Ass kickers unite!
By Ben Salter
Developed by legendary game designer Tim Schafer, staring Jack Black, featuring awesome music, great gameplay and a humorous narrative. On paper
Brutal Legend appears to have everything going for it. To an extent it does, and that’s why it’s such a hard game to review. As a mash-up of an action brawler, RTS and escort racer
Brutal Legend is great in some areas, but tries to be a jack of all trades when it needed to focus on one of its more favourable aspects.
Brutal Legend has something most games forgo; passion, and a story that is actually entertaining, not just a bland filler piece between missions. You play as Eddie Riggs, voiced by Jack Black, a simple roadie from a time when music meant something. Eddie is the best in business, he can fix anything, tune any instrument, and he lives for rock. But there’s one thing he cannot stand. The emo wannabe rockers made popular by their legions of tween fans. When he’s injured in a freak stage accident Eddie is transported to another world; a world full of demons, chrome V-8 engines and rock. A world forged by the gods of heavy metal. Here he finds a resistance movement oppressed by the tyrant Doviculus, and using all that he has learned upon his path as a roadie, Eddied realises his true density as their saviour.
The cutscenes are absolutely amazing, and are what we’ve come to expect from Schafer. They’re full of what’s best described as eye-humour. The wide eyes of every character, along with the quick whit delivered by Jack Black (who also plays himself in the flesh during the intro) makes Brutal Legend one of the funniest games in a long time. As a fan of metal Shafter includes cameos from music icons, such as Ossy Osborne, and has some of the best music from the rock offset.
Brutal Legend begins as a standard action-adventure game, anyone who’s played the demo will have a general idea of what I mean. I’d even say it has a little bit of a Zelda meets heavy metal feel to it at the onset. You begin learning about your badass giant axe, and your guitar, which has accumulated magic shocking abilities in the new world. They combine to create some truly amazing attacks, and when controlled by a guy who looks like Jack Black on steroids you feel unstoppable. After an hour or two you’ll stumble across a mini-dungeon complete with a giant metallic spider to defeat. Sadly, it’s here that Brutal Legend peaks. You’ll be hard pressed to find another boss, and for whatever reason the developers over at Double Fine decided it would be a great idea to turn a fun action-adventure brawler into a real time strategy game. Not that there's anything wrong with that, it just seems a little odd that they'd create a great action-adventure game then slowly start to change the genre and style.
The thing with RTS games is that you either love them or you don’t. That’s what makes it even worse; it’s not a real RTS title. If you enjoyed playing the beginning you’ll be disappointed at the change of direction in general gameplay, and if you’re a fan of real-time strategy you’ll be disappointed at the lack of depth. We fit into the former; I’ve got a giant axe and a badass protagonist, I don’t want to waste my time trying to direct incompetent troops. To make matters worse you don’t really have enough control over your units, but they fail to do their own thing so you can’t just leave them and run off. The D-Pad is used to give clunky commands, and offers nowhere near the level of control you get with a mouse and keyboard. That isn’t to say it’s not enjoyable; it just won’t really appeal to either the hardcore action brawler crowd or RTS fans, as it sits somewhere in between. If you’re up for a basic mash-up of the two, and I mean basic non-conventional RTS, then Brutal Legend may very well be the game for you. However, I was left wanting it to go back to the action-adventure game it was at the beginning. Unfortunately it kept becoming more and more of a watered-down RTS, which is exactly what I didn’t want to happen. Yes, I knew it was an RTS before I played it, but it’s almost a tease leading you into a false sense of security with some great action brawling play and then BAM! We’re into RTS mode, a totally different genre, and it just didn’t work as Double Fine had intended.
The action combat is actually quite good. Using your mega Axe and shocking guitar you have a whole range of melee and combo attacks at your disposal. Every character that joins your party will offer a different double-team attack. Most of them either involve Eddie throwing the other character at the enemy in a humorous manner, or in some way relate back to rock, such as the head banging technique.
The third component to this little bit of everything affair is the escort missions. Eddie’s V8 roadster, The Deuce, is the perfect vehicle for travelling in such a world; it’s got style and can be customised by Ossy Osborne! The missions are generally short, straight to the point, and fun. Most involve rushing off somewhere either against the clock or collapsing bridge. Best of all is that The Deuce can be used at any time between missions to explore the vast open world. These missions are great for anyone disappointed at the transition from action brawler to RTS. They break things up, but to be honest most tasks in Brutal Legend are over in less than 15 minutes. On the whole it’ll only take you about 7 hours to complete. Some of the side quests were entertaining, and give you around 9 hours play in total, which is still far too short.
The world of Brutal Legend is a sight to behold. It’s not often that I stop to admire a scene in a videogame, but you’ll want to take-in every last minute of the world that is Brutal Legend. It’s a tribute to heavy metal. The scenes, the characters, the music, the vibe, everything is almost perfect. The use of different colours and textures is amazing. It may not be the best, or most realistic, looking game out there, but this is how to create a game world. We’ve already mentioned it, but serious kudos has to be given for all of the voice acting and scripting. Jack Black does what he does best playing a badass rocker (or roadie in this instance). It’s not often that a game is actually laugh out loud funny, but Brutal Legend is just that.
Likewise the game’s soundtrack is a thing of beauty. With over 100 heavy metal tracks it’s sure to keep you head banging right until the ending credits. Don’t let that discourage you if metal isn’t your favourite genre; I’m far from being the world’s biggest fan but it suited the overall mood of the game so well that I really got into it.
The multiplayer component pits you against an opponent playing in a similar fashion to the single player. The three mash-up genre elements are back, but aren’t any better against an opponent online. The RTS elements are much more important here than they are in the single player, but there isn't depth enough to provide a long lasting experience.
The Final Verdict
Brutal Legend is a genuine laugh out loud narrative driven adventure. The genius of Tim Shafer combines with the talent of Jack Black to create a predictable story that is still worth playing. The world is amazing, the sound track is brilliant and the game itself is a tribute to metal. The action-adventure brawling gameplay is fun, but ruined somewhat by the transition to RTS if you’re not a fan. It’s still fun to play, but either the two genres don’t go together or you have to start out as a fully blown RTS from the beginning. Moving away from being in the action to controlling it was an experiment that just didn’t work out. Still, if you’re into heavy metal it’s worth overlooking the gameplay mash-up to experience the world that is Brutal Legend.
Gameplay
7.5/10
It felt like Zelda meets metal to begin with, but the RTS elements just didn’t work out. It’s still a fun game with great combat and driving components, but it just keeps taking you further away from what you want if you’re not into RTS.
Graphics
9.0/10
Brutal Legend has one of the best worlds I’ve ever seen. It’s perfect for the context of the game and the character models are great.
Sound
9.5/10
A legendary heavy metal track list that you can appreciate even if you don’t love the genre.
Value
7.0/10
It’s fairly short at 7-9 hours. The side quests and multiplayer lengthen it out, but it won’t sit in your console for too long.
Overall
7.6/10