Harmonix, or Harmonix Music Systems in full, is a video game developer in Cambridge, Massachusetts. As the name might imply, they work primarily on the Rhythm Game genre. The main reason behind this is because many, if not most of their developers, are passionate about music, and even have side projects related to their bands, such as Freezepop, That Handsome Devil, and Bang Camaro. This is why many games feature their music.
The company was founded in 1995, but it wasn't until 2001 that their first game, Frequency, was released. They are perhaps most well known for starting the Guitar Hero, Rock Band, and Dance Central franchises.
In 2006, the company was acquired by Viacom through MTV's short-lived gaming division. After declining sales due to over-saturation of both the Rock Band and Guitar Hero franchises and the impact of the Great Recession, Viacom sold Harmonix to its stock holders by the end of 2010 after they marked the unit as a discontinued operation to write off a $299 million loss for its 2010 third-quarter earnings statement. As a result, Harmonix operated as an independent game developer until November 2021, when Epic Games bought the company.
Games and franchises developed by Harmonix:
- Frequency (2001)
- Amplitude (2003, remade in 2016)
- Karaoke Revolution (2003)
- Karaoke Revolution Vol. 2 (2004)
- Karaoke Revolution Vol. 3 (2004)
- Karaoke Revolution Party (2005)
- CMT Presents: Karaoke Revolution Country (2006)
- EyeToy: AntiGrav (2004)note
- Guitar Hero (2005)
- Guitar Hero II (2006)
- Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s (2007)
- Phase (2007)
- Rock Band (2007)
- Rock Band 2 (2008)
- Rock Band Unplugged (2009)
- The Beatles: Rock Band (2009)
- LEGO Rock Band (2009)
- Rock Band Mobile (2009)
- Green Day: Rock Band (2010)
- Rock Band 3 (2010)
- Rock Band Blitz (2012)
- Rock Band 4 (2015)
- Rock Band Rivals (2016)
- Dance Central (2010)
- Dance Central 2 (2011)
- Dance Central 3 (2012)
- Dance Central Spotlight (2014)
- Dance Central (2019) (2019)
- Vid Rhythm (2011)
- Record Run (2014)
- A City Sleeps (2014)
- Fantasia: Music Evolved (2014)
- Chroma (cancelled, originally planned for 2014)
- Beat Sports (2015)
- Super Beat Sports (2017)
- BeatNiks
- Harmonix Music VR (2016)
- SingSpace (2017)
- Dropmix (2017)
- Audica (2019)
- Twitch Sings (2019)
- Fuser (2020)
- Fortnite Festival (2023)note
