The Rise and SAD Fall of Skylanders
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 15 ноя 2022
- Skylanders was a massive gaming franchise that truly started the rise of the toys to life genre for gaming, so today, I wanted to look at the rise and fall of Skylanders, and by extension the toys to life market in the mid 2010's. I also take a look at the spin-off Netflix Cartoon for Skylanders, Skylanders Academy over on my cartoon channel: • What Happened To Skyla...
Written By: Jordan Fringe
Edited By: Jordan Fringe & David Strickland
Gameplay Captured by: David Strickland
Channel Art By: Jerry Meehan 
Игры
Thanks so much for watching, check out my video on Skylanders Academy on my Cartoon channel: ruclips.net/video/D26BOZm5OaE/видео.html&ab_channel=JordanFringe
Loved the video ! Please do one on U:B. Funkeys, the first iteration of the "scan a figure to put it in your game" formula, would be very interesting after this one !
It's really sad how money hungry Activision always is, and how they themselves kill off their IPs
UB Funkeys?
@@spearmintpony7105 UB FUNKEYS 4ever
If you were to bring back The Skylanders Game Franchise, what are some concepts would you like to add in your next Skylanders game?
Rip to a good franchise. And also my parents wallets for buying me almost every single gen 1 figure
😂😂
same. i think i have about 30 total. and i only got the starter sets for giants and swap force. so, not all the gen 1, but more than half at least
I had all but 2 of the original 32.
Same bro 🫡
Awful franchise
Finding rare skylanders in stores was the peak of shopping, from themed to flocked or clear
$1 each
Yeah it reminded me of the whole Beanie Baby craze of the 90s, too bad there really ain’t anything like that anymore, kinda miss that in a weird way.
I remember I passed by one of those red Drill Sergeants at the store as a kid, but I didn’t want it because I just assumed it was a faulty copy that shouldn’t look like that. Which, if anything, that should’ve made me want it even MORE, but oh well 🙃
I remember going to Time Square ToysRus was still there I was obsessed with The Legendary Skylanders! I got Legendary Bash,Spyro,and Chopper.
@@PropiaPersona where you lived? they were like 10-15 dollars for me
My dad has every single skylander to exist; the employee only skylanders, the mispainted or error skylanders, at least 300 boxes of them. And to top it off, a tattoo of ghost roaster. I feel like i have to say this here because this is the only appropriate place to bring up this man’s dedication to skylanders. It will be missed.
A true hero, what was the most difficult one to collect
Skylanders is coming back so tell him to get ready
@@49HEALTHit is?
@@conflictedomega7562 yessir, activision CEO wants to bring it back and they’d make a fortune if they did. It’s coming back.
Ngl I would kill to buy a few from him but I'm sure a collector like that couldn't possibly part with a piece of such an all-encompassing collection. Respect to him.
My cousin got cancer when we were really young, it had progressed a great deal and none of us were sure she would make it. I remember seeing the valve she used to take her chemo for the first time and thinking that she was a cyborg (in a good way), I didn't really understand what cancer was yet.
Her parents wanted to do something for her before she passed away, so they got in contact with Make - a - Wish. From what I remember, she really loved Skylanders and wanted to learn more about game design. She ended up going to the studio where they developed the game!
They ended up naming a level after her, the Heroic Challenge - SABRINA level in Skylanders Giants. I think she was super in love with capybaras, so she wanted to have them in the game somehow? I kinda forget.
Sadly, this story doesn't have a great ending. Sabrina hasn't played Skylanders in years. She totally kicked cancer's ass though! Just completely grew out of the whole Skylander phase.
Really got me there at first with that ending
my guess seeing how games are made. ruined gaming for her. just a wild guess tho. if you see her, tell her i say congratulations on surviving and beating cancer
How is that not a great ending? It's the best ending i have ever seen, make her play Skylanders again 💗
U almost got me there with the ending... very cool. Hope she is doing well!
Oh wow. That's nice.
But the ending was probably the best in this scenario.
I worked at Toys R Us in 2016 and I had to stock the shelves with all three of these companies' statues and it was a mess. We had way too many and it was the Christmas rush so we were expected to get them all out on the shelves and on the hanging pegs. Thanks for reminding me of this. The horror...
Should have seen it when they first came out. I worked there 2011-2015.
@@pixality7902 I’m pretty sure some people quit in Q4 2011 just because of skylanders
Edit: 0 to 46 likes in 3 hours on a 2 month old comment? RUclips is wack
Vietnam flashbacks lmao
Pls bring them back
Trash game anyways
I was a kid during this whole thing. This whole video felt like being dragged down memory lane in the fastest, harshest, yet a very pleasant way.
i had to revive some lost braincells bc i remember playing with so many skylanders back in the day yet i didn't have a big part of em... then i remember this game was a catalyst for bringing over friends and just sharing skylanders. these memories were locked away and i don't mind remembering
Ikr? Same here!
@@user-tv1id7hf9y my first game and only one with the skylanders was the last one imaginagtors and I remember buying all the toys and then wondering why I saw the older ones in dollarama and stuff 😅I was more into pokemon and beyblade in terns if collecting tho
I remember when I was in Elementary school, some kids would have a Skylanders rental service! It was honestly pretty cool to see how Skylanders was such a big thing in my small town. People would also trade Skylanders and simply show them off.
