Games Booth

Wednesday, 3 December 2014

Lego Batman 3 – Beyond Gotham,

Now depending on how long you have been following Gamesbooth, you’ll know that I am a big fan of the Lego games franchise. There’s been a few hiccups of my affection along the way, but usually I am a loving, complimentary gamer, who enjoys smashing the crap out of virtually everything that is breakable in the game screen – because let’s face it – it makes you feel a whole lot better!

So here I was, full of cold, but determined to be a superhero and battle on with the gaming I had to do, and this particular weekend I wanted to don tight lycra suits, fly across galaxies and shoot lasers from my uber cool gadget suit. Yes I was settling in for long haul with Lego Batman 3 – Beyond Gotham.

It’s truly is Beyond Gotham. I’m not exactly sure why they added this into the Lego Batman series as it could’ve just been called Lego DC Super Heroes, but ‘hey ho’ who am I to question game names.

The game is pretty much run of the mill, when it comes to Lego games, why mess up a good thing right? You play as Batman and all his Justice League friends(there’s over 100 of them, so not going to name them all but, there’s good guys and gals like Robin and Wonder Woman, and there’s even some friendly bad guys like Killer Croc. The aim of the game is to use all the characters and their skills to ultimately protect the planet from an evil android, which likes to shrink cities and people in them.

In one level you make your way through a shrunken Paris, London and Pisa is order to beat the droid. All very realistically recreated in Lego.

As per any Lego game, you’re providing with a load of suits and gadgets to help you through, but some you’ll only collect on your second pass through the game in free mode, rather than story mode. Meaning that you have to play the game twice in order to truly complete it. This can be a little tedious as not all the levels are fun and exciting and others can be quite long.

In addition to the story line there is, of course, the various collectibles that are contained within the levels. These are the same as in previous Lego Batman’s - the boost pack (10 per level). However, there is one notable difference. Like previous Batman’s you have to rescue a civilian in every level, but in Lego Batman 3, this is no ordinary civilian, this is none other than Adam West – the original Batman, with his own voice included too.

The game itself is well thought out, after this many years of practice the Lego teams have got it pretty much down to a tee! The games play screen are colourful, bright, clean and crisp and there doesn’t seem to be any major glitches or setbacks to the game play overall.

Although it’s got a ‘3’ in the title, you don’t have to have played the previous games, or any of the previous Lego games for that matter. It’s a general all round fun game than any child gamer, Lego fan or platform style gamer will love this Christmas. However, if you’re looking for something ‘out there’ and different when it comes to gaming then this isn’t going to take you there – despite wanting to take you ‘Beyond Gotham’.