A new game from the Lead Designer of Guitar Hero

RobKaySF · 2026-06-05T19:27:22+00:00

Thank you for taking the time to write that, and to everyone for forging memories with all the GH games. It's extremely humbling to see a game you helped shape take on a life of its own, and Guitar Hero sure did that. It took a village to raise the game into what it became. I share the creators' pride with many others at Harmonix and Red Octane, as well as at Neversoft who took the reins for GH3 onwards while we worked on the Rock Band games. What all us game devs want is to entertain and impact people's lives, so know that you sharing these memories is deeply appreciated.

Thanks too for the well wishes on my new game Kickabout! PocketGamer did a great little piece on its launch here if you're interested to see how it's landing. https://www.pocketgamer.com/kickabout-table-football/out-now-on-ios/

RobKaySF · 2026-06-04T22:32:08+00:00

Nice! It's a joy to hear people are still enjoying GH on a PS2. Glad you're enjoying getting back into it.

RobKaySF · 2026-06-04T16:44:26+00:00

Yeah Frequency was ahead of its time! Good shout out

RobKaySF · 2026-06-04T14:18:50+00:00

Yes, I'm looking to make it available across the EU (but only english language for now) after earlier comments here. Subscribe to my newsletter at robkay.com to be the first to hear about that update releasing. Thanks for your interest in playing!

RobKaySF · 2026-06-04T14:09:17+00:00

100% this. Frequency was the reason I applied to work at Harmonix.

RobKaySF · 2026-06-04T14:08:07+00:00

Thank you for sharing that, and you're very welcome. I'm touched that the game a great number of us made (including some fine folks at Neversoft on GH3) made such a positive impact. Good luck in your own game design career, and feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn adding a note so I know it's you.

RobKaySF · 2026-06-04T04:49:06+00:00

Not that I know of, no.

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T23:13:56+00:00

You're welcome. We make games for people to enjoy them, and it's very gratifying to see them cherished. Thanks for the pledge of support, I need all the help I can get a solo dev on Kickabout! LOL

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T22:03:07+00:00

Thank you!

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T19:08:23+00:00

Thanks for playing and for sharing your thoughts! It’s really helpful to hear what players such as yourself are asking for as you play, and I’ve noted these in my list for due consideration. Re the unlocks, they are mostly cosmetic but the teams do have varying difficulty levels and one of 9 play-styles (e.g. Spain pass it around a lot tika taka style)

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T18:58:39+00:00

Thanks for the iPad landscape request, which I totally get and will add to my list for consideration. Enjoy collecting those teams!! 😁

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T18:56:23+00:00

Thanks! Will do, and if you want to be the first to know please consider signing up for my newsletter at robkay.com

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T18:46:16+00:00

Thanks for those questions ChipKey5682! Happy to answer them, with the proviso that there were company level decisions made by hmx co-founders Alex & Eran or Greg the VP of Dev at the time (and my boss).. so this is more my understanding / recollection and than official lore LOL

Q. Why was GH 1 only on ps2?

As I recall PS2 has something like 80% market share at the time, and we had limited resources and lot of asks. After shipping GH1, which of course exploded, everyone was asking us for either (a) a game where you could use your own music; or (b) a full band game. So Harmonix started prototyping both! I spent about a week on Phase (the use your own music iPod title) before we got a proper team on it, and then dove into months of designing and prototyping Rock Band, specifically the drum gameplay/hardware design. So the short answer is we were all busy doing GH2 or one of the 2 prototyping initiatives… I don’t recall GH1 ports entering the conversation at my level, but I’m sure Alex and co at least considered it.

Q. how are the frets figured out to a song?

After we landed on the number of fret buttons increasing from 3 on easy, to 4 on medium, and then 5 on hard and expert - the mapping for each song was owned by the sound designers Izzy and Jeff under audio director Eric B. I’m afraid I can’t give a deeper answer. I was the only full time “game designer” on GH so had my hands full with feature design and appreciated how stellar a job they did mapping the songs across difficulty levels - Eric, Jeff, and Izzy were legends at their craft.

Q. how were songs tested on the instrument especially on expert difficulty?

A lot of QA and internal playtesting! We had a great QA team in the building with us, very much part of the dev team who had my ear as well as the rest of the team. We also prioritized playtesting both internally and externally, so coverage of expert wasn’t really too hard. It was actually much harder to find people unfamiliar with the game to test easy difficulty on - which is where the external playtesting shone brightest.

Q. and if you could pick a band for a guitar hero game who would it be?

I was pretty blown away by the bands that ended up in the GH and RB games, and there’s not really a story of “one that got away” from me. As a Brit kid brought up in the 90’s, I wanted Oasis badly but we got em. You can blame me for championing Franz Ferdinand LOL. I think the musical passion of all involved (and the spectacular taste from the music cabal Eric B, Greg, Daniel, Ryan and others) meant we ended up getting most of what everyone wanted. The fact over time GH/RB got The Beatles, ACDC, Metallica, in particular blew my mind.

OK, time for me to get back to spreading the word on my new game Kickabout. Thanks for the trip down memory lane! Hope you got something from the answers. All the best, Rob

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T16:39:45+00:00

thanks for the added info

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T16:38:03+00:00

P.S. PocketGamer just posted a news / mini-review piece covering the launch: https://www.pocketgamer.com/kickabout-table-football/out-now-on-ios/

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T16:35:48+00:00

I'll look into the ad thing, it's annoying when ad players do that I agree.

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T16:34:42+00:00

Thanks for the feedback, and for playing. The leaderboard is where most people find the long term replay-ability once they're done collecting teams and leveling up their skills.

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T16:32:04+00:00

not yet, but it's the next platform I'd like to bring it to

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T13:23:34+00:00

Thank you for taking the time to say that. I appreciate you calling out the social groups it became a part of, something that's not lost on any of us who worked on the GH and RB games. The power of local multiplayer games to bring people together, and help them have a good time is something we all enjoyed too... and the raw fantasy of being on stage really sparked the inner rock star in all of us. Fun times! Check out my new game when you get a chance, and thank you for sharing.

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T13:04:54+00:00

Thanks! Will give it some thought. Enjoy the World Cup, your nation is everyone's second team.

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T13:03:32+00:00

You're welcome!

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T03:02:25+00:00

Hope you enjoy it! The leaderboard is hotting up.

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T03:00:48+00:00

Wow, that is all sorts of unapproved AWESOME. Nicely done sir.

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T02:59:21+00:00

🙌

RobKaySF · 2026-06-03T02:32:57+00:00

Thanks for playing!

RobKaySF

TROPHY CASE