Those were the good ole days. 😌
Same! I lived in a small town where our whole grade traded skylanders regulary, my buddies and i basically got to play with all the skylanders without driving our parents to financial ruin haha
My mom was the one to get me into Skylanders, she saw it and thought I would like it. I originally didn't want to play it as a kid, but my mom kind of forced me to play it since she already bought it. That's how I got started and I've been hooked all the way to Imaginators.
It's sad to see it go because this is the series that introduced me to Spyro. For the longest time as a kid I thought Spyro was just an original Skylander character but he wasn't and years when I found out about this it made me want to play the reignited trilogy when it was announced. So I have Skylanders to thank for introducing me to Spyro and his series.
The old Spyro fans kinda drove the community mad, I’m very sure some people were introduced to Spyro with skylanders, and Spyro wasn’t having the best time before skylanders came.
Same for me until I looked up Spyro gameplay on RUclips when the game first came out lol
Same, but this also introduced me to the concept of Elements. No Avatar or Classics here. Whenever I hear of elements, THIS is what I think about.
Skylanders was abd still is awful
@@riso9059 Ouch
I remember telling my mom that me and my sister needed one of each elemental to get extra stuff in the game and she took that as “get every skylander at every opportunity” leaving me and my sister with an overwhelming amount of characters to play as when we only needed like 6 and ended up with 20
Me and my brother had 36 exactly by the time our wii busted
And we didn’t have any intent to stop growing that number
Rookie numbers, I got like 83 of them😅
@@rhysme423 Imagine playing skylanders on the wii 🤢
@@burgerkingfries4941 bro I don’t give a shit on what you call a bad console. It was good and served us well for its time. So shut the fuck up about the fact you think the wii was a bad console.
I remember being so pumped for Sunburn's release. It was sold out at every store we checked, but finally at our hometown Walmart, a lone Sunburn was sat atop the book shelf aisle. Felt like the happiest day of my childhood ngl
That's wholesome ! I'm glad you were able to find him ! Sunburn really deserved to have variants and to be a returning Skylander in later games.
I can’t believe that I was so obsessed with this game and how long ago it was. I treasure the early installments in this series and they remain as a permanent part of my childhood gaming.
Skylanders was big back when I was in elementary school. I was such a fan of the games. I remember every Friday my 6th grade teacher would give us spelling tests. If I did well, my mom would allow me to buy another Skylander figure the next day. The spelling tests were something I was also very excited about because of that. I remember even having a giant suite case filled with skylanders. From the 1st game all the way to swap force. Watching this video made me very nostalgic. This was such a massive part of my childhood.
Yeah same for me, but I only ditched after Imaginators. I must ask, have you ever þought about making a fan game?
@@paneonsweirdtomfoolery4056 I’m in a server that making a fan game
@@superplushlord5391 Oh sweet,
By any chance: Is it public?
Yep i even was gonna make a trade with skylanders with another kid like it was a pokemon card
@@superplushlord5391 Any name u could give to us?
Sigh…here’s to you Skylanders. You lasted a good long while. So many memorable and unique Skylanders to pick from, so many toys to collect, all the laughs we got from Kaos, all the shelf space taken up by massive collections…sigh how I wish you guys were still going but alas…parting is such sweet sorrow
I’ll always treasure the memories playing through that game with my younger sister 🙂 we both still have our favourite characters.
@@undeadwerewolves9463 who’re your favorites?
We had a nice run of Toys To Life games while it lasted - Skylanders Forever!
I remember watching your videos on the skylanders stuff all the time, along with my friend 8Bittheater, you both did great for awesome content surrounding the franchise! Appreciate you watching!
Also! I’m subscribed on my main account but it’s cool to see you doing bluray stuff as I still collect movies and enjoy the videos on them!
@@JordanFringeGaming Thanks for being an OG supporter! I would still be making Skylanders videos if the franchise didn't end..... now just tossing up random videos when I get a movie to unbox but made a fun Skylanders Giants video last month :)
I don’t think I ever finished sky landers but I remember having soo much fun with the whole action figure being placed on the portal platform thing and then learning what they do. It was really fun every time just leveling them up and learning the ability’s.
exactlyy
Dude this was one of my fondest childhood memories. The first three games were amazing, and Giants was my favorite and the peak IMO. As a kid it was all I ever asked for. I even did extra chores to get money to buy more lol. I got a few rare ones but eventually ended up selling my huge collection where I was basically robbed by GameStop. I had so many of the unique ones like the dark Spyro, the dark granite crusher, both versions of Ninjini, which wasn’t even in my side of the country, some gold figures, and a ton more that I’m willing to bet go for quintuple the amount GameStop gave to me for them. It was the largest collection of things I’ve ever owned, maybe about 120 figures total. Truly an amazing franchise.
Skylanders was awesome when I was a kid, swap force was the first game I played of the series.
I did later try spyros adventure but that was one of the last ones I got so it was around the time I started growing out of the games.
