LEGO The Hobbit

Genre: Isometric Action

Players: 1

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Review:

LEGO The Hobbit is a family-friendly Isometric Action game released in 2014 on PlayStation Vita and Nintendo 3DS, with an entirely different game bearing the same title also coming to PC, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, Xbox One, and Wii U in 2014. As with the console versions of the game, this release follows the plot of the first two Hobbit films, as the third Hobbit film would not hit theaters until a half a year after this game was released.

Following in the footsteps of the handheld releases of LEGO Marvel Super Heroes: Universe in Peril and the Nintendo 3DS version of The Lego Movie Videogame, the handheld release of LEGO The Hobbit abandons the 3D platforming of the console version of the game in favor of Isometric Action, and the results are… well, about what you’d expect if you’ve played either of those two earlier games.

This is to say that these games respond to the problem of the Nintendo 3DS being unable to handle the same sort of graphics and Open-World gameplay of the console games by not even trying, and rather than delivering a more stripped-down experience of the same game (as was the case in LEGO The Lord of the Rings), we are instead getting a much simpler game that not only lacks the Open-World elements of the console games, it also doesn’t have any of the platforming or the rich, detailed world.

At the very least, this time around the game does attempt to retain some semblance of the puzzles of the console games, as well as the tedious resource collecting, but none of this saves this from feeling like an extremely underwhelming experience by comparison, especially when LEGO The Lord of the Rings on Nintendo 3DS managed to preserve much of what was good about the console games (except the Open World, of course). That this game manages to be less impressive than a title in the same franchise released two years prior is pretty depressing.

As with the two previous games in this style, the visuals are highly underwhelming, though at the very least this game retains the great cinematic soundtrack and voice acting pulled directly from the films. Still, even with the game still sounding like a proper Lord of the Rings game, the visuals are highly disappointing here.

In the end, the Nintendo 3DS once more gets a sorely disappointing release in the LEGO franchise that simply cannot compare to its console counterpart. But what’s worse about LEGO The Hobbit on Nintendo 3DS is that we have a clear point of comparison on the Nintendo 3DS in LEGO The Lord of the Rings, and while that game was far from perfect, it’s far better than this disappointing farce of a follow-up. If you’re wanting a good Middle-Earth game on Nintendo 3DS, get LEGO The Lord of the Rings. If you’re wanting a good LEGO game based on The Hobbit, get the console version of the game. But in either case, you definitely should not get this.

tl;dr – LEGO The Hobbit on Nintendo 3DS is an Isometric Action game that once again uses the same style of Isometric Action gameplay that has disappointed twice before on the handheld, and which unsurprisingly disappoints here too, with tedious, repetitive gameplay and a severely underwhelming presentation, made even more inexplicable by the existence of the far superior LEGO The Lord of the Rings on the same platform two years prior. If you want to adventure through Middle-Earth on your Nintendo 3DS, get that game instead.

Grade: D+

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