Lego Racers 2 is a Lego-themed racing video game developed by Attention to Detail and published by Lego Software. It was first released in September 2001 for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 2 and Game Boy Advance. It is the sequel to the 1999 game Lego Racers. This sequel was first revealed by The Lego Group on 20 August 2001. Unlike the original Lego Racers, the player has more "freedom", because the player can race or drive freely, and there are other characters that the player can talk to. Lego Racers 2 also has, like in the original, a car and characters designer. It has more bricks but fewer characters to make and edit. In Lego Racers 2, up to 11 opponents can be chosen. There are five large worlds, starting with the hometown, Sandy Bay. The player wins 4 races in Sandy Bay, then collects gold bricks to move on to Dino Island, Mars, Arctic, and finally Xalax. In Xalax, the player will face Rocket Racer, who when beaten, will hand over the title as the greatest racer in the galaxy.
Each world is based on a particular theme. In addition to racing cars in the Racers product line, each theme is based on an actual series Lego sets, and includes parts of those sets. Upgrades for players' car may be obtained by winning mini games. Each mini game is accessible by driving through a vortex while exploring the Lego worlds. There are two mini games per world, one on an easy level and one on a difficult level. The first vortex players go to will be the easy level. There are three categories of upgrades available: Grip, which improves how well players' car turns and how much their car slides; Power, which controls how fast players' car goes and how much climbing power their car has; and Shield, which controls how much damage the car can take before being destroyed. Powerups are various types of weapons that can be used while racing. Players obtain a powerup by driving over a white, spinning, glowing Lego brick. A counter appears that cycles through all of the powerups;
the one it lands on is the one players get. Players may press the "fire" button to stop the counter. Otherwise, the counter will automatically give players a bonus based on their position in the race. Persons in last place will receive the best powerups. Unlike Lego Racers 1, there are no power-enhancing bricks for their powerup. Lego Racers 2 was rated average to positive. The PC version was given a score of 7.8 out of 10 by IGN; the reviewer praised its graphics and gameplay,[3] but criticized the voice and talk which were derided as "cartoon gibberish". IGN rated the PS2 version only 6 out of 10, which corresponding graphics and gameplay were inferior to its PC counterpart. An additional note is that a copy cost $20 for PC, but $40 for PS2; the reviewer thought the latter to be poor value for money, while the PC version, at half the cost, was acceptable. 5703 (N64), 5704 (PC), 5705 (PlayStation), 5719 (GBC) Microsoft Windows: July 31, 1999, Nintendo 64: October 31, 1999, Playstation: December 17, 1999, Gameboy Color: December 29, 2000
Singeplayer, Multiplayer (2 players) Microsoft Windows, Gameboy Color, PlayStation, Nintendo 64 LEGO Racers is a LEGO racing video game developed by High Voltage Software and published by LEGO Media, released for Microsoft Windows, Nintendo 64, and PlayStation in 1999, 2000 and for Gameboy Color in 2000. The player races various characters made of LEGO in custom-built cars based on the Racers theme to become "the greatest LEGO racing champion of all-time". The sequel of the game is LEGO Racers 2, released in 2001. The game featured many of LEGO's best sets from the 90's. Being a racing game, the gameplay is centered around racing. You can race against computer-controlled (AI) opponents or against another person. There are four types of races: circuit, single, VS, and time. In the game, you choose from different car frames and build upon them until you have your car. You can also customize your driver and race with it. There are 7 circuits, and each has a circuit champion.
There are total of 26 tracks. 12 of them are mirror tracks and one of them is a test drive track available only in Build mode and used for testing the kart not racing. The champions of the game were some of the most popular LEGO minifigures of the time. The main antagonist, Rocket Racer, has never been officially appeared in a physical set. Each circuit has four racetracks and all of them are hosted by other characters: These characters can be made to race with as well as the champions, as soon as you win the circuit. The tracks from circuits 4 and 5 and 6 are mirrored. Rocket Racer's circuit (7) has only one track. The tracks are based of different lines of LEGO themes. For example, 'Knightmare-Athon' is based of the Fright Knights theme. In this mode, you race AI opponents on one of seven circuits. Each circuit consists of four three-lap races on different tracks (with the exception of circuit 7, which contains only one track). Depending on how you place in each race you get a certain number of points: 30 points for 1st place, 20 points for 2nd, 10 for 3rd, 3 for 4th, 5th is 2 points, and last is 1 point.
The points from each track are added to determine the winner of the circuit. If you do not have certain amount of points during the circuit race except for the 7th one (10 points for 1st race, 20 points for 2nd race, and 30 points for 3rd race) then the circuit ends. (If you tie with an AI opponent, you will receive the higher place.) In this mode, you race against AI opponents around a single track. (You can only race on tracks you have unlocked). This mode is useful if you are having trouble with a certain track and want to practice without doing an entire circuit or if you just want to race on one track only or if you just want to explore the track. In this mode, you race against a human opponent around a single track. (You can only race on tracks from circuits you have unlocked). On the PC version, you can only use this mode if you have a game pad for your computer. In this mode, you race against a "ghost" of Veronica Voltage, (and the ghost record of you after your first try).
This means that neither of you can affect the other in any way. There are only 12 tracks that you need to race through and none of them are mirrored tracks and Rocket Racer Run track is out. They are the tracks from Circuit 1 and 2 and 3. Also unique to this mode is the placement of power-ups. They are arranged differently than they are in the other modes: the most common are green and white, red only appears when there is a shortcut that can only be accessed with it, blue only appears when there is a hazard on the course that can be avoided with it, and yellow never appears. If the player completes all of the courses for Time Races, then they get a set of car from Veronica. Each track has a number of power-ups in the form of bricks placed on it. There are five different colors of bricks. Four of them (red, green, blue and yellow) allow the player to activate their respective power-up whilst the fifth one (white) increases the power of the power-up. The following table displays the properties of each brick and the affect white bricks have on it:
Almost all tracks have hazards which slow down the player and other racers. They are physical obstructions (giant rolling stones, swinging axes or a falling pillar); hazards which mimic power-ups (cannon fire, falling bombs, electrical discharges, swinging boxes and ground volcanoes which make the player slip and turn, and mummy's curses); or unique hazards (a ghost which spooks the racer and a flying saucer which drags the racer backwards). All hazards can be countered using shields or by avoiding them. Every track except the Knightmare-Athon has at least one shortcut. Shortcuts can be open (eg. a tunnel which turns from the track), hidden (eg. a tunnel hidden by a waterfall), or can only be blasted open by projectile power-ups (eg. passage hidden by barrels). However all the racers (except Veronica Voltage and the player (for sometimes)) ignore them. The Knightmare-Athon track had at least two shortcuts in the beta-version of the game, however they were removed in the final version, but the bricks that were inside the shortcuts can still be seen behind the walls.