Since last Thursday, fans of Horizonone of Playstation's most recent video game licenses, can rediscover this universe from a new angle, the kind that hurts when you walk on it barefoot. This is the proposal of Lego Horizon Adventures.
If you don't know Horizonquick summary: in the United States of the thirty-first century, humans live as tribals, threatened by machines that have become aggressive. Two games, Horizon Zero Dawn et Horizon Forbidden Westdeveloped by Guerilla Games, offered Sony two successes for the Playstation 4 and 5. By mid-2023, they had sold 24 and 8 million copies respectively. Lego Horizon Adventuresavailable on Playstation 5, Nintendo Switch and PC, offers an offbeat revisit of the first episode.
The Lego tone with a “Horizon” skin
Lego first looked at this franchise for its universe, assures Frédéric Roland Andre, designer for the brand. “It corresponded exactly to our values: a super strong heroine, a world where nature is very present, robots that seemed to have been made out of Lego before being digitized. » After the success of a set to reproduce the Longneck, one of the emblematic mechanical enemies of the game, which looks like a diplodocus, the idea of a game emerged. “It’s something that we haven’t shared very much until now, but indeed the first machines of Horizon Zero Dawn were made in Duplo before being modeled,” even confides Stéphane Varrault. The collaboration continues, as another Lego set was announced this week to complement the game's release. Lego Horizon Adventures is intended to be faithful to the brick game. “We approved all the constructions to be sure that everything was feasible in real life,” insists Frédéric Roland André.
But everything was not so easy to transform an open-ended adventure game, with a serious plot, into a family game. “There is already, obviously, an accuracy to be found in the tone,” recognizes Stéphane Varrault. We must find both the themes and the characters in the game, but we must also see them under another prism. The movie The Great Adventure Lego was a big influence from this point of view, with writing that can speak to both young people and adults. »
“For me, the Lego tone is humor, quite simply,” defines Frédéric Roland André. It's fantastic to see Aloy [l’héroïne de Horizon] finally happy, having fun, doing stupid things. I think that’s what makes it accessible to a younger audience. » The game, open to co-op, available on Nintendo Switch, and with numerous difficulty modes, actually seems to be aimed at casual players, or parents with their children. The open world is replaced by a linear level system, but the clashes retain the system of weak points to target on enemies which made the combat of the Horizon originals.
A renewal strategy
This new foray by Lego into video games sounds like the culmination of thirty years of strategy. At the end of the 1990s, the company recorded its first financial losses. At the same time, she laid her first bricks in video games for the first time at the same time, first with in-house creations (like Lego Island Adventuresin 1997), then with the Lego Star Wars in the 2000s.
And if the brand is so interested in video games, it’s because “it’s one of the places where today’s children are,” believes Frédéric Roland André. In December 2023, the brand joined forces with one of the most played video games to launch Lego Fortnitea survival game that can be launched from the same account as the famous battle royale. “The objective is to be able to reach a wider audience with the experience of creativity and fun than Lego,” explains Frédéric Roland André. On the other hand, brick sets are aimed at gamers or nostalgic fans, with kits set in the world of Zelda, Mario, Minecraft or Sonic.
But Lego is not finished. Since the beginning of the 2010s, the firm has multiplied its audiovisual productions: two original films, but also a film Lego Batman, Piece by Piecea Lego biopic on Pharrell Williams, Ninjagoan animated series of 15 seasons, and a host of other more confidential works. The company also has a board game and is preparing a live action film in the future. In its 2023 annual report, Lego announced a 2% increase in its turnover compared to the previous year, brought to 65.9 billion Danish crowns, or approximately 8.8 billion euros. Between nostalgia and the desire to practice a manual activity, the game of bricks appeals to millennials, for their children or for themselves. In short, the world has not finished seeing bricks.
