I'm Calling It. Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight Is the Couch Co-Op Game of the Summer

I'm Calling It. Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight Is the Couch Co-Op Game of the Summer | PCMag

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It’s official: The definitive multiplayer blockbuster of the season doesn't require an online subscription—just a second controller. Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight ($69.99, reviewed on PC, but also available on PS5, and Xbox Series X/S) takes the franchise's definitive humor and pairs it with addictive, Arkham-style beat 'em up action. It is a detail-rich, visually impressive celebration that honors every era of Batman, from the comic page to the silver screen. While I started my review playthrough exploring Gotham solo on PC, the game truly came into its own when my wife and son joined in. Together, we solved puzzles and smashed baddies in ludicrous fashion, cementing Legacy of the Dark Knight as a cooperative masterpiece and the ultimate summer living-room experience.

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A Co-Op Masterpiece for Kids of All AgesWhile Legacy of the Dark Knight draws from the many classic Batman movies and animated series over the years, developer Traveller's Tales carved its own unique narrative. The game seamlessly strings together disparate incarnations of Batman into a cohesive experience that feels surprisingly fresh. For example, I started the game with the Wayne family making their way to the theater, loaded with Tim Burton-esque nods to the 1989 Batman film. Similarly, the tutorial features a prologue that riffs on Bruce's training with Ra's al Ghul and the League of Shadows in Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins. There's even a wild Penguin car chase scene inspired by Matt Reeves' The Batman. Buy Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight (for PC)

$69.99 at Steam $69.99 Shop Now Mixing all these cinematic elements sounds disjointed on paper, but Legacy of the Dark Knight is aggressively light-hearted and very, very silly. The comedic throughline and slapstick physical humor make all of these disparate film elements work together wonderfully.The visual presentation is stunning, packed with impressive detail. Walking through Gotham City feels like playing with massive Lego sets inside an open-world diorama. The developers utilize the city's darkness perfectly, creating jaw-dropping lighting effects from street lamps, neon signs, and rainfall. You can even see the subtle weathered texture on Lego Batman's helmet during cutscenes.

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Engaging Combat and Dynamic Co-Op PuzzlesThe melee action is heavily inspired by Rocksteady’s Arkham games. Lego’s classic button-mashing combat is spiced up with dodge and parry prompts to evade gunfire and counter incoming attacks. This slows the pace compared with previous Lego titles, but it makes the brawling considerably more engaging. Mastering the system to rack up combos returned me to that classic Arkham flow-state. That said, combat becomes a bit repetitive as the game progresses. Most fights consist of dealing with waves of basic grunts with the occasional bruiser or shooter thrown in to keep you on edge. The game doesn't deviate much from this formula.To accommodate this mechanical depth, the roster shrinks to just seven core characters. Yes, that sounds anemic compared with the hundreds-strong roster in previous Lego games. But Lego Batman delivers its classic character roll-call in other ways: namely, the hundreds of costumes you can collect for the playable cast. I think this is a fine compromise. While everyone feels identical in basic combat and movement, each hero is made distinct by a unique gadget tree and fun unlockable ultimate abilities. Puzzles are where these unique skills shine, which forced my family and me to work together to progress through stages. Every level features a terrific mix of problem-solving elements, where you must switch between characters to move forward. We had to pause a few times to figure out who needed to hold a door open to let the other player through to solve the puzzle, or to scan the environment for smashable objects we needed for a door-opening build. Solutions might require Gordon’s goo-gun cannon to jam up gears, or Batgirl's hacking Batarang, for example. We spent most of our time playing on the Caped Crusader difficulty, which is essentially medium/normal. The highest setting, Dark Knight difficulty, scales up enemy damage and limits your total lives per mission. But the timing windows on parries remain very lenient, and health pickups are plentiful. In truth, my family and I died far more from accidentally falling from stages than at the hands of an enemy. If playing solo, without the mayhem of co-op, I probably could have played the entire game on Dark Knight with little trouble.

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Exploring an Open-World SandboxThe classic completionist urge comes to life in the game’s open world. The crime-ravaged city is dense, and my family spent hours tackling side activities. These include:Stopping randomly generated street crimes Participating in racing trialsSolving Riddler puzzles Tracking side quests that feature villains not in the main storyZooming around the city in 30 distinct vehicles, or just using the surprisingly intuitive character mobility to explore the city. There were tons of collectibles to find to pad out our Batcave, as well as skill points to find for our heroes. After about 10 hours of game time and with a big chunk of the story tackled, we were still only at 30% completion. My main criticism here is that you can’t just ignore the story and explore the sandbox. Much of the map is gated until you unlock a particular character and gadget via the story. Recommended by Our Editors I Played NBA The Run for 1 Hour: It's Arcade Fun, But It's No NBA Street (Yet) 2 Months Later and I'm Still Hooked. Why Crimson Desert Is the Only RPG That Matters I've Been Reviewing Games for Years, and Never Dreaded a Launch More Than GTA VI

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Smooth Frame Rates on a Variety of HardwareAs mentioned, Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight looks amazing. It features fantastic lighting and superb texture quality, crammed into one detail-packed Lego city. It is fairly demanding, though thankfully, it isn’t nearly as intimidating as the system requirements indicate. I tested it on three devices and found the performance acceptable, though with some compromises. On an Alienware gaming laptop with an Intel Core i9-275HX CPU, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080 Laptop GPU, and 32GB of RAM, I played Lego Batman at 1440p with frame rates in the high 60s and graphics settings on high. On my own PC, equipped with an AMD Ryzen 5 3600 CPU, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 GPU, and 16GB of RAM, the game ranged from 50fps in enclosed mission spaces to 30fps in the open-world city on Medium settings at 1080p. I also fired it up on my Steam Deck, which, at the lowest settings, ran at 800p and delivered a very respectable 30fps. On PC, Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight supports Steam Achievements and gamepads, keyboards, and mice.