Headbangers serve as your basic infantry unit. Yes, Brutal Legend is a RTS game.
Monkey Island. Full Throttle. Grim Fandango. Psychonauts. What do these games all have in common? One thing: Tim Schafer. The man has been cursed the past few years: he has created critically acclaimed games that have been flops at retail (see: Psychonauts). Brutal Legend is his latest offering, and it contains star power like Jack Black, Ozzy Osborne, and a whole slew of metalheads. Will this heavy metal epic find the retail success that has eluded Schafer recently? More importantly, is the game worth your precious dollars, and more importantly, your precious time in the wake of all the holiday releases?
I had been keeping an eye on Brutal Legend all year, but upon its release it met with mixed reviews so I wasn’t sure. I ended up picking it up along with Borderlands during an Amazon sale, and I’m really glad I did! If you don’t know anything about the game, it’s best described as an action/RTS hybrid heavy metal epic. That’s right, it’s an incredible mouthful, and very ambitious in its scope.
You play as Eddie Riggs (voiced by Jack Black), a roadie who gets magically summoned to a world steeped in heavy metal (not like zinc, the musical genre). This alternate reality is oppressed by the evil Emperor Deviculus, and Riggs gets caught up in the rebellion. Along the way, he fights various illegitimate heavy metal factions, including hair and nu metal armies. Schafer’s games have always had engaging stories, and Brutal Legend is no exception. I’m kind of a sucker, so my opinion might be biased, but I grew really attached to the characters and definitely felt the emotional swings during the plot twists.
The world Schafer has created is amazing, and definitely is the best part about this game. Brutal Legend’s world looks exactly as I’d imagine an alternate heavy metal dimension would, and heavy metal music is used to great effect. The soundtrack includes 107 tracks from 75 different heavy metal bands, some of which you unlock throughout the course of the game. In addition, there are various heavy metal guests, including Ozzy Osborne, Lemmy, Rob Halford, and Lita Ford. I only knew who Ozzy Osborne was, yet I thought all the characters were perfectly voiced, including Eddie Riggs (Jack Black turned in his best performance since School of Rock). Brutal Legend is a love letter to heavy metal fans, yet even though I don’t know all that much about heavy metal, I found myself booting up Brutal Legend again and again to be a part of its world. In a game about music, I would also add that the soundtrack plays the PERFECT songs to complement the gameplay. It’s remarkable.
The gameplay in Brutal Legend is what has met the most criticism, and I can see where it comes from. From everything I’ve said so far, you’d probably assume that Brutal Legend is a heavy metal version of God of War, something that was casually mentioned during the game’s development. Yet Brutal Legend is essentially a real-time strategy game! You do drive from place to place in the expansive game world in an awesome car, and there are often action sequences where you need to fight enemies on foot. Yet the “boss battles” are real-time strategy affairs, when you control an army of headbangers, healing bassists, and motorcycle riding hell bringers. The single player is basically a tutorial for the multiplayer. You are always in control of your hero character, and you fly around the battlefield giving your troops orders. The unique thing about Brutal Legend is that instead of casting spells as a hero, you play guitar solos (a series of timed button presses) which have a variety of effects ranging from killing enemy troops to buffing your characters to crippling enemy heroes.
Brutal Legend’s battles are not as deep as a game like Halo Wars, which I consider a successful console RTS. There is always only one base per side (no expansions), and you spend the battle making your way across the map trying to grab control of resource points before your opponent can. It essentially becomes a tug of war: if you can control the resources, you can eventually win. Good guitar solo use also is essential. It’s sometimes tough to see the battle since you are always only in control of one unit, and my biggest frustration with the RTS in Brutal Legend was that it can get very difficult to split your units and assign individual orders. You do have “team up” attacks with each of your units so you can kind of separate them, but for the most part it can be difficult. I found myself generally massing an army and slowly rolling through the battlefield most of the time. There are 8 or 9 of these major battles throughout the course of the campaign, although there are a lot of smaller side missions you can undertake as well (which tend to get repetitive). I see a lot of potential in the system, but right now it’s just not as clean as it should be.
That being said, I never really found myself frustrated, and that’s mostly because the world is so awesome (though I’m not too interested in multiplayer). I wanted to see what happened in the story, and the battles weren’t so difficult that I wanted to give up. I really love this game despite its gameplay flaws. Schafer and his team obviously took a lot of risks in this game in an attempt to try something new and different. It may not have been executed perfectly, but I think they should be applauded for that, since innovation is what keeps games fun. The game isn’t perfect, but I’d definitely recommend checking it out. What other game will get you screaming “decapitatioooooooooooonnnnnn!?!?” Did I forget to mention this game has a great sense of humor?
Final Grade: B+
