Lego Indiana Jones was unveiled to the public in fully playable form for the first time at play.com live. The dedicated booth for the game contained 4 demo pods all able to be played in two player co-op, although single player was available should you so choose. Me and Frosty waited no longer than 5 minutes to get on a demo pod to play a good 15 minutes of co-op play. The level on offer was the one you may have seen recently in a gameplay footage video online. The core gameplay is much the same as the Lego Star Wars games but seems to focus more on little puzzles to solve rather than just simply using the right character for the right job. E.g. you come to a set of bridge posts but there is no bridge, so you then search around in the area nearby to find some Lego to pick up and roll out to complete it. Later on in the level spears pop up out the ground which initially appear to just be a hazard, but you then figure out they can be picked up and thrown at the object blocking your way in order to clear the path and progress. The right character for the job still plays a part though such as in one area where you quickly realise each player needs to take a different route across the level to progress. Indy taking the top route using the whip to hook onto objects and swing across areas, with his sidekick on the lower area swinging across bars and vines available to hold onto. The graphical detail has been upped compared to the Star Wars games with much more texturing of the environment to pull off the rocky jungle look compared to the shiny plain surface look found in the star wars games. Click continue reading for the full arcticle!
There’s more of a feel of a fuller 3d environment with the non playable jungle backdrops stretching into the distance and the sun shining through the leaves. Co-op mode was great fun and it felt like the players really needed to work together as a team to progress through the level. However when Indy accidentally gives his sidekick a good whipping a girly looking fight then naturally breaks out between the two co-op players with Indy taking hit from the sidekicks spade while all running round in a small area which looks pretty funny on screen when you start attacking each other instead of playing the game. As do the story sequences with some hilarious facial animation. The demo build on show naturally contained a few bugs such as some times when falling down a slope to your death it then re-spawned you over and over again in the same place and so took a long time to get out of being stuck in this position. This is to be expected with early preview builds and these little niggles are sure to have been ironed out for the full retail release. If you liked the star wars Lego games then you will definitely enjoy Lego’s take on the world of Indiana Jones.
bought this game yesterday for my son, after the first chapter of the first film, the game freezes completely!! cannot go anywhere - looks like they did not iron out all the bugs.