Lego Rivendell Teaser

Review of Legos for Game and Craft

The new 1st edition of LEGO® Villains: Return of the Living Tribunal, includes all the sets and expansions from their three different editions: Mythical Creatures, Heroes & Villains, and Legends – with just a single piece missing, thus breaking the mold in a much more “un-Lego” manner. That piece, a unique in-game item, was created specifically for this edition and is certainly an improvement on the previous editions.

Lego fans are definitely going to be excited and all-around pleased. While I love the existing sets, especially the legendary Dark World version, from mythological origin, Return of the Living Tribunal builds on it both visually, due to new icons, and gameplay-wise, having all the set pieces and expansions fit together in one universe and not having to assemble by hand.

For this new edition, both my main goal was to return to the formula of game design and minimize the amount of mechanics for mechanics sake. I think the move towards mechanical gameplay in the previous two editions was fine and dandy as it allowed for a larger variety of plays and allow players to play through each level again, but in Return of the Living Tribunal, I felt better having every piece I need to go to work on.

Obviously, if you’re an experienced LEGO or casual games player then this “titleset” shouldn’t hold you back and you can jump into it right away. If you’ve been playing through Challenge (or The Adventure Cards from Adventureland), or are exploring new game modes in LEGO Star Wars: The Miniland, then it’d be a good start and you should definitely give it a shot.

The Good:

Return of the Living Tribunal has an excellent balance between mechanics and flexibility, allowing for a wider variety of play throughout the various levels. Since Return of the Living Tribunal is a massive game with much more mechanics than just the single-tiered “challenge” levels, the levels go together well.

Focused mechanics, mostly on enemy behavior, create interesting new challenges without being too specific.