(Updated 4:20 PM) Activision/Blizzard announced it is dropping the in-development Guitar Hero game planned for 2011. The company is also disbanding its Guitar Hero division, best described by the company itself in the following statement:
“Due to continued declines in the music genre, the company will disband Activision Publishing’s Guitar Hero business unit and discontinue development on its Guitar Hero game for 2011."
Activision was clear that there would be no music games from the company this fiscal year. That means no Guitar Hero, and no DJ Hero. During the investment call, the company also said it plans to lay off approximately 500 employees. But does this mean the franchise is truly dead, or will we see a newly re-vamped game in 2012 or 2013? According to Wedbush Securities' analyst Michael Pachter, a return of the Guitar Hero franchise is unlikely in the near future.
"I don't think it's going to be revamped," Pachter said. "It would only happen if there's a whole new console refresh, but if it's an Xbox 360 with a two-terabyte hard-drive and an 802.11 N, who cares? You don't need a new Guitar Hero for that. I think Guitar Hero is one of those things you don't need to buy more than once."
I've contacted Activision about this, but as yet, haven't heard back from the company on an official basis, but this blog post from Activision's Dan Amrich takes a different tact from Pachter's:
"For a while there I couldn’t drown out the cries of gamers on forums, blogs, and Twitter saying GH should take some time off, and from all appearances, that’s what this is. Step back, let it breathe for a while, don’t make any major plans, and see what happens in the future. I’m very okay with that.
Chapter closed? Sure, okay. Book burned? I doubt it."
So what do you guys think? Is Guitar Hero, as a franchise, dead, or is it just sleeping for a bit?
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JokermanUno
FINISH HIM!!! ((F, F, B, B, BL)) *UGH!* .....Rock Band wins....Fatality. Thing is though, Rock Band and Harmonix is on the rocks too. But still, way to beat out the game that paved the way for you.
Natedizzy
I had a feeling that the music games were a fad. I never got in to them so I don't really care. I am more of a COD fan so if they can spend more time to make that franchise better thats more awsome to me.
Muscley_Arms
good. got really tired of seeing a brand new one every year. wonder if thats why it burned out so fast?
dci260
True Crime: Hong Kong got canned as well, sad it looked like it had some potential...
Tyman2
I think i just died a bit on the inside YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY YYYYYYYYYYYYYYY NOT GUITAR HERO
Smasher122
Bout time
Bi-PolarBear
Time to get my violin out and start playing Nearer My God To Thee as Activision slowly begins to sink under it's own failure
MadB00tleg
We all knew it was coming. As long as Harmonix holds up the torch I'm ok with it.
s0beit
haha, good.
BONERJAM
I'm not surprised, the last good GH game was GH2.
We all know which franchise is next, its already at the tipping point in terms of over saturation.
Nerdi_Master
Wasn't a fan of Guitar Hero so it's no big loss for me personally, sucks for the fans though so I sympathize. But hopefully it's good news for WoW. I'm not a huge fan of Call of Duty either, there's too many of them these days and I feel like eventually that franchise might lose steam eventually too.
blee427
It will be missed. It got the ball rolling and for that we are forever thankful.
godzillaisyourdaddy
Finally! Fricken finally they stopped! I feel that they purposely killed the music game genre to destroy Harmonix for making the superior game franchise, which sucks since Harmonix deserved praise for making the best music game ever, being Rock Band 3. Activision needs to start publishing more new games rather than having their developers make the same trash over and over again. Call of Duty just needs stop, the franchise failed after COD 4.
MetallicaFan
As much as I want to say "I told you so" to Activision, I can only imagine this means a lot of layoffs in the companies future. My heart goes out to all the talented people that lose their jobs.
mosespippy
How does Guitar Hero no longer exist yet Tony Hawk continues? Or is 2011 the death of 2 Activision franchises?
Angelicsin87
Now they killed Guitar Hero like they killed Tony Hawk. Next will be Call of Duty on the hit list of failing franchises. Keep it up Bobby Kotick.
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