The humble party game genre has connected people throughout gaming generations. And while nobody really considers it whenever a new one hits the fray, the results are usually an enjoyable time. That’s true for Lego Party, the mini brick’s seemingly successful attempt to Lego-fy Mario Party so that fans of the tiny constructables can get together in a group of four and proceed to ruin their friendship over minigames.
If you’ve played Mario Party you know exactly what to expect for Lego Party. A group of four players will drop onto a boardgame-like table and roll numbers to advance the requisite number of spots. Some spots will have special prizes, some will hide traps that will steal your hard-earned Stars, or in this case, a golden Lego Brick. After every player rolls their turn, they’ll all drop in to compete in one of 60 Lego-themed minigames.
And to Lego Party’s credit, the minigames is where this effort can differentiate itself from Mario Party. There are some standard-fare activities, like a game where players jump over a swinging octopus tentacle until the last player is left standing, to some very off-kilter ones. One I tried is a Bennett Foddy-style unicycle racing game where players must use the joysticks to balance atop a very fiddly unicycle and inch their way towards the finish line. We only played about eight minigames total, so I’m very excited to see what else Lego Party has in store.
Another Lego innovation is how Lego Party leans into the creative aspect of the toy bricks. While the overworld maps are themed after fun concepts like “Pirates,” they can also be modified if certain conditions are met within the game. Landing on a specific spot will let players create unique elements to add to the map like a pirate ship that wasn’t there when the game began.
Visually, Lego Party has the crisp, colorful aesthetic Lego games have come to be known for, though the party game aesthetic means that these Legos lean towards more whacky designs than something I’d consider charming. That is to say, these Legos are all about being zany and loud, which is perfect for the genre.
Playing with three other players (my two IGN colleagues and a developer), we found ourselves immediately sucked into its playful orbit. The goal is to collect as many Gold Bricks by the end of the game. Winning minigames on their own will only award you Lego bits that you can turn into ways to score Gold Bricks, such as movement modifiers that will help you land on the spot where a Gold Brick has spawned.
There’re also traps you can purchase (don’t worry, it’s not in a microtransaction way) to potentially steal Gold Bricks from other players, and unique spots on the board that will initiate a special 2v2 game where the winning team will both get Gold Bricks as a reward. These 2v2 rounds include special minigames where, for example, both players each control one half of a car and must coordinate their controls to drive to the designated goal.
While we did complete a small game ourselves, we only saw a fraction of what Lego Party has to offer. If the rest of the games are anywhere near as fun as the handful that we played, I can see Lego Party having the kind of addictive appeal Mario Party has had – which is especially good news for PlayStation and Xbox players that don’t have access to Mario Party.
Matt Kim is IGN's Senior Features Editor.
