Lego dimensions gamer kid

Обновлено: 22.04.2024

Six months after its initial release and with more than one million units sold in the UK alone, it is safe to say that LEGO Dimensions has been a major success story for both Warner Bros. Interactive and TT Games. With the likes of The Simpsons, Doctor Who and Ghostbusters already released, this fourth wave of expansions brings us the final announced level pack, Midway Arcade.

Before we even begin to delve into the pack, it is clear that this expansion is going to be a little different from the rest. This isn’t based on a highly successful TV Show, or soon to be rebooted cult movie, but on a collection of retro video games from the 1980s, it seems a little niche for the wider LEGO Dimensions audience.

For those that aren’t familiar (or under 30), Midway is actually quite an important part of gaming history, having been one of the major players in the arcade scene throughout the 80’s and 90’s. They were not only the western publisher for Namco classics such as Pac-Man and Galaga but also the creators of one of the most popular fighting game of all time, Mortal Kombat. While the company made a number of attempts to revive the love for their older stock with compilation games at the turn of the century, Midway sadly filed for bankruptcy in 2009 with Warner Bros. purchasing the majority of their assets.

While Mortal Kombat continues to do great things for Warner, the wealth of arcade classics from Midway’s golden days hasn’t seen the light of day for some time, besides another compilation release in 2012, that is. Could the LEGO Dimensions platform be the unique opportunity to bring these pixelated beauties back to the forefront?

As this is a LEGO Dimensions pack, we get the physical builds to deal with first. So, what’s in the box?

Interestingly, Warner and TT have decided not to use a character from their many gaming assets and instead gone with a rather generically named ‘Gamer Kid’ minifigure. This is actually the first, and currently only character created for LEGO Dimensions to represent a franchise. The two additional accessories, however, take a lot of inspiration from Midway’s lengthy history as we get an Arcade Machine and vehicle from one of the classic games, Spy Hunter.

Being a new creation by LEGO, the set exclusive minifigure features LEGO original yellow ‘skin’ on both the headpiece and his hands and while the legs are the same used by both Homer Simpson and Marty McFly, the torso piece is stunningly original. The design on the main body piece is a t-shirt under a black jacket and while it isn’t mind-blowing in detail compared to the Ghostbusters or Cyberman figures, it still looks brilliant with the retro pixelated Manti Lander on the green t-shirt.

The headpiece is fairly generic, with a cheesy grin and very little other detail. That said, the hairpiece does a great job of creating the teenage, long-haired, scruffy look to match the character’s origins. Accessory-wise, Gamer Kid has a can of soda, much like Homer’s beer can, and a nickel coin.

In-game, Gamer Kid actually turns out to be one of the most versatile characters in the game with a plethora of useful skills, he also has a unique mechanic for activating his skills. Rather than having a number of different buttons assigned to each power, you can cycle through them, find the skill you want to use and then activate it by drinking from his soda can, similar to Homer’s belching power.

The powers available are quite impressive and each skill changes the t-shirt that our retro gamer is wearing; The default t-shirt is used for Laser vision, a blue shirt featuring a lightning bolt for Super Strength, a gray shirt with a Super Mario’esque superstar for Invulnerability, a yellow shirt with Hermes’ feet for Super Speed, and a white shirt featuring a ghost face makes you invisible to other characters. As you can see, the Gamer Kid character features quite the array of skills, making him one of the most valuable assets for completionists.

Despite its incredible quick build, the arcade machine is a delight to construct, utilizing mostly generic LEGO pieces with a few pre-printed panels, the lack of stickers is a fantastic decision here. The machine is designed to be a replica of one of Midway’s famous games, Defender, and the detail added to the logo and impressive screen panels are superb. Looking back over the four waves of LEGO Dimensions so far, aesthetically this is one of the best accessories available for the game.

It’s not all about the looks though, as this Arcade Machine is one of those special accessories which offers a unique gameplay mechanic not available anywhere else. Through your adventures in LEGO Dimensions, you may have come across a number of plug-in points with ‘DEFENDER’ and ‘ROBOTRON’ plastered all over them, these are arcade game activation points. While riding the arcade machine you can dock with one of these points and begin playing one of twenty classic Midway games.

