Brutal Legend Message Board

A couple of weeks ago, I sat down with one of video gaming's most creative people to talk about... money. Money. Business. And how things are so different and so much better in this, Tim Schafer's 25th year making video games.Read more...

It’s not Android games, nor soundtracks, nor books about kettles. The new Humble Bundle is the original, the Humble Indie Bundle 9. And for a ninth time in a row, it’s a corker. With names like Mark Of The Ninja, FTL: Faster Than Light, and FEZ, you can see the dollar signs spinning already.

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Brutal Legend was Tim Schafer and Double Fine’s follow-up to the cult classic Psychonauts, and tragically denied a PC release. Only now, four years late, it’s suddenly got one. A strange, very hard-to-describe hybrid of hack’n'slash action, real-time strategy and open-world racing/exploring, it’s also an unabashed love letter to the golden age of heavy metal: a tale of a Jack Black-voiced roadie finding himself transported to a fantasy world of demonic tyranny and rock imagery. With a mixed reception on console, will its strategic elements and ramped-up graphics make it a better fit on PC? If you like to gamble, I tell you I’m your man.(more…)

An action-RTS inspired by classic heavy metal album covers. Starring Jack Black. And a mad menagerie of metal icons. And a 100-strong soundtrack that pridefully pounded eardrums with everything from Judas Priest to Motorhead to (ew) DragonForce.

Let’s reflect, for a moment, on how absurdly specific Brutal Legend‘s chunky thematic stew actually was. And then let’s remember that EA, of all publishers, was manning the unlikely super group’s synth – which, in this particular case, was wired exclusively to make “ka-ching” sounds at Double Fine’s behest. Oh, and that was only after Activision flushed Schafer’s metal dream into the nightmarish bowels of development hell, nearly dooming it in the process. By most standards, Brutal Legend simply shouldn’t have happened. Nowadays – a mere three years later – a similar meeting of minds isn’t even conceivable. But Double Fine’s last truly all-or-nothing shout at the triple-A devil was unique for a number of reasons. It was a product of oddball inspiration, once-in-a-lifetime timing, and quite a bit of luck. Also guitars. OK, mostly guitars.

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Are you ready to rock?

I can't hear you! I said, ARE YOU YOU READY TO RAAAAWK!?

Good! Double Fine's heavy metal action-adventure Brutal Legend is available now on Steam. The rock epic is a mere $20, and Double Fine founder Tim Schafer has says he'd be open to add more modes, tweaks and content. However, Double Fine is busy with a couple other projects, including its record-breaking Kickstarter-funded adventure game.

Brutal Legend is now available on Steam!

Set in a universe somewhere between Lord of the Rings and Spinal Tap, Brutal Legend is an action-adventure that marries visceral combat with open-world freedom and features a talented voice cast including Jack Black, Lemmy Kilmister, Rob Halford, and more!

Brutal Legend is coming to PC! With shiny, PC-only bells and whistles, no less. Be still, my barbed-wire-wrapped, blood-and-oil-coughing heart. Its arrival comes at a bit of an odd time, though, given that it’s been more than three years since Tim Schafer’s metal epic knee-slid into living rooms, spraying fireworks and Judas Priest references every which way. But perhaps that’s not such a bad thing. After all, the Double Fine of today and the Double Fine of yester-three-years-ago are very different companies. Back then, EA called the shots, and that ultimately resulted in a canceled Brutal Legend sequel. But now Schafer and co make their own destiny, and as it turns out, that could well involve more guitar axes, tree-necked headbangers, and Jack Blacks. But how many, exactly? That depends on a number of factors.

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Listen Here Wolfchild I Speak To You Of The Science Of Mythology I Speak Of Maverick Deviation The Psychotronic Love Commandos We Shall Be Drunken Stars We Shall Fear Nothing

–WOLFCHILD, Zodiac Mindwarp

And: the release date is going to be February 26thst.

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Hmm! The Klaxons of hype were blaring over the weekend, with Steam-database watchers claiming the appearance of Halo 3, Fez and Brutal Legend on the service’s list of forthcoming IDs. As far as I can see these have now been changed to “test” names, which suggests revealing their addition was a mistake, but nevertheless the information seems to point to Double Fine’s bizarre Jack Black-voiced rock RTS coming to PC, along with Master Chief’s third outing and Polytron’s dimension-rotating platformer. So that’s interesting. Oh and Quantum Conundrum 2.

Yeah. Anyway. What you been up to this weekend?

After the release of Brutal Legend, Double Fine Productions turned its attention from massive retail games every few years to downlodable creations at a much faster pace. Following the incredibly well received Costume Quest and Stacking, Trenched now joins the lineup on June 22.

Double Fine announced the release date today, alongside the price: 1200 Microsoft Points ($15).

Trenched is basically Double Fine's take on tower defense for people who get bored of tower defense. Instead of just clicking on a map, you're blastin' dudes up close.

