A history of Vita games: LEGO releases on PlayStation handhelds

If there’s one franchise that’s been a consistent presence on Vita (more than any other in fact) it’s the LEGO series. The first game showed up just after the console’s western launch (Harry Potter) and releases have continued well into 2016 (Star Wars), each bringing us a different spin on the core gameplay ideas. Ever since the appearance of LEGO Batman 2 in 2012 however, Vita fans have been left baffled – the powerhouse handheld has seemed more than capable of handling the full console versions, yet owners have often had to settle for disappointing stripped-down ports.

In this article I’ll be looking back at a history of the franchise on Sony’s handhelds from its origins on the PSP right through the latest release on Vita, but in particular the quality of the ports on these consoles. Both handhelds have been (relatively) powerful in their time yet as we’ll see, this hasn’t necessarily translated to the games taking full advantage of their capabilities.

(Disclaimer: This article was edited on 11/03/18 to include developments since the date of publication)

 

The birth of a franchise and full console ports on PSP

As with any good history lesson, it’s best to start at the beginning.  The LEGO games had existed in one form or another since the mid-90’s, but it was 2005’s LEGO Star Wars that served as a breakthrough for the series, laying the blueprint for all future games as a collectathon platformer with light puzzle elements that adapts parts of the film series into a hilariously oddball retelling.

It wasn’t until the game’s sequel LEGO Star Wars II in 2006, however, that the series would make its debut on Sony’s line of handhelds. And what a debut it was – the game was a full port of the console release merely with toned-down graphics and sound effects, ported by the team who handled the main release. It proved the PSP was more than capable of handling the console versions of the game and is well worth checking out as it’s a very enjoyable game (sadly, it’s one of the few titles in the series which is currently unavailable on PSN therefore is unplayable on Vita).

This period of home-console-version porting continued on PSP through 2008 with the arrival of LEGO Indiana Jones and LEGO Batman. The former provided an opportunity to revisit Indiana Jones’ first three adventures in that traditional goofy LEGO style, while the latter was a brand new story developer by Traveller’s Tales themselves, offering a crazy and hilarious visit to Gotham City as the caped crusader as he fights crime. Both offered a large amount of content alongside decent presentation and while perhaps not the most ambitious handheld games released at the time, it was still an impressive feat having the full console experience on the go especially compared to the rather watered-down DS versions releasing simultaneously.

(Thankfully, they were both made available on PSN too, meaning you can grab them for your Vita!).

 

Change of developer and DS ports on PSP

As with any good thing, eventually this run of high-quality ports had to come to an end and that began with LEGO Indiana Jones 2 on the PSP. You see, while Traveller’s Tales (the company behind all of the console LEGO games) had been porting each prior title with care to PSP, their sister studio TT Fusion had been making bespoke titles for the Nintendo DS due to its lack of power to run the full console release.

For whatever reason, in 2009 Traveller’s Tales decided that the PSP versions should now be ports of the DS games , rather the home console games and TT Fusion were handed the reigns for all handheld LEGO titles. Starting with LEGO Indiana Jones 2 (an un-necessary sequel that shoe-horns in the fourth film while revisiting content from the first three) and running through LEGO Harry Potter Years 1-4; LEGO Star Wars III and LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean, the PSP releases were now DS up-ports. These games typically featured the same core ideas, but watered-down gameplay and a much shorter run-time than their home console counterparts.

They weren’t necessarily bad – they were still fun to play and retained much of the collectathon craziness of the series. Unfortunately, they lacked a lot of the features of the main versions and were notably graphically inferior due to the console they originated from being so significantly under-powered compared to the PSP. There was still enjoyment to be had with them, but it was a sad mis-use of the console’s strengths and a massive shame to see after the brilliance of the first few titles on the handheld.

Of the four, LEGO Star Wars III is the one I’d recommend checking out as there’s just something about the LEGO and Star Wars IP’s that mixes so well, but if you’re a fan of the franchises they’re based on then they can offer some enjoyment (although LEGO Indiana Jones 2 is no longer available on PSN).

 

First Vita LEGO title but no shift in direction

So with the release of the much more powerful Vita in 2012 and the announcement that the games would continue their now-long tradition of arriving on Sony’s platforms, we could expect a return to the home-console quality LEGO ports on the go, right?

Things didn’t get off to a great start, as LEGO Harry Potter Years 5-7 landed a couple of weeks after the console’s launch and was merely a continuation of the tradition at this point, being an up-port of the PSP release (which itself was an up-port of the DS version) and a particularly disappointing one at that, often looking like a blurry mess on the Vita’s screen (it was also amusing to see Traveller’s Tales split up the films across two entries like this, meaning you had to buy the PSP version of Years 1-4 to play the full tale on Vita).

However, with the imminent release of LEGO Batman 2 there was a glimmer of hope – there was no PSP version this time and some sites were reporting that the free-roaming open world had made its way into the Vita version. Sadly, early reports following release confirmed what we feared – the game was yet another DS port. As usual, while still a fun game in its own right, it was missing features like open-world and contained compressed graphics and audio (particularly noticeable during cutscenes) and in general felt lower-quality meaning the title was a bit of a let-down, although the addition of voice acting was praised.

The next title in the series – LEGO Lord of the Rings, along with the following title (and the first non-licenced LEGO game on a Sony handheld), LEGO Legend of Chima – suffered from exactly the same fate as the prior two games and it became clear at this point that DS porting was here to stay, especially with the Vita struggling in the west and Nintendo’s handhelds reigning supreme in sales (although at least Chima was somewhat ambitious in its scope and design).

