Hey rockers!



Last week we pulled back the curtain and revealed the first groups of songs off the Rock Band VR soundtrack. 21 awesome songs to be exact. Today we’re back with 20 more amazing tracks, each one hand selected for Rock Band VR on Oculus Rift.



On March 23rd, you’ll be able to rock with these tracks:





Blondie – “One Way Or Another”

Carrie Underwood – “Church Bells”

Catfish And The Bottlemen – “Postpone”

Coldplay – “Birds”

David Bowie – “Suffragette City”

Europe – “The Final Countdown”

Green Day – “Holiday”

Jimmy Eat World – “The Middle”

Maroon 5 – “Maps”

Mumford & Sons – “I Will Wait”

Nirvana – “Smells Like Teen Spirit”

Parks – “Sweater Weather”

Pearl Jam – “Alive”

The Pretty Reckless – “Heaven Knows”

The Starting Line – “Quitter”

Stone Temple Pilots – “Plush”

Switchfoot – “Float”

The Temper Trap – “Alive”

Twin Atlantic – “I Am Alive”

The Wind And The Wave – “Grand Canyon”



I know what you’re thinking – “That’s an amazing soundtrack!” And you’re right. But guess what - we’re not even done yet! Rock Band VR will feature 60 songs when it releases on March 23rd! For those of you that went to the school of rock (or just aren’t great at math?), that means we’ve got 19 songs left to reveal. Follow us at @RockBand on Twitter and give us a like on Facebook to make sure you’re in the know when our next announcement appears!



Some of the songs from the RBVR soundtrack will be heading to Rock Band 4 in the future as purchasable DLC. Stay tuned for details on which tracks are coming, and when!







You know what goes great with epic music? An epic story. Rock Band VR Producer Katie Naka is here to tell you a bit more about Rock Band VR’s immersive campaign.







Hi! My name is Katie Naka and I am a Producer and writer for the Rock Band VR Narrative and Character/Crowd teams. Bringing the characters of RBVR to life via a scripted narrative was a fun and exciting challenge for us, and a first for the Rock Band franchise. Since our goal with VR gameplay was to provide the player with as authentic an experience as possible, we wanted to do the same with our narrative. I can tell you that our first draft of the story probably contained enough material for a full length animated film. From that huge grouping of ideas, we pulled what we considered “the greatest hits” and made the scenes that we knew we could pull off really well in VR. Our process from start to finish involved many written drafts, many visits to the motion capture studio, and a lot of travel to L.A. to cast and record our voice over with awesome and talented voice actors. The final result shows your bandmates (Derek, Maddy, and Wes) as unique characters with relationships to each other and you that are revealed over the course of your band Autoblaster’s journey from playing dirty local bars to decadent theaters.







One of the early, important writing decisions we made was about tone. In the early days of the process the team dissected our favorite music, movies, and documentaries to find examples of what we thought were the most potent and realistic types of stories that we could portray in VR. Since many of the devs at Harmonix have also been in bands, we had a lot of firsthand knowledge about how bandmates relate to each other. To us, some of the best and most realistic interactions of a band were revealed through conflict. With RBVR, we not only wanted to show you how awesome it feels to play for adoring fans, but also give you the intimate experience of being “in the huddle” for moments of discord and insecurity that inevitably pop up along the way.







An extra twist to the RBVR story is that it unfolds in a non-linear way as you progress through the campaign. The present day that you find yourself in when you start the game is the day of your biggest show yet. Each narrative moment that you’ll experience while playing RBVR is attached to an item that the band has stored in their practice space- all keepsakes from particularly memorable shows. The narrative essentially takes place in a series of flashbacks, as if the band is sitting around reminiscing about their favorite moments from the past three years. We think it’s a fun convention that adds some extra agency to how players will interact with and take in each cut scene and band performance.







The story of Autoblaster has a little bit of everything; moments of realism that we hope will surprise players emotionally, bizarre non-sequiturs, and hilarious rock ‘n roll tropes that you never thought you’d be able experience firsthand. No matter what show you play in the Rock Band VR campaign, you’ll find yourself in the midst of unique and memorable characters (whether they’re human, animal, or sentient machine) that make each show something special. We can’t wait for players to check it out!







