I’ve always found LEGO games to be quite endearing, with their slapstick humor, eclectic blocky set pieces, and those fantastic destructible environments. I challenge you to find me someone who doesn’t enjoy destroying a once perfectly aligned pile of bricks in the guise of a cannon, a tree, or whatever, just to watch those objects suddenly transform into a wave of collectible studs of pure fun. I bet you can’t.
The question is, can Lego’s zany fun still come through when it’s based on more serious and “mature” source material like Horizon Zero Dawn? After all, the Horizon series has been geared toward a more mature audience from the beginning—its PEGI 16 age rating is a far cry from the U and PG settings that LEGO games like Star Wars and Raiders of the Lost Ark are famous for. There are also underlying themes of exclusion and isolation in Horizon , and let’s not forget the minor plot point of humanity’s decline. Yes, to be fair, Horizon Zero Dawn isn’t exactly a video game, and it’s not the equivalent of a cozy bedtime story you read to your kids while snuggled under a blanket and drinking cocoa.
Despite seemingly being at odds on many fronts, developers Guerrilla Games and Studio Gobo have managed to bring the two together quite nicely, as I discovered during a hands-on preview of LEGO Horizon Adventure Hour last week.
The upcoming release on PlayStation will mark a major change for the Horizon series. Not only does LEGO Horizon Adventures arrive in a light, easy, everyone-friendly way compared to its more cinematic cousins, but it also liberates Aloy from the constraints of PlayStation-first. She will debut simultaneously on the family favorite Nintendo Switch, PC and PS5 in LEGO Horizon Adventures, launching this November.
And, you know what, it’s so refreshing to see Aloy embrace her happier side, which her LEGO set allows for. Lego Aloy is actually a bit of a goofball, making silly jokes and quips from time to time about things like sandwiches. She finally gets a chance to relax and revel in her role as protector and hero – something I’m reliably told Aloy actress Ashly Burch also enjoyed during the game’s development, as she once again reprises her role for Aloy’s new brick dub. Personas.
So how does LEGO Horizon Adventure come to life? Well, it’s a Lego Horizon’s combat thrust certainly leans towards the more kid-friendly approach to the game, the blocky adaptations it’s known for, but it also has goofy and humorous twists that make it feel very much its own. For example, while Aloy will still use her trusty bow to take on cultists and some animal-like machines, she can now also make full use of some more unexpected but very Lego attacks to help her out of trouble.
In the opening section I played, Aloy was able to deploy a hot dog stand in the middle of the battlefield (yes, you read that right). This may not seem like a great defense system at first glance, but trust me, it actually works as the stall owners will periodically launch hot dogs into the fray, which then explode on impact, giving a whole new meaning to the word “banger” meaning’. Let me tell you, these unstable projectiles were very useful when I was trying to take down a bunch of herbivores that were trying their best to headbutt me.
Meanwhile, the bonfires and electric pits scattered throughout also added a little extra oomph to my arrows (and were a lot more fun than Horizon’s original crafting system). For example, the new flaming arrows not only deal more damage to my enemies, but can also be used to clear bushes to reveal additional hidden treasure chests filled with extra studs.
You have to be careful about fires, though, so please learn from my mistakes. At one point, I not only succeeded in burning away all the long grass that would have served as useful mulch, I also set I I caught fire when it occurred to me (for some stupid reason that even I didn’t fully understand) that it would be a good idea to try and sneak into the now burning bush. Needless to say, Aloy took some damage here and I had to throw our heroine into the pool to put her out. Sorry, Aloy!
Another thing I particularly enjoyed during my brief time with LEGO Horizon Adventures was its different difficulty options. While previous LEGO games have tended to take a one-size-fits-all approach, with no real fail states (even if you lose all the hearts and studs, your player character can still rejoin whatever chaos is happening around them, whether it’s Escape from Jurassic Park dinosaurs or fight sea monsters in Pirates of the Caribbean), that’s not always the case in LEGO Horizon Adventures.
