MTV recently accounced that they will enable any artist-unsigned emerging act, indie cult fave or major-label superstar-to submit songs for possible inclusion in the Rock Band game.

The plan isn’t as simple as uploading a song to iTunes or anything like that.  Rather, artists and labels will submit songs to a community of trained freelance game developers and other interested programmers who will prepare the tracks for Rock Band.  Additionally, labels can either hire trained developers or school their existing employees to do the work in-house.

Songs submitted through this process must then be reviewed by other developers to check for playability, inappropriate lyrics, copyright infringement and so on. Then approved tracks will be posted to an in-game download store separate from its existing “Rock Band” store where creators can set their own price (50 cents to $3 per song) and receive 30% of any resulting sales. Gamers will also be able to demo 30-second samples of each track.

If this process works and allows for any musician to have a fair chance of getting their music uploaded for games, it could obviously be a great way to attract new fans, as well as allow fans to add some individuality to their game playing experience.

According to Billboard music news, about 700 songs have been made available to download and play on the game. Those titles have sold a combined 50 million downloads through the game, demonstrating an ability to drive sales that has other artists and labels itching to have their music included.

MTV wants “Rock Band” to become a platform for music distribution, using its interactive features to lure music fans who otherwise may not be buying music. 

The primary point of differentiation between “Rock Band” and Activision’s rival “Guitar Hero” franchise is the downloadable feature.