The G-6155 Spy Hunter model does do a fantastic job of bringing the pixelated classic vehicle to life, it looks like something out of a popular Bond movie. The simple white design creates a slick, streamlined 1980s Ferrari look which uses brand new wheel arch pieces to add that special touch. In-game, the vehicle doesn’t bring anything unique or special to your LEGO Dimensions experience, with basic abilities which match the starter packs Batmobile. The Spy Hunter can, however, be transformed into both a speedboat, The Interdiver, and an aircraft, Aerial Spyhunter, by unlocking the additional blueprints.

With the building fun complete, let’s move on to the expansion level itself. Placing our retro gamer on the LEGO Dimensions toy pad will automatically unlock the exclusive level included within the pack.

The narrative seems to have been a second thought here, but the basic premise is that Gamer Kid is walking past his local arcade when suddenly pixelated 1980s characters from the games escape and begin running amok. In order to end the chaos, Gamer Kid must use his awesome gaming skills and newly found superpowers to enter the games, defeat them and get high scores. As you work your way through the level you must overcome a number of themed puzzles in the ‘real world’ in order to unlock the arcade port and enter the gaming world, with each room offering you a different Midway classic to enjoy.

The level itself actually offers very little when compared to the extensive LEGO creations for Doctor Who and Ghostbusters, but the unique game-in-game trope makes a massive difference to the overall gameplay value of the level, and while you may not spend all that long exploring the arcade world, playing the individual retro games does mean that gameplay is significantly more varied from the standard LEGO game mechanics.

As an added bonus, the exclusive level isn’t the only in-game addition you get from this pack. As with all LEGO Dimensions figures, Gamer Kid has the ability to unlock Midway’s hub world. It is in the hub world where we learn the full extent of what Warner has made available with all of the promised “20 Classic Arcade Games” available in-world, once you’ve collected all the gold bricks that is.

Overall, the Midway Arcade level pack is a mixed bag, it offers exclusive figures, new gaming mechanics and a smorgasbord of skills, but the additional level content is less impressive and unlikely to wow the majority of the LEGO Dimensions fans.

You need to have a genuine love for retro gaming to fully appreciate this pack and sadly I don’t believe that is something that many younger collectors will have. That said, the smaller retro-loving audience is going to love every aspect of Midway Arcade.

Lego Dimensions is a Lego-themed action-adventure platform crossover toy-to-life video game developed by Traveller's Tales and published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment for the PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Wii U, Xbox 360 and Xbox One. It follows the toys-to-life format, in that the player has Lego figures and a toy pad that can be played within the game itself where it features characters and environments from over 30 different franchises.

There is an ancient planet at the center of the Lego Multiverse inhabited by an evil mastermind, Lord Vortech. It is said that he who controls the Foundational Elements that this planet is built upon, controls all of the Multiverse. Lord Vortech has vowed to be that ruler, summoning characters from a variety of Lego worlds to help him find these building bricks of Lego civilization. Some have agreed. Others have rebelled. And only the combined powers of the greatest Lego heroes can stop him.

When a mysterious and powerful vortex suddenly appears in various Lego worlds, different characters from DC Comics, The Lord of the Rings and The Lego Movie are swept away. To save their friends, Batman, Gandalf and Wyldstyle bravely jump into the vortex. As they journey to locations beyond their wildest imaginations in search of their friends, they soon realize that Lord Vortech is summoning villains across different Lego worlds to help him gain control. As his power grows and the worlds collide, many unexpected characters meet and all boundaries are broken. Our heroes must travel through space and time to rescue their friends before Vortech destroys all of Lego humanity.

Why It Needs A Bigger Imagination

Bad Qualities

Reception

Lego Dimensions received positive reviews from critics, gamers and fans alike. The version of PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Wii U (despite having the porting disaster) received "generally favorable reviews", according to review aggregator Metacritic.

