So, believe it or not, those plastic instruments lying dormant in nearly everyone’s closet CAN be used to play a video game! I know, I know… It’s hard to believe. For some of us, those little instruments still get a lot of action. During the heyday of Guitar Hero and Rock Band, it seemed like every single birthday party/hang out session including playing the wildly popular rhythm game. But now, in 2020, the latest release of Rock Band was 5 years ago. But… Rock Band 4 (said latest release) still gets weekly updates of new songs and new challenges. The game is still thriving among the hardest of core. So, let’s check out how Rock Band 4 fairs in 2020.

Now I feel that I want to preface this review with a simple, biased fact: I LOVE Rock Band and Guitar Hero. I’m a sucker for these rhythm games and I bought every single release of both series. But, this is not a look at the series as a whole, this a look at just Rock Band 4.

Rock Band 4 came out in 2015. I bought it day one without any instruments. Because, luckily, the Xbox One got a legacy adapter. This little adapter lets you connect your old wireless instruments to the Xbox One. Excellent. Except… This leads to a MAJOR problem for those looking to get into the game in 2020. Finding instruments, whether legacy wireless instruments, or new Rock Band 4 instruments, is near impossible. I had two wireless guitars for Rock Band, but my drums were wired. Which meant, I had to track down a wireless drum set. To make it even worse, one of my guitars broke about a month into playing Rock Band 4. leaving me with one guitar and an awful microphone. I sort of stopped playing Rock Band 4.

Until 2019 when I wanted to play with friends. I started looking for wireless drum sets and found out that they were all selling for around $400! This is insane. Not to mention guitars were selling for around $200. But I kept hunting. I set up a Google alert for Rock Band instruments. One day I got an alert that a new listing, by Harmonix (creator of the game), for a guitar and microphone on Amazon. By the time I got to Amazon, there was ONE guitar left and five microphones. I put them both in the cart… And actually got them. All for regular, retail price! Unfortunately, I wasn’t so lucky with the drum set and eventually bought one for the low low price of $200… All the sudden, Rock Band 4 became the most expensive game I’ve ever bought. But at least I had a full band now.

Now that I got the gripe of the instruments out of the way, let’s talk about the actual game. This is where this review gets a little weird. Stock, no updates, no DLC Rock Band 4 is BY FAR the worst Rock Band game. It is stripped down to the bare bones: no online, a short story mode, not much content beyond that, and absolutely the worst on-disc song selection. It simply is not a good iteration of Rock Band. There’s a reason it sat on my shelf for four years after playing it for a month. There’s not much to it.

BUT! Luckily, Rock Band 4 is still updated weekly with new songs as DLC. Which brings me to another point: if you aren’t willing to drop $2 on a song, Rock Band 4 just isn’t worth it. I would much rather play Rock Band 3 with its amazing set list. BUT, if you start down the slippery slope of buying DLC, Rock Band 4 becomes something wonderful. Once you fill out your song list, Rock Band 4 has so much more to offer. Luckily, they added multiplayer, the song lists from all the other Rock Bands, new single player (and multiplayer of course) content, and THOUSANDS of songs as DLC. But, you have to be willing to buy it. This makes Rock Band 4 incredibly expensive. It already was the most expensive game I owned when I bought the instruments, but with all the DLC, this game really adds up. I have over 400 songs on the game now and could play for an entire 24 hours without a repeat. This is the form that Rock Band 4 is truly meant to be. It’s a wonderful game, but it comes with a price.

The wrap up:

Rock Band 4 is a really weird thing to review. I love the game and I think it might be the pinnacle of multiplayer with friends. But, it has two very different forms. The game really is a Jekyll and Hyde situation depending on how you treat it. If you ignore it and keep it locked in a closet, much like Edward Hyde this game is ugly and cruel. The base game has almost nothing to offer. Especially if you don’t have the rivals update or any DLC imports. The song list is awful and it’s easily the worst Rock Band release. But, Like the acclaimed Dr. Jekyll, Rock band 4 truly shines if you let it. If you invest in songs and update the game with as much extra content as you can afford, it becomes a great friend and a beautiful experience. Once you pad out your song list and get into the rivals update, or all the other added content, this game becomes the pinnacle of multiplayer. I will play this game any time anyone wants to. I love every single minute of it. That’s probably why I’m willing to dump so much money into this game. I love buying the new songs each week and look forward to every crew challenge that Harmonix does. I love this game, but it’s not hard to say that it isn’t for everyone. This game is a love letter to those that love rhythm games and (as someone who loves rhythm games) I seriously play it every single day. I play this game every day and I have been for a year now. AND IT STILL ISN’T OLD. I don’t know if I can get enough of this game to be honest and love it so very much.

I give Rock Band 4 a 3.5 out of 4. BUT! That’s the version I have now: the hundreds of dollars put into instruments and the hundreds of dollars put into DLC. The base version of Rock Band 4 gets a 1.5 out of 4. The base game simply isn’t worth it. The base game, unfortunately, turned a lot of people away from this game and probably killed the rhythm game genre all together. But the beauty is there for those with deep pockets. I have spent a lot on this game to see its beauty and let me tell you; it’s gorgeous. But it just is not worth it for a casual Rock Band fan.