LEGO Brawls makes its way from Apple exclusive to consoles, bringing some classic blocky style to multiplayer biffo. We found out more about it from Jared Kroff, the executive creative director at developer Red Games Co.
For those reading who haven’t had the pleasure, please give us the one paragraph pitch for LEGO Brawls…
Dream up the ultimate Minifigure brawlers and bash your way through all of your favourite LEGO themes in the first team action brawler set in the LEGO universe. Play with friends at home or around the world and see how you stack up against the competition.
LEGO Brawls has been an Apple Arcade exclusive up to this point. What sort of advances should we expect in its trip onto consoles?
For over two years we’ve been releasing limited-time LEGO Brawls content each month on Apple Arcade. Now, we’re opening the vaults and allowing players to unlock ALL this content at their own pace. That’s a lot of bricks! We’ve also added an all-new ‘Free-for-Brawl’ game mode available on four levels that’s perfect for brawling on the couch with four to eight friends. Look for more Free-for-Brawl levels to be released in the future!
How has Red Games Co. found the step from mobile development to console development? What have been the greatest challenges?
Part of our DNA is to seek and discover new ways to play together. So, we’re really excited to bring our games to additional platforms. It was important to us to have identical experiences and full cross-play anywhere you are brawling. Our testing team really stepped up to make sure that remained possible while we continued to add more content to the game.
We love playtesting new levels and powerups as a team, and during the pandemic that’s been done virtually. It’s been super fun to test the new couch Free-For-Brawl mode gathered around a big TV. It’s brought a whole new level of family friendly competition, and we think players are going to have a lot of fun together.
How has LEGO Brawls evolved over its almost three-year life content-wise?
LEGO Brawls is always adding new content from amazing LEGO themes past and present. We’ve added minifigures, powerups, and levels from Jurassic World, Ninjago, Monkie Kid and more. New levels sometimes have unique win conditions which add a new spin on gameplay.
How deep does the player brawler minifigure customisation go in LEGO Brawls?
Players unlock minifigures in a variety of ways, but in true LEGO fashion you can mix and match any minifigure part you collect to create your own unique brawler design! One of our engineers recently calculated there are 77,289,215,065,920 unique combinations possible… but we’re not done yet!
LEGO has had a longstanding ethos of not producing products that promote violence, for example they don’t release any military themed sets. As a brawler that’s also going to have fairly young kids playing, how did you go about toning down the violent aspects of the genre for LEGO Brawls?
The same guidelines that make LEGO sets appropriate for the whole family apply to LEGO Brawls. Any combat is fantasy-based, cartoony, and light-hearted. You can wield fantasy weapons from your favourite themes, but also breadsticks, angry chickens, and a ketchup shooting hotdog stand.
“You can wield fantasy weapons from your favourite themes, but also breadsticks, angry chickens, and a ketchup shooting hotdog stand.”
We’re after some insider information – who do you think is the best all-round character in LEGO Brawls, and what’s your favourite theme?
Cowgirl is one of the champion Brawlers that players can unlock and master. She has great crowd control with her lasso projectile, which is a great strategy for team play, but she can also clear or survive on the control point solo with her Bronco Buster.
What do you most look forward to players gaining from playing LEGO Brawls?
LEGO Brawls is a great opportunity for LEGO fans of all ages to enjoy all their favourite themes together. Hopefully fans find some old favourites as well as some new ones. The more you collect the more creative you can be with your one-of-a-kind brawler designs.
LEGO Brawls launches September 2 on PS5, Xbox, Switch and PS4. Pre-order now at JB Hi-Fi.