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Oh, Sonic fans. Every time a new Sonic is announced, you joke about not getting fooled again and you promise that, this time, you won't be taken in. And we believe you -- why would you go back to Sonic after everything he's done to you? But then a few weeks go by, and suddenly we click a link and find you remixing the 10 seconds of intro screen music that's been revealed from Sonic 4.

Seriously? Did you have to create a rock version, an 8-bit version and even a Dreamcast-style version? Sure, they're cool, and sure, we've embedded them after the break, but isn't this exactly the kind of excitement we all agreed we wouldn't have for the new game? Yes, we're glad to see that longtime Sonic musician Jun Senoue has been announced as the composer for new game, and we're looking forward to hearing more music when the Sega blog releases it. But as your history teacher said, those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. Let's wait until we play the game before we start remixing it 10 seconds at a time.

Mega64 gets back to its roots in the troupe's latest video, enlisting the aid of John and Jane Q. Public to create another minute and a half of comedy based on The Beatles: Rock Band. You're probably asking yourself how the trio can recreate the full British pop quartet. To answer that, we offer this: through the aid of a surprise guest, of course!

Head past the break to see who. We're pretty sure you'll never guess who it is.

[Thanks, Brock]

Looking to add 85 new songs to your Guitar Hero library? Want a game that's made for "Party Play?" Oh, sure. Admit it -- you just want to make the ghostly Cobain avatar do your musical bidding. Well, whatever the motivation, you can pick up Guitar Hero 5 (the game only) for a pretty reasonable $28.99 today, thanks to Amazon's Deal of the Day.

While supplies last (or through the end of the day), the discount is applied to the Wii, PS3, Xbox 360, and PS2 versions of the game. Guitar Hero 5 is worth investing in especially if you're loaded down with PS2 instruments and don't want to buy new ones for another console -- there won't be any more Guitar Heroes for PS2, after all. So, if you want more music, this is pretty much your last chance, all you PS2 holdouts!

[Thanks, Jared]

They started off by explaining a little bit about how thatgamecompany developed the game: It all started from the narrative, as co-founder Jenova Chen wanted to try and create a rise and fall story with no actual protagonist to speak of. Then, they loaded up the game itself, and played through most of the levels, talking about their designs as commentary over the gameplay itself.

Eleven days ago, Harmonix delivered on a concept many of us had fantasized about since the very first time we ever played Rock Band: It democratized the track-making process. For the first time in the franchise's history, any schmo off the street with a bit of MIDI engineering experience and a song in their heart could put that song on the Rock Band Store for the world to see (and hopefully purchase).

At GDC, Harmonix senior sound designer Caleb Epps and Rock Band Network producer Matthew Nordhouse sat down to speak about the challenges that came with opening up the game to user-generated content, and how its dedicated community has organically evolved the song-sharing process.

The title of Silent Hill composer Akira Yamaoka's GDC panel was "As long as the audio is fun, the game will be too." Kind of a perplexing title, especially if you've enjoyed Yamaoka's work in the horror genre. Don't get us wrong, it's good, we're just not sure fun is the word for it. Yamaoka used the panel to explain precisely why his music and sound effects are so disturbing, and it's more technical than you might think.

"Sound is very close to stimulating emotions in your brain," said Yamaoka via an interpreter. "What do humans fear?" He asked. In the case of audio, he noted that gaps between visual cues and accompanying audio. Specifically, if a sound precedes a visual cue, it can cause anxiety, while a sound that arrives too late is comforting. As an example, he noted the sounds of footsteps being made slightly before the onscreen action in a game. He noted that this effect can be felt even if the sync between sound and visual is off by a few frames of animation. Yamaoka said later in the panel that he used this technique in Silent Hill 3.

Another technique mentioned was the use of silence."When there's no sound, the brain fills in the gap," said Yamaoka. He then played a special version of Beethoven's "Für Elise" which had been injected with tiny, periodic gaps of silence. He then played the same piece, only this time injecting harsh noise instead of silence. Even packed in a fully lit lecture hall with hundreds of GDC attendees, it was unsettling. Unfortunately, Yamaoka wasn't able to give us the sound samples used during the panel, so we've done our best to recreate them:


Thankfully, Yamaoka closed the session with a soothing guitar performance, which we were able to capture for your enjoyment. Listen to it below and stay tuned for an interview with Mr. Yamoaka on Joystiq in the near future.

The one track we were most looking forward to from Green Day: Rock Band was, of course, "Brain Stew/Jaded" from the outfit's 1995 album. It's a powerful, triumphant tune -- and, apparently, it's also super hard. The Harmonix crew attempted the song during last night's "Rock Band Bar Night" event at GDC, and -- well, it ended in tears. Or rather, jeers.

You can check out some off-screen footage of their tremendous failure above, or footage of them actually playing the game past the jump. To be fair, the drummer didn't see the flurry of notes coming at him, due to his attempt to refresh himself with some libations. You know who else was enjoying a few beverages? The drunk dude who kept trying to throw the devil horns up in front of our camera while we were filming. Really, drunk dude? Really?

