Epic Games acquires Rock Band developer Harmonix

Harmonix, the developer behind the likes of Rock Band and last year’s music mixing title Fuser, has been acquired by Epic Games to “create musical journeys and gameplay for Fortnite.”

Harmonix was founded in 1995 and began carving a rhythm-action niche for itself with the 2001 release of celebrated PS2-exclusive Frequency and its much-loved sequel Amplitude. 2005 saw the studio release Guitar Hero, arguably its most impactful game to date, which would go on to spawn a steady succession of sequels – although the developer would soon leave the series behind to expand on Guitar Hero’s plastic instrument premise with 2007’s Rock Band.

Since then, Harmonix has continued to focus on music games, releasing the likes of Dance Central, 2016’s Amplitude revival, the VR-focussed Audica and, most recently, Fuser – all of which brings us to today and the announcement of the studio’s acquisition by Fortnite and Unreal Engine developer Epic Games.

“Over the last 26 years we have pushed ourselves to redefine how people experience and interact with music,” Harmonix wrote in a post announcing the acquisition. “Now, we’ll be working with Epic to once again challenge expectations as we bring our unique brand of musical gaming experiences to the Metaverse, and we couldn’t be more excited.”