Now looking back on it I wish I kept my figures and the games, had lots of Skylanders I could've saved for my future kids as Christmas presents.
Damn bro, giants was goated! My max level tree Rex my brother got was so op
I like the concept of the Skylanders thing of toys come to life. It gives a way of your toys being something more than just a figure. My nephew recently found my old Trap Team Skylanders and we got a couple for him, granted he likes playing with the figures more, but he still enjoys playing as said his Dinosaur one.
I think the concept could be used a lot better in different ways, like if they could have something scan the code of each Yu-gi-oh card and turned that into an online game. You'd buy the little pad that would scan the I.D. Of the card and it would appear on your computer. Hell, they could even apply that to Pokemon, or Magic the gathering.
I got tuned off because I had bought the Trap Team game, expecting that my other skylanders that weren't trapmasters could open the secret doors, but as I played I realized that it had to be a TRAP master, of said type. I enjoyed it when it didn't become a game where you had to buy more characters to progress in a game you had already purchased. The characters should've been more like, just the characters, not something required to play sections of the game. Or the fact that you had to buy a new portal everygame. meaning all your Traps, or cars from previous games are just... useless.
If they were to make a sequel, I'd want it to not be a gimmick, but one that focused on a new bad guy, that allowed some of the old portals to be used, or the old gimmicks to be used. hey, a free online MMO could world. The entire world is free, and the characters could be used to explore it, with many of the areas just being optional, and not P2W. Needless to say, the concept was cool, even if they did use Spyro's name and didn't really have Spyro in it.
Edit: And the numerous amount of figures and their models does make it seem just... bad. Rereleases of old skylanders were fine, to allow new players to purchase them, but having them be chrome, or this color, or that color was just ridiculous.
I completely agree from one Skylander fan to another, I hope our franchise comes back in SOME form that allows us to use our old figures
@@devintheundertalefan5611 You can, but only through the regular story. You can't use them for getting through secret doors, or use your traps for your old captures villains from trap team, and I don't think imaginators lets you use vehicles. the problem with gimmicks, is that they have no function in the next game. All those traps you spent weeks purchasing to capture every villain, utterly pointless in the next game. All those skylanders you bought of different elements from the OG skylanders, well now you need to buy them again, but make sure they're trap masters. The usefulness the original ones have is lowered, and the mechanic that made them unique is just gone.
Your IMAGINATION brings toys to life 🤡
@@darkmatter-mc5iv you can use the vehicles in Imaginators but it's just for the literally copy-pasted from Superchargers racing side mode while the traps just grant whatever Skylander is currently on the portal some treasure towards upgrades.
...man & I thought Pokemon was bad with basically just throwing away the last gimmick every game
That is why I loved Skylanders Giants more since it actually ran with the no gimmick route, if you had a Skylander Giant, some obstacles would be easier to get by since they are stronger to move things out of the way. But it isn't a requirement.
this game has so much potential for an awaited return, skylanders was such an amazing game it was almost like a mini pokemon franchise with how many things they had relating to the game that you could buy. I remember buying the official guide book at my schools book fair in 2016 in 3rd grade lmao
Oh man, you just brought so many memories. I still remember how I became interested into Skylanders at their launch: I had already seen their ads on TV and didn't thought much, until i went to kids event very famous in my region in Spain (La festa del Supers, shootout to all Supers out there) and there was a demo there and I played it, I becamed hooked. I bought the game and nearly every figure from the first game and the "expansion packs", and that game has to be the fastest game i've completed by game level-time ration. And I also bought the 3 next games, the only thing it stopped me from buying the 5th was that it was only in WiiU (I had a Wii and i wasn't going to buy a WiiU). But I muss say that it's true that during time each game felt more like a cheap sale, and this is seen with the minifigures I have, nearly all of them are from the first and each game has less and less. I didn't even knew they released a 6th game tho idk if it is because they never released it in Spain or because I already lost interesed in the series (which I already did). There was also that the first game had a lot of levels which ended up making it intresting and the next games had less levels and it angered me for some reason. Overall I have very found memories of that time.
That most likely had to do with the overall quality drop of the Wii ports. When swap force released, it was a port to the Wii unlike the past two which ported the Wii version to other platforms. Swap force and trap team look worse that sa and giants in terms of wii version.
Bowser is actually incredible in SuperChargers playthroughs. His hammer attacks are super powerful, the summoned Koopas are one of the most unique attacks in the franchise, and his Molten form is absolutely dominant over groups with the fire breathing. If you ever play SuperChargers on Wii U, it is worth tracking down Bowser for the gameplay.
I really wanted Hammer Slam Bowser and Turbo Charge DK as alt costumes in Smash ( in Bowser's case, it's just the armor as the hammer would be out of place in Smash given his moveset ) along with the Dark variants...love using them in Superchargers & Imaginators
I remember being obsessed with Skylanders! Skylanders Spyros Adventure and Giants were my favorites before I betrayed Skylanders for my favorite Toys to Life Game Series Disney Infinity.