Rather than, we don't know, a press release or any other professional method of disseminating a message (Twitter, perhaps?), Harmonix took to Facebook to tell friends and friends-of-friends that Rock Band 3 will be released "this holiday season."

The announcement is brief and detail-free, but reveals that EA will distribute the game -- apparently having renewed its Rock Band distribution deal with Viacom. With Rock Band 3, the developer promises to "innovate and revolutionize the music genre once again, just as Harmonix did with the original Rock Band, Rock Band 2 and The Beatles: Rock Band."

If previous comments by Dhani Harrison are to be believed, you may even learn something from playing RB3!

[Thanks Helloimbob!]

For those of you looking to put your '80s singing chops to the test, it would appear that iNiS will be offering you just that chance if a recent ESRB listing for a fourth installment in the Lips series is to be believed. "Lips: I (Heart) the 80s" was recently spotted by IGN over on the ratings website, sporting a description that reveals at least two tracks from the 1980s-centric title -- The Police's "Roxanne" and Rick James' "Super Freak."

The game is also said to feature "depictions of men and women in revealing outfits performing provocative choreography -- for example, women in negligees, black bras, panties dancing inside a classroom; large amounts of exposed cleavage, some grinding dance moves; and background images of storefronts/signs reading '25 cent Peepshows,' 'Live Sex Theatre,' and 'Topless Girls Dancing.'" Gosh golly! Regardless, with the recent release of Lips: Party Classics and today's ESRB listing, we have to imagine the official announce of Lips: I (Heart) the 80s is just around the corner. We'll be prepping our boom boxes with plenty of Public Enemy until then.

[Via IGN]

Last week, the Rock Band Store got a few healthy slices of Americana with tracks from Otis Redding and the Brian Setzer Orchestra. This week's offerings are much more foreign -- there's a three-pack from Finnish rock band HIM, a song from Britain's One Night Only, a track from The Police, and a song from Marilyn Manson, whom we all know actually descends from an extinct alien race whose name our human tongues could never hope to pronounce.

Click past the jump for the full list of new additions!

We thought we'd reached a point in the year where Uncharted 2 and Assassin's Creed 2 would stop being nominated for awards; apparently, we were wrong. The Game Audio Network Guild adorned both games with nine nominations in its 8th annual Audio Awards. Winners will be announced and awards will be distributed on March 12 in San Francisco, alongside the Game Developers Conference.

Check out the full list of nominees after the jump. They seem pretty fair, though House of the Dead: Overkill's absence from the "Best Dialogue" category almost ensures that we'll be boycotting the event.

While Activision may be moving away from heaping artist-centric Guitar Hero games on the market, it appears Rock Band is sliding in there to fill the void. According to a story in the L.A. Times, Jimi Hendrix stepsister Janie (who also controls his estate) says that a Rock Band game based on the legendary guitarist is slated to arrive before year's end.

We know that the officially announced Green Day: Rock Band won't be the only franchise release this year, so Hendrix: Rock Guy is definitely a possibility. But the mainstream press is bad enough about confusing Rock Band and Guitar Hero that we'll hold off on placing our pre-orders until we've heard something official.

Wow, either the L.A. Times is wrong or Slash is wrong. Whoever wins, we lose.

[Update: We just heard back from a Harmonix spokesperson, and there isn't a standalone product in the works. The official statement: "While we have not made any official announcements regarding Jimi Hendrix and Rock Band, we are excited to say that we are in discussions to bring more of his music to our platform. Stay tuned."]

[Via Billboard; thanks, TheWeaponeer]

We frequently tried to find ways to keep ourselves occupied during the days we spent probing planets for precious, precious minerals in Mass Effect 2, but largely came up empty-handed. You can only scan Uranus so many times before it loses its comedic value, you know? If only we'd followed the cue of YouTube rap sensation Kabuto the Python, who spent his mining moments crafting rhymes and beats, then combining the two into a single package which we feel comfortable calling a rap song. Check the NSFW track after the jump.

Eclectic might be a bit of an understatement when it comes to next week's Rock Band Weekly offerings, which run the gamut from soul to electronica to swing. Otis Redding dominates the majority of the new tunes, which is just fine by us. As for the rest, well you're just going to have to hit the jump to see!

We know we've already been diligent in keeping you abreast of the status of Bear McCreary's epic soundtrack for Dark Void, so consider this our penultimate update on the topic: The game's score is now available to download through iTunes, Amazon and a number of other retailers. It's very, very good. If you have some extra cash lying around, and enjoy the occasional non-lyrical musical offering, you should purchase it post-haste.

In addition, you can consider this our final post in which we proclaim our musical man-crush on Bear McCreary. That is, until he reveals the next game he's working on, at which point we'll probably pick right up where we left off.