Being from the generation who spawned the video game revolution, I'd have to say we've come a loooooooong way from the games I first grew up with. I've gone from playing football games with tiny red blinking lights to building my own custom football stadium on EA Games Madden NFL.

Anyone remember this?

 

The closest I ever came to emulating one of my music idols was playing my snare drum along to whatever video was on MTV at the time.        

(Back when it actually WAS MTV) I WANT MY MTV! Take it from the kids and give it back to us!!

Even though I was able to be a part of the video game phenomenon I would have killed to have a game like Guitar Hero or Rock Band. However, playing the game from a drummers standpoint  leaves the game with much to be desired. I mean, look at what we have to work with here.

 

 

The drum kit is basic and unresponsive at best, not to mention the durability issues. It just seemed like they spent all their time developing the guitar and vocal parts while just settling for the drums.......NOT COOL. I've been playing drums for 20 years and I would say I'm pretty good, but I can't get through 10 seconds of a song on the game without getting booed off stage. Needless to say...I don't own it and if you're a drummer worth your salt that dosen't have any kids ...odds are you don't either.

But that may change with the unveiling of the new drumkit for the highly anticipated follow up to Rock Band franchise as Rock Band 2 boasts a bigger, better. more awesome electric drum kit for the home wannabe musician.  Here is a piece of an article taken from Trusted Reviews. Who know's, mabye they'll have a lot more drummers crowding into stores to pick up what is sure to be one of the top games of the year.

The competition between Rock Band 2 and Guitar Hero: World Tour is really starting to hot up, and we're still weeks away from the games even being released. Kotaku's helping feed the fire, with some leaked pictures of Rock Band 2's forthcoming 'premium' drum kit. And we didn't even know there was going to be one!

The kit is, apparently, being manufactured by ION, makers of the ION iED05 USB Electric Drum Kit and looks pretty darned awesome. For $300 (some £150) buyers will be getting adjustable pads, three cymbals and a sturdy metal frame. Supposedly the kit will also work as a USB drum kit on a PC, which just adds to the cool.

Add to that the recent announcement that Rock Band 2 would let buyers download the whole original game's set list and we can't help but think that at this rate Guitar Hero: World Tour's dev team are really going to have to pull something special out of their collective hats to compete. Not that we mind in the slightest, we just want to rock - regardless which game we do so to.

Source : http://www.trustedreviews.com/peripherals/review/2008/05/25/ION-iED05-US...