It’s crazy to think that in the nearly eight years since Horizon: Zero Dawn was released on the PlayStation 4 family of consoles, we’ve had a full sequel, a remaster, plans to produce a television series (which apparently fell through), a virtual reality spin-off and now a Lego game adaptation of that first project. Sony has made the most of the development of Guerrilla Games, and that’s exactly why we’re now wondering whether there isn’t already too much Horizon in nature and whether this Lego Horizon Adventures is necessary.
Now, before I get into the details of my thoughts on Lego Horizon Adventures, I would also like to address the basic purpose of this game and point out that despite its charm, its existence makes no real sense. This is not Horizon: Zero Dawn in Lego format, but rather a simplified and retouched version of the story to adapt it to a younger audience. As a concept it makes a lot of sense, except that Horizon: Zero Dawn isn’t an overly mature game at all, which means there are probably a lot of young players who have already experienced the main part (maybe even with the remastered). version that debuted a few weeks ago…), young players who, after just a few hours with Lego Horizon Adventures, will find that the tone and structure are even too childish for them. Yes, this is where my first problem with Lego Horizon Adventures arises, because this game finds itself in a strange limbo where it doesn’t challenge any generation like TT Games’ Lego titles, but it also isn’t as kid-friendly as the family-friendly ones Offers from Outright Games. It features very rudimentary game design, combined with Cbeebies-like dialogue, jokes and text, but features combat that can be quite fast-paced and is based on a franchise that children and young adults probably don’t know or care about as much as established titans like SpongeBob or Bluey. All of this leads to a game that I still don’t know what demographic it was designed for.
But regardless, Lego Horizon Adventures takes the core story of the main game and distills it into a roughly five-hour narrative that focuses on key events in the prairies, snowy mountains, jungles and deserts of the American Midwest. You still face Helis and Hades, and several key characters meet unfortunate ends, but everything is toned down and much less emotional to make the story as kid-friendly as possible. For example, Rost’s death this time is very different than in Zero Dawn and the character never completely “lets you down”. This may seem like heresy to Horizon fans, but since there is no open-world element, the transition is smoother than you might think, and in fact my biggest concern is with the narrative structure and editing, how much it does Story has simplified and taken away any trace of appeal, something we don’t often see in other Lego adaptations.
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Ashly Burch and the rest of the voice actors return and do a fantastic job of continuing to bring their respective characters to life. There’s plenty of Lego’s trademark charm and humor that will often put a smile on your face, and the visuals and presentation are generally impressive, painting a wonderful brick-and-mortar version of the already beautiful world of Horizon. So narratively and presentationally there are good things and bad things, but most of them are positive and make for an entertaining experience.
What didn’t impress me that much is the gameplay. It’s stiff and often so predictable that after an hour or two you feel like you know exactly how this game works and how it’s going to work by the time the credits roll. And this impression is correct, because Lego Horizon Adventures basically never surprises. You set a foundation in the first minute and stick with it for the rest of the game. This basis essentially involves you using Aloy or one of the other three playable characters to progress through a linear level defeating cultists and creatures. Along the way, you’ll partially destroy the environment, open hidden chests, and build occasional (and seemingly meaningless) structures while obtaining bolts to upgrade Aloy and the central area of Mother’s Heart. The adventures and expeditions may vary due to elements of procedural generation or the foundation of unique biomes, but the actual structure and design philosophy is the same every time and really takes away from the magic of Horizon with such a rigid and predictable setup.
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Mother’s Heart also lacks depth and excitement, as it’s supposed to be a central hub where you can customize and shape the various elements to your liking, but everything is very simple and, again, so rigid that you lose interest in the Customize elements such as the roof of a building, the type of terrain it is based on, or adding silly elements around the village. Mother’s Heart doesn’t feel like it’s expanding and evolving with the adventure, it just gets bigger and longer to move around, with more non-interactable fluff everywhere.
Then there’s the content beyond the main story, which is minimal at best. While TT Games’ Lego projects are so extreme in collectibles and additional ways to engage the player that it can seem overwhelming, there’s so little in Lego Horizon Adventures that you really start to wonder if you’re missing out on something. There are Gold Bricks that you can earn by completing quests and smaller challenges like defeating enemies with explosive barrels, in addition to the Red Bricks you get from defeating the bosses and more targeted fights in Apex Hunts. But what do they really give you? Mainly, the reward opens the way to additional outfits for Aloy or more customizable items in Mother’s Heart. There are no minikits or other types of rewards to be found in the levels, there are no cute bonuses or extras in the form of cheat codes to play with, and all of this means that there is always more value and pressure on The gameplay and combat is set to succeed and impress, something that has neither the depth nor scope to make this possible. While fighting a Thunderer is a spectacle, it’s so rigid and mechanically limited that the threat these deadly robots posed in the original game isn’t really translated here in any way.
It’s all of these elements together that make me a little unsure about Lego Horizon Adventures. On the one hand, it’s so simple and easy to pick up and play, with wonderful presentation, great cooperative support and a great deal of charm, that it’s very, very easy to love it. But at the same time, the gameplay is often too predictable, the customization systems are disappointing, and even after buying all the red and gold blocks available, I still don’t know who this game is for. Given the recent remaster and even the relative delay of the original release on PS4, it’s difficult to point the finger at this game and call it a must-play, especially since it compares favorably to almost every other Lego game available Criteria are missing.
