Customer Reviews

LEGO: Marvel - Xbox 360

We own every single Lego game and we love all of them. There has been some bad ones, Indian Jones 2, but overall each Lego game has gotten better than the prior game and Marvel is no exception. We do not know much about Marvel comics besides what we have seen from the movies and we still love this game. If you are a comic book fan this game you'll fall in love with.

Pros:

Graphics/Sound are even better than Lego Batman 2/Lego Lord of the Rings
Local Co-Op
New LARGE characters, new fun element
100+ characters that are actually different from each other
Real Location of Open World (Manhattan)
Better Create a Character mode
Open for all ages
Lots to unlock and explore
Hours and Hours of fun and replay ability
Easy to pick up and play

Cons:

Flying is still pretty hard to do
Puzzles are easy, but we like that

We really have enjoyed this game so far and can't wait to finish this and for the next Lego game to come out. I would recommend this game to anyone who enjoys Marvel Comics, Lego or Lego Games and just anyone in general, this is fun and you should give it a try.

Thanks for Reading

Update - 10/28

The game is fun but to get all the gold bricks, there are several flying missions/tasks that are almost impossible to complete due to the poor flying mechanics. You really have to practice your flying a lot before you try these and be ready to be frustrated.

If you are just playing the game for fun and to explore, you will have a blast but if you are looking for 100% completion of the game be ready to be frustrated.

I've loved almost all the LEGO video games, but this might be my favorite yet. LEGO: Marvel has a wide range of characters with unique characteristics and skills, from Spider-Man to Mr. Fantastic to The Incredible Hulk. It's simple but challenging, something that has made the LEGO games so popular with my whole family, and, like most other LEGO games, the replay value is high. There's plenty of humor, but not so much that it slows down the stories or distracts me from the game.

As much as I've loved most LEGO games, none of them could match the entertainment value of the first one I played, LEGO: Batman. LEGO: Marvel is on its way to taking the top spot on my list. Highly recommended.

After DC received two Lego titles, it was only a matter of time before Marvel would jump in the fray with their own brick basher. After the bar was set ridiculously high with Lego Batman 2 and its superb voice cast and soundtrack, would Marvel's offering be able to match up? The answer is yes yes yes a thousand times YES.

Far from shrinking from the high mark set by DC's last Lego offering, Marvel instead meets the challenge head-on and succeeds. This is a game that is the best Marvel offering since Ultimate Alliance. First big plus: The voice cast. After Lego Batman 2 upped the ante with spot-on voice casting, Marvel raises the bar by using the entire voice cast from its "Avengers Assemble" cartoon. Adrian Pasdar is here as the snarky Tony Stark/Iron Man, Roger Craig Smith brings Captain America to (Lego) life, Travis Willingham thunders as Thor, and Fred Tatasciore just kills it as the Hulk (at this point, is there anyone who can voice the Hulk for any Marvel property BESIDE Fred?). Not only that, but in a nod to the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), Clark Gregg reprises his role as S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Phil Coulson, acting in the "advisor" role that Alfred had in Lego Batman 2. Kari Walghren reprises her Marvel anime role as Maria Hill, and Nick Fury is voiced by John Bentley, who does a SPOT-ON impression of Samuel L. Jackson. How this guy is not doing Fury for the Marvel cartoons is beyond me. He is amazing. Other notables include Dee Bradley Baker as Reed Richards, Troy Baker as Loki and Steve Blum as Wolverine, all reprising their roles from the various cartoons. Marvel did not skimp on the voiceover budget, that's for sure, and it adds to the overall familiarity across the differing Marvel media. Additionally, the music aboard the S.H.I.E.L.D. Heli-carrier and on some of the missions sounds like an adaptation of Alan Silvestri's score from "The Avengers", lending more gravitas to the game (or as much gravitas as you can lend to a game made up of Lego bricks).