 

Continued DS porting and isometric viewpoint

By October 2013 it was time for the next LEGO title to appear on Vita in LEGO Marvel Superheroes: Universe in Peril which TT Fusion promised to be a bespoke experience for handhelds that was entirely different to the console releases.

Alongside the red-hot IP attached to it at the time, it was easy to wonder whether this was finally the handheld LEGO game people had been waiting for. In fact, this turned out to be an even more pared-back version than ever (yet again designed for DS first and foremost) – an isometric viewpoint was chosen and levels were designed to be played in super-short chunks (in fact, a timer in levels to get bonuses actively discouraged exploration).

Also missing were any hub worlds (the console release actually had a fully open-world city to explore which was a big step up over the smaller hubs), as well as the ability of many characters to jump, taking away most of the platforming challenges and focusing purely on combat and puzzles/ Although the game was somewhat fun in its own right and still retained the core ideas of the franchise, it represented yet another missed opportunity to take advantage of the Vita’s hardware.

The isometric viewpoint and further watered-down mechanics continued in 2014 through the next two licenced properties (LEGO Movie and LEGO The Hobbit) as well as a second original game (LEGO Ninjago Nindroids). Particularly disappointing was the fact that they used the isometric camera for the LEGO Movie game – an IP which seemed to make a fantastic transition for the console release and looked gorgeous on PS360, but equally frustrating was that LEGO The Hobbit’s open-world version of Middle-Earth which was completely absent on handhelds (making it even less attractive than the two-years-old Lord of the Rings).

 

Beginnings of a new LEGO era

By the end of 2014, however, something pretty exciting happened – with the release of LEGO Batman 3, not only was the DS version finally dropped (which had actually happened with the prior release of LEGO The Hobbit although gameplay styles hadn’t shifted), but the series finally returned to its roots as an exploration-based; platform/puzzler with hub worlds.

Make no mistake – this wasn’t a port of the home console versions like fans had been wanting all along and the title missed a number of pieces of content from the console releases (most notably the free-roaming exploration aspects of the Lantern World), it marked a stark increase in quality for the franchise on handhelds as well as being an all-round solid game, plus a huge step up from LEGO Batman 2.

It was easy to wonder whether this was simply a fluke, but TT Fusion went on to impress again in June 2015 with LEGO Jurassic World. A combination of all 4 Jurassic Park films, the title provided a further improvement over Batman 3 and managed to retain much of the content from the console release – chopping out only a few bits and pieces. It was followed by LEGO Ninjago Shadow of Ronin, notable for its big free-roam island hub-world which tooks steps to push the Vita further than any previous LEGO game had done. It seemed like – for once – these games were being developed for Vita first and ported down to 3DS later.

The ultimate confirmation of this seemed to finally come at the start of 2016 with LEGO Marvel’s Avengers. As TT Fusion’s game director documented, the biggest development goal for this title was to finally bring the open-world environment of Manhattan to handhelds, which arguably brought the console and handheld releases the closest they’d been since 2008’s LEGO Batman. While concessions had to be made – there’s a lot of fog in the hub to reduce draw-distance, content from the extra films (Captain America/Iron Man/Thor) had to be cut etc., it’s an impressive feat and a testament to the team at TT Fusion to be able to take on the feedback they’d received over multiple entries to get the handheld games back on track (creating one of my favourite games on the Vita).

 

Future of LEGO games on Vita

The most recent title on Vita (LEGO Star Wars The Force Awakens) returned to the winning combination of LEGO and Star Wars that impressed gamers all those years ago.

Adding new refinements such as blaster battles and ship-to-ship combat created arguably the best LEGO game on Vita to date (at least according to the sites that did review it, myself included) and while it still lacks some content from the console version, the game is the closest we’ve seen on Vita to date and a great sign for the future – but what exactly does the future hold for LEGO games on the Vita?

Well sadly, the likelihood of any future LEGO content on either the Vita or 3DS at this point is very slim. Despite the fact that the games still regularly feature in the weekly top selling 3DS and Vita games in the UK, it seems the numbers they were pulling is no longer enough. After a lengthy series absence throughout early 2017 (aside from the fairly poorly-received LEGO Worlds), the latest round of licensed titles started in September with The LEGO Ninjago Movie – which opted to drop both last-gen ports (PS3/Xbox 360), Wii-U, 3DS and Vita versions, instead going for a four-platform release across PS4, XB1, PC & Switch.

The most recent release (at the time of publication) LEGO Marvel Superheroes 2 unsurprisingly chose these same four platforms again and it seems the franchise has finally moved on last-gen hardware and handhelds, which is a real shame given how rapidly the games were improving. Given the lukewarm reception both Marvel and Ninjago received though, this may be a smart move as it seems TT Games need to focus on getting the franchise back on the right track.

 

Conclusion

What I hope I’ve gotten across in this article more than anything is that although there have been some ups and downs along the way, the majority of LEGO games on both PSP and Vita are definitely worth checking out if you’re a fan of the IP they’re based on (or even if you’re not and just fancy a fun, easy platformer). There’s been a lot of rhetoric over the years about the quality of the games and it’s my belief that all of the titles from LEGO Batman 3 onwards are well worth your time due to the increased effort put in by TT Fusion, as well as some of the earlier PSP releases such as LEGO Indiana Jones.

It’s a shame that the series unceremoniously dropped Vita alongside a range of other platforms at the end of 2016, especially considering the vast improvements we were seeing over previous handheld entries. Still, in spite of this there are a numbers of games already available covering a range of IP’s that you’re sure to find something you like – so if you’ve ever been interested in the handheld LEGO games, there’s never been a better time to jump in than now!