LEGO Voyagers (PS5) Review: Caught On You

As somebody who immediately fell in love with thatgamecompany’s Journey, LEGO Voyagers already had a leg up when it got here to grabbing my consideration. To be clear, I’m not suggesting these two video games have loads in frequent to start with; Journey is, firstly, an journey recreation with mild platforming parts, whereas LEGO Voyagers is firmly rooted within the puzzle-platformer area.

But at their cores, each video games are centered across the thought of connection and communication, which is probably why LEGO Voyagers took me unexpectedly. The kind it takes is actually completely different from an artwork recreation like Journey, however it’s onerous to disclaim that they’re constructed from a number of the identical foundational blocks.

While you gained’t end up enjoying as a anonymous wanderer adventuring for the highest of a far-off mountain, LEGO Voyagers does open with a well-recognized setup. You play as a small, 1×1 Lego brick, the sort that may go away you on the ground, shouting expletives, do you have to ever step on one unintentionally. Thankfully, this Lego brick, with its single eye and talent to chirp/sing, is infinitely extra charming, and whereas it isn’t well-suited for fight or hardcore platforming, its bite-sized leap and talent to tumble and roll nearly wherever go away it well-suited for exploration.

You can maybe see why LEGO Voyagers jogged my memory of Journey, however gameplay-wise, that’s the place the similarities finish. Rather than making an attempt to succeed in the height of a mountain, your intrepid Lego brick has its personal North Star, which takes the type of an area shuttle launch web site far off within the distance. And as a substitute of randomly stumbling throughout different gamers throughout your journey, you’ll be making the journey with one other Lego brick by your aspect, from begin to end.

Whether you play on-line with a good friend or domestically, LEGO Voyagers follows in the identical vein as different co-op-only video games like Split Fiction and It Takes Two. To be truthful, co-op LEGO video games are nothing new, however not like the various licensed LEGO titles that leaned into popular culture references and lifting jokes out of your favourite summer time blockbusters, Voyagers is a way more serene, laid-back affair, extra consistent with developer Light Brick Studios’ final title, LEGO Builder’s Journey. There’s zero dialogue all through the whole recreation, and whereas I’d must do one other playthrough to verify, I swear I didn’t see a single digital camera lower throughout the three-hour marketing campaign. Eat your coronary heart out, God of War.

While your Lego brick’s means to roll round, leap, and talk through chirping would possibly make for a great recreation by itself, its means to snap onto different Lego items is the final piece of the puzzle that actually makes the whole factor click on. This performs an important position when platforming, permitting you to leap and snap onto items of scaffolding and different environmental objects, however you can even connect your Lego brick to different unfastened items of Lego and transfer them round. The constructing course of can take a minute to get used to, as you’ll must fastidiously orient Lego items earlier than snapping them collectively, however earlier than lengthy, you’ll be constructing makeshift bridges and ladders with ease.

That being mentioned, you’ll must work together with your co-op associate to sort out a number of the recreation’s larger challenges, which do an incredible job at recreating the childhood pleasure of constructing your personal LEGO creations with buddies. Piloting a ship (with every of you controlling a rear propeller) and driving a dump truck round (one on the throttle, the opposite on the steering wheel) won’t demand the identical degree of creativity as constructing a automobile from scratch, however the feeling you get from fixing a puzzle is simply as palpable.

LEGO Voyagers (PS5) Review: Final Verdict

LEGO Voyagers is a slightly transient affair (my first playthrough clocked in at simply over three hours), however every minute brings with it one thing new and novel. Whether you’re working collectively to restore a prepare monitor or taking a minute to unwind and play on a makeshift see-saw, it’s full of these particular moments that spotlight the significance of friendships in our lives. It’s additionally, surprisingly, an extremely emotional recreation (particularly throughout its remaining moments), however I gained’t dare spoil any of that for you. Even if LEGO Voyagers may very well be reworked right into a strictly single-player affair, the end result wouldn’t be half pretty much as good because it at the moment stands. It’s very a lot a recreation that’s not concerning the vacation spot, however slightly, the journey you make collectively.