I got to play LEGO Horizon Adventures a few months ago at SGF soon after it was announced and whilst I got a good taste for the game, it was a very quick demo that left me with more questions than I went into the preview with.
Thankfully, I got to spend over an hour with the game a few weeks ago which cleared up a lot of questions I had around how the game plays and how much fun it’d be over time.
Playing through the first chunk of the game, it’s clear that game re-tells the first game in a classic LEGO style, with extremely familiar beats that are re-told with humour in a way that’d feel odd if they were in the regular game, but make perfect sense in a LEGO world.
When I reviewed Horizon Zero Dawn, I felt like the story could be missed with how long you could spend away from story beats taking down machines, so I can’t wait to have that refresher in a more streamlined fashion. With many of the original voice cast reprising their role, it goes a long way to making this feel authentic too.
Unlike LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, this is a much more classic LEGO game, with there being a main hub (more on that soon) and levels with short missions that see you rescuing another character or taking down certain enemies. Whilst I loved the wider scope behind The Skywalker Saga, it did feel bogged down in to many open-world mechanics, so I was very happy to see a return to a more classic style of gameplay.
THE CHEAPEST COPY: $89 ON NINTENDO SWITCH / $99 ON PS5.
The game feels really familiar if you’ve played other LEGO games with the core premise being to take down enemies, whilst staying alive, with little bits of platforming and building. What this game does cleverly is borrow elements from Horizon Zero Dawn, so the machines from the game that are introduced one by one, have weaknesses just like in the main game, that can be targeted with Aloy’s bow.
It surprised me how tough it can be, but there are difficulty options available, so if you’re playing with a younger kid you can tone it down for them, and it is very clear that this game is going to be the most fun in co-op, and it’s available both locally and online which is great to see.
It really shocked me how liberal the team at Guerilla and Gobo have been with bringing in some LEGO elements to the combat as well though, with power-ups such as blast boots and other iconic LEGO characters coming in to save the day. It will really appeal to a younger audience, which is a clever move.
In classic LEGO fashion, you unlock characters as the story progresses, with Varl joining the team soon before my demo wrapped up with his iconic spear, so it’ll be interesting to see what other characters might join Aloy.
There’s also a number of upgrades both for each character specifically, and those that you can share across the board, but again, it feels simple enough for anyone to understand without being too convoluted which has become a real issue in modern gaming.
When you’re not in a mission, you can venture to the hub which is set in Mother’s Heart. Within this space you can customise buildings with items from the Horizon franchise as well as other iconic LEGO properties, unlock side missions in the community board, customise your characters, and I got the sense that that was just the beginning of what would be available.
The game looks absolutely stunning and I’d go as far as saying that this is the best looking LEGO game to date. On the base PS5, it has a fidelity mode at 4K/30 and a performance mode at 60 FPS, and I didn’t think that this could be a showcase for PS5 Pro, but I’m keen to see how it runs there.
Obviously there’s only so far you can take a LEGO game, but there’s a sense of realism provided by the lighting and different textures around the LEGO blocks that give it a personality that feels tonally in line with Horizon Zero Dawn.
This really is highlighted in the Cauldron level, which tonally, feels just as different in this game as it did in Horizon Zero Dawn, providing a totally different look to the wilderness where most of the game is experienced.
Overall, I came out of this session much more eager to pick this up. It’s definitely a change of pace for PlayStation, but there’s a lot more meat on the bone than I originally expected, and it’s a lot of fun.
LEGO Horizon Adventures launches on PS4, PC and Nintendo Switch on November 14th. The cheapest copy is $99 on PS5 or $89 on Nintendo Switch.