LEGO Dimensions starts in an unusual way: it asks you not to play the game. After some short, perfunctory in-game tasks, Dimensions takes a swerve, telling you to put your controller down and build (using actual LEGO pieces) a physical portal that sits atop the real-world base you'll use to interact with the game. The portal itself is attractive and intricate, and depending on your fine motor skills (and whether you have children helping/hindering you), could take at least an hour to build.

You don't actually have to physically build anything to progress within the game, but that off-game opening speaks to a confidence developer TT Games seemingly has in LEGO Dimensions, both as an actual toy and a virtual one. It's a confidence that's well founded. The appeal of building LEGO is near universal, and only the biggest curmudgeons would deny the appeal of Dimension's charming fusion of several huge entertainment franchises within its sprawling gameplay. LEGO Dimensions works unquestionably, unequivocally, as both a toy and a game, and it feels like the high point of the many LEGO titles that have come before it.

What's remarkable is that despite Dimensions being the long-running LEGO series' first foray into the toys-to-life genre, the newly physical nature of this game isn't its most noteworthy aspect. Previous LEGO games have showcased the series' irreverent, playful takes on huge pop culture franchises, but Dimensions significantly ups the ante by shoving multiple properties into one gigantic mash-up. The in-game premise is that the evil Lord Vortech is attempting to destroy all of the various LEGO dimensions and combine them into one; in reality, it's a handy excuse to see worlds and characters from some major franchises collide, including The Lord of the Rings, the DC universe, Doctor Who, The Simpsons, the Portal games, The LEGO Movie, and more kid-friendly series like Scooby Doo, Ninjago, and Legends of Chima.

The result is, in many cases, outstanding. There's an undeniable joy to be had in seeing Batman use the Bat Signal to defeat Sauron, or the Joker destroy the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant, or the off-handed way the Doctor addresses Portal's GLaDOS as the "faulty A.I.". My favourite--and forgive me for venturing into possible spoilers here (skip to the next paragraph if you're wary)--is a short sequence during the boss fight with GLaDOS. In the midst of this fight, a dimensional rift appears, pulling in HAL 9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey in the room. HAL is supposed to be a distraction, an opportunity for you to defeat GLaDOS during her preoccupation with the strange AI that just popped into her testing chamber. Instead, I put my controller down and just listened, transfixed by the pair's hilarious banter.

Many of the dimensions the game takes you to is filled with moments like these, and I looked forward to every rift, every intrusion, wondering what was going to happen next. The LEGO games' light touch and cheeky nose-tweaking of the franchises it portrays has always been one of the series' highlights, and it's in fine form here. Doctor Who's world, for example, is impressive. Nods to fans abound, from Bad Wolf graffiti on walls, to mysterious, glowing cracks in surfaces, to the excellent way the menace of the Weeping Angels was translated into a child-friendly video game. The stages based on classic Midway games, too, show ingenuity, changing the game to a top-down Gauntlet-like experience in one instance, to a 2D-shooter in another.

Other worlds were less impressive. The Wild West of Back to the Future is nondescript, feeling little like the source material outside of a few folks named after characters in the third BTTF movie. The New York of the Ghostbusters world, too, felt lacking. But even in the midst of my disappointment, I heard some of the cheesy '80s pop songs from the Ghostbusters soundtrack play, and I smiled. In LEGO Dimensions, the little touches are oft times as affecting as the major strokes.

Despite the age of some of these franchises, make no mistake: while much of the humor, references, and gags may be aimed at grown-up gamers, LEGO Dimensions is still unabashedly a family-friendly game, one that's best played with an adult assisting a child. The game's basic foundations remains true to previous LEGO titles--simple combat and controls, and no real penalty for dying. Each of the characters you control features one or two abilities specific to them--these become the basis for solving the game's most simple puzzles. Only Batman, for example, can use a Batarang to activate a switch, while Gandalf's magic is required to move certain blocks. This simplicity sometimes led to frustrations in Dimensions--driving controls, for example, felt too rudimentary, making it fiddly to manoeuvre vehicles into tight spots.

