Lego Horizon Adventures Review - Experience Aloy’s First Journey in Lego Form

Written by Brandon Hofer on November 14, 2024

Reviews: This is a new and much more family friendly way to experience Aloy’s story, however, it isn’t nearly as deep as its source material.

One of the biggest surprises that came out of “E3 season” in June was Lego Horizon Adventures. There have been many Lego games over the years covering a wide variety of properties but no one expected we would see Aloy’s journey in Lego form. After going through the game and seeing how Aloy’s world transformed into Legos, I think it was a great idea. The development team took the overall story and interjected classic Lego humor into the formula. The story here doesn’t hit all of the beats of the original Horizon game but there is enough included in the game to warrant playing Horizon Zero Dawn before embarking on this Lego journey.

Lego Horizon Adventures opens up with a nice cinematic that is very similar to the opening of Horizon Zero Dawn. Aloy is introduced as well as Rost and this is where we get our first glimpse into their lives as outcasts. Fans that are familiar with the original game will recognize a lot of the characters involved in this cinematic, as well as the different characters you will come across on your journey throughout the game. Lego games never really go beat for beat with their source material, instead opting to go for some of the high points in a game. For example, the whole sequence in Horizon Zero Dawn where Aloy is growing up and training to achieve her goals is not present in Lego Horizon Adventures. After watching some cinematics and dialogue she is already adult Aloy trying to save the world.

A group of cultists have kidnapped a good number of people from Mother’s Heart and caused some serious damage in the process. Mother’s Heart becomes the hub world for the game as Aloy tries to rebuild this village by finding gold blocks, purchasing upgrades, saving those who have been kidnapped, and more. As you progress through the story new sections of Mother’s Heart open up to you and allow you to rebuild and customize that section. Horizon Zero Dawn can be a fairly serious game but Lego Horizon Adventures takes things in a more relaxed direction. A great example of this is being able to build a concert stage in Mother’s Heart where everyone can party in Lego Horizon Adventures. In addition to main storyline quests there is a community job board where you will want to help out the citizens of Mother’s Heart in order to fully rebuild the village. Some of these jobs include repainting buildings, feeding some animals, using an arena, and much more.

The main storyline quests in Lego Horizon Adventures deals with some of the high level events that gamers experience in Horizon Zero Dawn. There is a lot from Horizon Zero Dawn that is not included in Lego Horizon Adventures but what is there is a good amount of fun. One great example I really enjoyed was when Aloy would use her Focus to call the main enemy in the game and basically taunt him and this enemy would get completely riled up and try to hang up on her. It was this type of Lego humor that I enjoyed and made this feel like a bit more of a relaxed game, even though combat could be challenging.

You start the storyline missions within the Mother’s Heart hub world. There are different gates you will use to access different parts of the world. For example, you will eventually open up quests that take place in a mountain area, while another place in the village will have access to quests in a jungle area. Not everything is open in the beginning of course but I enjoyed the quest progression and how the development team laid everything out. Once you clear all of the levels in all of the lands, you can go through those lands again with a different quest that is almost like a boss rush type of thing. Once you go through all of those then you will be offered some Free Mode Expeditions. These Free Mode Expeditions will serve trophy hunters well as there are trophies for getting characters to max level, so being able to replay these expeditions is a great way to grind some experience points. There are also places throughout the village that will periodically give you money so that you can purchase upgrades. Of course, money can also be earned by going through the missions and completing them.

The combat in Lego Horizon Adventures is reminiscent of Horizon Zero Dawn but more simplistic in nature. The combat in Horizon Zero Drawn will smack you in the face on a number of occasions due to its difficulty. The combat in Lego Horizon Adventures can get pretty tricky as well, depending on the difficulty you have the game set on. If you have it set on easy then you won’t have to do a whole lot and you can basically just spam your bow and arrow, Aloy’s primary weapon in the game. If you play on the more difficult settings your battle strategy will have to adapt to deal with the, at times, overwhelming amount of enemies that are coming at you from all sides. Throw in the occasion big boss fight and you can (and will) find yourself in a chaotic fight for survival on a semi-frequent basis. As I mentioned, Aloy’s primary weapon is her bow and arrow. There are different arrows you will find such as fire arrows, ice arrows, and more. As you progress in the game you will also find weapons and gadgets that Horizon Zero Dawn fans will be familiar with, such as the Tripcaster. For those unaware, the Tripcaster can be a fantastic way to make your enemies stumble and will give you a slight advantage, if you are quick enough to utilize it. The combat and the different options for it aren’t nearly as deep as they are in Horizon Zero Dawn but it is still a fun experience and could potentially make some gamers that haven’t played Aloy’s original adventure curious enough to buy it and check it out.

Lego Horizon Adventure also offers co-op play where you can play alongside a friend. They will control one of Aloy’s friends that you find in the game. I won’t spoil who those people are in this review but fans will recognize them and be happy to see them. At the beginning of each mission you can decide which character to play. You can either stay as Aloy who is the default character or choose someone else and earn some experience points with them. Unfortunately experience points are not shared, so if Aloy is Level 20, one of your allies might only be Level 5 and you will have to work to level them up.

Lego Horizon Adventures is a really fun game and the development team did a great job bringing a more light hearted approach to the story. If you want the full story you will want to play Horizon Zero Dawn but this is going to be a fantastic introduction to Aloy for a lot of people. The different missions that are available to you and the expeditions after the fact should keep gamers busy for a little while, especially if you are someone that wants to get the Platinum trophy. Lego Horizon Adventure is in no way as deep of a game as Horizon Zero Dawn and comparatively speaking it is quite a bit smaller, but it is a tremendous amount of fun to play and serves multiple markets. If you are a fan of Aloy and her adventures you will want to check out this lighthearted game. If you have no idea who Aloy is but have enjoyed Lego games in the past, be sure to give this one a shot. Lego Horizon Adventures is a game that almost anyone can enjoy and it would make a fantastic family game to play with your children.