The Beatles: Rock Band Hands-On Preview by The Game Reviews

Aside from game mechanics, the most impressive aspect of The Beatles: Rock Band shines in Harmonix’s treatment of the Beatles’ legacy. Of course the game has famous venues like the Ed Sullivan show, loads of shrieking girls, and Rock-Bandified versions of The Beatles themselves, but the game’s content goes a step beyond. The Beatles’ career, as the Harmonix presenter explained during the E3 demo, is defined by two different periods. Screaming girls, simple songs about love, and live performances mark the first half of The Beatles’ legacy. Songs from this portion of their career are represented in game as you would expect - The Beatles on stage rocking the ears and libidos of throngs of young girls.

The second half marks the fab four’s discovery of acid and eastern religions. Songs from this phase were never performed live, so having The Beatles perform them live in game would have felt wrong. Instead, these songs accompany a visualization called a "dreamscape." These visualizations open with The Beatles recording in Studio 2 on Abbey Road. Before long, the walls melt away, replaced with trippy splashes of color and eventually more concrete imagery to accompany the spirit of the song. For example, Here Comes the Sun eventually places The Beatles on a flower-covered hilltop, cheerily crooning aside flitting butterflies and warming sunrays. I Am the Walrus, on the other hand, puts the band behind masquerade masks against a backdrop of fundamentally disturbing colors.

The Beatles are great, Rock Band is great, and Harmonix’s treatment of the source material does their legacy justice. The biggest problem concerns the game’s price, amount of content, and lack of compatibility with other Rock Band titles. The Beatles: Rock Band will have 45 tracks on disc. Retailing at full price, that rounds out to $1.30 a track. Not bad, given current DLC prices for Rock Band. Unfortunately, The Beatles: Rock Band is completely standalone. Songs from other Rock Band titles aren’t playable in Beatles and vice versa. Part of the justification of DLC price includes the ability to play it alongside a collection. Without the freedom to throw together a set list including both The Beatles and say, Linkin Park, the price suddenly becomes less justifiable. This ultimately amounts to tough noogies, though, since there’s no alternative. If you want The Beatles in a music game, this is your only (legitimate) option.

While I can kvetch and moan about the lack of interplay between The Beatles: Rock Band with other games and DLC, I’m kidding no one but myself. Harmonix has done a fantastic job with the source material, and $60 for the ability to access Beatles music, however limited, will be worth it to any Beatles fan.

The Beatles: Rock Band is slated for release September 9, 2009 for the Xbox 360, PS3, and Wii.