Courtney Love is a musician and a widow. Her late husband Kurt Cobain was the lead singer of 90’s rock group Nirvana. At the age of 27, Cobain shot himself. Cobain and his wife were both struggling with drug abuse at the time of the incident.
In the video game Guitar Hero 5, an avatar that resembles the late Cobain appears to be singing the tracks of various artists including Bon Jovi. “FOR THE RECORD I DID NOT APPROVE KURTS AVATAR FOR GUYITARHERO5. i think Kurt would despise this game alone let alone this avatar,” tweeted Love.
However game company Activision said that it was “great to work with [Love].” They even added that Love even gave them photos and videos to use for the game. Love even picked the wardrobe and hairstyle. Love denies this saying that it is the fault of Dave Grohl and Activision. Grohl is the former drummer of Nirvana and currently plays for the Foo Fighters. Love said that she and Cobain Enterprises plans to “sue the shit out of Activison.”
Guitar Hero 5 hit the shelves about 10 days ago in the U.S.. It will be releasing in Europe today and Australia on the 16th.
Dan Rosensweig is the former COO of Yahoo! Inc. and former President of CNET. Now Rosensweig is getting into gaming by joining Activision Blizzard Inc. to head up the Guitar Hero franchise. Rosensweig quit Yahoo! in 2006 after working there for five years in product development and marketing. Rosensweig left around the same time Terry Semel did.
Coincidentally Activision’s current CEO Bobby Kotick served on the Yahoo! board of directors up until last year. When Rosensweig left Yahoo!, he worked at Quadrangle Group. Quadrangle is a private equity firm based out of New York. Rosensweig was the Silicon Valley representation of the firm.
Rosensweig’s responsibilities at Activision will be to maintain the whole Guitar Hero franchise. The franchise was put together by Activision’s Red Octane unit and Neversoft studios. Guitar Hero has had three blockbuster games in the franchise, but some analysts believe that the growth for music games may be slowing down. Rosenweig needs to make sure Guitar Hero does not become obsolete.
“With a platform and content that universally engages a wide range of audiences, Guitar Hero has incredible growth potential,” stated Rosensweig. “I look forward to continuing to develop Guitar Hero into an even more successful enterprise.”
Google Android has received the exclusive rights to distribute Guitar Hero World Tour Mobile. T-Mobile will soon be launching applications within the Android Market that will be available for a cost. Currently the applications available in the Android Market are all free. It is not specific whether GHWTM will be available exclusively for Android or if it is a specific version of the franchise.
According to a press release for T-Mobile, “gamers will use the G1’s sensitive touch-screen to play along with 15 rock classics including Deep Purple’s ‘Smoke on the Water’, Guns’n'Roses’ ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ and Black Sabbath’s ‘Paranoid’. There’s also a bonus song available every month, and users can log on to guitarheromobile.com to create their own rock star persona.”
Other games that are on the way for Google Android include Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, Tetris, and Monopoly. Guitar Hero is developed by Neversoft and published by RedOctane and Activision.
