Drums \ Pro Drums: Involves hitting the correct inputs. The normal mode has a bass pedal and 4 drums (one acts as snare, the other three divide tom and cymbal duties). The pro mode adds 3 cymbals, for 8 inputs total, but otherwise plays the same.
Vocals \ Harmonies: Lines on the highway dictate the target pitch level for each syllable of each vocal part (using sloped lines for Melismatic Vocals). Players try to sing to the same note as the lines, but the octave doesn't matter (e.g. singing a C2 while the real singer is in C4 is acceptable).
"Legacy" Guitar\Bass: These guitars have a fret board with 5 (main) buttons and 1 strum bar. When a gem reaches to bottom of the highway, the player must hit the strum bar while holding the fret button(s) that correspond to the gem(s). Without the strum bar, pressing fret buttons by itself has no effect, making this quite different from drum gameplay.
"Legacy" Keys: Could be considered similar to Legacy Guitar with a touch of drums, in terms of gameplay. Here, there are 5 keys, and the correct key must simply be played when the gem representing that key reaches the bottom of the highway (with the strumming mechanic removed). Legacy G\B charts can be played on keys, but fast "strumming" becomes fast repeated note hitting. Conversely, Legacy K charts can be played on guitar and bass, but keyboard chords tend to be more difficult than guitar chords in a 5-button paradigm, especially when played on a guitar controller.
Punk, 90's/00's/10's with 13 song. First released on Jan. 15, 2008 with "All The Small Things." The song happens to be the series' best-selling single, baring the free songs.
). First released on RB1 launch day, Nov. 20, 2007 with a small pack, their only release to date. Has also had all their on-disc songs ("Enter Sandman" and "Battery") removed from their respective export.]]
Alternative/Rock, 90's/00's/10's with 27 songs. First released (as DLC) on July 8, 2008 with two singles from Stadium Arcadium. Notably one of the few artists to have their songs removed from the RB2 export to RB3 ("Give It Away"), bringing them down from a potential 28. "Dani California" from RB1 had also received this treatment for a time.
Classic Rock, 60's/70's/80's/00's/10's with 17 songs. First released (as DLC) on July 15, 2008 with a 12-pack, The Best of The Who (Rock Band Edition), which was the series' first Greatest Hits 12 pack.
Though Harmonix wasn't willing to give any numbered order, they confirmed that The Beatles are #1, despite their store being separate.
Queen is arguable since Lego: Rock Band had two of their songs, the inseparable "We Will Rock You" and "We Are The Champions" along with their appearance on RB3.
Additionally, Dave Grohl appears as a guest drummer for the Queens Of The Stone Age in "Go With The Flow" (RB1) and "No One Knows" (RB3), takes drumming duties for Tenacious D in their song "Master Exploder" (RB2) and as a full member of Them Crooked Vultures ("Dead End Friends" on RB3) and Nirvana ("In Bloom" on RB1 and "Drain You" on RB2), giving him 9 appearances in the series' disc titles so far.
To this day only one band among these has appeared on all three main-disc titles: The Who with Won't Get Fooled Again on 1, Pinball Wizard on 2, and I Can See For Miles on 3. One thing that these three on disc songs by The Who have in common is that that they were in reverse chronological order (70's in the first game, and 60's in the second and third games) and it was during the time Keith Moon was the drummer for the Who.
All the other artists listed had songs appear on RB1, RB2 and Lego RB, excepting The Police (RB1, RB3 and Lego). Each of these other artists have had RB3-compatible DLC released since RB3 was released.