The gameplay itself is outstanding. With the HUB/sandbox being concentrated in and around Manhattan, there's plenty to do in the Big Apple. Every corner of the city is alive and teeming with different challenges, from random encounters with the various denizens of the Marvel Universe like J. Jonah Jameson, Heimdall and The Punisher, to races with the likes of Ghost Rider and Blade, to puzzle-solving with Ant-Man and Reed Richards. There is never a shortage of main story and side-missions to immerse yourself in. Additionally, the controls are identical to the Lego Batman controls, and the puzzles, land races and challenges are not too difficult, so that younger children (like my 6-year old) will find themselves challenged and not frustrated or upset. The map of the city is big but not clunkily so, enough to keep children immersed in the experience, and the mapping is superb, not too far from the amazing job Rockstar did on Liberty City in GTA IV. All the major landmarks are there (The Empire State Building, Central Park, Grand Central Station), as well as the tried-and-true Marvel Universe landmarks (The Stark Tower, The Baxter Building, The Daily Bugle, The Oscorp Tower, Dr. Strange's Sanctum Sanctorum, The Avengers Mansion and the X-Mansion).

Did I mention the insane amount of playable characters? This is quite frankly the largest number of characters ever employed in a Lego game to date. There are 132 playable characters, not including pre-order characters and DLC (An Asgard DLC pack is rumored to be in the offering once "Thor: The Dark World" hits theaters). As a result, there's a little bit of everything for everyone; Avengers fans can play as any one of their favorite heroes, X-Men fans have their merry band of mutants to use, Fantastic Four fans have theirs, etc. Even Rocket Raccoon and the Guardians of the Galaxy are available! Not a fan of the good guys? You can play as any of the evil mutants from The Brotherhood, or as the Sinister Six. Characters both big and small, from Abomination, the Red Skull and the Heroes For Hire, to minor characters, like Howard the Duck, Union Jack and Squirrel Girl, are playable. Even Stan Lee shows up, playing the Citizen in Peril throughout the game.

As per the norm, there are 45 Xbox achievements in the game, and some of them are a doozies. Adults who have spent time reading Marvel comics and watching the various films will recognize a lot of them and have a knowing smile when uncovering them, from the "Fastball Special" to "Welcome to Level 7" to "It's Clobberin' Time!". There are also a few in-jokes that will have the adults chuckling if not outright laughing, from Nick Fury paraphrasing Jules' "Avenging Angel" speech from "Pulp Fiction" to a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent cracking a joke about "Snakes on a Plane", making a point to use clean language (since it IS an E10+ game).

Now, all the above being said, the game is not flawless; no game is ever flawless, and Lego Marvel Super Heroes suffers from many of the similar issues that plagued prior Lego offerings. The split-screen during multiplayer sessions is still frustratingly uneven, leading to some situations where certain missions necessitate one of the players dropping out because it is otherwise impossible to reach certain areas of the screen. An example: There was an outlet that a charged-up Thor needed to activate in order to uncover a brick, but because of the split screen when I would get near the spot the outlet would just DISAPPEAR. After some head-scratching between me and my daughter, we finally realized that if she dropped out of the game the outlet would reappear. It was unreal, and I could just imagine the confusion if 2 children are playing the game together and this happens to them.

The flying mechanics are also still annoying, which is unfortunate since a lot of the gold bricks require some sort of flying challenge to uncover them. Making matters worse, a number of the flying challenges take place in and around Manhattan, which just adds to the frustration as there is literally zero room for error. After trying to complete a flying challenge and failing time after time after time, I wanted to throw my controller across the room. And if *I* have a problem doing the flying challenges, you can imagine the difficulty my 6 and 10-year old have. It's just a damper on an otherwise superb game and is going to make 100% completion of the game extremely difficult.

Despite the aforementioned (which I consider minor) issues, this is a game that is as fun for adults as it is for kids. Lego Marvel Super Heroes has earned each and every one of its 5 stars and is a must for Lego and Marvel enthusiasts alike. Excelsior!