But the gameplay strength of the LEGO series has always been with its environmental puzzles, and Dimensions features some of the most creative yet seen in the series. They start simply, with the game giving you the ability to teleport characters around, or change their size, or lend them specific elemental powers. By the end, when you're asked to combine powers in increasingly intricate ways to progress past puzzles, finding the right solutions was often times rewarding.

LEGO Dimensions comes with physical LEGO pieces that you have to build into sets (like the aforementioned portal base), characters, vehicles, or accessories. You place the characters, vehicles, or accessories (which you attach to small discs, which is where all of the information on that particular piece is stored) on the base, and voila: they'll pop up on your television ready to be controlled. The game's starter pack comes with Batman, Gandalf, and Wyldstyle (from The LEGO Movie), as well as the Batmobile.

You can complete the main narrative with the starter pack alone, but as is the case with other toys-to-life games, some content is locked to specific characters or sets that require separate purchase. In this case, characters and objects from the other worlds within Dimensions are sold separately which, if you're a veteran of the LEGO games, can seem somewhat annoying. Needing specific characters to access areas or activities is nothing new in a LEGO game--you simply had to amass enough in-game studs to purchase. In Dimensions, you'll have to use real money. Thankfully, there's a significant amount of content available within just the basic pack; finishing the main quest line should take more than 12 hours, depending on how obsessive you are about collecting studs within levels.

Outside of the narrative, Dimensions also features large, open world sections dedicated to each franchise, and all you need is a character from that franchise to unlock it (that means with the starter pack, you have The Lord of the Rings, DC Universe, and LEGO Movie open worlds already unlocked). These open world sections are separate from the main narrative and include various activities like checkpoint races, simple quests, and plenty of collectibles. While they don't feature the same level of intricacy the main game provides, they do add several more hours each to the overall experience, so the pain of buying a Homer Simpson pack just so you can use him within the main game can be somewhat mitigated knowing it also unlocks a virtual Springfield for you to play in.

So far, so basic for a game in the toys-to-life genre. But LEGO Dimensions takes things a step further. It requires you to almost constantly interact with the real LEGO figures on your base to solve in-game puzzles or avoid in-game obstacles, with the base having three different sections that light up depending on what's happening on screen. Wicked Witch of the West got Batman trapped in magical chains? Simply move the Batman figure off the red-colored area of the base to free him. Need to teleport a character to a specific spot within the level? Then move the real toy onto the appropriate color-matched spot on the base. Some of Dimensions' most complex puzzles and challenging bosses require a huge amount of moving toys around, making the game an extremely tactile experience. In LEGO Dimensions, sometimes you're manipulating real LEGO as much as you are holding a controller.

Make no mistake: while much of the humor, references, and gags may be aimed at grown-up gamers, LEGO Dimensions is still unabashedly a family-friendly game, one that's best played with an adult assisting a child.

It's this real world activity that makes Dimensions a unique experience. As toys, these are in every way the same as any other LEGO set you would buy--great build quality, simple in design but often times intricate in construction, and fully adaptable with other LEGO bricks you already have. There's nothing stopping you from putting Gandalf's hat on Batman, or ignoring instructions and building the portal to your own design, or even foregoing building altogether (after all, all you need to actually play the game are the ID discs for each character). But for me, Dimensions' endearing nature and interactivity with the real world made me want to build, and it's a feeling that's bound to intensify if you play with a young one.

In the first few hours of LEGO Dimensions play time with my six-year-old son, almost half the time was spent on playing with blocks. We built the portal together. We built the Batmobile, and then opened up a Scooby Doo pack and built the power-up Scooby Snack and Mystery Machine located within. We then hit the Wizard of Oz world, with Batman's head comically poking out the top of the Mystery Machine. In any game within the toys-to-life genre, there's sometimes an unspoken question: is this also a great toy or just a great game? In LEGO Dimensions' case, the answer is easy: it's both.

Fans of retro gaming rejoiced when they discovered that TT Games was planning a Level Pack based on Midway's classic arcade games. After waiting almost six months since the launch of Lego Dimensions, they can finally get their hands on it.

