Circuit Jerk

Brutal Legend is something I’m glad I experienced, but I won’t be covering the ceiling over my bed with its posters. The game is witty and fun, but also shallow.

I can’t really sugarcoat it, Brutal Legend isn’t anything special. It only really stands out when so many games try to take themselves seriously, Brutal Legend goes for a fantasy world of Metal puns and one shot jokes. It’s funny to the point of where even the “Evil” life ending world destroying demon doesn’t ever scare you or make you feel threatened.

Combat is simplistic, relying mostly on hitting the “A” and “X” buttons. Eventually you learn guitar solos, where in the middle of battle, you jam on the “Right Trigger,” choose your weapon, and then do a mini-Simon Says with the buttons.

Most larger battles force you into a simplistic Real Time Strategy mode where you have to build “Merc Booths” on top of geysers that spew out the souls of fans. These add up points so you can build your various units and send them into battle. The system surprisingly works well with one problem, the commands are a little “iffy.” You might send people to a certain area, but there’s no guarantee that the right group is going to go there, or that they will make it there at all.

The most frustrating part was when you had to send one particular unit in to do something they could only do. If you have 20 guys standing around, holding down the “Y” button until you selected who you were trying to can be a tiresome ordeal.

The story and the jokes are pretty funny. Puns and one liners fill about 90% of the dialogue. These could’ve gotten old quickly, but there were jokes that I didn’t expect. The storyline takes everything that had to do with metal and hard rock in the 1970s-80s and satires the hell outta it. Hell, even Ozzy Osborne is literally the Prince of Darkness in the game. Way to go writers.

I attempted a few of the side missions, but for the most part they were just miniature versions of what the main story had you doing. That’s the sort of thing that can make a story stale.

Just playing through the main game, I probably beat it in about six hours. It was about the perfect amount of time before I started getting tired of the game.

I fully expect there to be a second Brutal Legend. I can’t imagine this game costing much to make and if the E3 hype for it reflected at all on sales, they are good to go. I think the enemy in the second game will have to branch out of metal and perhaps we’ll see Jack Black taking on a Roller Disco Queen or a Kurt Cobain grungy sort of guy.