Lego Expands In-House Video Game Development with New Studio

Lego is making a massive shift in how it approaches video game development by taking it in-house. Lego has been the name on many diverse video games for years, but nearly none of those games have been developed internally within Lego itself, rather through partnerships with external development studios. That all changes under the new leadership.
Lego CEO Niels Christiansen has signaled the company’s intention to build internal game development capabilities. This is one aspect of a wider strategy to ensure that the Lego brand can cover a wide range of experiences for children of all ages, both physical and digital. While it is unclear whether this shift will entirely eliminate Lego’s collaborations with outside game developers, it does involve a substantial investment in internal capability.
One of the strongest recent collaborations of Lego is with Epic Games. Incorporating a Lego mode in Fortnite has proven very popular, being one of the game’s most beloved aspects. The mode allows players to play a crafting and survival game, utilizing Lego minifigure representations of hundreds of Fortnite skins. The collaboration shows Lego’s ability to fit its brand into other gaming ecosystems.
Most fans of the series think of Lego video games in terms of the TT Games series, which has developed countless adventure games for the last twenty years. Even though the series has pretty much stopped being worked on by TT, word of a new Lego Harry Potter game is in the works that would span the whole franchise in the same manner as Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga. The latter was both commercially and critically successful, indicating that there remains a healthy demand for such games.
Besides its co-developments with TT Games, Lego has also collaborated with 2K on a racing game called 2K Drive, which released last year. There are signs that this would be the starting point of a series of Lego sports games, including a rumored Lego football game. While there has been no confirmation of the football game, Lego sets related to it have appeared online, indicating that the game is ongoing.
Internalizing game development could be a strategic move, especially given the recent financial success of the company. Having greater control over the development process, Lego can ensure that its games embody its brand values and appeal to its core target market. In so doing, Lego can also experiment with small-scale projects and potentially reduce its reliance on third-party developers, which would be beneficial for keeping costs under control and retaining creative control.
But there are also concerns from fans about the impact on studios like TT Games, which have been instrumental in creating successful Lego video games. The hope is that Lego will continue to work with these studios so that they can continue to produce quality games while Lego focuses on its internal titles.
In total, the decision by Lego to establish an in-house video game development unit demonstrates that it is committed to expanding its digital business and having a strong brand presence across different media platforms. With the firm poised to keep growing and investing in digital technologies, this move will likely be just the beginning of a new era in Lego’s gaming operations.