Believe it or not, Concord is no longer Sony’s least played game of the year, as despite having both an established IP and one of the world’s biggest toy brands attached to its name, LEGO Horizon Adventures has actually managed to underperform the now-shuttered hero shooter.
For those unaware, LEGO Horizon Adventure is a condensed and far more lighthearted retelling of Horizon Zero Dawn‘s story which trades in its source title’s open-world gameplay for more linear levels and an abundance of humor.
Yet, despite being a family-friendly outing (as weird as that sounds in the face of a post-apocalyptic setting) and holding a not-great-but-not-terrible 71% on Metacritic, the game’s Steam release has utterly failed to bring in not just young players, but any players.
Debuting to the Valve-owned storefront on November 14th, Aloy’s latest adventure only hit a peak concurrent player count of just 602 – almost 100 players less than the disastrous Concord‘s peak count of 697.
In fairness, it should be noted that younger players who actually want to play LEGO Horizon Adventures will likely do so not on a personal desktop computer, but rather a PlayStation 5 or Nintendo Switch specifically due to the relative ease of access provided by such dedicated gaming hardware.
However, one would also be remiss to not point out that despite this trend, other LEGO titles (and to make things fair to Horizon, specifically those that don’t have a major cultural IP attached to them) have still managed to post higher peak player count numbers, including LEGO Bricktales (739), LEGO 2K Drive (1,039), and The LEGO NINJAGO Movie Video Game (5,434) – meaning that when it comes to LEGO Horizon Adventures, interest is low even among older, long-time franchise fans.
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Of course, it comes as no surprise that LEGO Horizon Adventures, despite being a smooth and stunning experience in its own right (as is the standard for the LEGO game series), is failing to draw in players: Simply put, it lacks the substance and charm that make ever other franchise adaptation a success.
For instance, LEGO Batman and LEGO Star Wars games are filled with numerous characters who have had a strong impact on pop culture. In contrast, Horizon’s characters and world just don’t have the same cultural recognition.
And while Aloy and her fellow playable characters (of which there are only three others, but that’s a whole separate issue) are a loveable group of well-designed protagonists, they all lack the kind of rich backstories that lend themselves to humor.
Left with little to work with, the game’s writers had no other choice but to just invent ‘humorous’ personality traits for everyone out of thin air, like Aloy’s newfound love of pickle sandwiches, Sylens’ transformation into a DJ, or Erend’s bizarre obsession with donuts.
As a result, the game feels less ‘playfully subverse and self-referential’ and more ‘lol so random’.
Sony’s price tag for LEGO Horizon Adventures has also likely played a part in repelling players away.
At €70/$60, the game is notably more expensive than other LEGO titles, such as the LEGO Harry Potter Collection, which is priced at $40 and features the content of two full entries. With many other LEGO games falling within the $10 to $50 range, Aloy’s adventure, which clocks in with a runtime of just under 10 hours and offers minimal replayability, feels far too overpriced for the amount of content it offers.
In further compounding LEGO Horizon Adventures‘ problems, there’s also the fact that Sony hasn’t given up on their plan to require a PlayStation Network account for all of their games, which not only turns players off their titles but also bars their sale in more than 160 countries.
So far, Sony’s fall season has been one to forget. Concord was shut down only two weeks after its disastrous launch, Astro Bot, while it achieved critical success and has earned a GOTY nomination, barely managed to sell a million copies, and the remastered Until Dawn disappointed even its biggest fans. And sadly, LEGO Horizon Adventures looks to be continuing the company’s losing streak.
As a franchise, Horizon has sold over 30 million copies, so it’s not surprising that Sony chose to test the LEGO adaptation waters with an entry centered on Aloy.
But be that as it may, LEGO Horizon Adventures is shaping up to be another title in the Sony catalog that will fail to meet expectations.