We've been enjoying ourselves Trenched in the past few months (there might even be an awfully long video coming down the pipe soon), but even though it's not Trenched related, I'm going to embed a video below featuring Trenched project lead Brad Muir below and just...well, walk away.

This is the first part of Joystiq's in-depth discussion with Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick, in which we cover Activision's Bungie partnership, the Infinity Ward situation, Treyarch's time in the spotlight with Call of Duty: Black Ops, and why Kotick's been cast in the role of video game industry villain. Up first: The real story behind Activision's Brutal Legend lawsuit:
In 2009, for the first time in years, E3 felt like a celebration again. The annual video game trade show had reemerged after a period of austerity, newly invigorated. For Brutal Legend, it was an especially momentous debutante's ball -- the game had suffered from delays and publisher battles, but it had finally found a suitor in EA Partners and a booth alongside Electronic Arts' other games. Then on June 4, the last day of the show, developer Double Fine got sued.

The difficult thing about lawsuits is this: None of the parties can say much. The inevitable result of that vacuum is confusion and misunderstanding. On the surface, it looked like Activision -- amidst the chaos of a merger with Vivendi and its Sierra and Blizzard games business -- simply chose to pass on Brutal Legend, leaving creator Tim Schafer and the team at Double Fine without a path to market. That's where EA Partners comes in, like a knight in shining armor. Then, perhaps in an effort to keep its biggest competitor from releasing a highly-anticipated game, Activision -- a company whose corporate persona had been portrayed as increasingly villainous in much of the gaming press -- sued the developer. During E3. The celebration.

But there was that vacuum: Double Fine couldn't say much; Activision couldn't say much; and that left Electronic Arts -- the white knight, if we're following the characterization of the press at the time -- to speak up. And the publisher did, issuing the following zinger which set the tone for the conflict:
"We doubt that Activision would try to sue. That would be like a husband abandoning his family, and then suing after his wife meets a better looking guy." And why not? Without any other commentary, the press, readers and fans all wanted an answer. Nature abhors a vacuum and, just like that, Activision wrote its own role, as the devious, conniving villain.

#robertkotick Once upon a time, game designer Tim Schafer called Activision honcho Robert Kotick "a total prick". ("Once upon a time" being this past July). Then, Schafer said his remark was an "accident". The "total..." exec has retorted. More »

#doublefine Double Fine's Tim Schafer is a bit of a cult darling, having been behind brilliant yet under appreciated games like Psychonauts and Grim Fandango. Thing is, he doesn't want to be a cult darling. More »

During his recent Develop panel, Tim Schafer -- creator of Brütal Legend and head of Double Fine Productions -- revealed that the potential for a sequel to Jack Black's journey through a fantastical world of rockitude is nonexistent. "Apparently when they said it was a done deal, they meant there was no deal, and we're done," he told attendees.

Double Fine fans shouldn't mourn the game's loss, however; the studio is currently at work on four new titles, so it's not like Schafer is riding off into the sunset -- unless that's part of one of the four games Double Fine is working on, in which case you heard it here first.

#timschafer Game designer Tim Schafer called Activision honcho Robert Kotick a "total prick" yesterday. Activision then replied to his claim that Kotick was a "total prick". Schafer now says calling Kotick "a total prick" was an "accident". More »

#activision Brutal Legend and Grim Fandango creator Tim Schafer labeled Activision Blizzard boss Bobby Kotick a "dick," "total prick" and, most damning, a ball bearing enthusiast. Fair enough. Just don't accuse Mr. Kotick of not liking video games, Activision says. More »

We had always assumed that we don't see more comedy in games because nothing could ever be funnier than the end of Limbo of the Lost. But speaking with Eurogamer before his upcoming Develop Conference keynote, Grim Fandango designer Tim Schafer said the comedy boom will come when publishers start connecting chuckles with dollar signs. "The industry is imitative," he said. "A lot of people are chasing the last thing that was a big hit. What we need is a big hit comedy game. As soon as we have one, everybody will follow, of course."

Schafer also has some choice words for Activision's Bobby Kotick, but our therapist says we need to spend more time focusing on positivity.

#activision Tim Schafer, the creator of classics like Grim Fandango, Full Throttle and Psychonauts, has some choice words to say about Activision boss Robert Kotick. Two of those words are "total" and "prick". More »

#clips Don't mock the humble user interface. It might sound boring, but it can make or break your experience with a game. This short clip explains how Brutal Legend's was made, and you should watch it, because Brutal Legend's menu was awesome. More »

#clips Graphic designer Joe Kowalski gives us a behind-the-scenes look at the work that goes into creating what some consider the best video game menu ever made. More »

#deaths Painter Frank Frazetta, best known for his striking fantasy work with characters like Conan the Barbarian, Vampirella and the original Death Dealer, died today at the age of 82. More »