You're story seems to parallel my own with me staying with swap force then moving to a bit of disney infinity. I tried trap team but never finished it. Giants is still my favorite though
Giants was my introduction and my true love of Skylanders lol
But I have so many memories of playing Disney infinity (2.0 and 3.0) with my sister too, so I just can’t pick which franchise I like best
They were both wonderful haha
How dare you
Personally I feel like a mistake was not doing more with the story of these games. Like you said, they kept doing Kaos as the villain and nothing else, which in itself was repetitive, but there's also the fact all characters have bios with interesting backstories... which are never used in the game proper. Even the Skylander Academy show does absolutely nothing with these backstories, instead just using most characters for cameos while making completely different stories for the ones who do get focus. This had the potential to be as rich in characters as Transformers, and they blew it.
i’m not going to lie if skylanders re released a 7th now i would genuinely break down and spend everything to get it it was my entire childhood and the nostalgia was already there with this video
Skylanders was my childhood, with Swap Force being the first video game I ever played (aside from Minecraft). It doesn't seem to get any attention at all anymore and it's kinda sad to see something that was a big part of my life and my introduction to video games be kind of left behind. Thanks for making this video :)
I'm sure it will make a comeback one day.
It would be really cool if they would keep all the old stuff in mind when it inevitably happens.
Giants was my first Skylanders game
Swap force is awesome! The only minor gripe i have with the game is that the levels are MASSIVE, taking so much more time to complete than seems reasonable, even if you're not trying to collect everything in the level
@@UltraDonny5000 I have made some videos based on the skylanders backstory and history on my channel so if your interested 😊
My personal regrets about the franchise was not being interested in the franchise until Imaginators was announced… which meant I never joined the Skylanders fandom until it was too late.
The fandom hasnt gone anywhere you just need to know where to look. Check out boombringer
imo swap force is the best game which luckily is the one i started with
i think the skylander peak was at giants
It’s never too late, but your wallet would be happier if you joined earlier.
i feel like i joined too late as well, i started at trap team
Loved sky landers as a kid. Before my grandma passed she would watch me play them while she sat in a chair next to me. We’d chat for hours as I completed levels and picked out specific characters she liked. I really hope this series can continue as it’s such a big part in my childhood. Especially playing it on the wii lol
I'm gonna give some props to the Skylanders developers. I recently replayed the first game with my old collection, and I constantly found myself saying "wow, [insert Skylander here] is actually really good here." There was always a situation where one of my Skylanders had a moment to shine. And to have that and make each character forward compatible with all their games is no small feat.
It seems like skylanders was kinda created by accident as they were trying to make a new spyro game but as they released each new skylanders game it became something completely different
I love both spyro and skylanders but apart from spyro being in both games they aren't really connected in any way
The first 3 had a relatively consistent story that connected and built the world. Trap Team was a bit strange, but felt like it still belonged there. After that the writing team just didn't give a shit anymore.
I loved Toys to Life 😭 (also agree that it's messed up from a value perspective). Personally I played Disney Infinity and got into it right around between 2.0 & 3.0 and I have both of those and keep all my figurines and stuff blocks in a small ottoman with other game accessories like old Wii remotes 🥰. I'm sad the genre winked out of existence just as fast as it came. At least, that's how it feels like and I did come into it pretty late.
@@Taydar thank you! I also avoided Skylanders as an original Spyro fan. But secretly at the same time thought it looked really fun, now I kinda wanna try it. Ill think of looking if there's any cheap bundles on Ebay 😂. Add it to my list of things I want like IRL card jitsu cards haha.
I still love playing Disney Infinity! I love the "toybox" sandbox game style and that you can build whatever you want in that one. I finally found out you could download other peoples worlds only *right as* they were shutting down online servers, so I only saved like 2 cool ones that I found 🥲. But heck, such a good game. Building games are one of my fave. I also got the star wars pack even as someone not particularly into star wars, cause I found it at a great discount. I haven't finished the story mode at all but I'm glad I got it :)
Whats your fave thing to do in Disney Infinity? :D
Same! I played 2.0 and 3.0 but I also played Skylanders. I still have all my old figures too... lol
@@MyUsersDark ah thats awesome :)))
The last point about a revival due to nostalgia is something I heavily agree with. At some point during the summer me and a bunch of my friends were on a Discord call talking about old games we missed and I bought up Skylanders, which sparked a two hour long convo about the memories some of us had playing the game and how we would want to see it come back. The nostalgia is already there, and that call alone proves it. Hell, after that call, the next week I dug out my old skylanders and now there are about 12 of them sitting on my shelf.
Personally I wouldn't want to see all of the games come back nor would I want the series to be extended, but I'd love to see the first four games get a remake/remaster. Will seriously bring out the child in me again, when all I focus on now are exams and what my future may look like career-wise.
for me (as a brazilian) it was VERY expensive to play skylanders, I recall that one day that I was in the US in a trip with my parents and they got me two figurines or something, in the line for the cashier there was a kid with at least 20 and he was being 100% chill about getting that, what would cost more than a minimun wage in Brazil.
Oversaturation killed this franchise. The first 3 games were pure magic for me as a growing gamer, but my parents could not standing having to dump in so much money on my Skylander obsession when each Christmas rolled around.
