Lego Dimensions

Lego Dimensions is a Lego-themed action-adventure platform crossover toy-to-life video game developed by Traveller's Tales and published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment for the PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Wii U, Xbox 360 and Xbox One. It follows the toys-to-life format, in that the player has Lego figures and a toy pad that can be played within the game itself where it features characters and environments from over 30 different franchises.

Plot
There is an ancient planet at the center of the Lego Multiverse inhabited by an evil mastermind, Lord Vortech. It is said that he who controls the Foundational Elements that this planet is built upon, controls all of the Multiverse. Lord Vortech has vowed to be that ruler, summoning characters from a variety of Lego worlds to help him find these building bricks of Lego civilization. Some have agreed. Others have rebelled. And only the combined powers of the greatest Lego heroes can stop him.

When a mysterious and powerful vortex suddenly appears in various Lego worlds, different characters from DC Comics, The Lord of the Rings and The Lego Movie are swept away. To save their friends, Batman, Gandalf and Wyldstyle bravely jump into the vortex. As they journey to locations beyond their wildest imaginations in search of their friends, they soon realize that Lord Vortech is summoning villains across different Lego worlds to help him gain control. As his power grows and the worlds collide, many unexpected characters meet and all boundaries are broken. Our heroes must travel through space and time to rescue their friends before Vortech destroys all of Lego humanity.

