Warner Bros. finally two new LEGO games recently and to everyone's surprise, neither of them were LEGO Harry Potter. LEGO Rock Band will be released later on in the year but LEGO Battles is coming to DS this summer, and will be based on the classic Castle, Pirate and Space ranges. It follows on from the family favourite LEGO Star Wars, Indiana Jones and Batman games. So with this in mind, we thought we'd take a closer look at just how these great videogames were made and what the UK developer and franchise mastermind Traveller's Tales might have in store for us next...
Treading on a bit of LEGO while barefoot has gone down in history as one of the universal childhood agonies of our time. But it's not writhing around in pain and permanent scarring that makes the LEGO experience so memorable.
It's pouring out a big tub of the stuff onto your bedroom floor one rainy sunday and letting your imagination run wild. During this scribe's childhood, you were a playground pariah unless you had a sprawling LEGO metropolis covering up three quarters of your horrendously-patterned carpet. It's no surprise that LEGO-related foot injuries were so common.
But times have changed, and thankfully LEGO has too. It's not just a load of coloured bricks any more - the company that has grown to global proportions from a small town in Denmark now embraces every aspect of youth entertainment.
And that's where videogames come in. While some old-fashioned toy companies continue to fight against the rise and rise of games, LEGO has fully embraced it and has reaped the rewards as a result. The Star Wars, Indiana Jones and Batman universes have already been through the LEGOnator and produced quality titles, all highly rated by this esteemed publication. So who is it that takes LEGO's Danish heritage and crosses it with Hollywood's biggest name franchises to create some of the most brilliantly-executed family games in recent years?
Fittingly, the studio responsible for this intriguing mix sits somewhere in between Denmark and Hollywood. In Knutsford, Cheshire, to be exact. So we travelled there to speak to Traveller's Tales' head of production to discover the secrets behind the series' huge success.
ONM: How did the original idea for LEGO Star Wars come about?
Jonathon Smith: LEGO Star Wars really came to life in an early demo produced by a small team at Traveller's Tales. It was just a very short cutscene - a room and a corridor, with only a few characters and limited animation - but it showed instantly how fun and fresh the game would turn out to be.
The lovely people at Lucasfilm were kind enough to listen to our proposal, and trusted us to build on that demo. From the first meeting, they were incredibly supportive and helpful, and the team just had a lot of fun!
ONM: How does your partnership with LEGO and the owners of the franchises work exactly?
JS: We're privileged to work with some of the best-loved characters in the world and we've been fantastically lucky to have had amazing support from all the people who look after those fictional universes. Everything we do gets checked over but because everyone on the team here has always been genuine fans of the worlds we've explored in LEGO form, we very rarely get anything wrong!
ONM: Why do you think the LEGO games are so well loved?
JS: There are lots and lots of different reasons why they are successful I think but, above all, they are games that anyone can play, with no barriers to entry, where just moving around as a character immediately feel fun.
ONM: Which gameplay features are you most proud of across the LEGO series?
JS: In LEGO Star Wars, the 'drop in/drop out' two-player feature has enabled millions of parents to play together with their children, which is something we're particularly proud of. LEGO Star Wars II introduced the character customiser, enabling you to build and play with your own unique LEGO creations. LEGO Indiana Jones introduced rich new options for LEGO interaction, including the ability to pick up and move around individual bricks. LEGO Batman then gave us the Villain Mode, with its colourful cast of bad guys just demanding their own parallel adventure to play through.
ONM: What elements are you looking to improve on with the next game?
JS: We're rigorous in our efforts to improve every element and introduce lots of great new features, from one LEGO game to the next.
ONM: What's your favourite story from the creation of the LEGO games?
JS: Not really an anecdote, but a single image - our Lead Programmer on LEGO Star Wars, John Hodskinson, somersaulting in to a huge pit of LEGO bricks to prove that he was immersed in the LEGO world. I think he really hurt himself!
ONM: Were you surprised at all at the sales success and critical acclaim your LEGO titles have attracted?
JS: We always believed in LEGO Star Wars, but we had no idea how it would be received in the market at large. Yes, we were certainly surprised by its success and we've just felt incredibly proud to be able to build on that with new adventures in new LEGO worlds.
ONM: What have been the biggest changes since Warner Bros bought Traveller's Tales?
JS: Warner Bros have been brilliant at making us feel supported and well looked after, but nothing whatsoever has changed in the way we go about work on the games.
ONM: How did the development process unfold for the latest game, LEGO Batman?
JS: We worked for a long time on LEGO Batman - a couple of years, in fact. We were building on the technology used for LEGO Star Wars, so some basic elements were in place at the start but we wanted to change and add a vast amount of things.
In the beginning, we focussed on coding, testing and refining all the new character abilities, the new, more intense, fighting system, and of course the Bat Suit technologies. At the same time, the design team at Traveller's Tales was working on the initial designs and layouts for our levels, so, once we had the new core gameplay proved out and working well, the artists could build the game environments and fill them with LEGO fun.
ONM: Will you always concentrate on the LEGO franchise or are you looking to work on other projects too?
JS: In addition to our LEGO work, we were really pleased to have been able to create the Guinness World Records videogame last year and we've been delighted with the reception that's received from both critics and players.
ONM: What other franchises do you feel would be ripe for a LEGO version?
JS: The amazing thing about LEGO is that it can become anything - ANYTHING you can imagine!
