Rock, Paper, Shotgun

By John Walker on February 1st, 2008 at 1:41 pm.

See in that cage over there? Those are our hearts. Yours too, probably. Traveller’s Tales have captured them, probably for nefarious purposes.

TT seem to somehow have time to make two games at once, when we know we’d be swimming around in the vast pools of money Warner just paid to acquire the company. £100 million. Blimey.

There’s a limit to how many times you can reel out the same idea before people start to get cynical. Fortunately, for the Lego series, there’s probably about another four hundred before they’re in trouble. What’s even better is that TT seem to have picked the two films anyone could have hoped to see recreated in Legoey gaming form: Indiana Jones and Batman.

So here’s what we know about each new game:

Lego Indiana Jones

Following a similar format to both Lego Star Wars games, Lego Indy will follow the content of the first three films, homaging and spoofing the most famous scenes. It will also obey the Holy Rule of Making an Indiana Jones Videogame: have Indy be able to use his whip to swing from platform to platform.

How can we be less than excited about playing the boulder scene, or dodging snakes, or riding in a mine cart? The Indy films have everything that’s necessary for a Lego Star Wars-a-like game to work, so it would seem silly not to set hopes high.

They’ve released the cheesiest trailer imaginable, which has a brief glimpse of game footage at the end.

Game Trailers, we’d walk through pits of snakes for you.

Lego Batman

A lot less is known about Lego Batman. However, the early indications are that it’s going to deviate quite a lot from the format of Star Wars and Indy. Instead, we think it’s going to feature an open, explorable Gotham City, where you can play as either Batman or Robin to capture the famous collection of enemies.

As always made for the best episodes of the TV series, the game will begin with all of his best foes managing to escape from the Arkham Asylum at once. So you’ll be able to track down and recapture The Joker, Penguin and so on, and eventually play as them. It’s also going to include Batman’s gadgets, and vehicles designed to encourage co-op play.

Beyond that, we don’t know. A GTA-style open city Lego game just sounds fantastic, especially with TT’s tradition for making all characters playable, and their unique abilities opening up new areas previously inaccessible. Let’s hope this is what they deliver. A teeny teaser has been released, with no game footage, but thankfully some silliness. Enjoy.

Holy thanks to Gametrailers.