Grand Theft Auto - simplifies song purchasing // canavarlar

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DENVER (Billboard) - The emerging effort to use videogames as a channel
for selling music is entering its next phase with the recent release
of "Grand Theft Auto IV."
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Phase I has proved a phenomenal success, with "Rock Band" and "Guitar
Hero III" selling millions of songs through their respective platforms. But it
has been a limited victory.

Both are music-based rhythm games that use master recordings and cover
songs to let gamers "play" along to the tunes using special controllers
shaped like musical instruments. Purchased songs can be used only as
elements of the game itself. They can't be transferred to an MP3 player or
stored in users' digital music libraries.

But "Grand Theft Auto IV" includes a feature that lets players tag any song
in the soundtrack in order to receive more information about the title and
artist, as well as store tagged tracks in a custom playlist on the Amazon
digital music store for later purchase.

"GTA IV" is not a rhythm game. It's a story-driven interactive "film" with
plenty of side missions that add up to 100 hours of gameplay and features
a soundtrack of more than 200 songs -- the largest in videogame history.

PRESS "BUY"

It's been well established how TV shows, ads and videogames are
growing areas of music discovery and promotion. But until "GTA IV," there's
been no construct that allows for the immediate identification and
purchase of those songs from videogames. "GTA IV" has added that "buy"
button, and record labels welcome the innovation.

"It's a very big deal for us," says Cynthia Sexton, senior vice president of
marketing and licensing for EMI Music North America. "We're continually
looking for new ways to sell our music. There are millions of people
buying 'Grand Theft Auto,' and we hope they will enjoy the music and in
turn buy those tracks."

With this in mind, the music industry could have no better ally than
Rockstar. The outfit is one of the few game developers that actually
creates and licenses its own soundtracks -- a task often left to the game
publisher -- and the company approaches it with a passion close to music-
geek-like obsession.

Consider the back story on how the 1979 cult classic "Walk the Night" by
the Skatt Bros. came to appear on the soundtrack. Skatt Bros. member
Sean Delaney -- also known as the "fifth member of Kiss" for his writing
and production work with the rock band -- died in 2003, leaving his
publishing share to a brother, a sister and a nephew living somewhere in
Utah. They proved so hard to find that Rockstar went through the trouble
of hiring a private investigator who flew to Orum, Utah, to locate them.

"It was just one of those songs we just couldn't let go of," Rockstar music
supervisor Ivan Pavlovich says. "It fit the game perfectly, so we were
obviously determined to track them down."

INSPIRING LOYALTY

It is this resolve to create the best entertainment experience for its fans --
postponing the game's release by almost six months because of quality
concerns, weathering persistent criticism from politicians over the game's
violent content and fighting a hostile takeover bid for parent company
Take-Two Interactive from Electronic Arts -- that has earned Rockstar and
the "GTA" franchise a rabidly loyal following within the gaming community.
As a result, the company may be the ultimate tastemaker for the hardcore
gamer set.

"The 'GTA' developers have gotten a really good reputation for having
really good taste because of the choices they've made," GameSpot editor
Ricardo Torres says. "They're really focused on the quality of the
experience for the player ... (so) there's a lot of anticipation to see what
they've deemed as cool enough to include in the new 'GTA.' "

The soundtrack is dominated by the kind of obscure tracks only the hippest
DJs know to spin, many of which may find new sales life as a result of
Rockstar's partnership with Amazon. According to Pavlovich, the Amazon
music service didn't even have 40 percent of the soundtrack in its
inventory when the deal was made. Rockstar gathered the product from its
many licensees so the store could be fully stocked by launch. This
separates "GTA IV" from other videogame franchises like the "Madden"
football series or "Guitar Hero" and "Rock Band." These are more casual
games generally featuring mainstream hits with the occasional emerging
act thrown in.

"That's fine for the masses," Torres says. "But when you're dealing with a
finicky crowd like gamers, it has to be really cool and really different."

Reuters/Billboard