Disney Interactive Studios is hardly renowned for its originality in the videogames industry. After all, you just know that a generic 3D platformer based on the firm’s latest blockbuster animation is an inevitability year after year, just as it has pilfered ideas from nearly every other popular type of videogaming experience. Given the success of rhythm-based music games of late, particularly Guitar Hero and Rock Band, it won’t come as a surprise to see DIS today announcing Ultimate Band for the Nintendo Wii and Nintendo DS.

[Screenshots source: Game Informer]

Ultimate Band’s storyline will sound suspiciously familiar to any fan of Guitar Hero or Rock Band. Players will have the opportunity to carve out a career in the music industry, either as a solo artist or through heading a rock band. Your journey will begin by terrorising the neighbours at all hours with an ungodly racket in your garage, all the way up to pleasing thousands in gigantic stadium venues around the world. New songs, venues and accessories will become available along the way.

Ultimate Band on the Nintendo Wii utilises the Remote and Nunchuk to give music fans the ability to play the drums, bass guitar, lead guitar, or take on the role of the front man.

The Nintendo DS version differs in that it is a rhythm-based music game with its very own built-in recording studios. Players can jam to current and classic songs using the drums, lead guitar, bass guitar, or rhythm guitar, and also create their own original songs using the DS touch screen and stylus to lay down tracks for each instrument and apply creative mixing effects. What’s more, handheld owners will be able to make use of Disney’s DGamer online community to, we presume, share their musical compositions.

“Ultimate Band invites kids, tweens and teens to join in the jam session,” said Craig Relyea, senior vice president, global marketing, Disney Interactive Studios. “And whether they choose guitar, drums, bass or front man, members don’t need to buy costly, single-function peripherals to play their way through Ultimate Band’s deep song list, dynamic venues, and customizable characters. The Wii Remote and DS stylus are the only tools they’ll need to reach rock stardom in Ultimate Band.”

“Radial worked closely with Disney to compile the perfect song list for Ultimate Band,” said David Hill of Radial Music. “With iconic songs from every decade since the 60s, these games feature music for everyone.”

Ultimate Band is currently scheduled to rock your world in the holiday season of 2008. It’s like Rock Band… without the instruments. Interested? Let us know in the comments section below.