Even the custom map screen itself is a remarkable, miniaturised version of the whole LEGO Valley environment, literally pieced together with fistfuls of digital LEGO bricks and packed with tiny riffs on the world’s huge pirate ships, bright-green football fields, and even its high-speed dedicated race track (which, notably, is the first purpose-built, full-time race track to appear in a Forza Horizon game).
The animals have been replaced with LEGO versions of themselves, rocking back and forth on their stiff plastic limbs. In keeping with the theme, there’s a new radio station called Radio Awesome which plays the aggressively saccharine LEGO hymn “Everything Is Awesome” non-stop.
Inspect the bones and skulls themselves and you’ll note they’re constructed with a broad spectrum of tiny, recognisable LEGO parts, and I get the feeling anything in the game could be built in real life with a big enough parts bucket at one’s disposal. The world itself is an ode to various famous LEGO themes, from the quaint village of Brickchester and its countless streetside cafes to a beach lined with pirate shipwrecks, a forest filled with glowing ghosts, and a desert spotted with towering dinosaur skeletons. This expansion has certainly been assembled with oodles of affection for Earth’s favourite building blocks. The attention to detail is typically terrific. Stickered parts even have a completely different sheen to them, and the texture of raised, glossy paper is noticeably distinct from the hard and smooth ABS plastic surface of a LEGO brick. Gaze over a grey baseplate and you’ll notice the word “LEGO” is stamped on every single stud. Zoom in on the headlights of a LEGO Mini and you’ll be able to make out individual part numbers and copyright symbols. The softly-scratched surfaces of the LEGO bricks (particularly clear pieces like headlights and windscreens) are incredibly authentic close up it’s far more in line with the look of The LEGO Movie and its follow-ups than Traveller’s Tales’ more stylised LEGO-branded games over the years. The LEGO looks quite remarkable, too – especially under bright sunlight. LEGO Speed Champions remains in sync with Playground’s previous work with Hot Wheels – just like the enormous, highway-width orange tracks of Hot Wheels Island, the LEGO bricks here have been scaled up to suit the real world, as if some billionaire lost a bet to a 10-year-old in the toy aisle.
0 kommentar(er)
