For all you Rock Band players out there…

An update was recently released to bypass the very ugly 360 and PSN downloadable content interface solutions.  I was playing around  with the 360 version this weekend and came away very impressed.  It isn’t just a simple list of clickable links.

You can reorganize the songs by release date, difficulty, and a few others.  One of the features I greatly appreciate is the ability to preview the song.  Find one you don’t remember to well?  Click on the song and then select preview and a short snippet of the track will download to your 360’s hard drive.  The preview will stay on your hard drive until the next reboot.

If there is one thing I could change about this update it would be to have the ability to keep the preview on the drive permanently.  I have the 120 GB drive so I’m not fighting for storage space as I was with the 20 GB my 360 came with.

In addition to the music store, there are also some updates to the core gameplay.

Adjusted fan limits for World mode: Those playing from Easy to Hard will be able to earn more fans, therefore allowing bands to get further along on the tour. Easy players will be able to cross the Atlantic, Medium players can get access to more venues, and Hard players on the Xbox 360 can unlock the One Million Fans achievement.

Better randomization of setlists: Senior Designer, Dan Teasdale was quoted from the Rock Band forums, “You’ll be glad to know that we’ve tracked down and fixed the issues that triggered these very repetitive moments in Band World Tour.”

Improved detection and scoring for mic recognition: “If you had trouble on songs like ‘Timmy and the Lords of the Underworld’ and ‘Blitzkrieg Bop,’ you should have an easier time beating these songs now” Teasdale continued.

Faster loading of DLC: DLC loads faster and only once, instead of each time the game is turned on.

Microphone latency on PS3 is “improved”: Microphone latency has been reduced.  High-end AV set-ups had mic and drum fill lag issues that affected a small but vocal amount of users.

Xbox 360 band logos visible on Xbox Live: Parental controls previously stopped band logos from being visible on Xbox Live.

ENCORE ladies and gentlemen!  If you stopped playing the game now you have an excuse to jump back in and pick up the mic!