LEGO Games

bluelion3

I never really noticed the LEGO games until Heroica. They seemed too simplistic.

What is your favorite LEGO game (excluding the videogames)?
Which games involve the most skill or strategy?
Which games are the best for parts? I never looked at Banana Balance before, but it has a lot of tree parts.
And when will we see a Star Wars LEGO game?!

brickmatic

The green tree element in Banana Balance is 0.24 cents from PAB, so it might be cheaper to go that router if you're looking to build up trees.

davee123

I like Heroica the best so far-- ranking the ones I've actually played:

1) Heroica
2) Minotaurus (it's a little simplistic, but a great basic game mechanic)
3) Harry Potter
4) Pirate Code (it's just Master Mind)
5) Creationary
6) Atlantis Treasure
7) Lava Dragon
8) Ramses' Pyramid

Technically, I own Race 3000 and Monster 4 too, but I haven't actually played them.

Heroica itself is a cute game engine (fantastic for the level of gameplay that they're shooting for), but I'm not sure if I'd give each of the standalone Heroica games top ranking-- the small Heroica set is pretty lame on its own. But when you put them all together, it becomes complex enough to be pretty neat.

Harry Potter seems to require some thinking and strategy, but is pretty complex. You have to plan out a lot of possibilities, only some of which are useful (but mostly serve to confuse rather than progress the game). Creationary requires skill, but not in a planning or strategic means-- more like a "building well and building fast" means.

As for parts, depends on what you're after, I guess. The Harry Potter game had some cool parts, like the green 1x1 round plates (which were VERY rare up until the game was released). Orient Bazaar also had some nice, rare elements.

DaveE

ParkGrades

For our family, Creationary is good for kids+adults, Harry Potter is pretty interesting for older kids, and our littlest one loves Monster 4!

Martin

For a short game with my daughter, we love Pirate Plank. It's more luck than skill, but it's quick and easy to have a game. Minotaurus is also a favourite.

burakki62

the only one I have played is creationary which I really enjoyed. I have other games but I bought them for parts really.

davee123

I went ahead and played both Monster 4 and Race 3000 this weekend... Updated:

1) Heroica
2) Minotaurus
3) Harry Potter
4) Pirate Code
5) Creationary
6) Monster 4
7) Atlantis Treasure
8) Lava Dragon (kinda lame)
9) Race 3000 (kinda lame)
10) Ramses' Pyramid (very lame)

DaveE

Hoboman

So far I have parted out the games we have bought except Minotaurus and Lava Dragon (Hobo Jr likes it).

On a side note: The Monster 4 is on sale around town and that makes it a good deal if you want the Fantasy Heads.

princedraven

Could someone who has played a number of these, let me know if any would be suitable for a 4yr old boy? My little one likes to play games like snakes and ladders, which is good to teach him numbers, and loves his LEGO, so LEGO games seems a good fit.
On [email protected] it seems to suggest 6+ for pretty much all the games, but then the LEGO he builds is 6+ anyway.

MinifigsMe

All I can say @princedraven is that my nephew enjoyed the shave a sheep game at that age. It's a sweet little game. So many of them are half price at 4-5 pounds that it's worth getting a couple to try out.

sirrich69

@princedraven

My daughter is 5 and she loves shave a sheep, we as parents also like it. We have just borrowed Robochamp and that is also good.

We have played Magikus at a friends and although the daughter seems to like it we as parents are not that keen.

Based on the shave a sheep and RoboChamp we have bought more games for the daughters brithday. We have got Minotaurus, simply because lots of good reports about it and got it half price off ebay. The bonus for me is minotarus is on a 32x32 green plate so if the game is average or the daughter does not like then the base plate will be very useful.

Based on your comments then yes get a Lego game for your son, he will Love it. Shave a sheep or robochamp would be a good starting point as they are one of the cheapest. Good basic game play.

princedraven

^ Could you let me know where they are half price?
Checked [email protected] and Amazon and the cheapest were about £7

MinifigsMe

They do go up and down in price, but are often half price on amazon. The orient bazar is 6.99 in my local TRU - which is v annoying as I paid 19.99 from [email protected] last december, and still haven't played it!! grrr.
Sunblock was recently half price on amazon, so I got that then...just keep an eye on them if your'e not in a hurry.
Someone was talking about a website that can watch amazon prices...camelcamelcamel or something???

Martin

Just put them in your Amazon basket or move them to your wishlist and you'll get notifications of price changes each time you view your basket. Of course, it means you need to check your basket each day which is where the aforementioned Amazon watch site wins.

DunedinNZ

I'm a member of boardgamegeek.com and have played a reasonable number of euro-style boardgames, and ameri-trash, including Race for the Galaxy, and Agricola.

I'm also collecting the Lego games, partly for the parts, partly for the game play and partly to redesign them.

Have Minotarus [unplayed], Race 3000 [nice quick race game, needs a little more strategy], Orient Bazaar [reasonable 2 player, much better 3 player], Ramses pyramid [unplayed], Shear a sheep [unplayed], Banana Tree [unplayed] and jumped through a lot of hoops to get Lunar Mission [unplayed].

As for Orient Bazaar, I am in the process of writing up some "print and play" materials to make the game a lot more strategic.

I'm definately waiting for Heroica to arrive in NZ, looks like it will be fun, and my GF actually likes the microfigs.

meyerc13

princedraven, my daughter is 3 years old, son is 5. A few of our favorites so far:

-Wild Wool (aka Shave a Sheep)
-Monster 4
-Pirate Plank

While my daughter may not get the strategy of some of the games, if you add sound effects a kid her age will still have fun. For example, whenever you roll the wolf, you must growl at the sheep, and the sheep must scream in terror as he/she loses all his wool.

For Monster 4 when the spider enters a quadrant on the board, the players in that quadrant simpliy must run from the board screaming in terror.

If you make the game fun like this, a 3-4 year old will have a blast.

princedraven

^ haha, great ideas, thanks.
Still waiting on some deals for these. Argos has it's usual great price but none in stock sale!!!