Queen headlines LEGO Rock Band

Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and MTV Games today announced that LEGO Rock Band will feature the likeness of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees Queen. Appearing in the game as LEGO minifigures, front man Freddie Mercury, guitarist Brian May, bassist John Deacon and drummer Roger Taylor will be rocking out to their hits “We Will Rock You” and “We Are The Champions.”

Guitarist Brian May seems excited about it: “This is IT! I wanna play!,” he said. “When do I get my toy LEGO man?” Right on, we say.

Today also marks the release of the Queen pack for the Rock Band Music Store of downloadable content, featuring 10 of the band’s most loved songs including Killer Queen, Somebody to Love, Fat Bottomed Girls and the Queen/David Bowie collaboration, Under Pressure. In addition, Queen will release Absolute Greatest on Nov. 17, featuring 20 of the band’s biggest hits.

LEGO Rock Band is scheduled for release holiday 2009.

The complete LEGO Rock Band track list

Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and MTV Games revealed the full track list for the upcoming LEGO Rock Band game, including songs from Queen, Bon Jovi, P!NK, Jimi Hendrix and Blur. In addition, the game will support downloadable content from the Rock Band Music Store, and enable songs from LEGO Rock Band to be exported on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 across all game modes in the Rock Band Music Platform.

The full track list for LEGO Rock Band on all platforms right after the break:

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Putting LEGO into LEGO Rock Band

We know that LEGO Rock Band is going to allow you to rock out as little people made up of little colorful blocks and that it will feature some licensed songs that some of you will want to jam out to but there are some new details about the game coming out of E3 from Warner Bros. Home Interactive and MTV Games.

First there’s a special function called the LEGO character customizer. This is where you’ll create your band use those LEGO blocks and cute head and accessory pieces. Besides customizing you band, you’ll be able to choose the instruments you play (from what’s available) and your entourage. There’s also a LEGO Rock Den that can be accessorized and decorated to perfectly suit your rock style.

Then there are features like LEGO themed Rock Power challenges. These challenges are the reason you’d want to play a LEGO themed music game: bands will perform amazing feats like destroying a giant robot, summoning a storm or demolishing a skyscraper - all with the power of music.

Finally there’s the power of building fame. Play well enough and you’ll gain fame, which in turn unlocks various things within the game like the ability to build cooler vehicles, progress to new venues and unlock new characters and instruments.

It’ll be interesting to see if Traveler’s Tales really gets how wonderful such a collaboration between LEGO and Rock Band can be. The game is on the right track (assuming they deliver on all the bullet points), but we won’t know for sure until the game ships this holiday season.

image source: gamemag.ru

LEGO Harry Potter game official

Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and TT Games officially announced LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4, the first game based on the popular Harry Potter book series re-imagined with the wonderful aid of LEGO blocks. Based on the first four Harry Potter books and movies that tell the story of Harry’s first four years at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4 mixes LEGO gameplay and light-hearted humor in a retelling of the grandest moments from both the books and films.

LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4 will give gamers the chance to experience Harry Potter in a new and uniquely LEGO way playing as Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, as well as other favorite characters. Players will attend lessons, cast spells, mix potions, fly on broomsticks and complete tasks to earn house points. Throughout the game, players will also have the freedom to explore familiar settings including Hogwarts castle, Diagon Alley, the Forbidden Forest and the village of Hogsmeade.

Look for more details this week from E3. LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4 is being developed by TT Games and will be published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and is scheduled for release in 2010. Platforms are to be announced.

The adventure continues: LEGO Indiana Jones 2

LucasArts and Traveler’s Tales are teaming up once again to bring another LEGO Indiana Jones game to fans this fall. LEGO Indiana Jones 2: The Adventure Continues combines the fun of LEGO bricks with the clever humor, and over abundance of cuteness, and a unique take on all the Indiana Jones films – including for the first time, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. LEGO Indiana Jones 2 follows Dr. Jones’ escapades from the jungles of South America to the Peruvian Ruins and beyond - and lets them build their own levels brick by brick if they so choose.