If Skylanders games released every other year as opposed to every year, I bet that we would still have new Skylanders games coming out right now.
Disney Infinity was such a fun an surreal project going through all these areas with mix matched characters
bringing over your skylanders to a friend's house was the peak for skylanders for me, good old times
this game was popular when i was like, 6 to 8, and they gave me some of my first memories about gaming. dang, the nostalgia i get seeing videos about skylanders brings back memories from a time i didnt know i could still remember
I managed to solo beat Giants on Hard way back in the day, that last level legitimately is pretty hard to beat on your own, and is one of my more prouder personal achievements on the 360; also it took me forever to actually find a Ninjini giant
Bro same. I remember boasting in 4th grade like “I have all the giants…… except ninjini”
I always played them at max difficulty.
My little brother got Giants and it was really fun playing together and just messing around with all the characters. Thumpback still sits on one of my shelves as my favorite. We stopped keeping up with it after the trap game, but still have good memories.
HAIL TO THE WHALE!!!
@@aidankeys8534 the last thing they hear before a whale smashes into them like a hydroplaning semi truck
my mum bought me this the year it came out for christmas. i think i got the next 2 games after that. this is the first time ive thought about sky landers since then. my mum died last year so this is really nostalgic as we used to play it together and we would go out looking for the figures together. i’m 21 now😢
It's so interesting. Me and my sister made memories with these games. But to be honest, the reason we stopped playing them entirely was because we couldn't find any new skylanders on the shelves. We had missed the hype, and suddenly weren't interested. I think Imaginators really re-ignited our interest though. I think if we got together we would probably play again. I do miss playing these.
Skylanders wasn't actually the first franchise with the toys to life model, although it was the one that popularised it. I used to play U.B. Funkeys a lot as a kid, a PC game that also had a toys to life model, although being a bit more simplistic in nature. The game released in 2007 and got shut down in 2010, a year before Spyro's Adventure released. I still think back about it with nostalgia every once in a while.
A similar concept was employed by The Eye Of Judgement, although that was in card game form.
Thats right i totally forgot about that game, i used to play it too lol.
Skylanders hits me so hard in the nostalgia. Such a quality game and collection concept. The only issue is storage for the figures. God I miss it
It's funny how the whole "they are really frozen living Skylanders magically transported to Earth, and placing each on the Portal brings them back to life" backstory was largely forgotten. The basic toys-to-life mechanic was so intuitive that even small children got it, and no further justification was really needed.
Skylanders was my childhood, and all the newer TV's we got didn't support the Wii. But recently one of my family members got a new TV and it had plugs to support the Wii. I'd love to revisit the games, because right now, there is a whole bag full of skylanders.
Started my oldest son who was in first grade the second year, gave him the base game for Christmas and Giants for his birthday. He and his younger brother loved the franchise, and as a toy collector I had fun hunting for the figures and getting deals. Once the toys were a year old you could usually get them for half off. It's too bad it took the Netflix series so long to air, finally hitting once the games and toys were an afterthought. It will always be an era I look back on fondly.
Me too.
My son and I had so many great memories like that.
As someone who always wanted to get all of these games and every figure for them and never stopped getting excited over them, the only thing that kept me from doing so was a lack of money. Which is what I feel was the real reason these games died out rather than lack of interest, because not everyone has the money to do all this insane collecting.
Agreed. They became too greedy and it affected the fanbase. It became hard to keep up and as a fan that was demoralizing.
Some of the games could have used more time in development too. It would have probably helped prevent fan burnout.
I was 10 when the original skylanders came out and a lot of my core memories revolve around it. I remember getting a new skylander and taking it to my friends house to show off, we'd finally be able to access that one area we had never seen. I remember entering darklight crypt for the first time. Man I miss those games. My parents wasted so much money on those stupid figures lmao
Damn I remember the good old days. Literally bought every skylander and disney infinity item sold until they shutdown. Glad to have experienced this as a memorable moment in my childhood 🙌
Disney Infinity was shut down, Skylanders wasn't!! It's on a break!!
Man oh man! I remember working for GameStop during the Toy to Life phase. What a time to be alive lol
I loved playing Skylanders when it was still moderately popular and was still in my top interests. Also the first 4 3DS games didn't have Kaos as the main villain, there were new big baddies to take the spot light in those games.
I have so much nostalgia for these games that they will always hold a special place for me. (I have way to many of these figures in storage lol)
Thanks for swinging back and hitting me with my childhood man! Miss these games 😭
Absolutely loved this blast to the past, however I disagree with Skylanders being the first in its genre. I believe this was UB Funkeys, and since no one really talks about that game and it's probably a hidden memory for many, it might be cool to make a video on it too!
I loved funkeys! Begged my mom to buy them when I was younger.
I remember playing that at my friend's house. I barely remember what you did in the, but I remember it was cool
Funkeys certainly fills me with good ol early 2000s nostalgia I got those as a kid but the thing is I played with them like toys.
I never got into Skylanders but I did get into amiibo when it started. I believe the reason it’s still popular is because Nintendo makes the hardware and the developers limit how many amiibo are made so they do not overproduce them. I know my main appeal was the fact that I could official figures for characters like Marth and Shulk. Theses days I just collect my favorites or the ones I find to be the most unique.