My son and I LOVE Lego games, and have played through all of them together over the last couple of years. He is 9 and can normally do 98% of them without any help from me. We adored this game right up until we realized that we will never get his favorite Marvel character (Deadpool), because it requires you to get 200 of 250 gold bricks, and we will never achieve that for one simple reason: the race-based gold brick challenges are RADICALLY more difficult than anything we've ever run into in a Lego game before. It would take us 20-30 tries per race (if not more) to get each brick, and by then, believe me, the fun has gone out of the endeavor. And I have a neckache and a migraine. Read the online forums, everyone agrees. The flight and driving mechanics are truly poor (flight controls are TERRIBLE), and they give you 50% or less of the time to get to each race checkpoint than they did in Lego Lord of the Rings or Lego Batman 2 (both of which had just the expected amount of difficulty -- with only having to re-do the hardest races 5 times or so to complete them). They broke the controls on this one, and must have beta-tested it with 12-fingered 15-year-old game addicts. They also made the best Deadpool ("cheat") bricks the hardest ones to get (in terms of the number of gold bricks needed to access them). This includes the character token finder which, if you are a 9-year-old comic book fan, is just about the most important one. The score multipliers are the easiest ones to get, but you only need a x2 brick to speed up game completion by reducing the need for "stud grinding" -- the rest of them just get you ridiculous amounts of studs that you can't spend on anything. We are so bummed about the gold brick problem, it is casting a pall over our enjoyment of the rest of this otherwise awesomely huge game that is absolutely crammed with all of the greatest and coolest superheroes and villains you could ever want. That's why I can only give it 3 stars -- and I feel strongly about those 3 stars. Traveler's Tales really let us down on this one. They could very easily have released a patch to just double or triple the race times, had they been paying the least attention to the forums, and they have not. First major disappointment in this franchise. And we even liked Lego Indiana Jones!

the graphics, voice acting and references with keep you enthralled for hours. this is by far the best lego video game to date. there are only minor issues to overcome (and are overshadowed by all the positives) are the flight controls, map view and changing characters when you are a big figure (its the same button, so its a dance to get the character switching menu up when you are hulk or other big figures).

In the same vein as the other entries in the Lego series, "Lego Marvel Super Heroes" is an enjoyable romp through the pages of the Marvel Universe.

The interim mission level this time around is the S.H.I.E.L.D Helicarrier over Manhattan enabling you to go and explore the somewhat sprawling city below when you want to take a break from the storyline. (This is similar to the University level in Lego Indiana Jones)

Making a return to the franchise after Lego Lord of the Rings is the ability to directly purchase characters you unlock as opposed to having to go to specific locations and find them there, though a few of the post storyline characters MUST be unlocked in special mini levels, but these levels are few and far between. My only complaint about this though is you are effectively forced to go back through and get a 100% on EVERY mission and complete EVERY side quest available in order to obtain the gold bricks necessary to unlock these bonus levels. (And with some of the higher level ones requiring 200+ gold bricks you will find yourself doing repetitive tasks quite a lot if you want every one of the over 100 playable characters.)

As far as the character selection/variety goes, you run the gamut from the Avengers to The Fantastic Four, to the upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy, to the obscure ones such as Captain Britain, Taskmaster etc. While there will certainly be characters you want more than others it does become a bit of a task to find them all. Also this time around there are vehicle unlocks spread throughout the city such as the Green Goblin's Pumpkin Copter, The Fantasticar, The Stark Jet etc which also serve to give you yet another series of things to find and unlock to move forward.

My only real complaint would be this, the game at times is a bit antagonistic. Granted, I understand that this is a game targeted at E (for Everyone) but that doesn't mean that when I played previous installments I found myself incapable of remembering I needed a certain character to access a certain point in a level. This time around the game takes it upon itself to tell you "Hey....you might have something that can fit there!" If you have Captain America and his shield in your party or to remind you the next time you play through that you'll need him. While I understand that this is a helpful thing for the exceptionally young gamer I think that most people will find it annoying after awhile as I know I certainly did.

Otherwise this is a nice change of pace in the Lego franchise and was nice to see a game with a wide depth of characters and variety of locales to explore. It was nice to see their take on the humor of the previous games with legendary comic book characters.

I highly recommend this game to anyone with young kids esp ones who like to get collectibles etc. It took me a little over a week to a week and a half to run through the campaign and several side missions. This was of course while taking breaks in Manhattan and collecting Gold bricks and Characters so in that regard your mileage may vary depending on how rigorously you just want to get through the campaign and to the end of the game.

The variety of characters is top notch, the levels are varied, the sound design is good, the story is the same Marvel plot line we all know and love from the comic books with a wide range of villains to do battle with. For young kids who love the Lego games this is a must add addition to your collection esp if they have loved the other installments into the series. It is also entertaining enough for older gamers if they're fans of comic books and the Marvel Universe.

