Lego Rock Band

Someone at Lego really deserves a bonus. They're not the most obvious toy company to embrace the world of video gaming but not only have they done it, they've done it well and continue to put their own highly endearing spin on family gaming.

After the successful film franchises, they've now turned their attention to the Rock Band genre. The results are typically Lego: cute, funny, involving and with an emphasis on (e)quality. Those expecting a dumbing down of the frantic fretwork won't be surprised to hear that you can complete the game just by strumming. However, that's only on Super Easy mode. Select Medium and above and even the most adept Guitar Hero will find something to challenge their hand/eye coordination. This means, of course, that the Rock Band dexterous can play alongside smaller siblings / less competent parents without anyone getting frustrated.

The other obvious difference between Lego's interpretation and the existing titles is the music. Thrash metal is notable by its absence and, instead, you've got crowdpleasers, mainstream rock and straightforward pop, from Queen to KT Tunstall, via the likes of Tom Petty, Bon Jovi, Lostprophets and the Ghostbusters theme. They've clearly missed a trick – what, no Blockheads? – but make up for it in Free Play mode with their Lego interpretations of the original artists. Like the movie franchises, these are charming and oddly accurate – particularly Lego Iggy Pop, Blur and Let's Dance era David Bowie. Iggy even gets to voice the Tutorial stages.

Story Mode is the main event here. Create a character, choose your instrument, recruit a band, then take them from humble beginnings to stadium success. You do this via a succession of gigs and challenges where you earn "studs" – Lego bricks – to spend on transport, management, clothes, instruments, record production, etc. This comes with a sensible learning curve, great variety, daft challenges – from being the entertainment at a birthday party to saving a ship from an angry octopus with the power of Rock – and, as you'd expect from these chaps, very funny cut scenes. Even the random facts on the loading screens provide frequently silly laughs: for example, did you know that if you stack Lego bricks in a certain way, you can spell the word Lego?

The obvious downside is that you have to focus so hard on the game that you can't watch the lovely accompanying animation. Still, that's another reason to get more friends / all the family involved. Chalk up another success to Lego then. Any chance of a football sim next? Just think how satisfying brick-crunching tackles would be.