Why It Needs A Bigger Imagination

 * 1) For the first time ever, it collides with over thirty different franchises of mh:greatestmovies:The Lego Movie and its spin-off, mh:greatestmovies:The Lego Batman Movie, The Lord of the Rings, the DC universe and Teen Titans GO!, mh:greatestmovies:The Wizard of Oz, The Simpsons, mh:greatestmovies:Back to the Future, Scooby-Doo, Ninjago, Portal, Doctor Who, the original mh:greatestmovies:Ghostbusters and its reboot of the same name, The A-Team, Adventure Time, mh:greatestmovies:Beetlejuice, E.T., Harry Potter and its spin-off prequel, Fantastic Beasts, mh:greatestmovies:The Goonies, mh:greatestmovies:Gremlins, mh:greatestmovies:Jurassic World, Knight Rider, Legends of Chima, Lego City, Midway Arcade, mh:greatestmovies:Mission: Impossible, The Powerpuff Girls, and Sonic the Hedgehog.
 * 2) It has completely unique mechanics from any other LEGO games at the time. Instead of choosing many characters of Lego games, they put each character on Toy Pad and can help to solve the puzzles, missions, battles and more. And unlike series such as Skylanders, and Disney Infinity, they can get respawn in a few seconds mostly because of the Lego video game.
 * 3) Lots of characters to play as and can use them whatever you want that has a many new different ability.
 * 4) Amazing adventure world to explore that helps the quest, collecting red bricks and unlocking jukebox.
 * 5) Awesome boss fights, mostly the Joker, General Zod, Dr. Eggman, and Lord Vortech (see below).
 * 6) The soundtrack is really amazing composed of Ian Livingstone that used the music score, notably John Williams, Jerry Goldsmith, Danny Elfman, and James Newton Howard.
 * 7) Great voice acting, especially the actors who reprise their role from LEGO games.
 * 8) The battle arena is super fun to play as. Battle Arenas feature videogame competitive split-screen local gameplay that can allow up to 4 players. These can be activated in the open Adventure Worlds of the corresponding franchises through the Year 2 minifigures of Waves 6 to 9 with their new translucent orange bases. There are tons of Year 2 arena, with four modes, Capture the Flag, Base Bash!, Objective, and Tick, Tag, Boom!. Sometimes, you can buy their own set of traps if you have enough studs. There are also Battle Shop which allows players to buy Gold Bricks to improve and change the gameplay of the Battle Arena to their liking. If you want to win battle arena, you can use either vehicles or power up to beat them.
 * 9) Iconic main theme song. Listen here.
 * 10) The vehicles in the game can be built and upgraded three times once you collect all gold bricks and has even new different abilities.
 * 11) The characters' special finishing moves are unique and interesting, like Shaggy's scaredy-cat persona actually defeating a foe.
 * 12) As mentioned stated, the Toy Pad in this game is not only the system used for bringing in your characters and vehicles, but also used to get around certain puzzles in the game. The controls are highly responsive and smooth.
 * 13) While the cutscenes are unskippable, you can skip cutscenes after you actually played all the level, which is quite fun for sure and speaking of cutscenes, they are technically hilarious, particularly humor.
 * 14) The level and world designs are excellent and very faithful to their respective franchise.
 * 15) X-PO and Lord Vortech are incredibly likable characters, although X-PO can get pretty annoying at times.
 * 16) Some franchises are good choices due to their ratings and success, like, Sonic the Hedgehog, Portal, Lego Ninjago, The Lego Movie and Mission: Impossible.
 * 17) Compared to the other Lego games that have shorter, the final boss battle is really long that can help you for doing abilities for each character, puzzles that must solve the missions and they can fight the enemies during the first act and the final level itself is really long as well.
 * 18) Most of the original actors, such as Michael J. Fox, Chris Pratt, Jake Johnson, Will Arnett, Rosario Dawson, Eddie Redmayne and even Roger Craig Smith, reprise their roles for this game.
 * 19) Unlike the other level packs, the Lego Sonic the Hedgehog level pack is a really big expansion pack and is considered the best level pack in the game because the level "Sonic Dimensions" is a really long and fun level filled with awesome vehicles and with Sonic the Hedgehog playable, he can do a homing attack, spin dash, and can build up speed like his video game counterpart. The story for this level pack is great and is filled with fun references.
 * 20) Much like the original Portal games, GLaDOS sings an original song for the end credits, "You Wouldn’t Know" after the final level of "The Final Dimensions", which is a nice reference to the video games she previously appears in as she sings a song at the end of these.
 * 21) This game shows great respect to the franchises its adapting, which does an excellent job of it.
 * 22) You unlock disco cheat for 100% after you collect at least 480 Gold Bricks in total.
 * 23) The graphics and animations are so much better and it was even given more look, expectedly.
 * 24) In Year 2, the Story Packs are introduced in this game, you can play multiple levels from Story Packs and even build a theme LEGO Gateway to customize the LEGO Toy Pad. Each pack also includes a new Keystone ability.
 * 25) Include the reference of easter eggs and even pop-culture:
 * 26) * HAL 9000 from the Space Odyssey series is seen during the level of "GLaD to See You", he was summoned by the Locate Keystone to distract GLaDOS so that Batman, Gandalf and Wyldstyle could defeat her. During this distraction, GLaDOS becomes increasingly agitated by H.A.L. 9000, especially since he repeatedly calls her "Dave". She even goes as far as threatening to throw him into her Emergency Intelligence Incinerator.
 * 27) * S.T.A.R. Labs from CW's The Flash is in the level of "A Walk In The Park" when you go to secret room by using TARDIS. If you use the Locate Keystone to summon, The Flash is running on the treadmill that he is seen going through the Rifts.
 * 28) * Bedrock from The Flintstones and the family room from The Jetsons are seen in the game for secret room.
 * 29) * The Valiant from Doctor Who series is summoned by Lord Vortech as a obstacle to stop Batman, Gandalf and Wyldstyle and the DNA ship from Red Dwarf is in the secret room, too.
 * 30) * In addition, there are many references to internet memes about Sonic in the Sonic the Hedgehog World such as Sonic and E.T. saying "Gotta Go Fast", a quest with Knuckles named LEGO Dimensions & Knuckles, and Big the Cat mentioning Sanic in the Big's Big Fishing Adventure 4 quest. There is also a reference to the meme named Doge in the Aperture Science level when Space Core says, "Such space, very orbit, such black hole. Wow... space".
 * 31) *In one scene, when Batman, Gandalf and Wyldstyle begins to find one of the Keystones for the LEGO Gateway, if ever they want to find Robin, Frodo, and MetalBeard, Batman says "We are not in the Gotham anymore."
 * 32) *When Gandalf says Middle Earth, Wyldstyle says "Do you mean Middle Zealand?"

