Lips patch brings microphone compatibility to Rock Band

Our super sophisticated estimation process has it that a whole 2.89 of ya even care that Microsoft's Lips microphone won't work with Rock Band or Guitar Hero, but we're about to make just south of three Earthlings a lot happier. Harmonix and MTV Games have been working with Microsoft to provide compatibility (via a patch) with Rock Band 2, though there's no definite date to latch on to. Alright Activision, the bar has been set -- you up to the challenge?

[Via Xbox 360 Fanboy]

[Matthew @ Dec 6th 2008 5:37AM]

I would love to sing a particular Rick Astley song using one of these.

[Taylor @ Dec 6th 2008 7:59PM]

wait... is it Together Forever?

[Muhammed @ Dec 6th 2008 5:53AM]

that will definitely be awesome.
I'd love to do a "all that remains" cover while trying to imitate Phil's brutal voice.

[Brad @ Dec 6th 2008 6:01AM]

Hey, don't hate. I'm looking forward to some slick wireless mic action.

[jpxdude @ Dec 6th 2008 6:15AM]

Any ideas on whether this patch will work for the first Rock Band game??

[Fade2blac @ Dec 6th 2008 7:00AM]

Consider me in the other 97.11 group (if Darren was talking percentages, not sure)!

[Madmax @ Dec 6th 2008 8:11AM]

awesome.

[Subsonicwave @ Dec 6th 2008 8:18AM]

How about getting the delay problem fixed first.

[Cybergypsy @ Dec 6th 2008 8:29AM]

thats all we need, people sit in Best Buy hours on these things.

[Aaquib @ Dec 6th 2008 9:09AM]

How about actually innovating instead of just copying Sony? Singstar, much?

[James Pope @ Dec 6th 2008 11:29AM]

um.
lots of new features:

motion sensing
flashing lights
availiable on xbox 360
can pull music from cd, hdd, wireless streaming pc/mac, usb mass storage device...
wireless-ness..

i bought it and its fantastic to be able to use your own music collection!! :D
(forgive me if any of these are on ps3 singstar i havent played it)

[Richard @ Dec 6th 2008 9:35AM]

Engadget, change the headline please? The issue isn't new, other blogs have been talking about it for a while. Your headline however makes it sound like the patch was released recently. I was about to run out and go ahead and buy the game until I sat down and read the rest of what was written.

[Brad @ Dec 6th 2008 10:05AM]

So, Harmonix is devoting time to this, while all the poor schmucks in Europe don't get GH:WT drum compatibility for RB1? Classy.

[rask @ Dec 6th 2008 1:22PM]

Ah yes, Just like the Zune, Lips is another product that Microsoft makes that only 3 people can possibly own. Cause most reviews haven't been saying that the microphones are really high quality and the best part of that package.

Oh and making them work with a really popular series is an absolutely horrible idea. How dare they...

[techinkdev @ Dec 6th 2008 8:05AM]

Why you hating man :/

[The Aggie CEO @ Dec 6th 2008 8:19AM]

yea so more people own Zunes than other MP3 players........

I have 2 and love them.........all except for the fact I cant plug it up via USB to my car radio/cd receiver.....or any other mp3 capable via usb device.......I hope they release an update in the future that allows it to show up as a "mass storage device" so files can be read from it..........

at any rate.......Lips is Microsofts answer to Sony's SingStar.......and while SingStar is good Lips best feature is that it can pull tracks from any mp3 player......aside from that I dont know if its worth the hype.......but the Zune is.....one thing to know about M$ as much as I hate to admit it........when they are the underdog in something they learn from their initial entry into a domain(the first Xbox showed them what to do with the 360 in terms of how to get developers and consumers on board quickly) so now that we are on the 3 gen Zunes and they have slowly cut away at the iPods dominance just a little it may be another 3-5 years b4 the Zune can actually do damage to Apple as far as market share goes

at any rate enough going off on a tangent.......to say only 3 people own Zunes is just dumb.....

[Aaquib @ Dec 6th 2008 9:12AM]

So true. Microsoft just can't innovate.

Windows - Stolen from Mac OS X
XBOX - Stolen from Playstation
Zune - Stolen from iPod
Windows Live Search - Stolen from Google

Microsoft should just give up...That clown Ballmer won't last another 5 years..

[Phoenix @ Dec 6th 2008 9:25AM]

So Windows 3.1 was stolen from Mac OS X eh?

Why hasn't Microsoft released this time machine it's got then?

[Jarhead2012 @ Dec 6th 2008 9:44AM]

@ Phoenix

Win

[Quikboy @ Dec 6th 2008 10:43AM]

@Aaquib: So in your world, 'stolen' = making a competing product? In that case, Google and Apple must steal a ton too. Also, those 4 examples you provided are different enough that they're not exactly a direct clone of any of the items you compare them to.

I wonder where these people get this knack for believing "Microsoft copies everybody" all the time.

[nohone @ Dec 6th 2008 1:29PM]

@rask and Aaquib

Love him or hate him (I am personally not a fan), the biggest name of the past year owns and uses one. With all the fans he has who will do whatever he says without question, I can see a uptick in the number of Zune sales:

http://www.citypaper.net/blogs/clog/2008/12/02/cardio-with-obama/

[Harry Wagstaff @ Dec 6th 2008 1:44PM]

You know Microsoft employs _people_? They blatantly stole that idea. And don't even get me started about how they own offices.

[MichaelD @ Dec 6th 2008 3:03PM]

A company makes a product in an existing field= copying/stealing.

A company makes the only product in a field= monopoly.

Common denominator in this anti-logic? The company being accused is always Microsoft.

I'm not a huge fan of a lot of Microsoft's stuff, but this double standard is ridiculous.

[Rask @ Dec 6th 2008 1:25PM]

I was trying to be sarcastic at the dig on Lips in the article saying that only 2.85 people cared.
I've owned a Zune 4 and a Zune 120 and I love the platform personally.

The whole reaction by the Blogosphere about Obama and Zunegate has me somewhat pissed as well.

[Ryan @ Dec 6th 2008 2:28PM]

Seriously guys, stop hating--this is good news. At least the Lips microphones are wireless, unlike Rock Band which currently has no wireless mic option.

What I'm REALLY waiting for is a wireless Rock Band mic that has a D Pad and Buttons on it (like the current Mad Catz one), it gets annoying when you're the singer and you have to always put the mic down and pick up a controller to do anything.

[MarkHawk @ Dec 6th 2008 5:20PM]

I originally had this on pre-order to use with Rock Band 2. I was also excited to use my Zune Pass to play music. When both of the key features disappeared and were promised to be patched in later, I quickly canceled my pre-order. This announcement of a patch soon gets me interested but I am still disappointed the Zune feature was taken away before launch.

[Tiptup300 @ Dec 7th 2008 12:19AM]

They never said it would work.... Just pirate your music dude. Seriously, don't be lazy.

[MarkHawk @ Dec 7th 2008 6:22AM]

No, originally at E3 it was announced to be able to use music from your Zune (or other MP3 device) and take purchased music from it to create a lyrics for you to sign along with. Sure you can stream music to the game still but the feature that made some sort of lyrics/track list was cut a month before release.

It's true they never said it (the microphones) would work with rock band. Though IGN or Joystiq reported in an interview that Lips developers thought the Idea would be "Cool") Unfortunately, that is what I'd be using them for since the game shipped without full Zune(Purchased music) support.

Pirating is dumb. It's just easy stealing. I don't see what pirating had to do with what I originally wrote.