Playing A Game The LEGO Movie Videogame PC

LEGO Video Game The Movie The Game The LEGO Movie Videogame is a fascinating production. As the LEGO games are wont to do, this installment takes the franchise's well-worn rules and mixes them up just enough to keep things interesting. But as a licensed movie tie-in, it has some additional unexpected benefits, and pitfalls.

First off, the game's theme - not the overused, eventually-grating "Everything Is Awesome!" song, but the overall milieu - is a real treat. Like the movie itself, the game is not only kid-friendly, but adults-who-grew-up-with-LEGO friendly, and the diverse environs based on LEGO sets (construction, cowboys, et cetera) complement characters who are intimately relatable despite being computer-generated avatars for plastic toys. It helps immensely that, in addition to containing lines and video directly from the movie, a substantial cut of the movie's voice cast - Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Banks, Will Ferrell, et al - even recorded original lines for the game itself. (Although Liam Neeson is auspiciously absent.) The look and feel of the game, overall, is really impressive.

As an aside: I completed the game before seeing the movie, and despite following the same plot and using the same cutscenes, the game actually manages to not spoil the film's ending. So that was a fun surprise.

Unfortunately, being a simultaneously-released movie tie-in means that there are some obvious gaps in the game design. Like recent LEGO games, this one has an open world to roam around in, inbetween missions; but unlike LEGO The Lord of the Rings or LEGO City Undercover, this game's world is subdivided into thematic sub-worlds (again- construction, cowboys, et cetera). As a result, each sub-world is fairly small, and doesn't have a whole lot going on. While there are still 15 story missions, per the LEGO series standard, several of these are brief essentially-on-rails sequences; and there aren't as many collectibles, either in missions or out in the world, as other LEGO games typically have. Overall, The LEGO Movie Videogame is short on content, compared to its peers.

The really interesting new mechanic in this one is sort of an extension of LEGO City Undercover's "superbuilds" -- but instead of merely collecting items and bringing them to a location, this game actually makes the construction process semi-interactive. Most of an object will build itself, of course, but at key points the build will pause and demand that you select the appropriate piece from a radial-menu of eight choices. It's more engaging than a quick-time event, and certainly more fun than just watching the build happen all by itself.

Otherwise, the game is packed with the same kinds of basic puzzles and destroy-LEGO-things challenges you'd expect. Technologically, it's as polished as this series has ever been, my friends and I having encountered only one or two hiccups from start to finish. (One in particular was a character getting stuck in part of a level, making the mission unwinnable. So, there's still some room for improvement.)

On the whole, The LEGO Movie Videogame is a surprising success for a movie-license tie-in, and a good (albeit brief) entry in the LEGO game franchise. It's not going to blow anyone away, but it serves the movie and the game series well.

Better than: LEGO Marvel Super Heroes
Not as good as: LEGO City Undercover
Also: The movie is pretty good. Watch that, too.

Progress: Finished the game, didn't get 100%.

Rating: Good