A constant flood of references and punchlines that keeps pulling you in.
Something about my experience in the UK really stuck with me: I was collecting American comic books in the late 1980s. With every new issue I picked up, it felt like I was stepping through a doorway straight into pure disorder and imagination. I’m not talking about the comic stories themselves, though—rather, it was the American advertisements appearing on the alternative pages. Topps bubble gum cards. Garbage Pail—whatever the name was. Endless reasons to want Bayou Billy on the Nintendo Entertainment System. You’d be absorbed in a Batman yarn, watching him broodingly work his way around a Gotham tower, and then—turn the page—and BAM, you’re suddenly being offered something completely bizarre.
Let me say this upfront: all of it was genuinely fun. I liked the Batman material, but I also found myself lingering over those ads and their promise of mall-fueled, high-pressure consumer culture. The stream of fresh ideas and novelty items was genuinely thrilling. The sheer audacity of what you could request just by sending in cereal box tops! It’s that same spirit the new Lego Batman game nails particularly well.
This doesn’t mean it’s packed with advertisements, although being a Lego game with a Batman badge, it’s a kind of ad-like mix right from the start—just in a warm, inventive way. It’s almost as though every few moments the game stops remembering it’s a Batman title and instead slides in a wink at wider pop culture. There’s a Back to the Future reference here. Sure. But there’s also a callback to that famously kid-friendly novel, American Psycho. Eventually, I stopped keeping track of these nods, in the same way I stopped noting the salute to Anton Furst, the production designer behind the 1989 Batman’s Gotham City, or to Frank Miller and Alan Moore, who are credited on the side of a skyscraper.
Once again: it’s delightful. Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight is as lively, bright, and unpredictable as anything you’d discover by plunging your hand into a large pile of Lego bricks. Every moment feels like a gag, a punchline, a detour, or an unlock that could send someone running to Wikipedia. Anything can happen. Everything is fair game.
The reason it never tips into overkill comes down to the main reference it leans on. This is, above all else, a Lego take on Rocksteady’s Arkham games. It adopts the familiar ‘rush-up-and-glide around an urban open world’ approach built around momentum, along with the excellent Freeflow combat system—here delivered with a lively blend of countering, dodging, and charging up powerful ultimates. Legacy of the Dark Knight loves dropping you into a fight where it’s you against what feels like an entire school bus of foes: they close in, the symbols pop above their heads, and the camera pulls back just enough. It honestly does a strong job capturing the feel and possibilities of the Arkham series.
Paired with the open-world roaming, this combat system helps shape an adventurous campaign that blends and reworks moments from various Batman films released across recent decades. The tutorial level reads like an extended nod to the League of Shadows’ Himalayan sequence from Batman Begins, and nearly everything else gets attention too—from the Penguin’s army in Batman Returns to the Flugelheim Museum in the 1989 Batman. Still, my memory is that the Flugelheim looked more like a train from the outside back then, and it doesn’t quite resemble that now.
A lot of work has gone into making it land well—somehow, with a perfectly timed good/bad Arnold impression, the developers even manage to slip a bit of that regrettable Clooney Batman into the mix. At its best, it feels like those Jeph Loeb comics where Batman methodically goes through a row of famous villain after famous villain. Sometimes it genuinely hits: The Dark Knight’s defining moment becomes the basis for The Legacy of the Dark Knight’s standout scene, and I loved the whole sequence. Even during calmer stretches, the game stays enjoyable. It’s still Lego, and it’s still Batman.
As you play, you spend a lot of time moving through Gotham’s open world, where you’ll constantly encounter impromptu street fights and reckless drivers to chase down, alongside Riddler challenges and Waynetech treasure caches to uncover. There are also fast-travel options you can unlock by completing straightforward puzzles. Different districts bring their own variety, but the consistent blend of Gothic flair and urban danger remains throughout. In short, Gotham gives you plenty to do, but it’s also just a likable, atmospheric place to race around in a speedy bat-car—or glide across rooftops at street level.
