Review of Lego 2K Drive for Nintendo Switch: all block, no treat
Our Verdict
There is a good game buried somewhere in Lego 2K Drive, but it’s not here yet. Fun racing mechanics, a large world, and great characters prop up this release, and kids are sure to have a blast. But dire Switch performance and a litany of monetization methods in a full-price release mean that parents should keep this well away from their kids. If you’re desperate to play it, buy it on PS5, otherwise, buy Mario Kart folks.
A new child is on the neighborhood, kart racers, so keep an eye out. Lego 2K Drive is a racing game that combines bricks and handbrakes while maintaining a comprehensive customizability system for track, off-road, and watercraft racing. Construct the most bizarre watercraft you can think of or the Lego-filled automobile of your dreams; if you can construct it, you can race it.
Together with entertaining tasks, Lego 2K Drive has an open-world sandbox full of people to meet and goodies to locate. In addition, split-screen cooperative gaming and internet racing are available for those who like to take their roommates to a few bouts. But keep in mind that this is first and foremost a kid's game. Its vivid, colorful Lego brick graphics style fits in well with the whimsical Lego universe. Furthermore, the Lego humor remains intact despite the lack of a license to attach it to.
After playing Lego 2K Drive for a long time, I must say that at its heart, it's a fun racing. Although the handling is a tad tight, you may stop or drift to quickly change your course in any vehicle mode. It also employs entertaining armaments like an electric sphere of some kind, a normal rocket to hit enemies, and a spider web to net opponents. Though it's corny, there are amusing things to do on other platforms.
First off, I'm a huge fan of racing games, and I really like the open-world aspect of driving between objectives and making your own discoveries. Thus, Lego 2K Drive seems promising to me. However, this game is horribly limited on the Nintendo Switch; I feel like I'm walking on a Lego block because of the visuals, performance, and relentless microtransactions. I really want to enjoy this title, people, and it should be ideal for me.
The handling, racing, and driving are all good, despite the lack of novelty. Not really remarkable, but they continue to function as intended, and it's a lot of fun to quickly flip between the various vehicle kinds. It's really fun to just go across the open world at top speed, climbing hills, jumping from buildings, and landing in rivers by changing into a boat. This has so much promise, and I can envisage a scenario in which it succeeds.
There are also plenty of side tasks to do, such as picking up blue pigs for a farmer or using your vehicle to move a gigantic egg into a gigantic frying pan, or frequent races against NPCs that provide a fun challenge. Together with the trinkets hidden in some difficult-to-find places, this world is bustling with activity and enjoyable to explore.
Next, the automobile creation in the garage is a lot of fun if you're even somewhat creative. There are few limitations and a wide selection of Lego components to choose from. But aligning your Lego parts is quite tedious, and I wish you could put symmetrical blocks on the other side of your car.
It's a hassle to build one side and then have to do the exact same thing in reverse, so I'm not sure why developer Visual Concepts overlooked it. Nevertheless, there are plenty of blocks to discover, cars to unlock, and simple loadout and vehicle switching. I like building things, and the kids will have a lot of fun with the unlocked vehicles, which include a mobile pizza oven and a gigantic burger.
I also find the humor to be really enjoyable since I'm usually a sucker for the clean-cut but lighthearted humor found in Lego games. I get a big grin on my face since I'm competing against characters named Vinny Unleaded. The voice acting, which is done with such verve that it seems like a Saturday morning cartoon come to life, is as good as the dialogue. Kids are going to love Lego 2K Drive, but why the game has so many microtransactions when it's a packed and appropriately priced game is beyond me.
The pricing of Lego 2K Drive is full price. If you provide value, the £49.99/$59.99 price is acceptable. Lego 2K Drive offers a season pass in addition to plenty of fun, while certain versions of the game with extra passes or content may cost an outrageous £89.99/$119.99. I ask you now, please don't waste all of your money on this game if you have that much to spend on a game.
Thus, in addition to being a full-price game with a season pass, Lego 2K Drive also has microtransactions for Brickbux, the in-game money. In addition, any child may just drive up to the store known as Unkie's Emporium, which is marked on a real-world map. Microtransactions in children's games are one thing, but it's appalling that they openly and unhinderedly appear on the in-game map.
Coins, a supplementary form of payment, further conceal the transactions. In Lego 2K Drive, a standard car costs around 10,000 Brickbux, although Brickbux cannot be purchased outright. To purchase Brickbux, you must purchase the coins. 500 coins cost £4.49 in the UK and $4.99 in the US. Okay, a clean conversion with no extra money.
However, if you're looking to buy in bulk, you can get 100,000 Bruckbux for only 4,500 coins if you want to save some cash. Well, that's a 500 penny save. The option to purchase 4,500 coins is absent. Alternatively, you can only get 3,600 coins for £24.99/$29.99, which means you will need to either repurchase £24.99/$29.99 or pay £4.49 twice to reach the 4,500 coin threshold.
We discuss this strategy of misleading customers with several payment options in our forced change feature, and it is very annoying to see such deceptive practices used in a kid's game that is already fully priced and includes a season pass. Even with poor performance, I may suggest Lego 2K Drive as a fun kid's game if all of its content was available for less than its original £49.99 price tag. However, wise parents should avoid letting their kids get too close to this kind of manipulative money trap.
Lastly, Lego 2K Drive is very unimpressive on Switch, even if you can tolerate the heavy commercialization. I apologize a lot for the Nintendo Switch. Children may use this portable platform, and the fact that it supports independent gaming is a significant benefit to such releases, and Nintendo is a master of its trade with its wonderful releases that masterfully balance framerate and visuals.
Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom demonstrates the Nintendo Switch's capabilities in terms of time, money, and quality assurance. So go get Zelda if you want to play a game where you can construct machines and ride them around. Playing on a docked or portable device, 2K Drive seems highly compressed, with many chinky pixels and jagged edges, making it difficult to distinguish details.
The texturing are worse than a tree in Galar, and there are several severe pop-ins. It's wonderful to see the car you create on screen, and the vehicle changes look amazing when you can see them, but if you have any other option to play this game, you should probably play it on the PS5 or something similar.
The performance and visuals are rather erratic. I can only image how kids could feel since I honestly get a little queasy at some races. Split-screen cooperative games don't seem to perform any better than online, which yields comparable results but with more latency. They have a lot of work ahead of them, but maybe fixes will be provided in the future.
When you want to enjoy a game but there's something better hidden underneath, it may be really irritating. I wish this was better since I'm a major fan of Lego and I still play Lego Racers on the Playstation 1. Although the building mechanics and driving feel excellent, Lego 2K Drivers on Switch has so much jank around the edges that it's difficult to suggest it to anybody with a different system.
Furthermore, it's disgusting to include aggressive monetization strategies into a game intended for young players, particularly when unsuspecting kids may drive right into a microtransaction garage and be met with a happy monkey and £24.99 worth of points in exchange for a lot of coins. It's almost immoral to pay for the season pass on top of that.
This game has a good lot of stuff to explore and uncover, so you can definitely get your money's worth without having to pay any money. That justification, however, falls flat when you provide children with the opportunity to spend money. Children are eager to spend money on the newest, quickest, and shiniest things and will happily click a single button to remove their parent's card. Though there's a lot to like about this, I'm more disappointed with the performance and monetization than I am in a Lego build that is missing a component.
Check out our recommendations for the best Switch racing games and the best racing games on mobile for games to play in place of Lego 2K Drive.