I've purchased and played every Lego game that Tt games has released. I have seen them go from fairly easy to play intuitive games that younger kids could easily play to a game that even harder core gamers are struggling with. I am not a hard core gamer, but I'm no slouch either. I like a game to be challenging like the next player, but retain that fun element that keeps on giving by way of beatable missions and challenges. In the beginning, Lego games were a lot simpler right down to the dialog which was basically mumbles. Players, especially kids could figure out what to do and where to go without too much difficulty, challenges were fun and beatable. With Lego Marvel Superheroes a new level of difficulty has been reached. Why Tt got away from their roots is a big question for many. Maybe to appease big time hard core gamers who thought the earlier games were not worth the money because they were too easy. Who knows. All I do know is that the Lego games have gotten to the point that they are not much fun any more.

There have been many reports of games freezing. I have been fortunate in that I have not had that happen to me yet. I have had characters get stuck in simple areas and not be able to get out. In the free world of New York City this is not too much of a problem as you can just switch to the other character and play on, or return to the Heli-Carrier. Sometimes the other character will eventually free itself and appear where you've gotten off to. Otherwise you have to listen to them grunt repeatedly as they try to get out of where they are. I also have frustrations with characters not performing as expected when needed. Sometimes this can be avoided by selecting a different character. Getting used to the free world map takes a little time but is well worth your effort if you want to understand where to go in most cases. Characters, Vehicles, and Side Missions that you complete disappear from the map generally. So as you play and complete tasks the map gets cleaner. I have had task icons reappear and I would go play them only to find that I only get a stud. There is a bus token for example under the expressway you have to use jumping walls to get to a token up in a box at the top. I obtained this bus yet the icon still appeared on the map. Another is a character token you get by blasting a frozen Spiderman on the roof of a building. This icon reappears as well. There are probably more. Just a small section of New York is visible at first on the map, you should fly all over the whole island including the prison island and Ellis island to reveal all of the map areas and their mission markers.

In past games, the developers were very good with giving you hints as to where to go, what to do, and who to select to get the task done. This made the game very intuitive. This is lacking a lot in this game. Many missions are a bit self explanatory, others you have to think about for a while, and others there are some hints by the commend center on the Heli-Carrier. But there are quite a few missions where the player has no idea what to do, and who to use. I have a green female character to get on the east side. I go to the location, and there is a metal platform that goes up to the railroad tracks. The token finder arrow (A red brick extra), shows the character to be under this platform or the railroad. I've used dozens of characters to try to move or destroy the platform to no avail. This character is not in any of the hint guides so I am stuck and cannot figure out what to do. At first I got stuck on the JJ/Peter Parker missions. Getting to a location and not knowing what to do is frustrating. The Trax character wanted a Lion for his show on a roof top. It was not clear at all on how to get the Lion up on the roof. One had to search surrounding buildings and find a ramp that was not exactly obvious unless you knew what it was for. A stud trail would have helped a lot here. Talking about stud trails. These too were poorly designed. In one mission you had to use Wolverine and find dig spots. But the dig spots were not obvious and out in the open, you needed to find the special spot that triggered the characters special ability. But this required you to break stuff near by to reveal this trigger. This was a big area so you could be breaking stuff for a long time. Once you found the first one and dug it up a stud trail was obvious, but when you followed them they abruptly ended in the middle of a large walkway, and you could not see the next spot. Once you found it and dug it up, another stud trail appeared, but the camera ended up behind a tree so you didn't see it, and when you went to search you didn't know which trail to follow as they lined the route with studs on all sides. When you finally figured out where to go because this stud trail ended in the middle of nowhere too, the next dig produced an arrow as a hint, but the arrow was so poorly done you could not tell which direction it was pointing in. This type of poor design was apparent in several areas. There was also a DeadPool character that would show you the way around New York and take you to your next destination once you selected it in the map. Many times he would take you right to where you needed to go and it was obvious. But other times he would stop in locations nowhere near where your next task was to start so you ended up frantically searching for something you didn't know how it looked or what it even was. Sometimes he stopped on a street, and the location was way up on a roof. I still have missions that I don't know what I'm doing wrong or what to do. I have gold statues near Fisk Tower. One is on the roof and several surrounding the building on the streets, and one inside. I've blasted them all and never got anything. Other missions don't work like this either. Up near X-Mansion you have a woman who's dog has buried his toy and she needs you to find it and dig it up. Use Wolverine and follow the studs. I dig up all of the spots and follow the studs back to her and she just starts the mission over. I never find a dog toy to pick up even though the studs lead me back to her.

