An formidable and celebrated fan challenge based mostly on the cult franchise Bionicle has now been pulled by Lego – however the workforce is constant.
Three years in the past, we reported on a long-awaited fan challenge that aimed to remodel the favored Bionicle figures from the early 2000s into a contemporary open-world role-playing recreation. A playable demo was presupposed to be launched this 12 months, however that may now not occur, because the rights holder Lego has determined to scrap the sport. However it’s not fully over but.
Makes an attempt had been made to adjust to Lego’s tips
What sort of recreation is it? The challenge was referred to as Bionicle: Masks of Energy and was presupposed to be accessible for followers to obtain without cost. The motion role-playing recreation follows the story of the Toa, who got down to discover the Masks of Energy to free the island of Mata Nui from the evil Makuta.
Masks of Energy was developed in Unreal Engine 5 and needed to ship you into an open world modeled after the lore of Bionicle with six completely different Toa.
Lego steps in: Lego nonetheless owns the rights to Bionicle, although the franchise has been dormant for a few years. Nonetheless, Masks of Energy apparently grew to become too large for the Danish toy producer, and Lego requested the event workforce to discontinue manufacturing. Naturally, they complied.
Unmasked Video games has issued a public assertion on Steam saying that the demo is theoreticallyin its closing phases and just a few bug fixes and closing touches areleft to finish it. It was initially scheduled to be launched as a shadow drop on August 10, 2025.
To acknowledge the onerous work that has gone into the sport, an entire walkthrough of the demo in its present state has been launched as a two-hour video on YouTube.
Precautions had been taken: Unmasked Video games goes on to write down that each effort was made to adjust to Lego’s truthful play tips No cash was ever requested, and there have been quite a few indications that Masks of Energy was a fan challenge. Sadly, the Lego Group’s perspective towards fan-created media appears to have modified.
Though the workforce by no means obtained an evidence for Lego’s resolution, they believe that it might have been simply confused with an official challenge.
On the time of writing, the Steam web page for Bionicle: Masks of Energy seems among the many high outcomes when trying to find Bionicle recreation on Google. A median particular person seeing our recreation for the primary time might simply suppose it was an official recreation – and no quantity of clear disclaimers or disclaimers on our half might change that impression.
Bionicle followers don’t must throw within the towel simply but, although. One other promising fan challenge is at the moment within the works that would fulfill all of our editor Fabiano’s childhood goals.
For Unmasked Video games, the journey is simply starting
Till Bionicle: Masks of Energy was discontinued, the builders had been referred to as Group Kanohi. The group is now utilizing its expertise and achievements to create a brand new recreation with its personal IP. This was adopted not solely by a reputation change, but additionally by the conversion of the Steam web page for Masks of Energy to a brand new challenge.
There you’ll now discover the upcoming recreation Venture Rustbound. The hooked up pictures are nonetheless from the Bionicle challenge. It may possibly subsequently be assumed that improvement is just not ranging from scratch. Maybe there’ll even be a religious successor to Bionicle. It stays thrilling!
Issues are additionally transferring ahead at Lego. After the toy producer posted document income once more in 2024, the corporate now desires to take a position extra closely within the online game market.