I decided to play the last part of the preview on the most challenging option in the game. Horizon’s restorative, comforting berries are less accessible in this mode, and combat is noticeably more difficult, although I never felt it was unreasonable for younger players to have fun too. What I particularly appreciate about this harder-than-average mode, though, is if Aloy and her then-cooperating wingman did Hit too many times and they’ll encounter what is essentially a game-over screen, upping the stakes and bringing just a touch of danger to the mix without being overly brutal in the process.
Please allow me to explain further. When my heart returned to zero, I became a little ghost that couldn’t move. My partner then had the chance to resurrect me, although of course this had to be done while they were also trying to escape the wrath of the machine – making it more in line with the style of a co-op game where teamwork and rescuing your partner is crucial these days. After being resurrected, my little ghost was once again replaced by Aloy, but not a loving Aloy. Instead, she had to make do with what little of her full health potential she had, and when my heart dropped to zero again, that brat didn’t come back. Two strikes and I was out. When my partner also succumbed to the rampaging machine, we were forced to restart the scene from the last checkpoint – thus starting the battle again.
This adds a welcome layer of challenge for adult gamers, who might be immersed in a LEGO Horizon adventure with their kids but don’t want to just breeze through a video game with no real threats. However, if these modes prove to be too much, there is still the option of lowering the difficulty. After all, this is still a LEGO game, and I’ve never been locked into one difficulty mode with a “you made the bed, now you have to lie on it” attitude.
In a similar vein to Lego, Horizon Adventures also simplifies the game’s plot so it doesn’t focus too much on the gore and violence of the original. As mentioned earlier, Zero Dawn has a mature age rating due to scenes such as Aloy’s throat being slit early on by the ruthless Shadow Kaja Helis. He’s still present in LEGO Horizon Adventures, but his introduction is a little different. Rather than performing a massacre in a proving ceremony like we saw in Zero Dawn, Horizon Adventures has him first appear as a hologram who thinks he’s having some kind of reception issue (“I don’t Mute, isn’t it?”) he asked Aloy, which reminded me a lot of Zoom calls).
His intentions are still evil, and he’s clearly one of the bad guys. But Horizon Adventures delivers this in the way it’s most familiar with, using the series’ classic “LEGO villains are all clowns” sense of humor to play him for laughs. At one point, he accidentally sets his hand on fire and then runs around in an over-the-top manner before getting into a childish slap fight with Aloy’s father, Rost.
Then, instead of slaughtering the members of Nora’s tribe with a hail of arrows and fire like in Zero Dawn, he simply kidnapped some of Mother Heart’s residents and put them in cages. I agree, it’s still not great, but it’s definitely a more family-friendly version of the Zero Dawn campaign, and as a mother of a 9 and 11-year-old, I’m happy with this approach.
Meanwhile, several members of the rest of the Zero Dawn cast also return in beautiful brick form. Characters like Teb served as a fashion-forward tailor in Horizon Adventures, while businessman Custer appeared as a LEGO “handyman” in Zero Dawn. Each character has a level of banter with Aloy, once again adding more joy to this fresh brick world.
Speaking of Brick World, from what I’ve seen so far, there are no mini kits to collect, like the likes of Lego Star Wars (probably because Horizon Adventures is from a different developer). But there’s still plenty to enjoy while out and about, right in the heart of Horizon Adventures. These include a place to change Aloy’s outfits, customize her house, and some small “side quests” such as extra tasks such as setting up a table for a party.
All in all, if you enjoyed Traveller’s Tales, the previous LEGO games, I’m sure you’ll also enjoy Horizon Adventures, regardless of whether you’ve played Zero Dawn before. Yes, it’s still essentially a “kid’s game,” but as a Horizon fan, I feel a lot better when I introduce my own kids to the world of Aloy… and now that includes hot dogs.