Once upon a time, grown men strummed plastic guitars and tipsy family members strutted in front of the TV, all in the name of interactive entertainment. Admittedly, those days weren't so long ago, but the party game scene just hasn't been the same since Rock Band and Dance Central were put in mothballs.
The good news is, those days may be returning. While giving a keynote address at the PAX East gaming show, Alex Rigopulos, CEO of music game specialist Harmonix, hinted that the company wasn't ready to write off its biggest hits just yet. "[Rock Band and Dance Central] are near and dear to our hearts and our minds," he told the crowd. "And we have grand plans to bring back both of them with guns blazing at some point in the coming console cycle."
It's the closest the developer has come to confirming a new game in either series for the Xbox One or PlayStation 4, but Rigopulos has hinted at it before. Last year he told VentureBeat that Rock Band is "something we'll return to at the right point in time and reimagine it as appropriate for its time."
Apart from downloadable curiosity Rock Band Blitz in 2012 there hasn't been a new title in that series since Rock Band 3 in 2010. Dance Central last got an update in "01". Harmonix is currently working on the Disney Kinect game Fantasia: Music Evolved, inspired by the classic 1940 movie, which lets players remix music in real time using motion controls. It's due for release on Xbox 360 and Xbox One later this year.