Disney shutting down LucasArts

LucasArts, the game-making division of Lucasfilm, is being shut down by the company's new supreme overlords at Disney.

Disney is instead switching video game development of Lucasfilm properties (i.e. Star Wars) to external companies under a licencing model. The fate of 1313, a new Star Wars game internally developed by LucasArts and set between Episode III and IV, is unclear, although rumours have stated that the game has been on hold since late last year as Disney wants all new Star Wars games to focus on the time period of the new movies.

LucasArts was founded in 1982 and worked on some very early home video games before the release of its first big hit, Maniac Mansion, in 1987. That game introduced the SCUMM Engine, which put impressive graphics and a mouse-driven interface into the adventure genre, previously dominated by text inputs. Further games refined this system, such as the brilliant Zak McKraken and the Alien Mindbenders (1988) and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), the latter of which may still be one of the very best movie tie-in games ever made. LucasArts adjusted their formula in 1990 with the quirky and enjoyable LOOM, which replaced the typical command system with a music-driven one. In 1990 LucasArts released arguably their best-known, non-Star Wars game with The Secret of Monkey Island, following that up a year later with the epic and superior Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge. Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis was released in 1992, followed by Maniac Mansion 2: Day of the Tentacle and Sam and Max Hit the Road in 1993.

Following this point, the widespread adoption of 3D technology for games left LucasArts feeling that their adventure games looked outdated. The Curse of Monkey Island (1997) was their last adventure game using 2D animation, with both Grim Fandango (1999) and Escape from Monkey Island (2000) featuring 3D graphics. Though critical acclaim was still forthcoming (rather less for Escape), LucasArts wound up its adventure-producing division in 2003. Many of the people working there went on to found Telltale Games, who eventually ended up producing episodic new Sam and Max and Monkey Island games. Their most recent hit was The Walking Dead episodic game series.

Meanwhile, LucasArts branched into other areas of gaming. In 1993 they published X-Wing, a Star Wars-themed competitor to Chris Roberts's Wing Commander series of space combat games. The critically-acclaimed series eventually ended up comprising four core titles: X-Wing (1993), TIE Fighter (1994), X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter (1997) and X-Wing Alliance (1999). Disappointing sales for X-Wing Alliance - accompanying the wholesale collapse of the space combat simulator genre after a decade of success - saw the series cancelled at that point. LucasArts moved into console gaming, working with BioWare to produce the RPG Knights of the Old Republic in 2003 and with Obsidian on the ill-fated Knights of the Old Republic II in 2004. They also produced the action game Star Wars: Republic Commando in 2005.

Increasingly, post-2000 LucasArts was working more and more with external companies to produce their games, with LucasArts often only providing oversight. The most recent example of this is the highly troubled MMORPG The Old Republic, co-produced with BioWare and apparently the most expensive computer game of all time (with rumours abounding about how close the game has come to breaking even). It is likely that these elements also factored into Disney's decision to shut down the company.

Sad news for the once-great games development company which kick-started the careers of, amongst many others, Ron Gilbert and Tim Schafer.

Brutal Legend

Eddie Riggs, a roadie for an underwhelming rock band who bemoans the death of 'real' metal, is transported into a hellish world where humanity is kept in thrall by demons. Discovering that in this world music has real power, manifesting as combat abilities, Riggs joins a rebel army that is trying to bring down the demons and helps them organise for one last battle against the darkness.

Brutal Legend is a curious game. It's a heavy metal/comedy/action/real-time strategy game set in an open world and featuring personal combat and driving sections. The game feels like it was made by Double Fine Studios taking every 'awesome' idea they could think of and hurling it at the wall to see what would stick. It certainly feels like a game that lacks a clear vision of what the developers wanted it to be, and whilst it may be an adequate jack of all trades it is a master of none.

The game opens as an action title, with you directly controlling Eddie Riggs. You can kill enemies with your giant axe or electrocute them or set them on fire with special attacks from your guitar (which overheats if you use it too much, limiting its use). After a few minutes of this the game seems to get a bit bored, so Eddie spontaneously builds a car out of scenery, has a boss fight and then roars out into an open world, which you can explore to your heart's content (if only briefly; it's fairly small as these things go) to find unlockable skills, upgradable powers and optional side-missions. When you pursue the game's main storyline, it then rather abruptly transforms into a strategy battle game.

In this battle mode, you have a command centre - your stage - and an enemy HQ - their stage - that you must destroy. You gain resources in the form of adoration from fans, who issue forth from geysers (I think the heavy metal/RTS metaphor was straining a bit here) which you can tap into with merchandise stalls. With more resources, you can build more troops and upgrade your stage's capabilities. As the game continues you unlock more units, so you can build everything from a basic infantry grunt (head-banging nutcases) to a massive siege unit (a huge tank thing which call down fireballs from the skies). Your character, Eddie, serves as the commander and a powerful unit on his own right, and must join the fight directly to ensure the battles are won in a timely manner.

There is a big problem with this: Brutal Legend may now be out on PCs, but was designed for consoles. So rather than controlling the battles with a mouse, multi-unit selecting and intelligent hotkeys, you're instead struggling with a UI designed for console joypads. It's hideously slow and inefficient, requiring Eddie to be close to units he wants to give orders to (or constantly performing a tedious guitar solo minigame to summon units to him from across the map). Carrying out pincer attacks is therefore almost impossible. Indeed, the need to be simultaneously giving orders, building units and summoning them to you whilst also have to directly get involved in combat is initially overwhelming and confusing, with you losing battles due to having to fight the poor controls as well as the enemy. This problem eventually disappears once you get used to what units to build and in what order, at which point you simply steamroller the enemy and the game becomes trivially easy.

Brutal Legend is therefore a bit of a mixed bag. The humour, the writing and the voice-acting (most notably thankfully restrained performances from Jack Black and Tim Curry) are all top-notch, though some of the celebrity voice-overs are better than others. Rob Halford and Ozzie Osbourne give it their all, but Lemmy (from Motorhead) gives a fairly catatonic performance throughout the whole game. The game has a strong visual style, with the stylised 3D graphics complemented well by the excellent 2D artwork and the idea of a world based on metal album covers is successfully implemented.

The gameplay is all over the place, however. The solo combat sections are fairly decent, but quite brief, and the escort missions are a bit tedious (though a sequence in a dark swamp with Riggs riding a fire-breathing panther and having to clear a route for the tour bus is quite atmospheric). The battle sections make up a substantial chunk of the game's playing time and are unfortunately the game's weakest link, being poorly-controlled but ultimately far too easy. The game's single-player storyline is also fairly risible in length, clocking in at barely five hours.

All of that said, Brutal Legend (***) has a fair amount of wit, charm and imagination going for it. Like most of Tim Schafer's games, it's fun, but the gameplay struggles to keep pace with the ideas. It's definitely worth a look, but only if you can find it at a budget price. The game is available now in the UK (X-Box 360, PlayStation 3) and USA (X-Box 360, PlayStation 3). It is also available for PC on Steam.