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Lego video games haven’t always been this way, however, as prior to Lego Star Wars: The Video Game’s release, Lego games covered a wide range of different genres, such as racing, action-adventure, and even sport. Lego first entered the gaming industry in the 90s and covered a huge range of genres in a short period of time. Impressively, many of these games hold up well today, so we decided to list the very best Lego video games that were released in the 1990s.
5 Lego Creator
Lego Creator was developed by British studio Superscape and released on PC in November 1998. As the name suggests, Lego Creator is a sandbox game with no mission objectives or storylines, as players are free to flex their creative muscles and make whatever they please with the wide range of bricks on offer.
Following the game’s success, a handful of sequels were released in the 2000s. Lego Creator: Knights’ Kingdom was released in 2000 and implemented the company’s Lego Castle theme; Lego Creator: Harry Potter was released the following year and was based on the first Harry Potter book and film; and finally, there was Creator: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets which released in 2002 and focused on the second book and film.
4 Lego Loco
Lego Loco is a virtual world game that was developed by Intelligent Games, which would go on to develop September 2000’s racing game Lego Stunt Rally.
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Lego Loco offers open-ended construction gameplay and tasks players with constructing a town for Lego people to live in. Although players can construct various buildings and scenery, the gameplay is predominantly centered around constructing train lines and stations. The trains aren’t just for transporting townsfolk, as they can also be fitted with a mail carriage that can carry postcards created by the player. Impressively for the time, players could add a tunnel at the end of their town’s map, which would let them exchange postcards with other people online.
3 Lego Racers
Lego Racers is one of the most recognizable Lego games from the pre-Lego Star Wars era. The game was released in 1999 and looked to capitalize on the success of the kart racing genre at the time with games like Mario Kart 64 and Diddy Kong Racing both racking up impressive sales figures. Although the racing gameplay itself wasn’t very strong, Lego Racers’ tracks look fantastic and had a great variety to them thanks to the implementation of notable Lego sets from the time.
Another great aspect of the game was its vehicle and character customization. Players were given a wide range of pre-set options for creating their character, but more impressively, they could create almost any vehicle that they wanted with a huge range of bricks that could be freely placed.
A sequel, Lego Racers 2, was released in September 2001.
2 Lego Island
Lego Island was developed by Mindscape and hit stores in September 1997; it was the first Lego game to be released outside of Japan. The action-adventure game has five playable characters, including the protagonist Pepper Roni who, believe it or not, is a pizza delivery boy. The game had a non-linear structure and let players perform a range of tasks, including delivering pizzas and building vehicles that could then be ridden.
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Two sequels were released due to the game’s impressive sales figures, Lego Island 2: The Brickster’s Revenge in 2001 and Island Xtreme Stunts in 2002. Lego Island wasn’t just a commercial success, as critics also showered the game with praise, and the game was even awarded the Kids/Family Product accolade from the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences.
1 Lego Rock Raiders (PC Version)
Lego Rock Raiders was developed by Data Design Interactive and first released on PC in November 1999 before releasing on PlayStation 1 in August 2000. Interestingly, the PlayStation 1 version of the game had significant differences from the PC one, as it replaced the real-time strategy gameplay with third-person action, essentially turning it into a completely separate game.
Lego Rock Raiders’ PC campaign featured an impressive range of 25 different missions, which predominantly tasked players with finding and collecting Energy Crystals. To obtain these crystals, players must continuously craft bigger and better vehicles along with more advanced technology. Collecting the crystals is easier said than done, however, as there are a range of environmental hazards to contend with, as well as powerful enemies.
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