Batman seems like the prime candidate for LEGOfication by Traveller’s Tales (which seems to now be dedicated to LEGO titles) – you’ve got 70 years of comic, TV and movie history to draw from, a bigger list of enemies than Richard Nixon and a ton of awesome gadgets and vehicles. As the fourth LEGO title by the developer in three years, and only three months since the last, it’s hard to not feel that the formula is a little fatigued. It’s not familiarity that proves to be LEGO Batman’s biggest issue, though.

LEGO Batman marks the formula’s first iteration outside the work of George Lucas, and since it’s not tied to any existing Batman product, Traveller’s Tales have a bit more freedom in storytelling. However, with no existing framework and nothing to parody, one is exposed to the full extent of Traveller’s Tales weak storytelling abilities. Story is entirely unimportant in the grand scheme of things, but you know they could have done a lot more with the Batman world than a basic “everyone’s broken out of Arkham Asylum – catch them!” theme. It’s a wasted opportunity. What’s worrying is that most of their trademark humour ends up falling flat on its face. Robin is meant to serve as the primary source of humour in the game, but his routines become repetitive pretty quickly. It’s hard to write a good joke, but a joke doesn’t suddenly become funny if you tell it to someone 30 odd times over the course of a six hour game. Younger audiences probably won’t mind, though. Killer Moth ends up being the real source of laughter in the game, fluttering around like a fool and repeatedly banging his head while flying into large light bulbs.


Various elements from the comics, animated TV show and the Tim Burton movies are compiled together to form the setting of LEGO Batman. Most of the characters appear in a form very similar to the mid-90s animated series, but their personalities tend to reflect their comic book incarnations. The soundtrack is mostly comprised of pieces from Danny Elfman’s Batman (1989) score – it’s a shame that Warner (who presumably controls the rights to the soundtrack on all Batman films) didn’t push for a wider variety of music, since you essentially hear the same tunes throughout the game.

Players get to tackle the LEGO Batman story from both the good and evil sides. Batman and Robin (joined later by Nightwing and Batgirl, if you unlock them) are based in the Batcave beneath Wayne Manor. Throughout their campaign, you’ll use a variety of different suits to solve puzzles and such, rather than changing between multiple characters as in previous games. These suits are pretty cool – Batman has a suits for gliding, demolition, glass shattering, and extreme heat, while Robin’s costumes allow for walking up metallic walls, controlling remote vehicles, swimming and cleaning up spare parts to convert into useful things. Each of the three chapters (comprised of five levels each) will have you chasing one of Batman’s main foes – the Riddler, the Penguin and the Joker respectively.

It’s always more fun to be bad though. Batman’s enemies strike from Arkham Asylum, which is set up much in the same way as the Batcave. Playing as the bad guys basically lets you see the other side of the coin from Batman’s story, so the locations are a little recycled (though the levels themselves are different), but you get to have a lot more fun. The same chapter structure is retained, so you control the Riddler first up, followed by the Penguin and the Joker. In each level, you’re accompanied by other nemeses of Batman, such as Catwoman, Harley Quinn, Two Face and Mr Freeze. There’s also a few lower grade enemies like the Mad Hatter, Man-Bat and Killer Moth to round out the roster. The bad guys have more interesting abilities than the Caped Crusader and his Boy Wonder; Mr Freeze can freeze and shatter his opponents, the Joker can shock them with a deadly electric buzzer. Perhaps the only real disappointing fact about the Villain side of the game is that you never come face to face with Batman & Robin, you’re almost always fighting faceless police and SWAT members, with the odd fight against Commissioner Gordon.


LEGO Batman never strays from the formula established in the Star Wars and Indiana Jones games, employing a mix of building and block puzzles with some light platforming. There is a bit of a noticeable increase in hand-to-hand combat, and players are given more techniques to compensate, but it becomes a bit annoying if you’re playing alone. Vehicle sections also feature prominently on both sides of the karmic scale, so you get to pilot craft like the Batmobile, Batwing, Robin’s Submarine and the Scarecrow’s bi-plane in a series of missions that are rather similar to the ones featured in LEGO Star Wars.

It’s the quality of the LEGO Batman experience that really drags it down. The game feels really unrefined compared to the previous two LEGO efforts. At many times it seems like the developer has intended the game to be played with a second person exclusively, because the AI is absolutely terrible at controlling the second character. They constantly get stuck, and sit there like idiots when they’re meant to be hitting a switch. If you switch to take control of the character not doing anything, your other character will then move out of position, which can get pretty infuriating after a few levels. They also have a tendency to push you off smaller platforms and ledges, which seem to have greatly multiplied, resulting in a lot of unnecessary deaths. Puzzles seem a bit obtuse compared to the other outings, despite the fact that there isn’t a whole lot of variety. Players pretty much have to destroy everything in a given area to ensure they have everything they need to find a solution, but that’s never a guarantee.

Traveller’s Tales appears to have skimped on the extra content for LEGO Batman. You need to collect the minikits, gain a specified number of studs, rescue the hostage (on non-vehicular levels) and find the power brick on any given level for full completion. There isn’t much in the way outside of the main levels; LEGO Batman only provides two extra levels for those who get Super Hero/Villain status on the other 30 levels – a big step down from LEGO Star Wars. As such, getting 100% in the game isn’t much of a challenge anymore. There’s a few cool Achievements in there for the Xbox 360 version that reference events in the movies and comics, such as breaking Batman’s back with Bane.


LEGO Batman manages to provide a relatively fun experience, but it’s got a lot of frustrating quality control issues, and the developer hasn’t made the most of the opportunity to use the characters to their fullest. It seems like the flaws in the LEGO formula have become more pronounced with this release, and some of the trademark humour seems to have evaporated. If you can rope a friend into playing with you, you’ll still have a good time, but Traveller’s Tales have a lot of things to iron out in the next LEGO release.