Pepper's in the difficult recording of Let it be

Ex-fan of the sixties you have always dreamed of being a Beatles era Cup Bowl or "flower power" Here is the video game to become a virtual member of the "Fab Four". Produced by MTV Games with studio Harmonix, The Beatles Rock Band, coming out today as integral re-mastered, allows squarely to replay in 3D the saga of the most popular in the history of the rock group: the first concert at the Cavern in Liverpool at the famous "gig" on the roof of the building of Apple Records, the creation under LSD from the album "Sgt. Pepper's" in the difficult recording of "Let it be".signed the formal separation of the group in 1970...

Other side of a formidable marketing operation aimed at reviving the "Beatlemania", the launch of this video game is not anecdotal in terms of the business. The Publisher MTV Games (a subsidiary of the music channel owned by Viacom) had first to talk about royalties with the two surviving members of the Beatles, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr and widow of John Lennon (Yoko Ono) and George Harrison (Olivia). Then it took moving from licensing agreements with Sony Music and EMI labels to digging among the 45 most popular titles in the music catalogue of the group. Say that MTV capitalized large financially on this operation. Then, the creation of the game required long months of working at the studio Harmonix, with a budget of development-promotion sales in ten million.

A "work of art".

In an interview with the "Financial Times", Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman ensured yesterday that "the Beatles Rock band" was a "work of art" and would "change the way people view music video games."But, in principle, the copy the concept of "guitar hero" game, Activision Blizzard (Vivendi), one of the titles that are the most sold in recent years: equipped player of a game console type Xbox360, PlayStation 3 or Wii and needed devices can replay note for note his favourite piece, the seminal "Help" to the very psychedelic "I'm the Walrus." No need to be musician or "hardcore gamer", the game offers accessible to the greatest number "gameplay". On the other hand, will require a budget therefore: If only one CD-ROM costs less than 50 euros, full pack comprising the kit of instruments (micro, mini-guitare, low, battery...) is equivalent to nearly 140 euros. In the United States, a Deluxe series (with the bass McCartney mini-répliques) will be squarely marketed to $ 250!

So MTV Games and Electronic Arts distributor expect to earn comfortable revenues. Morgan Securities analyst estimated recently that "the Beatles Rock band" could sell 5 million copies of here at the holiday of the year. A reasonable objective in view of the "mark" Beatles and the MTV Games has already made the teeth on the "CDCA Rock Band" game. The famous Guitar Hero series has it, past more than 35 million units by multiplying the extensions (Metallica, Aero-smith, Nirvana...)! But the Publisher of the game also on the sale of dematerialized music: the player will be able to download new songs ($ 2 unit) or whole albums (17 dollars) of the Beatles from his console connected to the Internet. However MTV will collect 70 of the price on each downloaded title...

Whether that will buy the video game of the "Fab Four": the four in Liverpool will probably speak to the baby boomeurs as children of the Internet. But, today, the video game industry is the bet to play everyone from 7 to 77 years.