E3 2018: Hands on with Lego DC Super Villains

Another year and another Lego game, heading into E3 this year, the spotlight being on the villains was sounded cool, but would it be enough, having now played the game, I am leaning towards yes.

Kicking off the demo, Commissioner Gordon is escorting an unnamed prisoner, towards prison, but after he checks in with the guard at the entrance, the guard was quickly taken out, by an unseen foe. It turns out the prisoner, which is you, was only in the transport vehicle and not bound for this prison, but Gordon was coming here to speak with inmate, Lex Luthor about a cataclysmic event that was happening. However, the guard that was taken out, shows up to explain what happened to him, but points to the guard in with Gordon and Luthor, who quickly disarms Gordon and reveals herself to be Mercy, Luthor’s highly trained and extremely loyal bodyguard. As they begin to make their escape, Luthor speaks to you and suggests you come along and it is at this point, that you can create your character.

That is right, Lego DC Super Villains gives you complete freedom to create a character to play as in the game, unlike the Incredibles, where your customer character was only available in the free roam mode, here you customer character is you throughout the story. Based on the character that you create, your abilities will start out differently each time, but they don’t remain that way, as your character has the ability to absorb powers, something that happens in the first mission. Apart from this, the gameplay is pretty much standard, collect studs, bash apart the world and so on, with plenty of secrets and blocked off areas to discover.

The second stage had me playing as the Joker, escaping from the Justice League, while they were busy fighting with Luthor, Cheetah, Solomon Grundy and others. Again, a lot of the gameplay boiled down to the usual Lego fare, but it did change up a little when I had to go as Harley Quinn, up the side of a large tower and then lower a platform for the Joker to use to get up top. I can see that part being interesting when players encounter it in co-op, but solo, not so much.

The single aspect of the game that I love is the voices, the moment Batman spoke, attempting to get the baddies to surrender, I registered at once that it was Kevin Conroy, which as most people will know, is the true voice of Batman. However, it got even cooler, when Mark Hamill’s voiced appeared from the mouth of the Joker, something I did not expect based on that teaser trailer, if other characters are voiced by their iconic actors, the game could be elevated into great heights.

The addition of a completely unique character should be enough to get even the most jaded gamer back on board for this Lego outing. In addition, with a who’s who of actors providing their vocal talents for the game and you have what could be one of the greatest love letters to DC in gaming, and making it funnier is that it is all about the bad guys as well.