Far From The Previous Incredible Lego Games
It seems almost yesterday that Travelers Tales brought us Lego: Star Wars back in 2005 and with it, a flurry of brick-sized recreations for some of the best loved franchises out there. Across the span of 13 years and a staggering 34 games, Lego has managed to convert Batman, Lord Of The Rings, Harry Potter and even Ninjago to brick form in a familiar and largely enjoyable format. Next in the seemingly endless production line of Lego games from the studio is Lego Incredibles, a faithful recreation of the films bearing the same name and the unfortunate first signs of fatigue from the company. Thoughtless level design, repetitive gameplay segments and a lacklustre open world make Lego Incredibles one of the least inspired games to come from the studio despite some impressive character recreations. The levels feel largely uninspiring to play through The game begins with a prologue which sees you begin the story to The Incredibles 2, taking control of Mr Incredible as you aim to stop The Underminer. From here, the game skips between cut-scenes and gameplay, recreating key moments from the film with the usual array of Lego wit and humour across 6 levels. After finishing the story to Incredibles 2 you’re given the chance to relive the best moments from the original film in another 6 levels which admittedly have slightly more thought put into their level design. The levels themselves are relatively short, with each roughly taking between 15-30 minutes to complete. Between these levels you’ll explore a vast city complete with crime waves (more on that later) and over 200 gold bricks and building blocks needed to reach that illusive 100% to see and do everything the game has to offer. While there’s no denying there’s a vast amount of content to sift through, in comparison to some of the other Lego games, Lego Incredibles feels void of original ideas, despite an effort to shake things up with a few gameplay elements. You’ll spend the majority of your time zipping around the open world area Considering it picks up right at the end of the first film, the decision to place Incredibles 2 as the first set of levels and then follow it up with the original film is a really odd choice and perhaps the story mode may have had a better flow to it had Travelers Tales chosen to faithfully follow the linear story of the first film through to the second. There’s enough enjoyment to be had here during these missions and in true Lego fashion you’ll find yourself replaying these again with different characters to unlock everything but the meat of the content lies in the open world area. Split into 10 distinct districts, each segment of the city sees you tackle a villain that’s taken control of that area after completing a few fetch quests for local civilians. After completing the boss fight, the district unlocks, showing a burst of collectables on the world map including races to complete for gold bricks, district-specific tasks and incredibricks to collect to convert into “family builds” (structures to build for that area). The characters are largely the stand-out here in an otherwise mediocre title Unfortunately for Lego Incredibles, a lot of these tasks become formulaic and mundane as you realize the gold bricks and various building blocks for the game are literally lying on the ground or simply placed up high to fly into with little to no challenge behind it. Unlike games like Lego Marvel Superheroes which required you to unlock a flurry of heroes and use their unique abilities in order to gain every gold brick, the same thoughtfulness is lacking in Lego Incredibles, requiring little to no skill to unlock everything. During our 20 hours playing the game we needed to use Screenslaver once and ended up using Bomb Voyage, Mr Incredible, a swimming character and Syndrome almost exclusively throughout the open world areas. There’s a conscious effort to make each of the districts at least feel a little original in design but a questionable draw distance and a lack of thought put into the placement of these collectables dampens the overall appeal of the game. The visual design of the game is generally pretty good For fans of Pixar or The Incredibles, Lego Incredibles is still an enjoyable game and features enough nostalgia and unique characters to make it a Lego title worth picking up. While it’s certainly not worth the £40 price tag right now, at a discount Lego Incredibles is the perfect game to chill with, especially with little ones in the household. The characters are the stand out in an otherwise mediocre title and whether it be Frozone’s unique ice surfing or Violet’s forcefield abilities, there’s a conscious effort to at least make the main characters feel unique and different enough to not imitate other Lego titles. The same thoughtfulness is distinctly lacking in both plot, layout and overall design of the world and what should be exciting and interesting to explore, feels mundane and unoriginal. It’s this lack of thoughtfulness that detracts from the overall appeal of this one and in comparison to other Lego titles, Incredibles is a far cry from living up to its name.
