The Lego Movie Videogame game review

After seeing The Lego Movie, you probably couldn’t stop singing the hit song, “Everything is Awesome!” The movie has been a massive success, and most of that has to do with its heart.

THE LEGO MOVIE VIDEOGAME Gameplay: 8.5 Graphics: 8.0 Sound: 7.0 Replay Value: 8.2 Overall Score: 8.2Pros: Goes deeper than the movie could; tons of characters to unlock; as funny as the movie. Cons: You may get stuck in a vehicle; game is short; no online play.

The question is, does The Lego Movie Videogame have the same heart?

LIVING UP TO THE MOVIE

Before playing, I worried that the game couldn’t produce the same kind of laughs that the movie did. But the wit is there. So listen hard and enjoy them as you blast through the Lego world.

Faster than you can say “Lego,” the game tosses you straight into the universe that was featured in the movie. It lets you explore and look around. Remember the big fight with Lord Business near the beginning of the movie? That’s how the game begins. But here, it’s as if you are on that movie set.

Before long, the song “Everything Is Awesome” pops up for the first time. It’s turned into a mini rhythm game. If you think the movie’s signature song got stuck in your head, just wait until you play the game. You’ll be dreaming about that song. I guarantee it.

NAVIGATING THE GAME

Progressing through the game is challenging. Things you need to find to move forward are well hidden in the brightly colored Bricksburg. It took me 10 minutes to figure out how to turn a conveyor belt in the opposite direction. I don’t mind this at all because it makes the game all the more fun.

Lego games are all about building cool things. For instance, one of your first tasks as a Regular Builder is to find instructions to create a wrecking ball. Build it and knock down an old house that your construction crew needs to have moved out of the way.

If you’re controlling a Master Builder, you can create working tools and vehicles out of the scattered Lego parts. Pieces are outlined in green. Highlight each one and put them together with a simple button push.

There are tons of different vehicles in the game. As Emmett, I got into what looked like an armored truck early on. It was a fast way to collect the studs in the Bricksburg town square.

But I got stuck on a light pole in a corner, and couldn’t move forward or backward. And I couldn’t get Emmett out of the vehicle, either. (Not that you’ll need to search in the corners for much, but I noticed some camera angle problems there as well.)

VARIETY GALORE

With each chapter you finish, you’ll unlock five or more characters. And each of the 15 chapters gives you a wide variety of gameplay. You’ll collect studs as you fall down a crazy rabbit hole. You’ll swim away from some nasty electric eels. You’ll attack helicopters. You’ll even play a Lego-inspired homage to Pac-Man.

And, of course, it’s fun to control the superheroes, too, like the egotistical Batman.

You’ll need Batman to help you in the most visually inventive of the areas, Cloud Cuckoo Land. There, you’ll see everything from dragons swooping down to butterflies flitting about. High above the Earth, you’ll grapple from cloud to cloud. And you’ll use the Batarang to bust balloons that hold up clouds to bring them down to your level. Then, you can turn some Lego parts into a sail and use the cloud as a sailboat.

Overall, there’s a lot of replay-ability in the game. You need to go back to levels and collect all the gold bricks and unlock more characters. That said, the main game is shorter than, say, Marvel Lego Super Heroes. It’s a fine game; I just wish it could have been longer.