Today is a tragic day in my illustrious gaming career, as my Rock Band drumset has broken yet again (and right in time for my purchase of RB2). I would have no gripes if this were an isolated incident, thus making this a slight inconvenience, but this has occured with great frequency.

This will be my 4th drum set since receiving the game last xmas. Also during this period I have successfully burned thru 4 guitars a USB expansion and 6, yes, 6 drum pedals. It has gotten to the point that my local UPS store knows me by name. A sad but true situation.

Now with this vast amount of hardware I have destroyed, one could look at me and say that I am simply misusing the equipment. That is far from the case. My intention is not to break my "instruments" solely that I can put myself at a disadvantage while waiting for a replacement to come. That would be senseless. My gripe lies within the build quality of these peripherals. This is not a new complaint by any means, and I recognize that. It just seems I've been cursed in this aspect. My situation appears to be the slightest bit excessive.

What adds to my frustration, is the onset of accessories for Rockband that are used to up the quality of the peripherals. For example, pedal reinforcements and drum pads. These are two examples of milkage that frustrate me to no end. Instead of upping the quality of the set to begin with, the consumer is now faced with more of a cost.

Rockband 2 seems to have upped the anty with their new drum set, but that doesnt help me here. I just wish they solved these issues when RB1 was in the beta stages.

/rant