There are missions where its impossible to find what your looking for. On the Heli-Carrier your supposed to find a lost document. The DeadPool guide takes you to the middle rear of the deck. You can look for ever on that deck and you'll never find that document. Its stuck, hidden under debris, on the intake vent under the carrier. You have to fly down off the back edge, see the well hidden debris and remove it, then use a different character to get it out of the intake. Why not make it a little harder??? Another is a crewman on the carrier that has lost a companion during a game of hide and seek. You need to find him. The DeadPool guide takes you to the left front near some guns and that is it. It's not even close to where the character actually is located. You have to go to the edge of the carrier there, and go right and traverse all the way around the engine, there you'll see nothing. You have to somehow know your supposed to use a character to make this guy appear because he is invisible. Ridiculous.

Then there are the controls. Touchy is putting it mildly. As your running or flying just the slightest movement of the stick causes your character to go wildly where you don't want them to go. In New York on the streets this is a nightmare as there are people, vehicles, and objects everywhere and they love to get in your way and cut you off. Running is not too bad if you stay on the middle of the road. But driving, forget it, its a lesson in frustration. Its not impossible if you are not in a timed event, and you can crawl little bit at a time to your destination. But a timed event, forget it, you'll be lucky to finish in a dozen dozen tries or more if you finish at all. Vehicles are nearly impossible to control, and aircraft are worse. There sadly are many timed events, mostly races in this game. Some are just running events. These used to be a decent challenge until in this game where they made them so long and complex you cannot finish them in the time they allow. Many times they go from one area or building to others. This is where characters fail to do what you want them to do. They will start to fly instead of jumping down, or they will fail to grab a rope etc. There should be precious few of these timed events and they should be much more forgiving. Then there is flying with characters like Iron Man. Its impossible to properly go up and down. He goes left and right fine, but the controls are so anemic on the up and down, you can forget most flying challenges.

Outlined above are some of the frustrations I've had with this game so far. I've completed 75% of the game and I am down to the timed events and races which I have not even wasted my time on. Tt needs to go back to the roots of the Lego games and make them simple and fun like they used to be. A few minikits, a decent grouping of characters to obtain, and some red and gold bricks, maybe 10 Red and 50 Gold. Its obvious that a lot more thorough testing during development is needed as well. Too many things don't work at all or work improperly. Clues and hints are missing, and missions have too many hidden tricks. Is it a good game, yes, but not for $50. Maybe $25 is a better bargain so when you discover you cannot complete it because its too complex then you won't be out so much cash. Is this game for kids. Unless they are master gamers, no, not with this one. Its for kids only in subject matter and title.

I get the lego games to play with my 5 year old. This one is far and above better than the DC Batman 2 game. They fixed the annoying multiplayer pause that happened when 1 player decides to switch characters, so I can keep playing when my kid decides to change characters every 5 seconds. Also, they have a ton of characters and costumes to choose from for each character. Stan Lee makes great comical appearances throughout the game. The value is definitely there. If I had bought this just for me, I would have gotten it on PC and Steam. But, I let my kid play on xbox so he doesn't take up the computer all day ;) Check it out only if you like marvel and the lego games, but well worth the cost.

It's a fun game don't get me wrong. It's really improved since the last one I've played (Batman 1). I love seeing and playing in the world. It's the best Marvel game I've played. I really enjoy it. What I don't enjoy is all the glitches on top of glitches. They're some graphic bugs and animation hiccups but as they don't affect gameplay so it's fine and understandable as I'm playing on an Xbox 360 made almost a decade ago. Some characters get stuck in spots and it's fairly annoying and easy to fix but in a game this size I'll let it slide. But what is absolutely without a doubt inexcusable is the end mission glitches. After beating a mission the screen goes black and music plays forever. All progress lost no matter how many saves you made in the level. Real nice. Reeeeal nice. How many mission have I had to redo? Not one. Not two. Not three. Not four. Not five. But six. SIX! That's almost half the missions. How do you miss a glitch that big?!? My guess is that the devs just didn't care. It's inexcusable. It's worth is easily destroyed by bugs. I'd say never play full price or even half price for this until there is a patch which I highly doubt due to the devs lack of concern over glitches. Just borrow it from a friend or get it when it's dirt cheap. Then enjoy it but prepare for frustration.

I'm a dad and my 4th grader LOVES this game. It's clean, the graphics are great, there is a pretty consistent level of humor, and there are good puzzles. It's the Xbox definition of good clean fun.