DarqByte

To those that know me, this is not old news. Laura and I have different bands we hold as our favorites. For Laura, it’s The Beatles. For me, it’s Van Halen.

There was a time when I tried to convince Laura that Van Halen was far superior to The Beatles. Well, they are. But I don’t try to convince her any more. All she does is bring out sales figures and the number of bands that say The Beatles influenced them. I’d counter with things like how many bands said Van Halen influenced them and that The Beatles came first, so you can’t judge sales figures.

Of course, The Beatles influenced Van Halen. But that doesn’t make them better. The Beatles probably had influences too, but that doesn’t make the influences better than The Beatles now does it?

But I’m not here to argue the point much. I’m here to point you to an article about two video games coming out this fall. Well, you don’t really need to read the article, I’ll summarize.

Just about everybody knows about Guitar Hero and Rock Band. The two mega-popular rhythm games based on guitar-based bands. Well, for some time now Guitar Hero has been rolling out band-specific versions of their game. Aerosmith and Metallica have already come. Rock Band hasn’t done the same.

Well, recently Rock Band announced they were developing a Beatles-specific version of their game. Naturally, Laura was super-excited and we’ll have to get it eventually (hopefully our existing equipment will work well with it).

And now there are rumors that Guitar Hero will finally release a Van Halen-based game. That’s only natural progression, right? Using Van Halen, one of the greatest guitar-based bands ever, in a game that features the guitar more than any other? Makes sense.

And the kicker? It looks like the Van Halen game is being developed and deployed at the same time as the Beatles game to combat it. How could it get any better for Laura and me? Now our bands battle can continue in video games!

But I still won’t quote sales numbers for the games to determine which is better. I could make guesses as to why which game would sell more, such as:

• Van Halen because the band is better
• Van Halen because it’s based on the Guitar Hero franchise, and it almost always outsells Rock Band
• The Beatles because Rock Band has never released a band-specific game
• Or, one of the games is far and above better than the other and is more enjoyable to play

Let the throwdown begin!