Vito

Report #26

I finally managed to beat a game again, wohoo! I got LEGO LotR from HumbleBundle for free shortly before christmas. It is my first LEGO game and I was keen on playing one for quite some time, so I started playing it right away. Beating it was quick, but collecting all achievements took some time. Apart from that I’m still enjoying myself playing Dungeon Siege. I don’t think I’ve played practically the same game (DS II + I) for such a long time. There is not much else to say, so let’s start:


Reviews

LEGO® The Lord of the Rings™

37.3 hours, 48 of 48 achievements
★★☆☆☆

More

Release Date: 2012

LEGO LotR is a Lego-themed action adventure game, following the storylines from the LotR movie trilogy. It uses the original voices and soundtrack from the movies, which immediately makes for a great atmosphere (well, unless you disliked the movies, but then you wouldn't play the game anyways, I guess…)

The gameplay has an open-world part, where you can collect collectibles, forge new items for your characters and explore. And a second part, where you replay key-scenes from the movies. You play as the characters from the movies, able to switch to other characters during play. Each character has special abilities (Sam can garden and make a fire for example) and you need to combine these abilities to solve puzzles.

Personally I really struggled with the controls. It's really hard to play with keyboard and mouse, since there is no mouse support ingame. So everything has to be done with the keyboard. And that's no fun at all. So I switched to controller: better, but still found the controls clumsy. In conjunction with the sometimes strange camera angles they were not always quite precise. Or I am just not good enough with a controller, that may also be true.

Collecting stuff in the open-world and exploring middle-earth was quite fun (apart from some jumping puzzles, where I would have wished for better controls). Replaying each level to get all the in-level collectibles was tedious however. Especially since when you missed one item you had to start the whole level from the beginning.

Achievements: Easy to get, but time-consuming and sometimes wrath-incurring.

Verdict: This was my first LEGO game and after hearing great things about them I was honestly disappointed. I really wanted to like the game. At some points I did, but on so many others I did not. Sorry to all you LEGO game fans out there, but it don't recommend the game.



Currently playing

  • Dungeon Siege
    Dungeon Siege

    too many hours playtime

    no achievements

I think I’m slowly reaching the end of this…my life will be empty afterwards.


At first I was a bit sad that I missed the LEGO The Hobbit giveaway on HB, especially after learning the games were pulled from stores. But after not liking LEGO LotR, I think I can live with it.

Happy backlog-clearing to everyone,
Vito

petpasta

You’re probably right about The Hobbit, you might as well ignore the other LEGO games then, since they’re all almost exactly the same, with minor differences in gameplay. So if you didn’t like one game, chances are, you’ll dislike all of them.
(I also think The Hobbit is the only LEGO game that is literally unfinished)
That’s beside the point, but personally I love ‘em. My first one was the second part of Star Wars, I think. It didn’t have original voice-acting back then, so the characters had to manage with body language and stuff, it was adorable.

Vito

I know that a lot of people like them, so I’ll probably try one again in a few years – maybe it was just not the right time, who knows?

Cece09

Wow surprised to see you 100% it then if you didn’t like it. As the above user said the games are pretty much the same. You get their versions of characters which some way or another is a clone of other games and their storyline. The only game I felt different was lego incredibles, actually felt like a hero beating up crime rather then marvel where you got to do meaningless chores to get your items. But again they were just the same characters with a disney skin slapped on them and in fact it was a much easier game. Lego games are set to play easy enough for kids but that game took it from 7 to 3

Vito

Yeah, I wanted it to be perfected, because it’s not that hard, just costs some time. And you’re right, I think they would perfectly fit for kids.

Formidolosus

Oh well I guess people don’t always have the same tastes in games. I enjoy the lego games, primarily because they are great games for me to play with my kids in co-op mode, but I also enjoy the humour. I don’t personally think LOTR is the best one out there, but it’s unlikely you’ll enjoy marvel heroes or batman if you didn’t enjoy the gameplay of this one, as they are all following the same playbook.
And yeah keyboard controls suck, which is usually what I’m stuck with as the kids play with the controller.

Vito

primarily because they are great games for me to play with my kids in co-op mode,

Ah, yeah, I can very well imagine that. I think they would be great to play with kids. I can absolutely understand that you like them, when you tell it like that! The humour was enjoyable, I also agree on that :)

Formidolosus

Yeah they are a bit like ‘my first action adventure’ game. Light puzzling, light platforming, easy combat, bright colours, no ‘fail’ state. A gateway drug before they get into the harder stuff.