New PSN Content. From the same source that brought you the predictions last week (the N4G story reached 1050°), here are the constantly updated list of rumors - several confirmed - for the new PSN content delivered weekly. All rumors have cited sources and media related to the game.

This week:
- The Club [demo]
- Guitar Hero III DLC
- PixelJunk Monsters [game & demo]
- PSone Classics
- Rock Band DLC
- Strangehold DLC

Note: Again, I know this is a forum post, but it's a collection from many different sources. The information is timely and updated immediately.
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Activision said Monday the Guitar Hero franchise has generated sales of $1 billion in North American retail - and that doesn't include song download revenue. The franchise has sold over 14 million units in North America, Activision said, citing NPD Group data. The latest franchise installment, Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock, grabbed the top spot in North American videogame software unit and dollar sales for 2007. Since Guitar Hero III's launch, gamers have downloaded 5 million songs, which ... » Read More

Mon Jan 21 2008, by Mark Wilson

Around 26 months ago, Guitar Hero was an instant cult classic. Today, it's officially a $1 billion franchise. Apparently this milestone comes in video game record time. In addition, since the launch of Guitar Hero III, users have downloaded five million songs. If so, that total is double the figure that Rock Band has released.

Kotaku posted Activision's official announcement.
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Activision has announced that according to data from the NPD Group, the company's market share in calendar year 2007 was 17.7% - a 7.2% increase over the same period last year - which in fact makes them 2007's number one publisher in the US.
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Gamasutra writes:

Gamasutra's weekly column, "Saling The World", covers the top five sellers for every available platform in the United States, Japan, and Europe, providing an important update of sales patterns worldwide.

This week's charts, with data taken from January 17th, 2008, feature Rock Band leading PS2 sales in North America, while Wii owners turn their attention to budget-priced titles like Luxor and Winter Sports. Data for "Saling The World" comes courtesy of the public sales information on Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, and Amazon.co.jp, with sales split out for each platform and territory, and pre-orders disregarded.

Nintendo Wii

North America:
1. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock Bundle (Activision)
2. Super Mario Galaxy (Nintendo)
3. Winter Sports: The Ultimate Challenge (Conspiracy),
4. Luxor: Pharaoh's Challenge (MumboJumbo)
5. Carnival Games (2K Games)

Japan:
1. Wii Fit (Nintendo)
2. Wii Sports (Nintendo)
3. Caduceus: New Blood (Atlus)
4. Nodame Cantabile: Dream * Orchestra (Bandai Namco)
5. Super Mario Galaxy (Nintendo).

Europe:
1. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games (Sega)
2. Big Brain Academy for Wii (Nintendo)
3. LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga (LucasArts)
4. Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure (Capcom)
5. Super Mario Galaxy (Nintendo).

Xbox 360

North America:
1. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Activision)
2. Rock Band Special Edition (EA Games)
3. Assassin's Creed (Ubisoft)
4. Halo 3 (Microsoft)
5. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock Bundle (Activision).

Japan:
1. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Activision)
2. Armored Core 4 - Xbox 360 Platinum Collection (From Software)
3. Dead Rising/Gears of War-360 Platinum Double Pack (Capcom/Microsoft)4. The IdolM@ster - Xbox...
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Kotaku reports that upset gamers who had their personal e-mails exposed to the hundreds, possibly thousands, of recipients of a customer service update from Activision on Guitar Hero III issues.

In just one of the e-mails that was forwarded to us, an impressive 860 recipient e-mail addresses were listed in the mail's 'To' field, ensuring that all who received updates on their replacement discs for the Wii version of Guitar Hero III had access to the e-mail addresses of the rest.

That's potentially bad news for consumers, who may have had their personal e-mail information sent to others, opening them up to heavy spamming. It may also be bad news for Activision, as the e-mail blasts may violate the company's online Privacy Policy.
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- When last we left our heroes in the gripping case of the missing monaural sound in Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock, Activision had set up its Web site to offer registration for replacements. Now we have an update on the progress of the replacement discs:
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While they haven't been officially announced yet, three classic rock tunes have shown up on the leaderboards over at GuitarHero.com, which is pretty much a dead giveaway that they're on the way. One of the first Guitar Hero III download packs I feel is truly worth the cost, the three new songs are:
Journey - "Any Way You Want It"
Foreigner - "Jukebox Hero"
Boston - "Peace of Mind"
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Activision gains more awards for COD4 and GHIII.
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Videogames are often put at odds with certain forms of productivity, such as learning a musical instrument. But performance simulators such as Guitar Hero have proven to be an entryway into real-world musicianship.

To help support a growing interest in guitar study, RedOctane and NAMM announced a partnership at the annual NAMM Show in Anaheim, Calif. that will link Guitar Hero III to NAMM's "Wanna Play" campaign. This new facet of the public awareness campaign focuses on bridging the gap between virtual and real-life musicianship.
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Janco Partners analyst Mike Hickey picks what he believes will be the biggest sellers of 2008.
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Just weeks ago, it felt as if the stalemate between Activision and Harmonix would never end. Both companies blamed the other for the lack of compatibility between guitar peripherals for Rock Band and Guitar Hero III. Thankfully, Nyko has come to save the day as it recently announced that it would develop a guitar that's compatible with both games.
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In 2008, the team at MTV Games are proud to present to you the MTV Rhythm Game Track Finder, your beacon in the confusing swirl of rhythm games.

