The saga continues. But with a change of thought. If on previous occasions Lego toys had gone through and adapted some of the most emotional universes of Harry Potter, Jurassic World, Marvel or Star Wars, this time «Lego City Undercover» is immersed in freedom of movement and a more luminescent attitude, but sustained under a somewhat worn formula.
In that attempt to offer a breath of fresh air, this title walks through the “sandbox” genre, becoming, saving the distances, a kind of “Grand Theft Auto” full of blocks but, without a doubt, with less load of violence. An innocent approach that reduces its capabilities but has an arm to all audiences.
The game is moistened, again, with its characteristic sense of humor, sometimes more justified than others, but that offers bits of fun. This ___tail of “legalized sandbox” proposes situations of direct confrontation and structures to build.
With a city that wander between San Francisco and New York, the game recreates a twenty districts distributed throughout the city where gamers can roam freely, collecting infinite coins, destroying all kinds of objects and even mounting on a wide variety of vehicles, essential many times to move to the locations. With a more extensive map than initially appears, the title is distributed between main missions, completed around ten hours, and secondary tasks scattered through the streets.
Unlike previous installments, in this Lego -originally released in 2013 for Nintendo Wii U- the player puts himself in the shoes of a stranger Chase McCain instead of other famous characters, but it contains enough traces of charisma to make them proud to handle it. The story, of cops and robbers, raises the return of this police officer to police action. Retired after having stopped the villain Rex Fury, finds himself in the dilemma of putting on his uniform and badge again because the enemy to beat has escaped from prison.
An excuse to go not only behind him throughout different missions, but also to capture other minor thieves, like the gang of clowns who try to hide in every corner of the city. Throughout the story, which constantly repeats patterns of a “thriller” and famous police movies, the player unlocks up to three hundred different characters (from the chief of police, the protected witness or the young police officer) and solving crimes by scoring medals in his personal account along the way.
Loaded with hours of fun and fortunately dubbed into Spanish, the game twists ad nauseam that formula of controlling the always fun toy dolls capable of destroying structures that is in its path, but proposes a traditional formula that on more than one occasion shows signs of exhaustion. Do you mean that it is worse than the previous ones? No, the argument simply may not be as appealing as previous installments. This time, for example, lacks those typical puzzles to be solved by two or more characterssomething that is missing.
That absence of novelties at a technical level, few novelties. Graphic details and a sufficiently adequate map full of peculiarities offer a space suitable for children and adults. What’s more, its cooperative component (offline for two) offers a great angle for family fun.
Available for: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch
Genre: action, adventure
Developer: Traveler’s Tales
Price: 59.95 euros
