So Black Sabbath bid farewell on a final performance this week, marking the sunset of Ozzy Osbourne’s nearly 60-year career. This reminded me of his own part in another piece of media from the days of yore: Brutal Legend.
I was in my early days as a journalist when EA announced Brutal Legend and I was immediately hooked: a 3D action-adventure game portraying the very best aspects of heavy metal in a quasi-medieval/hellish landscape with demons abound—also Jack Black? What’s there not to like?
Back then, gaming magazines were still the norm, so there wasn’t much news floating around in real time, but every time the game showed up on any feed, I made a case of paying attention, getting more and more hype. Sadly, the entire endeavor had mixed reviews and it never went further than its own, sole game. Still, I maintain that Brutal Legend was one of the best games of its time, and I need you to understand why…
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Table of contents
- Brutal Legend was an ode to heavy metal (when heavy metal was ailing)
- A cast that overshadowed any music festival
- Brutal Legend’s writing was beautiful and we’ll die on this hill
- Final thoughts: why did it fail (and can we fix it?)
Brutal Legend was an ode to heavy metal (when heavy metal was ailing)
I’ll start this off by saying there was nothing particularly wrong with the heavy metal scene back in October 2009, when Brutal Legend came out. Music is fluid enough to cater to everyone’s taste and fluctuations are, to me, more related to personal opinion than any factual perception.
Having said that, heavy metal was, at the time, different: while we had many of today’s greats gaining momentum back then, much of the so-called “peak” had already come and gone with the 80s.
That was the initial premise of Brutal Legend: as lead character Eddie Riggs (Jack Black) was “the world’s best roadie” working for “the world’s worst metal band”, while he himself was a child of the 80s, cater to that feeling that us older folk had at the time: “yeah, the new stuff is fun, but I miss the Ozzy-eating-a-bat-on-stage time.” Eddie was a man on disillusion, working for a band that did nothing to add to the genre and was more concerned about sales pitches and teen-demographic style headbanging (which, as any man with a receding hairline will tell you, is just the inappropriate form of headbanging: we used to do it for a reason, like proper gentlemen…)
Then shenanigans happen and Eddie is transported to a world entirely made under 80s heavy metal album cover aesthetics, with equally design demons, presented as that world’s savior, to the power of “real” rock and roll.
Kojima would never come up with something so intricate, I tell you…
A cast that overshadowed any music festival
Nowadays, we have Coachella, Lollapalooza and several other musical grand standing festivals that are more about brand experience than music. Again, nothing inherently wrong with that but…remember when rock concerts were about rock bands and rock fans?
Well, Tim Schafer, Brutal Legends main driving force as the game’s creative director, did. And by his own personal experiences, he often quoted concerts from great artists from that time: Judas Priest’s Rob Halford, Lita Ford, the aforementioned Ozzy Osbourne, Motorhead’s Lemmy Kilmister…they all were there, one way or the other. And even those who weren’t served as inspiration (such as the main antagonist’s obvious mix of David Bowie and glam metal group White Lion).
But, as Crime Boss: Rockay City will tell you, no matter how star studded is your cast, they would only do so much with crappy writing…
Brutal Legend’s writing was beautiful and we’ll die on this hill
One thing about having a comedian such as Jack Black playing the lead: the entire plot will have a penchant for tickling your funny bones. Right from the get go, the game prompt’s you the option of beeping or allowing curse words—spoiler: beeping was a lot funnier.
Plot-wise, Brutal Legend had nothing out of the ordinary: Jack Black does Jack Black stuff, which is most of the heavy lifting, honestly, but everything just fits. The jokes are just the right amount of funny, the quips are timely and never feel out of nowhere…if anything, my gripe with the game’s writing comes from deeper details (like the ending, which I won’t spoil here even though this is a 16-year old game).
There’s a Brazilian expression I’m very fond of that states: “you gotta learn how to drive a Beetle before buying a Ferrari”. Basically, it tells you to guarantee having the most excellent basic stuff possible, before delivering average premium features. While this lesson may seem lost on gaming nowadays, this is something that Double Fine did very well.
Like I said, you won’t find any Kojima-esque turn of events within Brutal Legend’s plot: I’ll even risk saying that about 80% of what the story throws at you is to be expected. But the delivery is just on point, which fits me just fine.
There’s a weird, very Jack Black-like introduction, an overarching story divided in two acts, many famous (and funny) cameos—even a betrayal— and an ending that makes sense (although it could be better). What it lacked was overall development, as some things taking place felt somewhat too sudden, like a twist that came earlier or later than it should.
Final thoughts: why did it fail (and can we fix it?)
To say that Brutal Legend “failed” requires explanation: all in all, critical reception of the game was mostly favorable. Some of the most outstanding outlets at the time reviewed it to an average 7/10 score (even my own, after the game came out: EGM Brazil shout-out!).
The perception of failure comes mostly from a huge hype that, in many-but-not-all instances, was largely misplaced, not akin to expecting Mega-Man to be The Legend of Zelda: different goals, different focus, different everything, but both are great in their own right.
I like to think there’s an audience for everything, which is great, as it brings variety to the gaming industry as a whole. But Brutal Legend managed to check all the “good game” boxes and is still perceived as something of a failure. So how do we make it better?
Well, my take on this? Remake it.
We are at a moment where most games are getting some sort of re-release. This era of second winds has The Last of Us as its greatest champion (how’s the count on that? Five or six times we played two games over and over again?) and it’s something that, well, brings some benefit.
Final Fantasy VII—the original—was a great game, arguably one that did not need a remake. But not only it got one, the current project fills a lot of gaps left by the original, while adding even more detail, giving a renewed take to a very old game. So why can’t Brutal Legend benefit from the same thoughts?
Well, there *is* a whole judicial fight that was settled out of court involving EA, Double-Fine and Vivendi, who was meant to be the game’s original publisher before being acquired Activision. Furthermore, Double Fine was acquired by Microsoft on June 2019—and we all know how anything related to Microsoft’s acquisitions have been going lately…
At least you can still play it: Steam and GOG both have PC versions with upgraded visuals and better sounds.
Point is, I’m not holding my breath for an eventual Brutal Legend remake, but I would most certainly welcome it with the sign of the horn held up high.
