Guitar Hero revival tipped for consoles later this year

It's time to brush up on your guitar skills and dust off that old controller. Or maybe not, since you might have to buy a new one just for this rumored comeback. Kotaku UK reports that Guitar Hero might be due a sequel and that it will be announced at E3 in June and that it will launch before 2015 ends. If true, then this year could very well be known as the revival of the music jamming games, with Rock Band also rumored to be back in town.

Despite initial booming sales and popularity, music games like Guitar Hero and Rock Band eventually started to die out. In 2011, Activision called it quits and pulled the plug on Guitar Hero and eventually closed down the game studios that were in charge of the game. Fast-forward four years later, word on the street is that Guitar Hero will be appearing this year once more.

This rumor couldn't have come at a better time, or perhaps a more suspicious time. Just last week, Harmonix, who develops Rock Band, was said to also be planning a return of the franchise. That said, both games will be up for quite a challenge. The gaming landscape has changed considerably since then, with many of music games' audience moving on to mobile gaming.

Like the Rock Band rumor, this new Garage Band is unsurprisingly said to be targeting the latest consoles, which mean the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One. What will significantly change is the artistic style of the game, with the upcoming version believed to be adopting a more realistic style in contrast to the previous installments' cartoonish visuals.

Activision says that it doesn't comment on speculation but it hasn't closed the doors to a Guitar Hero sequel as well. The only way they will revive the franchise is if they have come up with a new innovation that will catapult the title back to glory. Whether it has really reached that or not, we will most likely know in a few months.