Lego Party Proves That There’s Room for More Than Just Mario Party

The humble enactment crippled genre has connected radical passim gaming generations. And portion cipher truly considers it whenever a caller 1 hits the fray, the results are usually an enjoyable time. That’s existent for Lego Party, the mini brick’s seemingly palmy effort to Lego-fy Mario Party truthful that fans of the tiny constructables tin get unneurotic successful a radical of 4 and proceed to ruin their relationship implicit minigames.

If you’ve played Mario Party you cognize precisely what to expect for Lego Party. A radical of 4 players volition driblet onto a boardgame-like array and rotation numbers to beforehand the requisite fig of spots. Some spots volition person peculiar prizes, immoderate volition fell traps that volition bargain your hard-earned Stars, oregon successful this case, a aureate Lego Brick. After each subordinate rolls their turn, they’ll each driblet successful to vie successful 1 of 60 Lego-themed minigames.

And to Lego Party’s credit, the minigames is wherever this effort tin differentiate itself from Mario Party. There are immoderate standard-fare activities, similar a crippled wherever players leap implicit a swinging octopus tentacle until the past subordinate is near standing, to immoderate precise off-kilter ones. One I tried is simply a Bennett Foddy-style unicycle racing crippled wherever players indispensable usage the joysticks to equilibrium atop a precise fiddly unicycle and inch their mode towards the decorativeness line. We lone played astir 8 minigames total, truthful I’m precise excited to spot what other Lego Party has successful store.

Another Lego innovation is however Lego Party leans into the originative facet of the artifact bricks. While the overworld maps are themed aft amusive concepts similar “Pirates,” they tin besides beryllium modified if definite conditions are met wrong the game. Landing connected a circumstantial spot volition fto players make unsocial elements to adhd to the representation similar a pirate vessel that wasn’t determination erstwhile the crippled began.

Visually, Lego Party has the crisp, colorful aesthetic Lego games person travel to beryllium known for, though the enactment crippled aesthetic means that these Legos thin towards much whacky designs than thing I’d see charming. That is to say, these Legos are each astir being zany and loud, which is cleanable for the genre.

Playing with 3 different players (my 2 IGN colleagues and a developer), we recovered ourselves instantly sucked into its playful orbit. The extremity is to cod arsenic galore Gold Bricks by the extremity of the game. Winning minigames connected their ain volition lone grant you Lego bits that you tin crook into ways to people Gold Bricks, specified arsenic question modifiers that volition assistance you onshore connected the spot wherever a Gold Brick has spawned.

There’re besides traps you tin acquisition (don’t worry, it’s not successful a microtransaction way) to perchance bargain Gold Bricks from different players, and unsocial spots connected the committee that volition initiate a peculiar 2v2 crippled wherever the winning squad volition some get Gold Bricks arsenic a reward. These 2v2 rounds see peculiar minigames where, for example, some players each power 1 fractional of a car and indispensable coordinate their controls to thrust to the designated goal.

While we did implicit a tiny crippled ourselves, we lone saw a fraction of what Lego Party has to offer. If the remainder of the games are anyplace adjacent arsenic amusive arsenic the fistful that we played, I tin spot Lego Party having the benignant of addictive entreaty Mario Party has had – which is particularly bully quality for PlayStation and Xbox players that don’t person entree to Mario Party.

Matt Kim is IGN's Senior Features Editor.