Previews

Hands on with Eddie the Head's trippy mobile RPG Iron Maiden: Legacy of the Beast

Run to the kills

Hands on with Eddie the Head's trippy mobile RPG Iron Maiden: Legacy of the Beast
Legacy of the Beast

Musicians seem very interested in apps.

Linkin Park has a weird post-apocalyptic action game, Katy Perry's got a bizarre psychedelic pop star simulator, and Kanye West's hard at work on a game about his late mother ascending to heaven.

The latest band to get in on the app action is Iron Maiden, with a new game made by Warhammer Carnage developer Roadhouse.

The game is all about Eddie - the band's zombified mascot who pops up on album covers, as a giant fibreglass figure at the band's shows, and even as a secret character in Tony Hawk 4.

Legacy of the Beast

As Eddie has appeared in many forms and guises over the years (Egyptian pharaoh, soldier, mental patient, some sort of cyborg, zombie), you'll be able to collect, train, and level up different Eddies, and take 'em into turn-based RPG fights.

In battle you'll use one Eddie at a time (tagging in and out two others as needed), as well as a pair of devilish minions.

It's your standard mobile RPG. You know the sort. But it has some ideas of its own, like attacks that can be super powered if you unleash them with good timing (sort of like Super Mario RPG), and even the ability to travel forwards and backwards in time to unlock other abilities that are only available in the distant past or far future.

Legacy of the Beast

Battles are picked from a Candy Crush-style map, in areas that are inspired by bits of Maiden lore. An Egyptian themed world, complete with pyramids and obelisks, is based on the sleeve for Powerslave, for example.

And I think that's the important bit - even if many aspects of the game have been done before, Maiden fans are gonna flip over all the obsessively curated details in the game.

Ideas and art are ripped from tour fliers and liner notes, and music is compiled and remixed from unreleased Maiden songs.

Legacy of the Beast

Legacy of the Beast will be free and is out on mobile sometime this year.

Mark Brown
Mark Brown
Mark Brown is editor at large of Pocket Gamer