LEGO The Hobbit is the last games of the Danish toy maker recognized that in recent years has undergone a renaissance thanks to its alliance with all sorts of icons of popular culture, from platforms like Star Wars and Marvel to topic This time: the famous children’s book by JRR Tolkien film adaptation which is still being finalized. Although the title retains the usual mechanical framework that has been functional along countless deliveries, the truth is that chronic lack of inspiration of this game, its problematic controls and forced poor design make it the weakest and unnecessary LEGO titles in recent years.
The game follows the plot of the 2 films of The Hobbit that have come out so far, since the fall of Erebor until the issue of the 13 dwarves and Bilbo to reclaim the Arkenstone, the jewel that will rebuild the Kingdom of the Lonely Mountain but not show the final part of this adventure. Undoubtedly, the first delivery problem are the scope of its story line (derived from the film), as it inevitably feels incomplete until we have the content of the conclusion of the story. However, this decision betrays haste would not be too questionable if it were not accompanied by problems in other areas critical to the gaming experience.
The Hobbit is basically a collectathon in which our characters can collect all kinds of LEGO pieces to create tools to reconstruct objects of any size and interact with different environments. As usual in these securities, there is an important cooperative element, as each character uses items that are different and help solve puzzles, in which there are numerous cases of mechanical thought on 2 players as pulleys while pulling , do weights, climbing assistance platforms, cooperate to destroy environments, etc.. In the case of having a single player through the button and we can transfer control to another character of our team, so in a sense the camaraderie and mutual support that characterizes the usual situations in Tolkien’s narrative is transmitted. Also, the title presents a basic crafting system by collecting basic ingredients, encouraging the player to destroy objects constantly in search of materials to create artifacts that allow us to move forward.
However, the first problem is the skill system itself, which is quite arbitrary and never manages to give an iconic and distinctive character to his characters, in part because the design is generic puzzles and situations. It feels as if they have a lot of powers assigned random characters to fill roles in forced instead to make situations emerge naturally from the characteristics of the characters events.
Nevertheless, the problems of game design would be more bearable if not for the interaction with objects is surprisingly poor, little arbitrary and responsive, which is particularly annoying as it is a fun franchise construction. For example, to move any object with a hammer must be perfectly aligned and push the button to blow when the button graphic appears otherwise, your actions will have consequences would obviously be preferable to record the hammer blow at any time if the angle is right, but programming The Hobbit is unable to register the collision object hit and if you’re not in the circle of predetermined action. This represents a tremendous sacrifice playability to the problems of code in a matter of inputs and collision of objects and is present in all situations and circumstances.
The humor and dialogue also represent a new nadir for the series: never passed the most basic and tired physical comedy, and lots of charm and intelligence that characterizes LEGO spoofs missed. Cinemas full clipping about the events, but it is difficult to extract a drop genuine wit script for hours.
The visual aspect is competent, but it is a game clearly designed for the previous generation, ie still quite do justice to the potential of new platforms. You can even lock or suffer framerate drops at venues like The Shire. These limitations are evident in the case of invisible walls that abound in the game. There are beautiful environments, but most of them are inaccessible by some arbitrary decision: the treasure of Smaug has a default little way, if you leave it, the character sinks into coins; if you try to interact with an object that can not be used, but which is identical to the other things with which it is possible to do, your LEGO puts his hands to his head as if to attack him brainwaves space; if you walk a hallway perfectly within your grasp, but which does not have this purpose, you break into pieces, etc.. In summary, the design solutions used to limit the game is awkward scenarios.
The hours spent with LEGO The Hobbit was a coma, one that was reduced to walking for long periods in brain dead default paths collecting LEGOS as Hanzel and Gretel. The game makes you feel like a castaway adrift in a log, burned by the sun and eaten by flies for weeks. This new adventure is complete, it offers many hours of play and fans of the movies have a great time, but his overly scripted and lacking in new development did not surprise us.