Bad Qualities

 * 1) Due to licensing issues with Disney, some franchises such as Marvel and Star Wars aren't present. Especially the case for the latter since Star Wars started TT Games' LEGO legacy, with The Force Awakens.
 * 2) Being a 'toys-to-life' game, its way too expensive for not just the starter pack, but also all of the expansions packs as well.
 * 3) Some of the voice actors from Lego shows or movies didn't reprise their roles. For example, Kai (Lego Ninjago) sounded a little too young and bratty and Nolan North sounded nothing like Will Ferrell from President/Lord Business (The Lego Movie) (even through the voice acting is great).
 * 4) * On the other hand, some characters use archived audio clips from the original IP for their dialogue (ex., Ghostbusters 1984, since Harold Ramis died in 2014), which sounds off compared to the rest of the in-game audio.
 * 5) Like the rest of the LEGO games, it does get repetitive at times.
 * 6) Once again, Labyrinth Zone is back.
 * 7) They just added anything that many people hated like the 2016 Ghostbusters reboot, mh:terribletvshows:Teen Titans Go! (despite already having enough promotions) and 2016 The Powerpuff Girls reboot, resulting being prematurely cancelled by TT and WB Games in October 2017, due to lacklustre sales of Year 2 content and the game itself also ends on a cliffhanger, which is never resolved.
 * 8) * Also, while the game doesn't have worst and hatable characters, it still has some unlikable characters, such as Beast Boy, already hated in his own show, who continues to be a despised character in this game, though for different reasons. He's been greatly toned down, but he also never reaches his full potential since his Shapeshift ability has been nerfed for no good reason, when Jake is fully capable of using his.
 * 9) The Wii U Version (although not bad) became portable disaster after The Shard Update. If you don't have an external USB hard drive for your Wii U the game can be stuck in the Battle Arena 4 player split screen in regular levels and adventure worlds. Even with an external hard drive, the game's framerate can stutter and lag. It doesn't help matters that the game won't connect to the LEGO Dimensions server either which means you can't download the content for any Wave 6 onwards pack you buy. YouTuber Just2Good demonstrated these issues in a video and you could see quite a few Wii U players experiencing these issues on the LEGO Dimensions Miiverse as well. Several versions of the game have become this as well starting following post-Shard updates, with users on multiple platforms reporting frequent game crashes and even some cases of progress-blanking and save file corruption.
 * 10) While the characters menu in the Hub does a decent job at informing you of each character's abilities, it often fails to mention certain abilities, like Kai being able to melt ice by attacking it. It also hasn't updated the wave 1-5 character pages with the Year 2 abilities, despite various characters being updated with said new abilities.
 * 11) *While the game is pretty consistent with hint markers telling the player what character has what ability, it never does so with the Relic Detector (since Wyldstyle has the ability, and she comes with the Starter Pack needed to play the game).
 * 12) Some areas are this to new players, because the game is very unforgiving to those who aren't familiar with how LEGO video games work.
 * 13) * Averted with regards to the actual physical construction. Not everyone has the aptitude to build Lego; fortunately the game is set up in such a way that you can still play the main game and the expansion packs without actually having to build anything (though it's helpful to at least build the characters as it's easier to keep track).
 * 14) We see from someone's viewpoint as they explore Foundation Prime, where their red-sleeved arm gets corrupted by a piece of Vortech, followed by his cackling laugh which will never be elaborated on due the cancellation of Year 3.
 * 15) What Happened to the Mouse?:
 * 16) * Gandalf's sword Glamdring, which he's seen wielding in the beginning, in his fight with the Balrog, and carrying after Batman rescues him. Then it just disappears entirely, without comment.
 * 17) * There is no mention of what happens to Dorothy Gale after Vortech's defeat. Considering she shows up in the Ghostbusters 2016 Story Pack, it's implied that Lord Vortech let her go at some point or was freed.
