Rock Band 5

Rock Band 5 is an upcoming video game that is the sequel to the 2015 music rhythm game smasher, Rock Band 4. Announced in 2024 and expected to be released in 2025, the game is being developed mainly by Harmonix Music Studios, with the help of Rockstar Games, after both companies made a deal with each other to work on the game. Spotify, the company, served as the music liscence director for the game due to their connections with the music industry, making it easier to get songs for the game. Rock Band 5 will contain a total of 72 on-disc songs. All previous peripherals are back again for the game, and the keyboard (introduced in Rock Band 3) will be present in the game, after its absence in the previous installment of the franchise.

Development
Thought for Rock Band 5 didn't start until late 2019, that's when they started seeking a deal with a bigger video game studio to develop the next Rock Band game. Shortly after Harmonix and Rockstar games started working on the early stages of Rock Band 5, they wanted to look for another company that would help them in licensing songs for the game, making the job for them, easier. MTV denied getting involved after what happened last time with Rock Band 3. But soon, they settled with Spotify. And the game's development went underway.

The idea of the keyboard to return in the series, came from Rockstar Games who had enough of a budget to bring it back, and assigned Razer Inc. to work on making the new instruments for the new game. In 2025, Harmonix, Rockstar Games, Spotify, and Razer Inc. all confirmed that Rock Band 5 is currently in development on their Twitter accounts. As stated by Harmonix community representative Jon "Ohsnapitsjf" Harmonics, the game is currently in development, and it is unknown as of yet, as to when it'll be released.

Gameplay
Rock Band 5 allows for 1–7 players, either locally or through online game services, to use various instrument controllers to accurately simulate the playing of music. In addition to supporting the four Basic instrument controllers from previous Rock Band games (lead guitar, bass guitar, drums and vocals), Rock Band 5 adds support for two additional microphones for singers to provide backup vocal harmonies (previously found in The Beatles: Rock Band and Green Day: Rock Band), an electric keyboard as a re-introduced instrument (or any MIDI-compatible keyboard). The game also works for MIDI compatible electronic drum kits as well.

Prior to a song, each band member selects from one of four difficulty levels, Easy, Medium, Hard, and Expert, which influence the number and rate that notes appear on the note track; they also can select the Pro mode for real guitar, bass, keyboards, and drums. As the band performs, they score points. Each player can build up a multiplier by hitting consecutive notes correctly, which increases how many points each note is worth, but the multiplier is set back to 1× if a note is missed. After successfully completing a song, the performance of each player and the band as a whole is rated on a 5-star scale. The best performance by a player for each song in the player's library is tracked separately based on instrument, Basic or Pro mode, and difficulty, then is used to provide and compare leaderboard statistics at the end of the song.[4]

The overall goal of the band is to successfully complete a song and earn as many points as possible by using their selected controllers to play the notes shown on the screen at the proper time; or, in the case of the vocalists, to sing in relative pitch to the original artist. Players can also gain additional points by using "Overdrive". Once a player has enough energy, which is collected by perfectly playing marked sections of the song, he or she can activate Overdrive to double the number of points the whole band earns while it is deployed. Each instrument deploys overdrive differently, and some instruments have multiple methods of activating it.

In point competitive mode (without the "no-fail" option on — not recommended for Pro mode), players who are doing poorly might be forced to drop out of the band, which silences their part temporarily while the rest of the players continue to play. A dropped player can be saved up to two times by another player activating Overdrive; if the player is not saved soon enough, the whole band may fail the song and need to restart or exit to the song library. In some game modes, an option is also available to continue the song right from where the band failed at the cost of not being able to record a score for the rest of the song's playthrough.

Although Rock Band 5's gameplay in Basic mode is very similar to that of previous games in the series, it does introduce a new gameplay mechanic designed to make fast sections such as trills, tremolo picking, and drum rolls easier to play. In such sections, players are rewarded for being exactly on cue, but they are not penalized for small differences.[5]

New Gameplay Feature
Rock Band 5 offers a new gameplay mode: Multiplayer (Scene): This is the bread and butter of the game. Here players will be able to do the following, they will pick where ever they want to start their band and be able to build venues (House, Bar, Theater, Arena). They will also be able to make a local scene with their friends’ bands. As well as to book tours through out other scenes. Play with your friends bands on shows and their venues. If you are by yourself, be someone to get payed to fill in for someone’s band. If the RBN could come back even start a label and put your own band in the game.

Song List
Categories

Early Reception
According to IGN, who were invited by the developers of Rock Band 5, privately, to test the game in its' beta stages, it is like no other music rhythm video game out there, it stole all of their wallets, called them "sissy boys", and made them transform into their fursonas. Like no other music rhythm video game out there.