LEGO Marvel's Avengers Review

For years TT Games LEGO titles have wooed fans with their inimitable charm and personality, and recently, LEGO Dimensions has proved just how creative the UK studio can be with plastic bricks. By comparison, LEGO Marvel's Avengers feels a lot less creative, retreading old ground with the same gameplay that's made the LEGO series such a massive success. Is the formula beginning to wear thin? The short answer is yes. A little bit.

LEGO Marvel's Avengers is another reliably fun and robust chunk of entertainment wherein you collect millions of studs to unlock 200 or so characters, some of whom have been mined from the deepest recesses of Marvel comic book history. Die-hard Marvel fans will get a kick out of some of the more obscure inclusions like Moon Boy, Devil Dinosaur, A-Bomb, Crimson Dynamo, Butterball, Arkon and others, while casual fans will more likely feel the absence of big-hitters like Spider-Man. Regardless, it's still a great piece of fan service.

Hammer time.

Perhaps LEGO Marvel's Avengers greatest bugbear, however, is the inherently repetitious nature of its gameplay, especially when the same puzzles (the scanner puzzles in particular are massively over-used) are wheeled out over and over again. By the time the credits had rolled (for the second time), I'd grown weary of the interminable button-mashing, and 800 new team-up moves do little to alleviate the sense of repetition.

And while the story is told with the usual dose of humour – albeit most of it revolving around pigs and chickens - if you've seen all of the Marvel Cinematic Universe flicks, then you already know how it's all going to play out. The result is an altogether less engaging game that simply mashes up the best bits from both Avengers movies (with sojourns to Captain America: The First Avenger), peppering in three additional missions from Iron Man 3, Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Thor: The Dark World that you can complete in any order you like. There's plenty of content on offer here, but it's all a rather hum-drum.

As ever, each level, and the expansive hub areas you'll visit in between, harbour a slew of collectibles to gather, and you'll need to return to each mission in Free Play mode to reach previously inaccessible items. Essentially, if you've played any previous LEGO game, you'll know exactly what to expect here.

LEGO Marvel's Avengers isn't a bad game by any stretch of the imagination' it simply fails to move the series on in any particularly meaningful way. For all intents and purposes, you may as well play LEGO Marvel Super Heroes. Beyond the story, there's very little difference between the two games and the previous game arguably has the better character roster.

LEGO Marvel's Avengers does take some of LEGO Batman 3's best additions, like the revolving shooter sections, providing a welcome break from punching and kicking. Although epic battles taken from the MCU films are boiled down to dull, button-mashing QTE affairs, which is disappointing. Still, TT Games has once again done a fantastic job in capturing the essence of each and every Marvel character it's crammed into the game, with even minor players receiving due care and attention.

Magneto's kids are in the game too.

Consequently, LEGO Marvel's Avengers feels like something of a mixed bag. On the one hand, the tried-and-tested formula remains effortlessly endearing, brainless fun, while on the other hand, there's really no faulting TT Games' attention to detail and playful spirit that pervades every inch of the game. And therein lies the rub. LEGO games seem to have been limited by a catch-22 scenario of its own making. Change up the formula too much and it could all go wrong, while failing to change anything means the series remains stuck in an apparently inescapable rut.

At least the achievements encourage a bit of experimentation, asking that you play as various team-ups or perform certain actions. Most are once again assigned to progressing through the story, and you'll once again have to fill every stud counter in each level, unlock gold bricks, red bricks and minikits to access certain characters required for specific tasks. Again, achieving 100% completion is required if you want to unlock every achievement. Dig in for the long haul if you want the full 1000 Gamerscore.

A series growing increasingly comfortable with its seemingly set-in-stone formula, LEGO Marvel's Avengers highlights a perceived fear on TT Games' part to alter things too much, lest it rock the boat and scare away the fans. The bottom line is that this is a franchise that needs a serious shake-up at this stage, as this instalment fails to innovate or push things forward in any way whatsoever. LEGO Marvel's Avengers still offers an enjoyable, uncomplicated romp with a huge cast of colourful characters, but can feel like a chore at times. Just buy LEGO Marvel Super Heroes instead.