Brütal Legend/Trivia

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Colbert Bump:
    • A few of the bands featured in the game received some healthy boosts in popularity after the game's release. Wikipedia reports that sales of the included tracks went up 700%.
    • And Brocas Helm, which was so obscure you couldn't purchase anywhere, now enjoys sales on digital services all around due to popularity of their song Cry of the Banshee.
    • Skeletonwitch and 3 Inches of Blood both expressed pride in being in the game.
  • Development Gag: The older roadie in the intro is based off discarded concept art for Eddie.
  • Development Hell: The first publisher Sierra was acquired by Vivendi, who gave one condition to Double Fine: people will automatically hate it for having light RTS elements, no matter how light, so they wanted a complete media blackout on the Stage Battles, to the point that no marketing would ever use the phrase "RTS" ever. Vivendi still canceled Brutal Legend, and planned on chopping the IP up to make a Guitar Hero game.
    • Double Fine sued and left to join EA, Vivendi sued back, and EA actually followed through with the lack of multiplayer coverage. The incomplete single player adventure was rushed through, EA spent 15 million dollars on TV coverage and more (but of course, no multiplayer demo), but Brutal Legend, after five long years of hell, was released October 2009.
  • Doing It For The Metal:
    • Tim Schafer has wanted to make a heavy-metal inspired game since 1995, and has lavished vast amounts of love on the project.
    • When pitching the game idea to various publishers, it was suggested to Tim Schafer that he make a video game about a more commercially viable music genre like Hip-hop or country. Tim Schafer stuck to his guns, though, and insisted that the game be about heavy metal. In 2006 the video game Guitar Hero introduced classic heavy metal to today's young people and Tim was finally allowed to make Brutal Legend.
    • There's also the fact that Jack Black is playing Eddie. While Eddie was based on Black's mannerisms from the beginning, Schafer and his team never expected that they'd actually get Black to play the character. How did they get him? He loves rock, he loved the concept, and he loved Psychonauts.
  • Executive Meddling: A very controversial, very heavy amount. Unfortunately, this applies to every party involved in creating and releasing the game. Record labels and bands(music licensing), publishers(dropping support outright and forcing changes), even within the internal development team.
    • The most hardcore of fans could probably base a series of novels on the sheer amount involved with the game from all sides.
  • Fan Nickname: Sacrifice 2 or Ozzcraft.
    • "LOL RTS", used by those who disliked the RTS element.
    • "Nuke Solo" are the Facemelter, Shadow Blast, and Curse solos, which are short range explosions.
    • "Buzzsaw" is a near infinite combo "AAAX *roll forward* , repeat." It can be avoided.
    • To make a "Caravan" means to build a group of Headsplitters.
    • The "Wall of Death" is a full Drowning Doom army, with every debuffer available, and lots of Broods.
  • Follow the Leader: Guitar Hero - Warriors of Rock.

'Tim Schafer on Twitter': "Holy Crap! They even stole our intro music!"

  • One of Us: Tim Schafer plays on online matchmaking sometimes. His tag is Timof Legend on Xbox Live and PSN.
    • Skeletonwitch was boasting their track "Soul Thrashing Black Sorcery" was in the game before performing it live.
    • 3 Inches of Blood also has expressed pride that their music was in the game.
  • Promoted Fanboy: Jack Black, who voices Eddie Riggs. He wanted to make his own awesome game after playing—are you ready for this? -- Psychonauts.
    • Before the multiplayer patch was implemented in November, Double Fine took input from the authors of a Stage Battle Guide online.
  • Screwed by the Network: EA refuses to drop the money to make the patches created by Double Fine available to the public, including the desperately requested PS3 patch to stop crashing. Players who complain to EA have received copies of different games for free. Brutal Legend is not included in EA's Games on Demand on Xbox Live, or in any of its sales. They are working hard to pretend their relationship with Double Fine never happened.
  • Throw It In: Jack Black was kept on a tight script to prevent Eddie Riggs from totally being a Marty Stu for him. The "you are the definition of a butterface" line was not on the script, but they liked it, and used it in the game.
    • However, the original script had very little cursing. Word of God says this was changed because Black and Ozzy had a tendency to hilariously ad-lib their discussions as Eddie and the Guardian of Metal, which was rife with cursing. They ended up just running with it.
  • What Could Have Been: Although the multiplayer was completed without a hitch, single player was severely gutted.
    • The story was going to be twice as long.
    • An AI "autopilot mode" would have been available in which Mangus handles all RTS segments.
    • Fleetus was going to lead a fourth faction. The Tick Chopper units were originally his, and are the only creature of his army to stay in the game (he Tainted Coil uses them instead). Fleetus hints several times in-game that he has a whole army hidden somewhere and they will seek revenge on Eddie. Concept art reveals he had wings like the other factions, and there is a picture of him enjoying a beer alongside Eddie, implying friendly rivalry.
    • Ophelia was going to stay dead. But Tim Schafer didn't want to leave Eddie alone with Lita because she's a total bitch.
    • A lot of content that was cut was going to be in the now canceled sequel.
    • According to this article, when Tim Schafer was pitching the game, the execs wanted to make it a hip-hop or country music game.
    • Emperor Doviculous was originally going to be voiced by Ronnie James Dio, but Tim Schaffer eventually decided that Tim Curry would be a better fit for the character.
    • The original Ironheade Hero Unit was a younger, buff version of Kill Master/Thunderhog Bassists.

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