For a short time, it was almost impossible to go to a party without seeing a group of friends playing either Rock Band or Guitar Hero, but the two game oversaturated the market with an endless stream of sequels that offered little more than a few new songs to play, and as a result, the rhythm game genre dried up as suddenly as it had arrived.

Last year, the two game series finally made their next-gen comeback with Rock Band 4, the first mainline Rock Band title since 2010, and Guitar Hero Live, also the first mainline Guitar Hero game since 2010.

Unfortunately, five years does not seem to have been enough time for the public to overcome their apathy to the rhythm game genre, as neither game performed as well as their creators had hoped.

In fact, Rock Band 4 sold so much less than expected that Mad Catz Interactive Inc, which developed the specialized musical instrument controllers used for the game, were forced to lay off over a third of its staff earlier this week.

Karen McGinnis, the recently appointed CEO of Mad Catz, said in a statement that Rock Band 4’s sales were “strong,” yet they were apparently not as strong as the company expected.

“Our quarterly net sales were the second highest in the Company’s history reflecting strong Rock Band 4 sales, which were partially offset by continuing softness in sales of our audio and PC gaming products,” McGinnis said. “However, Rock Band sell-through was lower than originally forecast resulting in higher inventory balances as well as lower margins due to increased promotional activity with retailers.”

Things didn’t go great for Guitar Hero either

Now it seems that Guitar Hero Live had a similarly disappointing performance according to Activision Blizzard Inc’s recent earnings call (via EuroGamer), in which Activision said that the game had a “lower than expected performance.”

Activision did not reveal the exact sales figures for Guitar Hero Live, but “lower than expected” is about as damning as the company could be on a call with investors.

Activision CEO Eric Hirshberg also reaffirmed that while the company would continue producing content for Guitar Hero Live, it will not release another full Guitar Hero game during this console generation.

Based on the timeline of the previous console generation, that could mean a minimum of another four or five years before we could see another Guitar Hero, and if Mad Catz is not able to turn things around soon, it seems unlikely that we will see another Rock Band any time soon either.

Image credit: Harmonix / Rock Band 4