Boy, do I fondly remember the Skylanders franchise. My first real exposure to the series was when my brother got the Giants game for Christmas a decade ago, and... I was surprisingly the one who became obsessed with it (maybe to an unhealthy extent). I remember looking forward to the release dates of the following games and Expansion Packs, reading the bios of each Skylander, I was geeking out over scrap of information I could get my hands on whenever I could get it. This would be one of my biggest focuses for half a decade.
Looking back, I can see how a game a year would be exhausting, but I'll still cherish the game for what it was.
The first two were among my favorite games as a kid even though I only ever got one extra figure apart from the starters. They definitely hold a very special place in my heart and I would love to one day replay them and maybe some of the sequels if I manage to get my hands on them + some more figures :)
It should also be said that there were other major factors leading to the fall of the big toys to life games.
Disney's focus on promoting newer properties and lack of legacy franchises on top of just being a generally dull game until 3.0's combat revisions.
Skylanders having game specific gimmicks made it harder to implement them into future entries after Swap Force (honestly the swap gimmick was great, they didn't need to add anything else but they got greedy)
And Lego Dimensions being the most ambitious was also the most expensive because aside from multiple 3rd party IP's, Legos are extremely expensive to make due to their strict quality control. Which is a shame because that one has so much impressive shit and the Portal campaign actually acts as a follow-up to the events of Portal 2 complete with a GladOS end credits song.
There was also Starlink from Ubisoft which not only came out too late but also had the problem of actually giving you LESS content for buying the toys to life version as opposed to the digital version.
Amiibo's success is primarily due to their compatibility being so generalized that their in game implementation doesn't really matter as much, so they can just market themselves as figurines...I was in advertising and marketing classes when this craze was happening.
I remember getting Spyro's Adventure on release.. It was fantastic. I absolutely loved how can I use my Spyro Adventure Skylanders that I got on my PS3.. For my Skylanders Swap Force for the Wii U. And I got to keep my levels and stuff on top. Some games allowed you to carry your progress to sequels, such as LittleBigPlanet or the Trials series. But sadly this is a very rare sight to see in modern gaming, as most games would either give you basic items or just bonus costumes and not much else. I used to miss that "carry progress between games" feature until I came back to it again when it allowed me to carry my maxed Skylanders from game to game, and from console to console. It even gave away codes to use your Skylanders in their phone games or web browser game too.
i often think of how well a new toys to life game would be if it were to come out nowadays, giants was my first game and got every one after it, and still love them to bits, they were a key part of my childhood that i'm never going to forget. heck i'm even gonna play through them all in order again sometime soon, just as soon as i can get all the others from their hiding place haha. very good video and the first of yours that i've seen! thanks for shedding light on this amazing franchise
I loved this series , I constantly played it and it started my entire gaming hobby. I had so, so, so many of the sky landers. Funny enough, my parents barely paid a dime for it. They only payed for the game, my family friend just had to get me a new sky lander every time I saw her. I saw her every week haha.
This game gave me a newfound appreciation for my parents. I never knew these games were pretty much 200+ dollars yet I had pretty much every figure for the first 3 games (minus the series 2-3 figures)
I loved the Skylanders games growing up and Cynder and Spyro were always my favorite characters to use in those games mainly because The Legend of Spyro games were my favorite Spyro games, it always upsets me when people look at those games negatively, it's hard loving a game that everyone seems to hate, it makes me sad.
ah. I loved the games as a kid. I think I played the first 3 or so before growing out of it. Still I remember playing constantly with my brother and always getting excited when I got more characters. I was vaguely aware of the later games, think I played one of them at a friend's place but even so, the first game in particular is something ill never forget.
What a fantastically well made video! I loved every second of it. :)
I own all Skylanders console games and i mostly only bought the characters we liked. Sadly some i never got to buy like Scratch due to stores hardly having new characters anymore which was a shame but i'm still happy to have every Spyro, Cynder and several faves :)
@@kylespevak6781 Sound liek a spyro triology fan.
Fyi im jokeing.It a great game grew up with it i was molded by it and i have all of my skylanderf from when I was a kid.The game is really hard to explain.It a dungeon puzzle crawler game originally but it evolved to greatness and is very hard to explain
@@kylespevak6781 It's a pretty light hearted beat em up with puzzle elements which imo is at it's best when played with a friend. The main gameplay is leveling up and upgrading skylanders' abilities. Sometimes they throw in a (blank) element skylanders are stronger here or a door that can only be unlocked with a specific element.
I feel that one....part of why I never managed to complete my collection is that basically every store that carried games & the toys to life figures gradually started giving 90% of the space to Disney Infinity which in turn ( combined with living in a small town in southern NH....and online being full of scalpers & resellers that I really wish karma would hit nice & hard already ) made it hard to find most figures. I did get lucky with Gamestop a lot though, the guys working at mine at the time managed to track me down both Spotlight & Blackout
I remember seeing advertisements of that as a kid and getting the "rich kid toy" vibes
I never even asked my parents to buy it, I knew it was too expensive even tho I was 10 years old
Same, no poor families had this, and if they did, they screwed their families future
I remember Whamshell was one of the last ones I ever bought and he was my favorite, and I also remember walking to Walmart with enough money to buy a triple pack that I had seen a few days earlier and hidden behind a shelf so I could come back and buy it lol, it was camo, ignitor, and warnado, man what a time.
