Lego Horizon Adventures is the first Horizon game that I just couldn’t put down. It’s fun, relatively easy to play, and adds some brevity to an otherwise too self-serious title. 

It lego-fies the base game of Horizon Zero Dawn and offers an abridged version of the story. All the while, it offers fun platforming and relatively challenging combat. 

Horizon Lego Dawn

Whether or not you’re familiar with the story told during this franchise’s debut, you’ll likely find yourself enjoying how the experience is presented here. If you’ve played any Lego games before, it has the signature Lego game humor, poking fun at the material it’s “adapting” while still telling a generally faithful story. 

Lines like “you know how hard it is to count with no fingers” are littered across the game’s dialogue. And they never get old. Many of the punchlines are delivered on time and on target. It’s such stark contrast to the sometimes overly serious tone of Horizon Zero Dawn. 

That said, it’s able to take the 23-25 hour story of the original game and tell it in a little over half the time. I completed my playthrough in roughly around 15 hours. 

A slightly different LEGO game

The last Lego game we played is LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga. While they share the same DNA in terms of dialogue, aesthetic, and storytelling, the gameplay is vastly different. 

Unlike in the LEGO Star Wars, LEGO Horizon Adventures has a fixed camera angle. The platforming sections of the stages differ slightly but the entire game generally has a top-down perspective view. 

This helps simplify the experience. But make no mistake, there’s still a fair bit of exploring to do. It’s in the players best interest to move around the screen and check every nook and cranny for treasure chests, loot, and what not. 

The top-down perspective also makes the combat feel a little bit like the games that have that perspective like Diablo and Hades. While not as challenging as the aforementioned games, this one offers a good variety to keep you engaged. 

Arrows, Spheres and more 

Combat is pretty straightforward. Square is your primary attack button. You can press it quickly for quick strikes. But it’s best used to press, aim, and hold for more efficient damage. 

As you progress in the game, you gain different types of arrows just like in Zero Dawn. These vary from elemental damages to different ways of firing your arrows. 

Meanwhile, the circle button is how you activate your gadgets. You can only hold one at a time and most of them are pretty useful in combat. My favorites were the one that lets you dart around in a flash and a Horizon classic – the trapper. 

Weapons and gadgets can be picked up throughout a stage. But they’re also available during midpoints where you encounter a merchant and you have three chests to open, mostly containing a full ammo set at your disposal. 

Healing is handled through berry trees scattered across the stage. These are very generously placed, especially during the early part of the game. They get a little bit scarcer as you progress. 

Dealing with Machines and The Hive

Just like in Horizon Zero Dawn your primary foils are the Machines and The Hive. They can be dealt with generally in the same way. Machines still have weak points that can be targeted when you use your focus. Meanwhile, members of the hive can be dealt shot with weapons, gadgets, or even carried and thrown against each other. 

Most of the combat happens in an enclosed space. After exploring, you arrive at the area where there’s tall grass you can hide in. In the enclosed space, you’ll find weapons, gadgets, and things you can throw at the enemies. Some stages also feature environmental things you can use to knock out enemies. 

It’s in your best interest to move around as much as you can because the enemies tend to swarm you all at once. By moving around, you become a hard target to hit and also open yourself up to more possibilities of taking them out. 

Clearing these combat spaces, even in just the balanced difficulty, can feel rewarding. Boss fights offer some variety, but the game does well in making sure established rules of engagement remain pretty much the same.

Mother’s Heart

Your base of operations is Mother’s Heart which is your tribe’s town/village. As you progress, you’re able to unlock areas of the town and build different kinds of establishments. They vary in look, feel, and potential for interaction. 

It’s here where you spawn after every mission. You can customize the town to your liking with lego parts related to the Horizon franchise but there’s more to unlock and have fun with.

It’s also in this hub where you can level up, change your look, and collect more Lego Bricks by completing town quests. These quests are mostly simple and just require building certain things. While others require you to wear a particular costume as you go on your adventures. 

You can change up your look after a certain point of the game. It unlocks pretty early on. You can dress as Horizon characters. And just like the buildings and structures, more non–Horizon costumes will be available to you as you progress through.

There’s a general skill tree that applies to all the characters you can control. Yes, characters. As a solo player, you’ll have four playable characters at your disposal. If you’ve seen some of the previews of the game, you already know that Varl is one of them. Won’t spoil the rest. 

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to try Co-op play as my Player 2 was away during the review period. That opened up some tricky decision-making as to which character I will use in each mission. Ultimately, I went canon and just used Aloy 85% of the time. 

Is this your GameMatch?

LEGO Horizon Adventures is a Super Swipe. It’s a game we can easily recommend because it’s such a good time. The gameplay is fun, the humor is on point, there’s an option for couch or online Co-op, and it’s easy to pick-up and play. 

I have unfinished playthroughs in both Horizon Zero Dawn and Horizon Forbidden West. Something about those games just didn’t land with me personally right away. But the lego-fied version is different. In fact, it’s even renewed, even just by a little bit, my desire to complete the playthrough of the actual game it’s based on. 

I also learned a lot about my personal tastes playing through this. I’m all for realism and the usual cinematic action-adventure that PlayStation offers. But if Astro Bot and now LEGO Horizon Adventures is any indication, there’s definitely a place for bright, stylized games that’s just flat-out fun.