For more on LEGO Marvel Super Heroes, check out our full LEGO Marvel Super Heroes review. Or, for more of the best Xbox 360 games for an 8 year old, why not try our Family Game Finder
What is Lego Marvel Super Heroes?
Lego Marvel Super Heroes is a co-operative adventure game, with sprinklings of platforming, simple puzzle solving, and plenty of smashing things up to keep things moving along. A unique non-film inspired story sees Nick Fury rounding up all the heroes he can - from the Hulk and Iron Man, to X-men and the Fantastic Four and everyone in between - to help round up a number of powerful Cosmic Bricks, that have fallen to Earth, before they fall into the wrong hands. With fully-voiced cutscenes and plenty of humour that young kids are bound to appreciate, you don't have to have watched all the films or read the comic books to understand what's going on.
How do you play Lego Marvel Super Heroes?
Playable in split-screen same-console co-op, Lego Marvel Super Heroes is a game that's perfect for playing together, smashing, bashing and crashing your way through the streets of Manhattan, infiltrate a Hydra base and pay a visit the X-Mansion - with many more Marvel-themed locales along the way too. With a huge array of super heroes to choose from, all with their own unique powers, you'll need to mix and match, making clever use of their abilities in order to proceed, whether it's using Iron Man's missiles to blast apart silver Lego, deflecting laser beams with Captain America's shield or transforming into a teapot (or other useful object) as Mr Fantastic. As this is a Lego game, smashing up everything in sight and rebuilding the blocks into something more useful - and often hilariously over the top - also comes into play.
How easy is Lego Marvel Super Heroes to pick up and play?
Generally speaking, Lego Marvel Super Heroes is pretty easy to pick up and play, with unlimited lives, plenty of prompts and a low difficulty curve. Puzzles generally involve finding and pulling a couple of switches to open a door, or smashing everything up - furniture, scenery and of course, bad guys - and then rebuilding the remaining bricks into something more useful. Sometimes, you'll need to use a particular character's special abilities instead, whether it's lifting something with the Hulk's Super Strength, using Thor's lightning to charge up a generator or making use of Black Widow's agile, acrobatic skills. In theory the game should prompt you with a little picture of which character you need for which situation, but the hints can be a tad hit and miss at times. For example, one section tells you to use Captain America's shield to deflect a laser beam, yet we had no Captain America in our team at the time - apparently, you can use the Invisible Woman's pink magic shield thing to do the same job. You'll soon get the hang of what it means, but it can be initially confusing for younger players.
Lego Marvel Super Heroes is much like its predecessors in terms of content - players punch, shoot and fire lasers at bad guys who then break apart in a shower of brick pieces. With nothing in the way of realistic violence, it's all very harmless, and rather slapstick.
Age Ratings
Format Reviewed: Xbox 360
