2009-08-12 - Heavy Metal in Games
13 years after Nine Inch Nails writing the music for Quake, heavy-metal music is again on the uprise in games. Besides all the Guitar Heroes, Singalongs and other playback games there are several RPG's on the way that include metal-tracks.
Sacred II
First up is Sacred II. The title-track for this game, aptly named 'Sacred' was composed by Blind Guardian. The band members also appear in an in-game quest and cutscene.
Chronicles of Spellborn
Not all games are success stories. The Chronicles of Spellborn is a MMORPG set in a post-apocalyptic fantasy world. In June 2009, the developers of Spellborn, Spellborn NV, went bankrupt. The publisher, Acclaim, announced the following month that the game would be re-developed as a free-to-play game support by microtransactions. The new version would be released sometime after 2010, and until then the current pay-to-play/limited free-to-play version would remain active.
The Dutch band Within Temptation wrote two songs for the game: "The Howling" and "Sounds of Freedom".
Risen
There's also Risen. A RPG due to be released on October 2, 2009. Preview-movies for this game include fragments of Nightwish 'Poet and the Pendulum'.
Brutal Legend
And then there's also Brutal Legend. A game featuring all kinds of metal from Ozzy Osbourne over Iced Earth to Motorhead.
Brutal Legend tells the tale Eddie Riggs, the ultimate roadie. The "roadie's roadie", Eddie is the 1st person anyone calls when they need guitars tuned or stages rigged. With a love for hot rods and a photographic memory for every Heavy Metal album cover, and the lyrics those albums contained, committed to memory, Eddie has always felt out of place, like he should have been born earlier, when the music was real.
One night a stage accident knocks Eddie unconscious. With his blood dripping into the belt buckle he wears, a gift from his father, his blood quenches an ancient thirst that sucks him into a world that looks very strange yet oddly familiar, a world where every Heavy Metal album cover and lyric Eddie knows has come to life, a world where the evil emperor Doviculus and his demon army, The Tainted Coil, have enslaved the last remaining humans.
Led by Lars Halford alongside his sister Lita and the mysterious Ophelia, the human resistance is far from helpless. However, what they lack is someone to bring them all together; someone who can organise them and lead them into battle, what they need is a roadie. Under Eddie’s command, this barbaric force of hot-rods, Marshall stacks, leather, and chrome will bring this ancient world into the age of Metal.
