Jumping Between Worlds In LEGO Dimensions

The impending release of LEGO Dimensions is one that is surely met with a mixture of both childlike glee – from children and adults alike – and trepidation at how much pain it will inflict upon your wallet. The familiar gameplay formula from Traveller’s Tales’ endlessly popular Lego games merging with the recent Toys-to-Life genre is a dangerous cocktail, in that regard.

Yet, it may all be worth the price of admission, with a genuinely fun and creative spark of genius running through the small parts of the game I was able to explore. Rather than focussing on just a single property, it taps into the universe mash-ups that helped to make The Lego Movie feel so fun to watch. Amusingly enough, The Lego Movie is a distinct universe within Dimensions and Wyldstyle is one of the central protagonists early on, as she teams up with Gandalf and Batman – the one from the LEGO game universe and not from the Movie universe, who is also in the game – to try and figure out how to rescue their buddies from the clutches of Lord Vortech.

Their first excursion heads to the land of Oz, to do battle with a certain Wicked Witch of the West, as the two sides scrap over the MacGuffin that will let you overcome this evil. However, the game will see you hopping all over the place, with a baffling collection of locations and characters. Everything from Lord of the Rings to Doctor Who, Back To the Future, Portal and even Scooby-Doo is to be included in the game, with these sections locked away until you own toys from a particular universe.

Each of the playable universes is given a hub world to explore and play in. The Lego Movie, for example, has various sub-worlds that featured in the film, with secrets to discover, ramps to jump, races to take part in and so on. It’s like a condensed version of that universe, with The Old West hanging over the western themed section, which is just a short distance away from a handful of skyscrapers.

Of course, the main thrust will be with the story levels, and if those for Portal are anything to go by, they will be quite excellent. There’s an almost seamless blending of the Portal world of test chambers full of lasers and puzzles and the well worn LEGO gameplay. As such, it doesn’t quite play like you would expect a Portal level to, but instead integrates those ideas of unlocking doors and using portals to get from one place to another with bashing things to pieces and building things out of the rubble. Then there are the totally unexpected moments as, upon solving a puzzle, Homer Simpson on a wrecking ball crashes into the world for a brief cameo appearance.

From one portal to another, the real world Lego Toy Pad on which you place your Lego figures tries to push these devices to new and more interactive heights. The minifigs that you use don’t have the necessary NFC chips built into their limbs and parts, but rather stand on small discs that includes the NFC chip within them.

The same is true of the vehicles in the game, with an added twist. The Batmobile, for example, can be taken apart and put back together in a form that lets it act like a tractor beam. You have to do this at a specific station in the hub world of the game, which lets you then pull up the instructions to follow to make the change in the real world too, before asking you to put in on the prime point of the portal so that the new vehicle can be written to the NFC chip. Of course, this means you can simply skip the instructions and just change the car in game, but it’s a nice interactive touch from game world to real world.

Similarly, a number of the in game puzzles revolve around where on the portal a character is placed. The seven spaces are divided into two groups of three and a single central point, but these can be considered independently. They might become lit up with LED lights beneath the opaque plastic of different colours, forcing you to then interact with a puzzle in the real world by moving figures around to stand on a particular colour.

It’s just one of many small touches that could help Dimensions feel like a step forward from its competitors. The array of figures and the varying things that they unlock looks quite baffling, yet the heart and soul of the game will be in the way Traveller’s Tales distills and combines the franchises with their trademark sense of humour.