The regularly updated database will allow you to search any artist and any song to find out which rhythm games it is in and to compare song lists for any major music-based video game.

The database currently indexes song lists for more than two dozen rhythm games, including a range of SingStars, Guitar Heroes, Dance Dance Revolutions, Rock Band, and lesser-known favorites such as FreQuency, Elite Beat Agents and the Donkey Konga series.
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1UP has been closely following the ridiculous back-and-forth between Rock Band and Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock in achieving true cross-compatibility between the peripherals released for each. Unfortunately, the recent introduction of lawyers into the mix means gamers may not see an easy solution anytime soon, but at CES 2008, Nyko unveiled their own brand of solution that could make life easier for rockers on PlayStation 3.
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Orlando Sentinel "Control Freak" blogger Mark Reule has an opinion about the next installment of Guitar Hero.

He Writes

"After reading through February's EGM, I noticed a little tidbit about a rumored Guitar Hero sequel featuring a band that "rocks in mysterious ways". Give up?

Think 1991. Think Achtung Baby. It can only be U2."
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Jan. 2, 2008 -- MSNBC tallied in their Game of the Year readers' votes between December 19 and 27. "Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare" garnered 33 percent of the over 17,000 votes and is MSNBC Readers' Game of the Year. The runner-up was "Bioshock" at 22 percent of the votes. The second runner-up was "Mass Effect" at 10 percent.

Here are MSNBC readers' picks for the best in each genre:

¿ Best sports game: Madden NFL '08
¿ Best racing game: Project Gotham Racing 4
¿ Best casual game: Big Brain Academy: Wii Degree
¿ Best family game: LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga
¿ Best music game: Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock
¿ Best handheld game: The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass
¿ Best role-playing game: Mass Effect
¿ Best action/adventure game: Bioshock
¿ Best shooter: Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare

View the full report for the runners-up in each category.
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Perhaps you didn't notice, but more than a few PS3 titles got recent and very unexpected updates... and some could potentially hurt the system.

-- 12/31/2007, Ben Dutka
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ActionTrip's 2007 Game of the Year voting poll registered 10673 participants. 1809 registered users voted for Call of Duty 4, 1279 for Halo 3, 1192 for Assassin's Creed, 837 for "None of the Above", 716 for BioShock, 710 for Crysis, 627 for The Orange Box, and so on. The rest of the results can be viewed in ActionTrip's voting poll section.

¿ People's Choice: Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
¿ Runners-up: Halo 3, Assassin's Creed, Crysis, Half-Life 2: The Orange Box

¿ Game of the Year (ActionTrip Staff): Portal
¿ Runners-up: Mass Effect, Halo 3, BioShock, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, The Witcher

¿ Best Action Game: Halo 3
¿ Runners-up: Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Half-Life 2: The Orange Box, God of War II, BioShock, Crysis

¿ Best Strategy Game: World in Conflict
¿ Runners-up: Supreme Commander, Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars

¿ Best RPG: Mass Effect
¿ Runners-up: The Witcher, Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer

¿ Best Sports Game: FIFA 08
¿ Runners-up: SSX Blur, NHL 08, Winning Eleven: Pro Evolution Soccer 2008

¿ Best MMOG: World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade
¿ Runners-up: Tabula Rasa, The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar

¿ Best Rhythm/Music Game: Rock Band
¿ Runners-up: Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock

¿ Babe of the Year: Joanna Krupa
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MSNBC video game section has been polling gamers about their favorite games in a number of categories, trying to narrow down the search for the Game of the Year.

On Thursday the site put up the poll to decide which of the finalists, culled from the best of each genre, should be named the game of the year.

The finalists are:
¿ Madden NFL 08
¿ Project Gotham Racing 4
¿ Big Brain Academy: Wii Degree
¿ LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga
¿ Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock
¿ The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass
¿ Mass Effect
¿ Bioshock
¿ Call of Duty 4

At the time of this writing Call of Duty 4 was leading with 31 percent of the vote. BioShock was close behind with 22 percent and Mass Effect was in a distant third with 8.6 percent.

[ Words: Kotaku's Brian Crecente ]
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Game Informer - by Jeff Cork, 12/20/2007:

An Activision spokeswoman has shed a little more light on the situation surrounding compatibility issues between the company's Guitar Hero III controllers and Rock Band's controllers on the PlayStation 3. Unsurprisingly, it all comes down to the almighty dollar.

Speaking to the Boston Globe, Activision spokeswoman Maryanne Lataif clarified earlier statements. "Unfortunately for Rock Band users, Harmonix has been unwilling to discuss an agreement that will allow us to provide that option in a manner that maintains the high standards people have come to expect from Activision," she told the newspaper, adding any agreement will involve Harmonix writing a check. "We believe we should be compensated for the use of our technology."

The Boston Globe has Hiawatha Bray's full report of the controller fight between Guitar Hero's Activision and Rock Band's Harmonix.
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