This will be the first LEGO game that features the Build Your Own Adventure Mode, which allows you to create your own levels and environments and share them with your friends - you can even create your own levels and combine them with the existing ones in the game. Other features include new characters like Mutt Williams on his motorcycle, all new animations, the ability to jump in and drive a number of new vehicles, two-player drop-in drop-out coop, an improved whip that does more, story mode and free play mode, and lots of other new improvements.

Look for the game this fall on Xbox 360, PS3, DS, PSP, Windows and Wii.

LEGO Rock Band in Holiday 2009

What’s made of LEGOs and rocks you like a hurricane? According to an official announcement from Traveler’s Tales Games and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and Harmonix, LEGO Rock Band. Yeah, after all the speculation and posturing, it turns out that the rumors were true. Dubbed a “family-friendly music experience,” LEGO Rock Band players will build a band and rock the world.

The Xbox 360, Wii and PS3 versions of the game will be developed by TT Games with the help of Harmonix, while the DS version will be developed with Backbone Entertainment and Harmonix at the helm. All versions will be released sometime in holiday 2009. Players will be able to create their own LEGO Rock Band style as they customize their minifigure avatars, band and entourage, including roadies, managers and crew. LEGO Rock Band supports Rock Band instruments, as well as other music game controllers. Players can also expect local venues, stadiums and fantasy locations on Earth and beyond that attempt to capture the imaginative settings of the LEGO toy universe.

The game will offer multiplayer similar to what is in the Rock Band games, but a full accounting is to be revealed at a later date. Some of the songs to expect in LEGO Rock Band include Blur’s Song 2, Carl Douglas’ classic Kung-Fu Fighting, Europe’s 80’s power ballad The Final Countdown, Good Charlotte’s
Boys and Girls and Pink’s So What. No doubt more tunes and more details are to be announced later this year.

Animator’s Resume Leaks New LEGO Games Info

While it’s a given that the job market is pretty rough right now and it’s a smart move to update that dusty old resume, it probably not the best idea to tell everyone with an internet connection that you’re working on a couple of top secret projects for your current employer. Still, as discovered this morning by GamesIndustry.biz, that seems to be exactly what an animator with developer Traveler’s Tales has done, unintentionally blowing the whistle on a number of upcoming releases from the company.

Charlotte Parker, the animator in question, maintains a portfolio of her work online and recently updated the Curriculum Vitae portion of her site to include her most recent works. Unfortunately for Traveler’s Tales, a number of the games she’s listed herself as currently working on have not yet been announced by the developer or its parent company, Warner Bros. Interactive. Oops.

According to the CV, Parker has apparently been working at TT Games since March of 2007, working as a cutscene animator for LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga, LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures, and LEGO Batman: The Videogame. The CV also lists her credits as “currently working as a Cutscene Animator on LEGO Harry Potter & LEGO Indiana Jones 2: The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull which are both in the early stages of production.” Of course, until now, neither of these two games has existed as anything more than rumor outside of the walls to TT Games or Warner Bros.

Even more interesting than the leak of the two games currently in development, though, is Parker’s claim that she has “also recently been working on In-Game animation for the upcoming Hobbit Demo using Motion Capture Data in Motionbuilder, to be presented to Peter Jackson as a pitch for obtaining the license to the upcoming Hobbit films.” With the news this morning that the video game rights to Jackson’s Lord of the Rings movies has reverted back to Warner from EA, it’s hard to imagine Warner and Traveler’s Tales passing up the chance to give Frodo, Gandalf, and the rest of the Fellowship the LEGO treatment.

While gamers might be happy to get some sort of confirmation about the forthcoming games, it’s probably safe to assume that Warner and Traveler’s Tales are probably none too happy about having their big, secret games leaked online. While direct links to the CV have since been removed from Parker’s front page, the actual CV itself was still live on the site as of this morning. Hopefully, her posting of the resume online won’t lead to Parker needing it sooner than she anticipated.

[UPDATE: As of around 10:30a EST Friday, the CV Section of Parker's site has been edited, removing all mention of the projects in development and the pitch presentation to Peter Jackson.]