LEGO Island

LEGO Island
Developer: Mindscape Publisher: Mindscape Platform: Windows Released internationally: September 26, 1997 This game has unused cinematics. This game has unused music. This game has unused sounds. This game has debugging material. This game has a development article This game has a prototype article This game has a prerelease article

To do: Regional differences with versions released in different languages. Document Beta prototype July 25, 1997 Document the newly leaked Pre-Alpha build

LEGO Island is a 3D open-world action adventure game. Being one of the earliest pieces of digital LEGO media (at that time, LEGO didn't even have licensed themes in their sets), LEGO Island would jumpstart a decades-long and still ongoing series of numerous LEGO-branded games.

While it has roughly 10 minutes of gameplay, LEGO Island compensates heavily by providing a large amount of lore, characters, and personality to liven up basic functions and interactions. From changing the sky color, to riding vehicles such as cars, helicopters, and bikes, having a jukebox with its own music, a thematic emphasis on food, a gracious amount of enthusiasm, and even a little story that gets expanded in the manual - the list goes on.

It's a game that's designed to feel much bigger than it actually is as a kid, with players who grew up with LEGO Island having dubbed it in a tongue-in cheek manner "GTA before GTA". Curiously, for a LEGO game you can't actually build much in this game, you can only assemble a set number of vehicles.

Since the 2010s, it's garnered newfound interest regarding its development lore and bespoke codebase, the latter of which is best demonstrated by the existence of an almost complete decompilation currently maintained by itsmattkc, a longtime enthusiast for the game. Even before this, significant work and research was done to patch the game to work on modern systems as LEGO Island was infamous for running too fast on said machines.

It's also known for having one of the most interesting ways to tell you to put the CD back in your computer.

Sub-Pages

Development Info

Prototype Info

Prerelease Info

Debug Mode

Type ogel during gameplay to enable an extensive set of debugging keyboard shortcuts.

Key	Action
A	Plays the diving cutscene from the Information Center elevator.
C + 00 - 69	Momentarily displays a scene; for instance, C and 0 will show the race track.
D	Temporarily lowers viewpoint.
F	Switches model quality to low.
G + 1-5	Skip to part of the Brickster quest: 1: Spawns skateboard somewhere (only works after the Brickster escapes the jail). Collecting the skateboard too late crashes the game, as does enabling it before Brickster escapes. However, if you get the skateboard, you can pass through walls. Pressing J and K tilts the camera along the X-axis, while I and M tilts the camera along the Y-axis. 2: Brickster escape. 3: Helicopter mission. 4: Good ending. 5: Bad ending.
H	Switches model quality to high.
L + 0 or 1	Changes lighting based on current camera orientation.
N	Locks camera at the current position, though it's still possible to move around. Press again to return to normal.
P	Makes scenery objects (trees, flowers, etc.) disappear.
S	Stops music; press again and change scenes to re-enable.
U	Temporarily raises viewpoint.
V + A	Automatically warps to and plays each of the random mini-cutscenes in a pre-defined order.
X	Switches model quality to normal.
Tab	Shows the game's frame rate.
Numpad /	Causes clicks on scenery objects to destroy them. Note that this will persist in the save file it's used on and can cause the game to crash when trying to load the affected area.

(Source: GameFAQs)

There's also a debug feature accessible without the "ogel" code: press + on the Numpad and various character models will flip by. Each press will also cause the camera to temporarily jump up and to the right. Pressing - on the Numpad will go backwards. While the viewpoint is altered, it's possible to freely walk off paths and through walls. This mode is very finicky; sometimes part or all of it will stop working for no obvious reason.

To do: Is there more to this, or a better way to control it?

(Source: GameWinners)

Power Brick Cutscene

This unused prerendered cutscene with the filename of outro.smk shows the Power Brick flying off the top of the Information Center to heroic fanfare, which judging by the filename may have been the cutscene that plays when you exit the game, seeing as the Power Brick flies onto the Information Center in the intro. The only time the Brick comes off the Center in the final game is when the Brickster steals it using the helicopter, which happens in an ordinary in-game cutscene.

Music

A 22050 Hz version of the jail theme is stored with the rest of the music files, but only the lower-quality 11025 Hz version ever plays.

This version features an alternate arrangement with less melodic percussion, a slightly different tempo, and a different ending.

In fact, high quality versions and alternative arrangements for plenty of tracks have surfaced thanks to composer Lorin Nelson cassette tapes of his recordings.

Dialogue

Audio	Character	Transcription
	Infomaniac	Whoops! You have to put the CD back in your computer.
	Infomaniac	I just figured out why it isn’t working! You have to put the CD back into the computer!

This unused line is the original source of the message that plays when the game can't find the CD data. The used version has been edited (rather clumsily) to remove the word "back". It seems that the original idea was to play this message if the CD was ejected during gameplay, but doing so just crashes the game. Alternatively, there is a 2nd "CD back in computer" message.

Audio	Character	Transcription
	Infomaniac	Hmm… I think that name—yes, it is—that name is already used. If you want to use this name, you'll lose the old one! Maybe you want to type in another name instead. I would!

This would have played when a new user name was entered in the registration book that matched an existing one, but instead this just signs on as the existing user.

Audio	Character	Transcription
	Infomaniac	Do you want to save this game with a new name? Easy to do! *ahem* Select the green brick for "yes a new name please," or select the red brick for "no thank you, I'll keep the same name." Green: yes; red: no. Hmm, now that sounds rather familiar. Oh, I get it! Like a traffic light! Have I told you this one before?
	Infomaniac	Oh… do you want to load this game? Click on the red brick for no, and the green brick for yes. Green: "yes, go," and red: "no."
	Infomaniac	Oh… do you want to start a new game? Click on the red brick for no, and the green brick for yes. Green: "yes, go," and red: "nooo."

An earlier version of the registration book was more complicated and had features for manually saving, loading, or starting a new game where you'd be asked to click on red or green bricks. In the final game, you start a new game by typing in your name, load a game by clicking on a checkmark, and the game auto-saves. The red and green bricks were only used when asking if you want to quit the game.

Miscellaneous

An undocumented registry entry allows the game to be run in a window instead of fullscreen. Set the value HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Mindscape\LEGO Island\Full Screen to 0 to force windowed mode. This feature seems to be incomplete, though – it always uses the same rendering mode regardless of other settings.