What gamer kid wouldn't smile with a replica Spy Hunter and Defender arcade machine?

List of included Midway Arcade games

720°
Badlands
Blasteroids
Championship Sprint
Cyberball 2072
Defender
Defender II (AKA Stargate)
Gauntlet
Gauntlet II
Joust
Joust 2
Klax
Marble Madness
Paperboy
Rampage
RoadBlasters
Robotron: 2084
Spy Hunter
Super Sprint
Timber
Toobin'
Vindicators
Xybots

The following abilities become available for you to use throughout the Lego Dimensions universe when you purchase this Level Pack:

Unfortunately, the story level is pretty lackluster. The world and included Midway Arcade games more than make up for it, but I'll briefly talk about the level so that you know what to expect. Gamer Kid finds himself in what looks like an old arcade basement. The scenery is pretty typical of the dark cityscapes pictured in other Lego levels and doesn't do much to set itself apart. Your main goal is simply to build your arcade machine and place it on six different docking stations in order to play some retro games. Enemies from the games are dotted around and you have to choose a special ability at the right time to defeat them. To equip an ability, Gamer Kid can drink a can of pop in the flavour of his choice including: Super Strength, Laser, Invisibility, Invincibility and Speed. In order to unlock the next portion of the level, you have to get a bronze medal on each arcade game. Achieving these medals is easy if you're familiar with the games but pretty tough if they're new to you. Once you reach the roof of the arcade, the level comes to an end and you see Gamer Kid transform into George from Rampage. Placing your machine on each of the stations means that you can now access these games in the adventure world, so you do get something out of playing this simplistic level. Now comes the fun part: the life-size world of Midway Arcade!

Laval kicks butt in a more realistic game of Vindicators

The adventure world is a mash-up of many Midway Arcade games amplified to be hundreds of times the size of little Gamer Kid. The best way to enjoy it is to equip a flying character or hop in a plane to take in the sights of massive Marble Madness, big Badlands racing, gigantic Gauntlet and many more towering retro game incarnations. Once you drop to the ground, you'll be sporting around with the robots of Cyberball, riding ostriches in Joust, and rampaging with George, Lizzie and Ralph. The representation of these familiar franchises is spot-on, and the requests and puzzles for gold bricks emulate their gameplay, too. For example, you complete a request by shooting down twenty racers on the Badlands with your gunner vehicle, and collect a gold brick after blasting at aliens above Defender Mountain. Playing this adventure world is a delight for fans of the represented series and newcomers alike. Plus, if your main reason for purchasing the pack was to get your hands on the actual retro games, you have your choice of 23 classic Midway Arcade games accessible through the adventure world hub after you unlock them in other Lego Dimensions levels.

Seeing as my gaming career didn't really kick off until well into the 90s and early 2000s, I had to do a lot of research to get an understanding of the games represented for this review. However, a great game appeals to gamers of all backgrounds, so I expected to find it easy to pick up and enjoy. One thing that let me down in this regard was the controls for some retro games. I found it extremely difficult to get to grips with the games that were designed more than thirty years ago and the awkward controls that are implemented for many of the games here sure didn't help. Lego Dimensions has done a great job at simplifying controls in its base game and making it accessible, but the same can't be said for these arcade games. Too many buttons are used and they simply aren't intuitive.

Most of the arcade games are undeniable classics yet some of them are hard to enjoy in this day and age. Therefore, you're left with quite the mixed bag. On a positive note, my husband owns almost every Midway Arcade compilation and he has never played Blasteroids so he's very happy to be able to finally enjoy this 1987 sequel to Asteroids.

Wonder Woman sprints to victory in a reinterpretation of Badlands

The amount of content in the Midway Arcade Level Pack is the best yet out of all of the sets simply due to TT Games' decision to pack in over 20 full arcade games. The level itself is kind of drab, but there are some great retro moments. Where the Level Pack really shines is in the carefully crafted adventure world that boasts a genius amalgamation of many Midway franchises.