When you’ve already satisfied the most demanding fans ever, taking on the hopes and dreams of a brand-new cross-section of nerdom can’t be that scary. Fortunately, Traveller’s Tales is definitely not copy/pasting Batman costumes on top of its Star Wars and Indy games, and Jonathan Miller, head of production at Traveller’s, makes no bones about how much his team enjoys working on the new Lego Batman game. “We have a lot of fun with these two and how they look at each other: the stern Batman and the trying-too-hard Robin,” he says, flashing the kind of smile you can’t fake.

That love is hard to miss in this original Batman yarn. All those rascally villains have busted out of Arkham Asylum (again), and it’s up to the Dynamic Duo to put Gotham City back together (again). As far as exactly which characters you’ll see, Miller proudly calls the lineup “all the characters you’d expect, good guys and bad.” That didn’t seem like an exaggeration — we spotted Alfred, Catwoman, The Joker, Penguin, Harley Quinn, Bane, Mr. Freeze, Scarecrow, and Killer Croc…just to name more than a few. And while we didn’t see them in action, you’ll also get to drive the Batmobile, Batwing, and Batboat. Not-shotgun!

Judging from our chance to play three of the game’s levels, the action in Lego Batman seems to be more about slick refinements, rather than implementing a whole new world of gameplay innovation. Our favorite part was changing into the different suits: Robin could add electromagnetic boots that let him clump up the side of buildings, while Batman scores a nifty built-in glider that sends him coasting through the air.

Of course, you also get gadgets: you can steer a mini–Bat Signal anywhere around the screen, and when you let go, the Batarang proceeds to smack anything you highlighted upside the head. The combat itself feels a tad more energetic, too, thanks to new moves like grappling and throwing minions around like bags of trash. Some of the paths you’re supposed to unlock still aren’t as obvious as they should be — and c’mon, should Mr. Freeze really feel lost on the streets of Gotham? But it is rad that Story mode now lets you play as the villains — you’ll see the same story, just from their side in 15 different levels.

So not too surprisingly, Lego Batman has its share of the good, tried-and-true stuff, but if you weren’t already dead set on playing it the second you heard about it, there isn’t loads of new genius at work here that’ll reel you in. Still, the genuinely cutesy, funny humor and lively little Lego dudes at their crimefighting best look like they’ll be more than enough to hook the rest of us.