 * 18) * In "Sonic Dimensions", after Sonic saves all of his friends from Eggman early in the level, he realises that Amy isn't here despite her also being captured. She went into hiding and ended up on the Death Egg, allowing her to take the final Chaos Emerald from Eggman and give it to Sonic.
 * 19) The drop-in-drop-out aspect of gameplay can cheat a few of the puzzles. One good example is a gold brick found in the Portal 2 World, with the puzzle designed for Slimer (a wave 5 character), as there is a small hatch leading to the dark room.  However, the puzzle can easily be solved with only Wave One characters. Simply enter the dark room with a short character, and place an illuminating character on the pad, and they'll be teleported into the dark room with the player. The rest is fairly simple, and you only need to remove the tall characters from the pad to get them out of the room.
 * 20) Collecting all the Gold Bricks in Sonic the Hedgehog's Adventure World can prove a challenge, depending on how quickly you can learn to speed Sonic through the wildly varying terrain. The camera's movement also often becomes janky.
 * 21) Missed Opportunities:
 * 22) * Fans of someone playable only through the Character Switch ability (e.g., Doctors #1-12, a Ghostbuster who didn't get top billing in his or her respective movie) would probably feel disappointed if they can't find a physical minifigure of that character, or if completing a franchise's team seems either more costly or less convenient than if Lego sold more Fun or Team Packs for the franchise in question.
 * 23) * Some people thought that Beast Boy's ability to shapeshift, similarly to Jake, would save him from being an annoying character. Too bad that he doesn't have the shapeshift ability, but rather turns into the respective animal whenever he encounters a specific puzzle, or a bird when the player pushes "jump" twice. The removal of his gorilla form is also heavily criticized, since it's his most iconic form.
 * 24) * Generally, pick any character that isn't playable yet, despite the importance of them in their respective media. Especially for the worlds that have only one character, like The Wizard of Oz or Midway Arcade. As a singular character, the absence of a playable Alfred has gotten the most criticism, because of his importance in The LEGO Batman Movie and the franchise overall.
 * 25) * The fact that Ron Weasley has zero presence in the game, not even as an NPC, is still a sore point for many Harry Potter fans, years after the game has ended.
 * 26) * Some fans' feelings towards the game is that LEGO is wasting what could have been a big crossover between their own original themes (including fan-favorite "evergreen" themes such as LEGO Pirates, LEGO Space, and LEGO Castle) by instead focusing almost entirely upon licensed themes. The only exceptions included Ninjago, Legends of Chima, The LEGO Movie, and LEGO City Undercover.
 * 27) * A race scene featured in the Goonies Level Pack features several vehicles including a few guests from participating franchises taking part. While some vehicles that can be used in-game were given a larger redesign making them more detailed, some fans were disappointed by the fact that K.I.T.T. still appears in his in-game form, despite K.A.R.R. in the Knight Rider Adventure World having a larger and more realistic model.
 * 28) * The worlds of Jurassic World, Legends of Chima, and all of the Year Two franchises don't actually factor into the story. While Jurassic World was the last LEGO Adaptation Game, not being able to summon the T-Rex with the Locate keystone is downright criminal.
 * 29) * The plot point of Gamer Kid turning into George at the end of the Midway Arcade Level Pack could've actually been part of Gamer Kid's moveset. George could've been utilized as his Super Mode, or alternatively, every single ability could've been provided by a different character, making Gamer Kid a Voluntary Shapeshifter.
 * 30) * Harry Potter's charge attack is the Patronus Charm, and the Harry Potter world includes the tunnel where the dementors attack in the fifth book. Despite this combination, no dementors appear.
 * 31) * The thought of having male and female Ghostbusters fight evil side-by-side sounds less appealing when the only interactions they have include Abby insulting the original jumpsuit and Ecto-1.

