The music stops. The lights fade. The crowd goes quiet. The Guitar Hero series fades away evermore.
Via Joystiq, we're looking at a sign of the end; Activision has announced that it will be removing all DLC for their Hero games effective March 31.You know how the PlayStation Store and Xbox Live used to be filled to the brim with new song DLC for Guitar Hero? Well, all of those packs will be gone in twelve days. You'll no longer be able to purchase new songs for either of the three Hero series.
But that's not all, with this farewell, all DLC for Guitar Hero, Band Hero, and DJ Hero will be 50% off until the hour glass ends. Track DLC on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Wii will be affected by the discount.
Activision says that “any previously purchased downloadable content is unaffected by this change” and that online servers will stay online, so there's no worries about playing the games from here on out if you already have DLC purchased and want to go online and rock out.
The Guitar Hero mobile game on iTunes will also see a 50% discount until March 31.
The Hero brand hasn't seen a game release since 2010. In 2011 Activision announced that they were putting the series on hiatus due to reduced sales in the rhythm genre. This move canceled an in-progress game and has kept the series stagnant since then.
There's no word if this move strikes another nail in the coffin for the series. The Guitar Hero and other Hero brand games were extremely popular for a while, but interest quickly faded as Activision pumped out a new game each year with song DLC pouring out in a steady stream. The servers will remain up, so that's a good sign or saving grace for fans that still play these games, but I wouldn't be surprised to not see another Hero game for many years.
But hey, we've got Harmonix's Chroma to look forward to! That has rhythm-based gameplay … and shooting! Shooting people will never be unpopular.
