Skylanders: Spryo’s Adventure is finally here! It mixes two things kids love: collectible action figures and video games! To celebrate, here’s a big blowout blog with a review of the game, plus brief descriptions of six of the heroes you can collect and play as. And everyone’s favorite sock puppet puppy Boxer the Unboxer returns to ‘unbox’ the Wii and 3DS versions to show you everything you get in them!

The Skylands are a series of magical floating islands, and are also home to a group of warriors who protect this realm, and they are called Skylanders. But one day, an evil sorcerer named Kaos takes over, and freezes the Skylanders into miniature statues and banishes them to our world! Now it’s up to YOU to place these statues on the Portal of Power, bring them back to life, and send them back to the Skylands to fight against evil!

Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure plays a lot like the old arcade game Gauntlet. You move Spyro the Dragon and his friends around various areas and mazes, defeating hordes of enemies, solving basic block pushing puzzles, and collecting hidden rare treasures. Each character has two different attacks, and they are based on elements like fire, water, earth, wind, magic, undead, and so on. Some secret doors can only be opened by Skylanders of that same element, too. As you defeat enemies, you’ll earn experience points that will help you gain levels and increase your stats. Collect treasures to buy upgrades and new attacks and moves from Persephone the fairy.

It’s how you switch characters that makes Skylanders unique. Each copy of the game comes with a stand that lights up, and three figures. Other figures (more than 30 in all) are sold separately, but you don’t need ALL of them to enjoy the game. To play as a character, just place it on the pedestal. It’ll light up the same color as the element that the character represents, and you can then play as it in the game! When you want to switch characters, just remove the first and place another, and the switch is instantaneous. Two can play at the same time; just put another character on the pedestal!

Here’s the really cool part: Any gold and experience points you collect during the game is saved onto the figure. Then you can take it to a friend’s house and play on their console. It doesn’t matter if they have a different game system, your figure will work on Wii, PS3, Xbox 360 or 3DS!

The 3DS version of Skylanders is a bit different, though. The game is more like a 3-D platformer, as you can jump in this one. So it really feels more like a Spyro game than the big console ones do. The story is different, too. An evil being named Hector has shrouded some of the Skylands in darkness, and two of the citizens summon you to transport Skylanders to their land to help them. You are timed in each level, and must reach the exit before Hector gets to you!

Using the smaller Portal of Power on the 3DS is different, too. You can only place one figure on the pedestal at a time, and you use the infrared signal to put it in the game. You can save experience points onto the figure here, too, but it’s not instantaneous. You need to turn on the portal again and read the infrared signal to store the data. You must have two action figures to play the 3DS version, and can switch between the two on the touch screen at any time. Once you read the figures on the pedestal, you can take the game with you and not have to worry about carrying everything else. But make sure to read them again so you can save the data when you’re ready to use the figures for another console!

And now, Boxer the Unboxer, the sock puppet puppy who likes to unbox video games, has returned! He’ll show you everything that is included with the Wii and 3DS versions of Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure!

The Wii version comes with the game, instructions, three figures, stickers, trading cards, web codes to play games online on your PC, a poster showing all the figures, batteries for the portal, and the Portal of Power itself. Speaking of the portal, the USB adapter which helps the portal connect to the Wii is inside the battery pack. But it’s really hard to find and wedged in a corner. I almost missed it myself. So watch out for it when you put batteries in!

Anyway, the 3DS version comes with the game, three figures, stickers; trading cards more web codes, a USB port for the portal, batteries, and a smaller portal pedestal for the 3DS version of the game.

So now let’s take a look at the figures included with those versions of the game!

Spyro

He’s one of the characters included in the Wii game. Spyro’s a pretty famous purple dragon, appearing in all sorts of video games for more than ten years now. This Skylanders game doesn’t have much to do with Spyro, though. I think they probably just threw him in there for name recognition. Did you know the original Spyro game was made by Insomniac, who later went on to do the Ratchet and Clank games? I also read the original voice for Spyro was the same guy who did the voice of the Taco Bell dog, and the music in the very first Spyro game was composed by Steve Copeland! Anyway, in Skylanders, Spyro has his trademark fire breath and horn charge attacks. And he belongs to the Magic element, even though he breathes fire.

Trigger Happy

Aside from Spyro, this guy is another one of my favorites. He’s a round little dude with crazy eyes, a long waggling tongue, and wields two pistols. He’s great because his guns fire pretty rapidly, so taking out waves of enemies is a snap! He belongs in the Tech element.

Gill Grunt

The last guy included in the Wii version is a Water element Skylander who is a fish man wielding a harpoon gun. He can also spray out water as well as swim through small streams and other puddles, and go into whirlpools.

Dark Spyro

The 3DS version comes with an exclusive figure: Dark Spyro. It’s basically just a repaint of Spyro, but you can play with his new colors in the games, too.

Stealth Elf

The next 3DS figure is a ninja lady who belongs to the plant element. She uses quick slashes and has a weird special move where her body goes one way and her eyes go another, and you control her glowing eyes for a few short moments before her body returns to her. But she’s automatically cool because she’s a ninja.

Ignitor

He’s a knight with a suit of armor with a flaming sword and a tuft of fire atop his head. Obviously he belongs in the fire element. He kind of reminds me of one of the bosses in Mega Man. Care to take a guess? Yeah, Fire Man.

And those are the figures I have. There are more than 30 to collect. The kid in me wants to buy some more, but the adult in me says that I have enough junk around the house as it is. Man, the adult in me is NO FUN AT ALL!

Kid Factor:

Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure is rated E-10 with an ESRB descriptor of Cartoon Violence. While you do blast monsters with fireballs, water, and other projectiles, enemies just disappear when defeated. In the story sections, at least one of the main characters ‘dies’ but can still talk to you in spirit form, just like Obi-Wan. Reading skill isn’t needed for the Wii version as everyone has spoken voices, but not in the 3DS game.  Parents may need to help set everything up initially (or in my case, vice versa).

But the real question about if this game is suitable for your kids has nothing to do with the gameplay. These games require the Portal of Power pedestal and the figures to play (at least one for the Wii game, and two for the 3DS). If your kids break or lose any of these items, they won’t be able to play the game. So ask yourself this question: Are your kids good at keeping up with, taking care of, and not losing their toys? If the answer is yes, then they are ready for this game.

The other question is if kids will really get into this without a cartoon or other marketing gimmick to back it up. The only recognizable character in this game is Spyro, and he’s not really a big part of it. However, I think Activision is doing everything they can to make this game known to the public. There are huge display kiosks in stores that sell games that have figures you can buy. And even though there isn’t a cartoon to go along with the game, the characters and setting of Skylanders sound like something right off Nickelodeon’s NickToons. I think they even got some well-known cartoon voice actors to play the parts in the game. I swear the bad guy sounds just like Invader ZIM. And I think kids will like that. Plus, kids can play it together with their friends, siblings, and even parents! Heck, even my brother Jeff enjoys playing Skylanders, and I can hardly ever get him to play anything ‘kiddy.’ So despite its gimmicky-ness, Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure is a pretty cool idea and is OK in my book!

Tags: Game Reviews