#cosplaygallery MomoCon has filled the campus of Georgia Tech in downtown Atlanta with cosplayers, and video game fans are there in force. Check out characters from Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Miles Edgeworth, BioShock, Brutal Legend, and more! More »

[hugohugo at deviantART] deviantArt is usually the site you go to if you want to see uncomfortable, sexual doodles of anime characters and other such nonsense. Today, it's become the place to see the most badass Eddie Riggs homage known to man. In fact, we're pretty sure user hugohugo sold his soul to Satan for the ability to craft such a magnificent resemblance to Brütal Legend's protagonist. Compared to the official alternative, we have to say we dig hugohugo's a bit more. It's got character and is entirely posable -- even the fingers move for wicked faux-solos! [Via OKConsole]

New maps, paint jobs, skins and mayhem blitz their way to Brutal Legend via downloadable content.

Announced earlier this month (though fate had ensured its arrival since the beginning), Brütal Legend's second pack of downloadable content landed on Xbox Live and PlayStation Network this week. In celebration of the release, Double Fine has handed over a brand new trailer for the grab bag of multiplayer maps, skins for Eddie Riggs, and items with which to brutalize (as seen above). As we previously noted, the DLC also gives players the opportunity to endow Mt. Rockmore with Tim Schafer's beautiful face. If that doesn't sell you on it, we can't imagine what would.

It's been a bumpy road to release for Brütal Legend. Tim Schafer's had to change publishers, deal with a pesky lawsuit, soldier through PR missteps and even handle some post-release DLC. This is all common knowledge, but in a lengthy postmortem at Gamasutra, Caroline Esmurdoc, executive producer at Double Fine, goes in depth on the development strategy for the title and talks about what went right and what went wrong in the creation of this rock gaming opus. Double Fine adopted the Scrum method of agile software development for Brütal Legend, which allowed the company to create a renderer, terrain and a playable Eddie Riggs for Tim in a mere month. Content creation was fairly steady, Esmurdoc admitted, but around January of this year, the game's content jumped from the 2.5GB generated over three years to a massive 9GB, thanks to multiple teams unloading assets for the game simultaneously. Esmurdoc also touched on the lawsuit, though she couldn't go into specifics beyond mentioning that the transition between publishers caused "internal unrest and morale dips among the team", and that Double Fine learned Activision would not be publishing Brutal Legend when the game was suspiciously absent from a list of the publisher's upcoming games. Double Fine then pursued a new publishing partner.

Hammer of Infinite Fate Pack to reign down new outfits, upgrades, achievements and more.

If you claim to love Tim Schafer, the new Brütal Legend DLC, "Hammer of Infinite Fate," is your chance to prove it. When it arrives on Dec. 17, you'll be able to pay the designer the ultimate tribute and carve his giant, disembodied head into Mount Rockmore. Sure, you're still a stalker, but in a totally socially acceptable way. You'll also get the Oculus of the Lost, a Deuce upgrade that shows every collectible on the map, as well as new outfits for Eddie and four new multiplayer maps. The pack's apparently going to be a bit cheaper for PlayStation 3 users, who will pay $4.99 compared to 480 MS points ($6) on Xbox 360. That might be a misprint (we've asked EA for confirmation), but we recall that PSN users did get the first DLC free for two weeks. Teacher's pets.

Brütal Legend may have had a smaller-than-expected impact during the game's first month on shelves, but Double Fine head Tim Schafer remains nonplussed. In fact, he hasn't even seen the numbers yet, instead choosing to wait "'til after Christmas," he recently told GamePro. "I like to give it time, you know? I think many people look too soon but a lot of games I've worked on have succeeded based on word of mouth," he explained. And despite somewhat disappointed responses from critics, Schafer said he was happy "for the most part" with how the game was received. While he's still not talking specifics, the idea of more downloadable content is clearly one Schafer's interested in. "We definitely want to do more DLC for both single-player and multiplayer, as well as some tuning patches," he said, and added that the developers are still watching multiplayer online to see what needs fixing. We're betting it won't be too long before we hear what the folks at Double Fine have in mind.

Brütal Legend may have sold less than thrillingly during the game's first month on shelves, but Double Fine head Tim Schafer remains nonplussed. In fact, he hasn't even seen the numbers yet, instead choosing to wait "'til after Christmas," he recently told GamePro. "I like to give it time, you know? I think many people look too soon but a lot of games I've worked on have succeeded based on word of mouth," he explained. And despite somewhat tepid responses from critics, Schafer said he was happy "for the most part" with how the game was received. While he's still not talking specifics, the idea of more downloadable content is clearly one Schafer's interested in. "We definitely want to do more DLC for both single-player and multiplayer, as well as some tuning patches," he said, and added that the developers are still watching multiplayer online to see what needs fixing. Given the usual one month after release and then three month after release DLC schedule, we're betting it won't be too long before we hear about exactly what the folks at Double Fine have in mind.