Officials from MTV Games and Electronic Arts have confirmed, at the Games Convention in Leipzig, Germany, that
Rock Band will not be released in Europe this year. The game will still be released in North America in 2007 but will be delayed until next spring in all PAL territories.
At the same time a PlayStation 2 version of the game was announced for the first time, furthering rumors of an eventual Wii release as well. The PlayStation 2 version will include “many” of the same game modes as the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 version but will also include new exclusive elements.
The European delay has been attributed to delays in localizing the music content for each territory, much in the manner of Sony’s
SingStar series, both on-disc and through downloadable content. A total of ten new songs have also been announced at the Leipzig Games Convention, bringing the total known song list to twenty-six.
The new songs, all of which are original master recordings, are: Rolling Stones "Gimme Shelter," Deep Purple "Highway Star," The Clash "Should I Stay or Should I Go," Faith No More "Epic," Smashing Pumpkins "Cherub Rock," Radiohead "Creep," Beastie Boys "Sabotage," Jet "Are You Gonna Be My Girl," OK Go "Here It Goes Again" and Nine Inch Nails "The Hand That Feeds."
"It was imperative that we have significant on-disc and downloadable localized music content for multiple European territories on the PlayStation 2 system, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 system in order for Europeans to truly get the full
Rock Band experience and interact with the music they love," said Jeff Yapp, executive vice president of MTV Program Enterprises.
