After playing through the excellent Strong Badia the Free, and hearing great reviews for the third episode in the SBCG4AP series, I was a bit disappointed when I actually made my way through this new entry. There’s nothing horribly wrong with Baddest of the Bands, to be sure; the puzzles and humor remain intact, and it’s worth playing through if you enjoyed the previous titles, but something about the story managed to not stick very well with me. It feels like a bit of a missed opportunity; I think the Brothers Chaps could have made a great storyline based more around music, but this just failed to hook me like the other games.

In this installment, Strong Bad’s precious Fun Machine has bit the dust, and in order to get Bubs to fix it, he needs exactly one fat sack of cash; instead of getting a job, though, he decides to host a Battle of the Bands and use the bands’ entry fees to fix his Fun Machine. I had anticipated a greater emphasis on actual music for this entry, especially given referenecs to Journey and Judas Priest on the title screen, but this game is more of Strong Bad running around trying to get the battle actually organized, more similar to what he was doing in Homestar Ruiner, and it feels a little like a missed opportunity. The game certainly could have been much WORSE, though, and it still holds up rather well on its own.

The two things that matter in a Strong Bad game, of course, are humor and puzzles, and this game still has both in abundance. While music-related gags are oddly sparse, you’ll still get yourself some laugh-out-loud moments, and general entertainment from the goings-on of the citizens of Free Country USA. However, I’ve always thought it’s the little things that really make the humor in these games, and this title didn’t seem to have quite as many minor additions that make it shine, unlike Strong Badia the Free or the fantastic Dangeresque 3. The puzzles are also there, and they’re good, though closer to the end of the game the solutions got more and more esoteric. The final scene, however, is definitely one to remember.

Replay value also suffers a little bit with this title. As you may expect, the Fun Machine is only available after you complete the game, and the included game (Limozeen: Hot Babelian Odyssey) is a schmup that I found a little bit too slow-paced to be addicting like the other two titles were. Also, due to a scripted game event, there is no way to create your own Teen Girl Squad comic; this is something I personally didn’t miss horribly, but others might. Unfortunately, it’s starting to look like a lot of the game’s replay value comes from finding collectibles with the Metal Detector, and this is starting to grow rather old. This is something that’s unlikely to change with this season of SBCG4AP, but could possibly change if other seasons are to come around.

Taken altogether, while Baddest of the Bands is a bit disappointing when compared with the other available episodes, it’s still a great piece of adventure gaming, and includes lots of the Strong Badian humor fans will be hoping for. This title gets a Yay! from me, though I offer the fact that there are better ones out there, if it comes down to picking and choosing. If you’re looking to get all the Strong Bad episodes, though, you have no good reason to pass this one up.