LEGO Fun to Build

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LEGO Fun to Build
Front case cover
Developer(s)Easy Computer System
Publisher(s)Sega
Producer(s)Akemi Kamata[1]: 6 
Platform(s)Kids Computer Pico[1]: 1 
Release
Genre(s)Edutainment
Mode(s)Single-player

LEGO Fun to Build[note 1] is a 1995 educational children's game developed by Easy Computer System and published by Sega for the Kids Computer Pico. Released exclusively in Japan in December in 1995, it is the first official LEGO video game, predating LEGO Island by nearly two years.

Gameplay

LEGO Fun to Build is an activity center game. thing. Control with stylus and stuff.[4]: 4  It has four sections: Town, Aquazone, Castle, and Space, each accessed by turning pages in the Storyware cartridge. The Pico book.

Pages:

Caption text
Header text Header text
File:Fun to Build p1 title.png The game's title screen. It features no activities.
File:Fun to Build p2 Town.png Town (街シリ一ズ)
File:Fun to Build p3 Aquazone.png Aquazone (アクアゾーン)
File:Fun to Build p4 Castle.png Castle (お城シリ一ズ)
File:Fun to Build p5 Space.png Space (宇宙シリーズ)
File:Fun to Build p6 Building.png Building games (組み立て遊び)

Minigames

Caption text
Header text Header text
File:Fun to Build p2 Racing 1v3.png Racing game (レースゲーム)

The Racing game is accessed by selecting and assembling the Speedboat from the picture book. The player selects one of four vehicles and races three CPU opponents. If the player finishes in the top two they advance to the finals in a one-on-one race.[4]: 10 

File:Fun to Build p2 Pizza driving.png Pizza delivery game (ピザ配達ゲーム) [4]: 11 
File:Fun to Build p3 Crystal grab.png Aqua Crystal Exploration Vessel game (アクアクリスタル探査艇ゲーム) [4]: 14 
File:Fun to Build p3 Submarine game.png Aqua Mini Submarine game (アクアミニサブマリンゲーム) [4]: 15 
File:Fun to Build p4 Maze Knight drawbridge.png Castle maze game (お城迷路ゲーム) [4]: 18–19 
File:Fun to Build p5 Ice game.png Ice Planet Mogul game (アイスプラネットモーグルゲーム) [4]: 22 
File:Fun to Build p5 Falcon game.png Twin Falcon game (ツインファルコンゲーム) [4]: 23 

Development and release

LEGO Fun to Build was produced at Sega Enterprises for the educational Kids Computer Pico console (known internationally as the Sega Pico). The game was designed for children between the ages of three and six. Akemi Kamata headed its production; Kamata thought that a game featuring LEGO bricks would work well on the Pico, believing that LEGO naturally fostered creativity. She later said about it, "I thought that if I could make my favorite LEGO bricks that could be played with interactively through a TV, children's dreams would spread."[1]: 5–6  The game was programmed by the "AM" (Amusement) division[note 2] of Easy Computer System (ECOS),[5] a Japanese software company that developed dozens of Pico games for Sega.[6][7] Many of the in-game graphics are based on 1995 art assets from the marketing agency Advance; the game's box art and Storyware pages directly use photographs from these assets.[8] Programming was completed during October 1995,[9] and the game was released in Japan in December 1995.[2]

Prototype versions

File:Fun to Build p2 placeholder.png
Placeholder Town page from an early build

In March 2008, two early builds of Fun to Build were released on the video game preservation website Hidden Palace. The builds were part of a collection of Pico prototype EPROMs supplied by video game hardware developer Kevin "Kevtris" Horton.[10] The ROM headers of both prototypes label them as Crayon Shin-chan no Oekaki Note, a Pico game developed by Bandai based on the Crayon Shin-chan manga; the two prototypes were mislabeled as prototypes of this game on Hidden Palace as a result.[11][12] As the Crayon Shin-chan game's header date of January 1995[13] is also copied in both Fun to Build prototypes, their actual build dates are unknown.[11][12]

Both builds use a placeholder title screen featuring a hand-drawn hiragana LEGO logo.[note 3] The later build (labeled Prototype A/1 on Hidden Palace) is similar to the final build; some differences include different camera panning behavior, missing or different music and sound effects, and an incomplete Building page screen. The earlier build (labeled Prototype C/3) is very incomplete: no minigames are accessible, there is no music, and placeholder photographs are used in place of several page screens. The Building page screen features four sample models which can be rotated and will build one brick at a time when loaded.

