Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure Review: Bring Them To Life!

Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure Review

This review is of the Nintendo 3DS version.

Get ready to power up the Portal of Power and bring your Skylanders to life to save the Skylands in this action adventure title. For those who don’t know Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure comes with a starter pack that includes 3 toy characters and the Portal of Power. As the story goes an evil tyrant has frozen them and banished them to earth and it is our job to place them back on the Portal of Power and send them back to the Skylands. So when you put the game in and start it up it will tell you to activate the Portal of Power and at that time you will place one of the toy characters on the portal. It is at that time that you will send them into the game.

It’s a very interesting concept especially as you physically have the toys in front of you to watch as it transforms them into the game. I must say that I find myself to geek out over this process and find it to be a rather neat idea that’s fun to participate in. Once you activate the Portal of Power and transfer your Skylanders into the game their isn’t much use for the portal except to transfer Skylanders in and out of the game. Your starter kit will come with three characters and you can purchase an additional 30 characters if you so choose. You can only have two characters at a time in the Skylands, so if you want to switch out one of the characters you will have to do so via the Portal of Power.

Another one of the interesting aspects about this whole process is that when you play Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure on your home console or 3DS your character will remember all of its stats and remain at it’s level from where you left off. So if you wanted to take your toy character and play it at a friends or on another console version then you can do so and still have the same character experience and level that you had while playing it on your console. Therefore, you can go hang out with a friend and use their Portal of Power to send in your character for some co-op or player vs. player action. That is another one of the cooler things about the toys and the Portal of Power.

When it comes to playing the game I found it also to be quite fun and entertaining. You start out in the Sanctuary, which is the only place in the Skylands that you are safe from the evil doer Hektore. In the Sanctuary you will be led through many portals to different parts of the Skylands to try and take back the crystals that Hektore has taken. Each portal that you travel through has 5 levels within it for you to complete and each one of those levels has 5 crystals for you to get back. You get back these crystals by doing certain challenges while you play the level. This ranges from collecting items and killing a certain amount of specific enemies. Also, the final level of each portal has a mystic seeker that can help you in your quest, but you will have to rescue said mystic in order to secure their assistance. You will also need to collect a certain number of crystals table to unlock the next portal area, so if you don’t collect most of the crystals you will not be able to continue on in the game.

The gameplay in Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure is actually pretty fun. This will vary for a lot of us depending on what Skylander we end up choosing as each character plays differently. I liked using Dark Spyro and Ignitor as my two main characters during the game. Mostly I used Dark Spyro as I enjoyed his features a lot more. His attacks and special powers felt really good to me and the way he handles fit the way I liked playing best. He can glide around a little bit more with his wings compared to marching around on foot. Like I said earlier, you may only have two Skylanders in the world at one time and where this comes in handy is while you are playing. If your health runs out while playing with your main Skylander then your second Skylander will appear and take over. So you are not out of luck if you die while playing and have to start over the level. Another big factor is that you can revive your other Skylander so you can bring him back and use him again.

As you play through each level there are a lot of items for you to collect and the main item is radiance. This item is used for many things throughout the game and if you have enough while you are playing through the level it is also what is used to be able to revive a fallen Skylander. However, as you play through the level you will collect as much of it as possible as it is also what gives you experience points in order to level up your characters. In each portal area there is also one level in which it is basically set up like a battle area where you just fight and collect radiance as it will have a goal amount for you to collect until you can move on. As you level up your characters you will be able to unlock new abilities for them to use in battle.

Most of the levels are of fairly good size as you make your way through them and each has a few different ways for you to go though that are mostly linear. It has your basic platformer elements for you to progress past while fighting a good amount of enemies which vary from portal to portal. I had a lot of fun fighting the enemies as well. There are some easy battles, but there are certainly some big and tough ones that will challenge you. Also, as you go through each level and try to achieve the challenges to collect the crystals there will be a point at which Hektore will show up. A countdown will begin that will warn you of his impending arrival. If he arrives it is game over for you. So you will need to race against the clock to try and accomplish the challenges before that happens. However, as you play you will come across clocks that you can collect that will add time to the countdown; therefore, giving you extra seconds to try and achieve your goals.

Overall I liked the levels as they had some good elements to them but they also had some frustrating ones and you may come across some challenging moments in timing your jumps right with moving obstacles. This was another reason I liked playing with Dark Spyro as his gliding ability assisted my jumping a little bit more. Also, I really enjoyed the visuals in each level and there are some nice 3D effects as well. There is one level that I particularly liked in which this was more noticeable than the others. But visually the game really is pretty nice on the eye while you are playing. It also has some decent music throughout the game to enjoy.

I had a really good and enjoyable time playing through Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure. It is fun and unique due to the Portal of Power. It has good gameplay elements with fun characters to use and level up. The game did come off as a little easy though and was not always the most challenging. However, there where certainly moments that I had difficulties progressing past, but it wasn’t often that I had time run out on me. But I certainly did find myself lucky on a few occasions while racing the clock.

In the end, this is a fun title with good gameplay and it provides you with an interesting, yet fun experience. The challenges aren’t the most difficult, but they still do provide you with another layer of entertainment as you progress through the levels. There are plenty of items to collect while playing as well, which includes collectables for your characters with the main collectable being a hat for your character to wear.

If you do plan on buying more of the character toys you will have further realms to explore outside of what you get in the starter pack. Making this an added bonus in my oppinion.

Score: 4/5