In its very first month on the market, The Beatles: Rock Band has jumped to the top music video game charts. According to the NPD Group, The Beatles: Rock Band out sold Guitar Hero 5. The Rock Band spin off sold more than 464,000 copies for the Wii and Xbox 360 alone, meaning that the title brought in at least $27.8 million in sales. The revenue amount still doesnt include PS3 sales or associated accessories, which Im sure would push sale through the roof.
The research firm says the success of the title helped drive a 72 percent year-over-year increase in dollar sales of music and dance games. That was a stark contrast to overall video game sales, which posted a paltry one percent year-over-year sales increase. Overall, the title was the third top game in terms of units sold, with only Halo 3: ODST and Madden NFL 10 selling more copies.
Both Guitar Hero and Rock Band series are made by the same gaming studio, MTV’s Harmonix.
Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr turned up onstage at Microsoft’s E3 press conference last night to plug the upcoming music game The Beatles: Rock Band. The game will include over 45 songs with others also available to download from a dedicated online store.
One – All You Need Is Love – will have all royalties from sales donated to the Doctors Without Borders charity. There’s a trailer too – the first sight of how the game will look. Watch it above and let us know what you think.
Harmonix has confirmed that its Beatles-themed music game will be released on 9 September this year, and will be called The Beatles: Rock Band. An official site has gone live today inviting gamers to sign up for alerts when pre-ordering begins.
It’s a big deal – the game will launch simultaneously in North America, Europe, Australia, New Zealand and other countries, and will be available on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Wii.
The game will include support for guitar, bass, mic and drums, but will also offer “a limited number of new hardware offerings modeled after instruments used by John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr throughout their career”.
