You can’t have avoided the negativity around the WiiU recently, from slow menu loading times (soon to be fixed) to a lack of games. But my latest purchase for Nintendo’s newest home console has shown that they make up for a lack of games with the sheer quality and innovation in games.
In the four months that the console has been around we have some absolute corkers of games: ZombiU, Scribblenauts Unlimited, NintendoLand, Little Inferno, and we can add ‘Lego City Undercover’ to that list.
A free-roaming open world game, basically a Lego version of ‘Grand Theft Auto’ with jokes and pop-references replacing guns and prostitutes, you play as cop Chase McCain who is on the hunt of escaped criminal Rex Fury, completing various missions around the city to get on his trail.
The usual staples of games under the Lego banner are here: smashing up items to collect bricks and making the most of the situation to create jokes, and out of all the Lego games I’ve played this is by far the funniest. With some well-created characters, full exploitation of the clichés of detective and crime television shows and movies, this is a game that will have you constantly laughing, whether it’s the Matrix-inspired Kung Fu section, the anger management techniques of one of the small criminal bosses, the mannerisms of cop colleague Frank Honey or even just the random audio clips of Lego citizens as you approach them, there is plenty to laugh at.
And it’s certainly a game with plenty to do. Missions are varied and interesting and don’t feel tired, even when they fall sometimes onto the same mechanic. Within the first few hours of play you’ll find yourself doing driving missions, roof-top free running and kung-fu fighting, as well as time trials and item collection, all of which can be unlocked in free play as you go around to collect some of the hundreds of things hidden around the map.
Because, as with GTA and similar games, if you don’t fancy doing the missions there’s plenty of fun to be had by just navigating around the map. There are dozens of vehicles to carjack and drive around, plus as you progress through the story you unlock more disguises and abilities to reach areas you couldn’t previously get to, to grab hold of super bricks or just random scenes.
Scattered around the map are also many mini-games to play for fun, from basketball shoot-out to can toss, all small and quick but show a great eye for detail. In fact, the attention paid to the small parts of the game is worthy of note. What other game can you head to a play park and go on the swings, and slide, plus the ability to hook up to the Miiverse to show off photos works really well in this game, even if it is a bit slow to do and load.
It’s not a perfect game, however. Driving can be a little bit tricky at first, with each vehicle handling differently and some being a little over-sensitive, but it does make driving feel like a unique experience to each vehicle, whether you’re on the ‘hairdryer’ moped or the caravan, or one of the many, many other vehicles. It does also suffer from some frame rate drop-outs on the driving scenes when there’s a lot going on, but this is few and far between, and when you’re booting up the game the loading takes a good three-to-four minutes, but once you’re in the open world there’s no loading at all no matter where you go, only a small bar when loading missions, and the draw distance is impressive.
There’s loads of small moments that really draw you into this game that I won’t spoil here. This is a massive reason to buy a WiiU. If you’ve loved the Lego games up to now then this is the best example of them, with a larger scope, a huge focus and a brilliant sense of humour. The attention to detail in the open world, the missions and the random things you can do, find and experience around the map is incredible and it’s a fully enjoyable game that brings a smile constantly to your face and there is plenty to do for your money.
Graphically impressive, with the style of Lego fully integrated into the map, with a wide range of music tracks and audio for characters that rarely feels repetitive, with cut scenes fully narrated, it ticks all the boxes for a long-lasting, plain fun game to play.
A must-have purchase for WiiU owners.
9/10
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