Live From the Buzz Bin

I’m not sure if I ever mentioned my goals for this custom disc, but here they are:

  1. To act as a track pack of sorts for Guitar Hero II, replicating that “some favorites, some obscure new favorites” feel that the better GH and RB games had, but using tracks ported from a variety of sources (RB on-disc and DLC, RBN for GH1 picks, GH2 360 on-disc and DLC)
  2. To port the entirety of the 360-exclusive material (on-disc stuff and maybe the DLC, depending on space) back to the PS2 version, where someone could play them with pretty minimal DTA hacking
  3. Getting the feel of the disc as close to a proper Harmonix-made disc as possible, with all the polish that should come with it (including split audio)
  4. Having more songs I like on an engine I like, obviously

Naturally, with 64 songs to replace, this is a pretty monumental undertaking. At the moment, I have the first three tiers done, plus seven more tracks throughout the disc. So 24 done in total. It’s nowhere close to done, and this is fine–but with as much as I’ve talked about it, I kinda want people to be able to play some of it and also test if it works on console for me.

So here’s what I was thinking: a “demo” disc, using Encore: Rocks the 80s as a base rather than II. (80s only has 30 tracks, which makes filling it much more feasible.) This wouldn’t contain the first six tiers in full, but rather a couple of the tracks mixed in with a couple bonus tracks and some 360-exclusive material that won’t appear (unmodded) in the final disc. This gives a pretty good idea as to what I’m doing without giving away most of the really good stuff that’ll be on the final.

As an example, using just the first tier:

1. SOUNDCHECK

Steady as She Goes – The Raconteurs
Having a Blast – Green Day
Infected – Bad Religion
I Wanna Be Your Dog – The Stooges
Moving in Stereo – The Cars

Given that “Steady as She Goes” is this disc’s “Shout at the Devil”, I want to keep that, like the GH2 OPM and retail demos both have it. “Having a Blast” came out rather nicely, so that’ll get saved for the full thing and replaced with a 360-exclusive track that’ll still be on disc in the final, just not as part of the “official” setlist. Encores, because I consider them special and I don’t wanna just give my picks away, get replaced with bonus tracks (and 80s has no store or bonus tracks, so that works out).

Demo tier one now:

1. SOUNDCHECK

Steady as She Goes – The Raconteurs
Possum Kingdom – Toadies
Infected – Bad Religion
I Wanna Be Your Dog – The Stooges
Hey – Honest Bob and the Factory-to-Dealer Incentives

And so on. The end result of this is a disc that I could feasibly release this year, showing off the modding work I’ve done and some of the songs without having half the disc be a broken, crashy mess from files and charts I haven’t actually finished yet. Plus, most work that goes into the demo disc can be ported back to the final thing because they have the same songs, obviously.

Just something I’m thinking about. I like this game a lot.

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