Prerelease:LEGOLAND

This page details LEGOLAND's development.

Earliest
These screenshots are from the March-April 1999 issue of the LEGO Mania magazine. They appear to be from a very early version of the game, as they are vastly different from the final game.

At this stage of development, the GUI consisted of 3 bubbles on the upper-left side of the screen and a transparent menu bar on the bottom. Jonathan Ablebody or any of the other characters don't appear to be present and aren't even mentioned at all by the magazine.

The menu bar is much more clear in this screenshot. Dizzy Barrels was likely the original name for the spinning barrels ride.

The menu bar might have been able to auto-hide itself, as it's not present in this screenshot. The Gold Mine appears to be an early version of the Log Flume ride.

Earlier
These screenshots are from the September-October 1999 and November-December 1999 issues of the LEGO Mania magazine. The higher resolution screenshots are from ckopo.net, Spong, and an unknown site (see talk page).

Both the September-October 1999 and November-December 1999 issues of the LEGO Mania magazine feature this screenshot. The GUI is very different, Jonathan Ablebody is a creepy static image rather than a CGI animation, the coin meter doesn't display the amount of coins you have, the theme buttons use a different font, the price for each item isn't displayed, and there are hammer and thought bubble icons. There is a magnifying glass icon not present in the final, likely the zoom feature mentioned in the March-April 1999 issue of LEGO Mania. Beside Jonathan, there are 4 icons of Bob Longtree, Rosie, J.P. and Professor Voltage. It is unknown what clicking on these would have done.

At this point all of the characters are pretty close to their final designs. The cursors are also very different, the final game uses less generic red cursors.

Some screenshots, such as the one used by LEGO Mania, feature a brick counter on the bottom-left corner of the screen. It's purpose is unknown.

The Greenhouse was originally called the Potting Shed. It's still called that internally in the final game.

Early
These screenshots are from spong.com. They come from a later stage of development than the ones used in the September-October 1999 and November-December 1999 issues of LEGO Mania, but they are still far from the final The magnifying glass (zoom) icon is no longer present, and the coin meter now is the same as it is in the final game.

The unused globe icon appears here, as well as an icon of a drumstick that didn't make it to the final.

This screenshot shows what the thought bubble icon used to do, allowed you to research rides. It seems that this would've had to been done before you could build the ride, unlike in the final, where you are given rides at certain points in the game. A bunch of text strings from an early version of the game remain in Legoland.exe, including the one in this screenshot.

Unknown
These screenshots come from unknown stages of development.

This screenshot comes from the November-December 1999 issue of the LEGO Mania magazine. The grass is a different color and the scale of Miniland Washington DC seems different.

This screenshot comes from the May-June 1999 issue of the LEGO Mania magazine. There is no GUI present, making difficult to tell what stage of development it comes from.