Legacy

Despite being the first LEGO video game, Fun to Build has remained obscure compared to later titles such as LEGO Island, and little is known about its development. In December 2020, the LEGO Group launched the podcast Bits N' Bricks to celebrate the 25th anniversary of LEGO video games, based on the release of Fun to Build.[14] The game was only briefly discussed in episode 17, however, where Akemi Kamata was revealed to be its producer. Journalist Brian Crecente, one of the podcast's co-hosts, contacted Kamata and learned about her involvement in the game, though Kamata did not appear as a guest participant on the podcast.[1]: 5–6 

Notes

  1. ↑ Represented in furigana as ファン トゥ ビルド (Fan tu Birudo)[3]
  2. ↑ ＡＭ事業部, AM jigyō-bu
  3. ↑ As a foreign-language word, Lego in Japanese is usually written with katakana (レゴ) instead of hiragana (れご).

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Crecente, Brian; Vincent, Ethan (31 March 2021). "Episode 17 – LEGO Video Games and Digital Play" (PDF). Bits N' Bricks (Podcast). Participants: Niels B. Christiansen, Julia Goldin, and Sean McEvoy. The LEGO Group. Archived (PDF) from the original on 15 May 2024. Audio version via YouTube.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 "From Bricks to Bits: The LEGO Group Celebrates 25 Years of LEGO Video Games" (Press release). Billund: The LEGO Group. 2 December 2020. Archived from the original on 2021-01-17. Retrieved 2024-05-15.
  3. ↑ LEGO Fun to Build (Media notes) (in 日本語). Sega. December 1995. Spine. Archived from the original on 2024-09-17.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 LEGO Fun to Build ガイドブック [LEGO Fun to Build Guidebook] (PDF) (in 日本語). Sega Enterprises Ltd. 1995. Archived (PDF) from the original on 14 February 2024.
  5. ↑ Easy Computer System (1995). LEGO Fun to Build (Sega Pico) (early prototype ed.). Sega. Scene: Building game test models. ECOS
  6. ↑ "ＡＭ事業部 あしあと" [AM Division Footprint]. ecos.co.jp (in 日本語). Archived from the original on 1997-05-28. セガ・エンタープライゼス 【キッズコンピュータ・ピコ】(絵本ソフト約６０本) [Sega Enterprises – [Kids computer pico] (approximately 60 picture book software)]
  7. ↑ "ＡＭ事業部 業務内容" [AM Division Business Contents]. ecos.co.jp (in 日本語). Archived from the original on 1997-05-28.
  8. ↑ emily/Pereki (2 January 2015). "The entire game is based almost exclusively on 1995 art assets from Advance". Rock Raiders United (Comment in topic "LEGO Fun to Build: The first LEGO game?"). Archived from the original on 19 January 2019.
  9. ↑ Easy Computer System (December 1995). LEGO Fun to Build (Sega Pico). Sega. File/code: ROM header, offset 00000100. SEGA PICO – (C)SEGA 1995.OCT – LEGO—FUN TO BUILD – LEGO—FUN TO BUILD – HPC-6032-00
  10. ↑ "Ecco 2, Nightmare Circus, X-Perts..." Hidden Palace. March 30, 2008. Archived from the original on 2024-09-16.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 "Crayon Shinchan Oekaki Note (Prototype A)". Hidden Palace. Archived from the original on 2024-09-16.
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 "Crayon Shinchan Oekaki Note (Prototype C)". Hidden Palace. Archived from the original on 2024-09-16.
  13. ↑ Bandai (January 1995). Crayon Shin-chan no o-Ekaki Nōte (Sega Pico). File/code: ROM header, offset 00000100. SEGA PICO – (C)T-1331995.JAN – CRAYON SHINCHAN – OEKAKI NOTE – T-133080-00
  14. ↑ "From Bricks to Bits: The LEGO Group Celebrates 25 Years of LEGO Video Games". LEGO.com (Press release). Billund, Denmark: The LEGO Group. 2 December 2020. Archived from the original on 15 August 2022.

External links

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