Remembering Lego Bionicle, My First Ever Roguelite
Lego Bionicle: Quest for the Toa is an unremarkable action-adventure game that released for the Game Boy Advance in 2001, at the height of Bionicle’s cultural relevance. Unfortunately, the game was crap. IGN’s 4.5/10 review said, “I've had more fun watching my grandmother play bingo, and my grandmother is dead.” But I was a kid, I didn’t know what IGN was, and I wanted a video game that was based on my Technic Toa. I had to have it.
As a seven-year-old at the time, I loved Bionicles. I still do, to be honest, despite not knowing where any of my prized Lego creatures are 20 years later. Between myself and my brother, we must have owned every Toa and most of the Matora, plus a bunch of the enemies.
Related: Why On Mata Nui Are We Still Waiting For A Bionicle Reboot?
The Lego creations were brilliant, like a regular Lego kit blended with an Action Man; the perfect combination for kids to build and play with. It’s no wonder so many millennials look back on the kits fondly, and why Bionicle nostalgia is having a cultural renaissance in the modern day. My love peaked with the Bionicle: Mask of Light film in 2003, and the GBA game was a natural companion. The problem was, I was skint.
Quest for the Toa must have been about 30 quid, or whatever the price of Game Boy games was back in the day. That was an unattainable price tag for a kid back then, I got five quid a month pocket money! What was I meant to do, save up for six whole months without spending a penny in order to afford it? What a ridiculous proposition.
You may have noticed that I called Quest for the Toa a roguelite in the title of this feature. Played traditionally, this game is not a roguelite. It’s not a roguelike either. It’s an action-adventure game with
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