buy it, go home, use that single use importer code and then flip the game back to them.  This way you don't get completely screwed over by AC/DC for overpriced content that should just be DLC.

The price is a bit much and due to the fact that there are many other good games coming out, I'll have to put this off for a bit longer but I will eventually get it.

It makes sense in that this decision was probably a move by AC/DC as in a take it or leave it sorta deal. It was either overpriced AC/DC tracks or nothing. This is 40$ but it's 40$ for songs that you would really want to play.

" don't care how good the live tracks sound, Brian Johnson singing the Bon Scott songs is blasphemy to me."

I'm with you on that one dude.

Getting tracks in an album format is supposed to make them cheaper, not more expensive. o_o

$40 is way too high.

I mean, come on - for $40 you can pre-order the new Banjo game and get the original Banjo for free!

Compared to that amazing deal, this stinks of "EA".

And "Wal-Mart", a store which I hope will never enter.

Meh, fuck itunes. If you want your AC/DC from teh interwebz so bad, pirate it. Or go to a store and own it legit, it's not as big a deal as you might think.

As long as we don't have to deal with Sammy Hagar singing Dave's Van Halen songs, I'm cool with these live album concepts... Panama!

All my initial excitement has since ceded to the unavoidable truth that "AC/DC" is simply Australian for "Metallica."

I have Live at Donington on Blu-ray and DVD. AC/DC rock. I would get this pack even if it was $100