Kudos to Gamasutra for digging through Viacom's recent SEC filings and unearthing this gem: "We believe that we are entitled to a refund of a substantial portion of amounts previously paid, but the final amount of the earn-out has not yet been determined."
During yesterday's quarterly conference call with investors, Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman pointed his finger firmly in Rock Band's direction when detailing the reasons for the company's 3.4% revenue slide. "It certainly was a challenging year in 2009 for the videogame industry in general, and certainly the Rock Band franchise," Dauman said.
Dauman also said the company's games unit will move away from peripheral hardware, and be more selective in the royalty-based music tracks it releases for Rock Band.
Sharkey says: More bad news for Harmonix, which already announced 39 layoffs in December. Hard to believe the folks who unleashed the Guitar Hero and Rock Band phenomena on the world are suddenly under fire.