Reception
Lego Dimensions received positive reviews from critics, gamers and fans alike. The version of PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Wii U (despite the latter having the porting disaster) received "generally favorable reviews", according to review aggregator Metacritic.

Trivia

 * Franchises that were considered but scrapped included Pirates of the Caribbean, Universal Monsters,  The Matrix, Clash of The Titans, King Kong vs. Godzilla, Mega Man, Minecraft, Arrow, CW The Flash, The 2017 Wonder Woman movie, Despicable Me (Which was going to be a starter pack for another scrapped idea, Connectables), The Angry Birds Movie, Dreamworks animated movies (specifically Shrek, How to Train your Dragon, The Croods and Captain Underpants), Tom and Jerry, Looney Tunes, The Smurfs, The Adventures of Tin-Tin, Thunderbirds, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, Fast & Furious, Avatar: The Last Airbender and Steven Universe.
 * Had Year 3 been made, the final character to be released would have been Lord Vortex, the main villain of the game.
 * This is the first game to have a Valve product appear on a Nintendo Console.
 * Unlike series such as Skylanders, Disney Infinity, and Amiibo, the minifigures, vehicles, and the USB toy pad are all made from real Lego pieces and can be freely built and customized.
 * LEGO decided to retire some packs, such as the Portal 2 Level Pack, before the Starter Pack goes out-of-print.
 * Most of the franchises in Year 1 are from LEGO's catalog of play-themes, licensed (movies/TV) or otherwise. Rejected and discontinued themes, such as Portal 2, The Wizard of Oz, Midway Arcade, Mission: Impossible, Harry Potter, Sonic the Hedgehog, etc. are exclusive to the game.
 * However it should be noted that Portal 2, The Goonies, and The Wizard of Oz had pitched LEGO Ideas sets known as "Thinking With Portals", "The Goonies 30th Anniversary - The Inferno" and "The Road to Oz" respectively that were noteworthy for their success with fans, but ultimately turned down by the LEGO Group in the end.
 * Midway Arcade, however, wasn't inspired by any theme, and was instead inspired by the team's desire to introduce the games to a younger generation, thanks to Warner Bros.' purchase of Midway, which gave them full access to all of their IPs, and although Mortal Kombat was considered to be included as part of the theme, it was eventually dropped due to age concerns, due to the game's focus on blood and gore.
 * In Year 2 however, with the exception of Ghostbusters (2016), Harry Potter, Adventure Time, The Lego Batman Movie and LEGO City: Undercover, most of the franchises included had no LEGO sets released or announced or a notable LEGO Ideas pitch prior to their releases.
 * LEGO Dimensions was alluded to in the post-credits sequence of LEGO Jurassic World, in which LEGO bricks used in the Toy Pad and the Scale Keystone are dug up by Alan Grant.
 * In the UK and Ireland, the game sales had surpassed in comparison to first week sales of other 2015 toys-to-life game competitors Skylanders: Superchargers and Disney Infinity 3.0.
 * The Starter Pack, which contained the game, the USB toy pad, and three minifigures, was released in September 2015, while additional level packs and characters were released over the following two years.
 * A third year of content was planned as well, but was cancelled in October 2017.
 * There is an unused pack number right in the middle of the 2016 version of Ghostbusters content, suggesting an unused G16 character. A common theory was that Rowan was meant to fill this role, yet it is unconfirmed. There is no official cancellation reason, however the leak that uncovered it was part of Wave 9, the game's last wave, suggesting it may have gotten cut with the game getting cancelled.
 * A unique shader is sometimes used in certain Adventure Worlds and levels.
 * Cartoon series such as Adventure Time, Scooby-Doo!, Teen Titans Go!, The Powerpuff Girls and The Simpsons gain a cel-shaded, outlined appearance. Scooby-Doo! uses noticeable thick outlines, while the other franchises use thinner outlines, which are harder to notice.
 * The A-Team gains shading replicating the slight dirt and scratches on the film of older television series.
 * Sonic the Hedgehog gains more saturated shading.
 * For some reason, the game was announced to be in development on April 9, 2015, but was first rumored a few weeks before.
 * The graphics on the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Wii U versions of LEGO Dimensions are of slightly lesser quality, due to the relatively smaller amount of memory available.
 * Certain objects and sound effects are missing in these versions (most noticeably seen in the complete lack of dinosaurs in the Jurassic World Adventure World)
 * This sometimes affects quests, such as You Had One Job!, where a light tunnel usable in the quest is removed these versions of the game.