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Skylanders: Swap Force

by Neal Ronaghan - June 12, 2013, 11:48 pm EDT
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The third Skylanders game appears to be a bigger leap than the second.

For the next Skylanders adventure, Skylanders: Swap Force, the characters journey to a new area, Cloudbreak Island, with a new developer, Vicarious Visions. The results so far are enough to make me excited for the October launch on Wii U (and Wii, which is a port handled by Beenox).

The most impressive thing from Swap Force, is, honestly, the fact that you can jump. We've known about it since the game's January reveal, but it's still that I keep smiling about when I actually play the game. I loved the first two Skylanders games, but the lack of jumping was always something that stood out. The reason it was excluded was touched on during a presentation at Activision's booth. Basically, Toys for Bob thought that jumping made each playable character too similar, since the action is similar. Instead, they focused on attacks to differentiate the characters.

Jumping doesn't change the flow of the game much, though, as I learned in the E3 demo, which showed off a mission in a jungle setting. It had all the Skylanders staples: hidden areas, collectables, elemental focuses, and more. What jumping does is just give you an added feeling of maneuverability, which also translates well with the new Swap Zones, where you can move through certain areas of the game using powers from the new Swap Force characters. I got to play one of these sections, which put me in the shoes of Wash Buckler who used his octopus legs to climb up a wall while avoiding obstacles. It's a new style of playing that adds to the variety of gameplay styles to the series.

The demo didn't show much more, though I was able to tool around with swapping Wash Buckler and Magna Charge, two of the new Skylanders. I could make them Wash Charge or Magna Buckler with an easy switch of their tops. I also played as Series 3 Stealth Elf and Crusher, one of the giants from last year's Skylanders Giants.

I did notice some Nintendo Network integration. On the GamePad, I could switch to something on the menu that would lead to a high score table, meaning players can easily compare their scores and times for levels with friends.

And that's not all. All Skylanders can now go up to level 20, and each part of the swappable characters is upgradeable. So, the top half of Stink Bomb, the stealthy ninja skunk, has a different upgrade path than the bottom. If you want to hear some other delicious Skylanders names, I also saw Nightshift, an undead vampire boxer; Free Ranger, a storm chicken who can turn into a tornado; Freeze Blade, a water-based ice-skate wearing being; and Star Strike, a new magic element.

It's not all sunshine though, as some modes and items are going away. The awesome football-inspired multiplayer is getting axed, because apparently no one played it. That breaks my heart as that was my favorite multiplayer mode. Also, the Adventure Packs from Spyro's Adventure no longer produce extra levels. However, Swap Force will have two new Adventure Packs and two new Battle Packs.

With 16 Swap Force characters and 16 new Skylanders characters, alongside a variety of new poses of characters from the past two games, the Skylanders series will have enough new content to keep ardent fans happy. As one of those fans, I'm looking forward to October to get my hands on this title.

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WiiU

Game Profile

Skylanders: Swap Force Box Art

Genre Action
Developer Vicarious Visions
Players1 - 2

Worldwide Releases

na: Skylanders: Swap Force
Release Oct 13, 2013
PublisherActivision
RatingEveryone 10+
eu: Skylanders: Swap Force
Release Oct 18, 2013
PublisherActivision
aus: Skylanders SWAP Force
Release Oct 16, 2013
PublisherActivision
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