Tim Schafer is back with his first game since Psychonauts, and it definitely isn't a stain on his reputation.
The game stars Eddie Riggs, a heavy metal roadie (voiced by Jack Black) that is mysteriously transported to a medieval age in which the environments bear a resemblance to the same type of music. Eddie soon finds himself building an army to rebel against Emporor Doviculus, the evil "king" who is rapidly taking over the land. The plot of the game is quite simple and yet interesting at the same time, mainly due to the many hilarious moments scattered throughout the game.
Many people have considered Brutal Legend to be a Real-Time Strategy title, which has disappointed many due to expecting more of a hack-and-slash sty-le Action-Adventure game. But in a way, I found this game to be a mixture of both of these genres. Although Brutal Legend has you commanding a fleet of metal-based soldiers while in combat, this is still a sandbox game, allowing you to freely roam across the large continent as you kill enemies in many different ways while taking on side-missions and buying upgrades at the "Motor Forge".
Speaking of which, the game does allow you to do some fighting on your own as well as command your army to run to various parts of the battlefield. Your main attacks feature using a battle axe to hack and slash your way through various types of enemies in close-range battles, while your guitar, "Clementine", can use lightning and fire attacks to damage the enemy from slightly farther away, and also use different types of guitar solos that can be used to kill enemies (although some of the solos are only usable during open-world exploration). You also have a car, called the "Druid Plow", which can be used in combat to fire missles, machine gun turrets, and other types of weapons when you aren't simply driving around the world map.
The stage battles (the main RTS aspect of Brutal Legend), however, can mainly force you to let your army (called "Ironheade") do most of the fighting for you. You are given access to assorted types of troops, which grow in variety as you progress through the game, which are recruited into battle thanks to "Merch Booths" that you construct more and more across your fighting territory. I can't be one to judge on how good this game's strategy elements are compared to other games of the genre, since I haven't played many other strategy games, but the elements seem to be lacking sometimes. This is mainly because all you can really do in battle is tell your army to either follow you, go to a certain location, or go absolutely haywire on any enemies that dare to come their way. Overall, the RTS portion of Brutal Legend can be fun, but at times can be tedious and repetitive as well.
On the other hand, the Action-Adventure part of this game is completely different. The game never forces you to go straight to your next objective in this game, and thus allows you to go pretty much wherever you want on the world map, even areas that you haven't quite travelled to yet. There are plenty of side missions scattered across the continent, which are fun to play every now and then, but my only complaint about them is that there isn't too much variety in them. You'll often come across the same type of missions over and over again, which can make them get a little boring after a while if you find yourself trying to complete all of them at once. It isn't too much of a problem, though, because the side missions can be quite fun at the same time. The other thing that you will frequently come across as you explore is the "Motor Forge", a store in which you can purchase upgrades for your car and weapons using "Fire Tributes", the currency that you collect by finishing side missions or progressing through the game. The store is run by none other than the Guardian of Metal, voiced by Ozzy Osbourne himself, and it features a rapidly-growing library of items that will take quite a bit of effort and patience to completely finish collecting.
But one of the things that shines above all in Brutal Legend is the game's soundtrack, which is absolutely amazing. The game's music features songs from every genre of heavy metal, including types of metal that I didn't even know of until I played this game. Featuring songs by classic metalheads and the more modern metalheads, this game's music will have you constantly headbanging as you play deeper and deeper into the game. An amazing variety of music, overall.
Overall, Brutal Legend is a hilarious game that's a blast to play, and I would highly recommend it to fans of Tim Schafer's previous games and fans of heavy metal alike.
Breakdown by category:
Plot: 8.5/10
Graphics: 8/10
Gameplay: 8.5/10
Sound: 10/10
Replay Value: 8/10
Fun level: 8.5/10
Pros:
+ Amazing soundtrack.
+ Lots of side missions
+ Stage battles can be a lot of fun
+ Many hilarious moments to be found across the game
+ The fact that Jack Black, Ozzy, and Lemmy are all in the same game
Cons:
- Side missions can get boring due to lack of variety
- Side missions can sometimes be frustrating and tedious
Overall score: 8.5/10