I was 16 when it came out and a friend in school and I both got super into it. So fun slowly building my collection. I remember not finding Stealth Elf in the shops for ages and I borrowed his.
Not the best use of my working money but I really enjoyed that time. I got out of it by the time Giants rolled around when I was moving out but my little brother still enjoys playing my original Skylanders.
Even though I never played with the toys or played the games or watched the netflix show, I feel nostalgic for this franchise for some reason. Rest in piece Skylanders. And god bless the fans of it.
This explains basically everything about why the franchise died, but Skylanders will always have a place in my heart.💚
I remember being in the demographic of these toys when the first game came out. But my parents were stingy enough to see the scam. So I would go to my rich friend's house and play it there because his parents bought the toys to distract him from their failing marriage. Good times
The rant of all the types of versions and the increasing volume was perfect
Crazy to think that me and my father still have both the first and second games still with all the figures. One of our favorite times was going and looking for these figures but once my ex step mother got a lot more strict and hated me playing video games and dad got lost in his work, we never finished the series past Giants. and kinda the start of me liking more handheld consoles and the internet more than games too but it leaned heavily with my step mothers distaste of those not Just Dance or Wii Sports.
Often times checked the Toy Stores to see if there was a new, cool, Skylander I wanted. Some were there in abundance, whilst others were near-impossible to find xD
You could just come over to a friend and play, or have them bring their Skylander or magic item of choice so you could unlock more content
I think it met it’s end when people realized how much they were spending. I did the math when I came to the end of my Skylanders phase, and I believe that my Skylanders collection ended up costing over 1,000 dollars, and that was just from Giants to Superchargers.
This hits hard, Skylanders were my childhood and i Will always remenber them for that, It was sad when It ended but all things have to come to an end, rip
I loved this game when I was young, thought even back then I thought it was a bit scummy. But the figures were so cool and I could personalize my group in such a satisfying way. I wonder if their is a way to make it less scummy.
It might work better when 3d printers become more common and they can just sell the models and DLC that way.
you would still need to buy the rfid chips for the figure
@@excaliber2845
Still would be cheaper. Either they sell packs of chips that can be programmed through the portal equivalent and slotted into the figures, or the chip is replaced completely by a code and the figures are more decorative.
Thought with that second one it is closer to just printing out game trophies.
Back when ToysRUs was properly still around, I remember walking by the video games and all games for all console were cramped in half an aisle with the other half being the consoles and accessories. Next to it was a full aisle that was nothing but Disney Infinity and Skylanders figures. Man I am certain L&P must have been horrible seeing all the empty cardboard boxes of skylanders lying around. As a young adult, my reason for entering ToysRUs was to get their Lucario "exclusive" amiibo at the time lol
Massive props to skylanders for making a 99.9% Original Character based game with only spyro to help kick it off.
Technically, Skylanders was my first ever “spyro game” lol, I thought he was an OC too at the time
The toy designs were fun, the characters all felt different.
Drobot was my favourite too, alongside other dragons like whirlwind and cynder.
I only ever got up second game, Giants, before my fixation stopped. And I’m pretty sure I fixated HARD on this expensive ass, battery guzzling game as a kid XD (the portal of power for the Wii was insane for batteries..)
I remember spending hours and hours of all my free time as a kid glued to skylanders, getting my sister or parents to play with me since it could be 2 player co-op and I remember even making OCs for it!
First game? Was absolutely in love, played it a lot, still not 100% on my collection nor the content (challenges, etc)
Second game? Eh? Didn’t charm me as much, but was still fun.
I remember thinking how gimmicky and sell-out-y the new releases were and eventually just stopped even catching up on info- I never new Boswer got a cameo in one, for instance. Never saw them for sale much after the trap one either.
Still have the toys I have, still cherish the memories stored within them, big part of my childhood.
My good night this was a nostalgia boost i played all three of the toys to life games. i remember getting the first Skylanders game in 3rd grade and now I'm about to graduate High School. I also remember building worlds with my younger brothers in Disney Infinity and having a blast. Lego Dementions i also loved but eventuly lost all of the peices. I think Skylanders picked at Swap Force but then slowly felt the magic fade.
I totally got into Skylanders. The idea of Spyro the Dragon in a fantasy world where you get so many playable characters intrigued me. I was into it during the rise. One thing's for certain, they created a Pug Dragon.
This was a really interesting video about a part of the gaming market that I was only faintly aware of. It really feels like something that was just present in the background of some of my memories. Maybe it's because I was already a young adult when they came out, but I barely remember seeing these games in the stores.
This game no kidding made my child hood and i can not emphasize enough how much of an impact games 1-4 had on my younger self
really well made mad and i miss this series so much
My favorite moment from Swap Force was during one of the final bosses. Basically she would disappear every now and then, then you'd hear her voice coming from the portal. I didn't even notice it had speakers.
