Brütal Legend: First Impressions

This week has been a slow gaming week for me; in that I havent been playing many new games that have NOT been reviewed on this blog site before. Mainly I've been chasing elusive trophies like Mario chasing that idiot princess of his.
However, today I picked up Brütal Legend; and I've decided that I will do a first impressions review of it.

Brütal Legend was created by Tim Schafer's developers at Double Fine, and was published by Electronic Arts. It is an open world Action/adventure/real time strategy game (if you can believe all that) with a huge heavy metal theme.

STORY
Brütal Legend follows the tale of Eddie Riggs, the worlds greatest Roadie; who is crushed by a falling peice of stage while working for a "wannabe" heavy metal band. He soon finds himself transported to a magical world where his guitar has superpowers, and the land looks like it was ripped straight from a heavy metal album cover.
While in this world, he partakes in a resistance movement against an evil force that controls the land; becoming a hero as he goes.

The story takes a while to get going; at the beginning, you are as clueless as Eddie is as to what is going on and why he's in this mystical world. Once it gets going, however, it is pretty interesting and has a lot of humour and charm to it.

PRESENTATION
As I mentioned above, the entire landscape looks as if it was ripped from a heavy metal album cover, or music video. There are mountains made of giant bones, cliffs made of thousands of Amplifiers, and rock formations in the shape of guitars! It is a metal lovers paradise, filled with characters and creatures that really embody this theme.
Along with the heavy metal style comes an awesome soundtrack that is going to appeal to most, if not all, head bangers. The set list ranges from songs by Motley Crue and Diamond Head, to Slayer and Anthrax.

The voice acting is also pretty strong, featuring many cameo appearances by rock gods like Lemmy Kilmeister (of Motorhead) and Ozzy Osbourne himself; as well as Tim Curry and Jack Black (as protagonist, Eddie Riggs)

GAMEPLAY
If only presentation and charm were enough to save this product of the Metal Gods. I'm not saying that Brütal Legend's gameplay is particularly bad; its just that Double Fine seem to have tried to cram too much into one game.
Here we have an action adventure game, with an open world to explore. Sounds pretty cool. But then we add in the genre of RTS, but you aren't some general watching from afar. No, sir, you are in the midst of the battle; so not only do you have to command your units and defend your bases, you also have to worry about your own ass.

On the action adventure basis, Brütal Legend works rather well; despite the lack of a jump button, which i found odd. You have guitar attacks (ranged) and Axe attacks (standard melee); as well as a bunch of Guitar Solos; acting as a rhythm based quick time event that work in a variety of ways.
These uses range from Face Melting, to summoning your dragster, "The Deuce".

On the RTS front, I'm not sure I'm one to comment well on it. I've never been a fan of rts, but I'm willing to give it a try. However, RTS seems to work best when viewing the entire battlefield, and having the accuracy to command certain squads to do your bidding. In Brütal Legend, this is difficult as your camera is constantly stuck behind Eddie in 3rd person view mode; and more often than not, you'll have multiple enemies attacking you.

Playing the game on Brütal difficulty probably doesn't help my opinion on it, but so be it. As much fun as Brütal Legend can be, it can also get frustrating.

REPLAYABILITY
In Brütal Legend, not only do you have the single player campaign, but you also have a multiplayer aspect; in the form of a Player vs Player RTS battle; with each player commanding the leader of their army in 3rd person view. There is also a multitude of side quests and collectibles to find, so compulsive gamers, or achievement/trophy whores will be at this one for a while.

OVERVIEW
Despite having charm and humour in bucket loads, Brütal Legend falls short in the gameplay department for me. Its as if the developers threw too much into the game, and p[rayed that it would work. Although, the presentation and theme are enough to keep me coming back, at least until it is finished.
If you're a metal fan, this may suit you; however the RTS gameplay might ruin the experience a bit.

Sorry about the first impressions review guys, but I was a bit pressed for time, as well as a game to review. So, enjoy it anyway, and keep coming back to read... please? See you next time!