Brutal Legend

From the mind of Tim Schafer, who has worked on many classics such as the Secret of Monkey Island, Full Throttle, Day of the Tentacle, Grim Fandango, and Psychonauts comes Brutal Legend, an absolute love letter to all things heavy metal. In the game you play as a roadie named Eddie Riggs who’s voiced by Jack Black as he grows tired of supporting a shitty tween metal band. He soon however gets caught in an accident that transports him to another world full of crazy locations inspired by heavy metal lore. After managing to escape from the dark forces, discovering his knowledge of rock can actually “blow shit up literally”, and meeting up with a bunch of freedom fighters willing to free their land, its up to Eddie to raise an army and take down the evil Doviculus. Of course being a Tim Schafer game you can easily expect the plot to entertain you with all the hilarious dialogue and unique characters. What I didn’t expect however was at times the game gets serious in a good way (kind of like the final act of Shaun of the Dead) which you really care about what happens to the characters. Of course this is a game so game play is obviously important to enhance the experience and Brutal Legend absolutely delivers. The game is a crazy combination of an action adventure game mixed in with an open world mission structure of fable and Grand Theft Auto, with some RTS elements, hack and slash, and vehicular combat. You’re never doing the same thing and every element of the game coexists perfectly with each other. The voice cast is outstanding as well with Jack Black perfecting the role of Eddie Riggs without being too much like Jack Black. The other celebrity cast is completely made up of rock legends such as Lemmy Kilmister, Lita Ford, Rob Halford, and Ozzy Osbourne are all perfect in their roles and are unexpectedly hilarious. The game also has a robust multiplayer mode that takes the rts sections of the game and pits you against another player with three factions to choose from. Overall, if you love heavy metal, enjoy a great mix of game play styles, or just love Tim Schafer’s work you owe it to yourself to check out this game!