Anyways you can probably guess where she was.
That was such a twist!
The boss on Superchargers was such a shocker when he came back; my son and I were just talking about that the other day.
You mean Swap-Force?
@@thehydrationman5500 Yes. Fixed.
@@thekoifishcoyote8762 She is the penultimate boss in the game. Kaos is the actual final boss.
@@thehydrationman5500 It's been a while, OK?
I think I was just outside the targeted demographic to have been part of this whole craze. So I’m detached enough to say: respect the hustle. If your singular goal in life is to make money, then this is how you do it.
the memories coming in from this are crazy
Funny that this popped into my recommendations. I was just cleaning out some old boxes and found my PS3 stuff, each and every one of my old skylanders that I played on Giants and Swap force. I had a 1 armed chopchop, and he was easily my favorite to play.
man this series has so many memories in my childhood. I hope they can bring the games back in some way without betraying the fanbase. RIP
For me, my cousin got giants, and I played a bit and fell in love. So I got swap force the next year and liked it, but honestly, I wasn't in love with it. When the trap team came out, though, I absolutely fell in love with it. I was 8 when it came out but I still managed to get through most of the game and absolutely loved everything about it and I've been replaying each skylanders game and I skipped ahead to just do the first level of trap team, and I remembered why I loved it so much. It's just a straight-up good game. The same can't be said for superchargers, though. I got it and didn't get far since it was just kinda boring. And when I saw imaginators, I thought it was such a cool concept but I was just burnt out and decided to pass on it and wait for the next game... Little did I know that next game never came and I ended up being sad I missed out on imaginators
aye, i havent played any of the games but when i was smaller used to watch cutscenes, boss battles, some gameplay from it, and had figures. swap force did seem like an afterthought and trap team was honestly very cool along with giants.
bless my dad for putting up with me when i was little. i couldnt imagine my kid asking for a 11 dollar toy for a video game everytime we went to target
This was the first video game I really got into with my little brother. I was pretty sporty at the time and he has severe autism. We loved each other but we didn't have a lot in common. That was until we got an XBOX 360 and Skylanders for christmas in 2011. We were only allowed to play on weekends but still racked up hundreds of hours, and agreed to never play by ourselves. Our favorite character by far was Drobot and would play rock paper scissors to see who would get to play with him that day. Such good times.
I was actually one of the very first RUclipsrs to post "Let's Play" videos of the first Skylanders game, and I too was initially drawn to it because it featured Spyro, who I loved from the PS1 era games.
I thought the game was fun enough, I liked the look of most the figurines, and I thought most of the characters were fun to play as. They did a good job giving the different characters various abilities to make them play differently from one-another.
I do have some issues with the series though. First thing, the whole "Toys to life" concept was dead on arrival because they're figurines, not toys. You can't actually play with these things, and I wish that you could. I think they should have made these actual pose-able toys that could be removed from their stands to play with. It's what made Lego Dimensions superior, because at the end of the day, when you got bored with the game, you still had these awesome lego figures to play with.
Second, yeah, annual releases were a real problem, especially as they demanded that you buy more and more figurines with each one. They should have made new figures a bi-annual thing, at least, where you have either a gap year between games or have a game that doesn't require purchasing new figurines. Forcing people to not only buy a game every year, but also spend lots of cash on the new figurines was a real big issue, especially for parents who were being forced to keep buying more figurines for each of these games.
Dude this was a really good video and one I've been waiting for someone to make. This was really well put together, hope to see more of your content soon!
just recently had to return to my childhood room to clean out all my old stuff to make room for a baby room and in my closet i found my entire collection of skylanders with the portal and everything alongside my old xbox 360, one of the strongest waves of nostalgia ive ever had.
i found mighty beans and bayblades also
The memories have been flooding back. I completely forgot how much I loved skylanders as a a kid. I didn't realize how much I missed it.
I wanted to play this game so bad but when my dad got it for me for Christmas my wii was stolen and I was so sad
I worked in electronics at Toys R Us when Skylanders first came out and I absolutely hated it. To this day I have zero respect for Activision and refuse to purchase any of their products because they made our lives a living hell with their release windows and limited supply of Skylanders figurines. They knew exactly what they were doing, and didn't care about the workers who suffered because of it, or the kids who were disappointed by their new favourite character being sold out within an hour. Screw Activision. They single-handedly made one of my favourite jobs one of the worst experiences of my life. They knowingly caused
And that's not even mentioning the shitty parents who would swarm the store on release day, pushing and shoving, being incredibly rude, leaving their kids in the department for me to "babysit" while they shopped the rest of the store, trying to buy 10 of the same figurine for all their friends. Everything about Skylanders fills me with absolute rage. It brought out the absolute worst out of every customer I encountered in that store and I haven't given Activision a single dime in over a decade as a result.
Ultimately it's that exact greed and limiting of supplies that caused the Skylanders downfall. They continued to be incredibly greedy and the franchise died because of it. Parents just got sick of it and I don't blame them.
bro i haven’t subscribed to someone in years thank you for some seamingly fresh content ive been watching your channel for hours now 💯