Brutal Legend

Brütal Legend, like its unnecessarily umlauted name implies, tosses you into an over-the-top heavy metal fairy tale. Tim Schafer's name is on the box, so you know that, just like Psychonauts and Grim Fandango, you're going to get a humorous, well-written narrative. But despite the terrific, superbly voice-acted story (featuring Jack Black, Tim Curry, and cameos from many other musicians and comedians), certain missing gameplay features, like the lack of a minimap, jump button, or warp feature make Brütal Legend feel unfinished.
The story centers on roadie Eddie Riggs as he drops into the living, breathing world of heavy metal. He operates behind the scenes to make sure the forces of good (heavy metal) triumph over the forces of evil (hair metal). The game is mostly action mixed with a little light RTS, but in addition to your main mission to save the world, you can undertake side missions to earn extra Fire Tributes (the in-game currency) for new abilities and other upgrades. The missions themselves aren't very original, ranging from basic "kill a group of enemies before they kill you" skirmishes to races in the Deuce, Eddie's custom metalmobile. But they're all surprisingly fast-paced and not too challenging -- in another game, they might feel like overdone, unnecessary wastes of time, but in Brütal Legend, they're quick one-offs with decent rewards.