Then there are the missions, which steer you through specific places, mixing battles and boss fights with puzzles, set-pieces, and comedic beats. Batman keeps a sidekick with you throughout, since the game is built for couch co-op—and that sidekick always brings a selection of specialized skills. Catwoman can cut through glass, climb walls, and call in a cat that can squeeze through vents. Robin can pull objects toward him and force doors open, among other abilities.
Even Commissioner Gordon gets his turn with a gadget capable of disabling machinery. Alongside Nightwing and Talia Al Ghul—who has a genuinely clever trick that I won’t spoil—Batgirl is the only one that comes off a bit less impressive. She can summon a drone that serves as a tether point and includes a tech-hacking mini-game tool. Compared to
As for the other characters, particularly Catwoman and Talia, their sections feel a touch slow-paced.
Some missions ask you to switch between multiple sidekicks and their unique skills. Along the way, you’re also treated to a steady stream of collectibles and sought-after trinkets—things you can spot, even if you can’t reach them right away. On top of that, there’s a constant parade of villain cameos, movie references, and combat, which does a solid job of keeping your attention away from the bigger picture, much like many…
In the wider world of Lego games, you can clearly spot how boldly the developers lean on a fairly limited selection of design approaches.
Combat and puzzles go hand in hand. Smash through everything and build a surprising Lego creation to open a door or bridge a gap. It works because of how polished and playful it feels, and I think it’s also perfect for an easygoing co-op experience—especially one you can enjoy with kids. With a simple, clear objective, plenty of goofy moments can crop up along the way.
A few things here are especially charming surprises. First, a simplified version of Detective Mode proves genuinely useful when the Lego games’ otherwise topsy-turvy puzzle design gets a little unclear. As a result, you won’t run into many situations where you feel truly stuck, no matter how odd the correct answer ends up being.
The second standout is the combat, which surprisingly delivers some genuinely fun stealth. What really pulls me toward the Arkham series isn’t the Freeflow brawling so much as the predator-style sequences—when you’re hidden in the shadows and have to figure out how to take out targets. Legacy of the Dark Knight doesn’t go quite as deep, but it still offers plenty of chances to move through an area, disable security cameras, slip into patrol routes, drop enemies before they realize what’s happening, and then vanish back into the dark fast.
All of this adds up to a campaign that feels generous, fun, and packed with genuine affection for Batman and the wider universe around him. Sure, Poison Ivy and Two-Face make appearances, but Legacy of the Dark Knight also tips its hat to Bat Mite and the Grey Ghost. There’s an entire Bat Cave waiting for you to decorate with collectibles, expand it, and fill it with unlockable outfits. You can drive through Gotham’s streets in inviting versions of the Batmobile from the newest film, or the Tumbler from The Dark Knight—and even something stranger still. (By the way, the driving is enjoyable too, largely because it often feels incidental. You’re not constantly trying to plug the vehicle into the mission the way Arkham Knight keeps doing. Instead, it’s just a convenient option for getting around when you want to pause your cape-fueled glide through the air.)
That said, a few points cause the gameplay to wobble. Occasionally, you may end up getting stuck on the edges of the Lego world. And while searching for Waynetech Caches around the city is enjoyable, I can’t honestly say the money I gathered felt rewarding enough for upgrading gadgets. I also didn’t come across anything particularly exciting in the characters’ skill trees. On top of that, some moments that closely echo the Arkham games mainly highlight just how much more refined those titles feel—for example, the grappling boost in Arkham City makes you feel like you’re attached to a huge aircraft, while the comparable mechanic here lands more in the “adequate” range.
Still, these are small annoyances to worry about in a game packed with lots of other minor touches designed just to make you laugh, surprise you, or nudge you toward a comic-book moment you likely haven’t thought about in decades.
If you’ve been following the comics lately, you’ll know Batman is currently split between the horror-leaning Absolute line written by Scott Snyder and a warm, feel-good run created by Matt Fraction—one where Bruce Wayne is portrayed as a sweet, genuinely caring person, a side Fraction is especially good at bringing to life. So, in the comics, you basically get to choose your Batman. And you’ve probably always been able to. That’s the way the Lego games handle it so effortlessly: every version of Batman is represented here, and everything has a purpose.
A copy of Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight was supplied for this review by Warner Bros. Games.