My Pitch for a Skylanders Revival game:
everybody and their mother who was in love with this series has done something like this, but fuck it ive got ideas too. here is what i think a revival of the series should aim to achieve:
1. an evolution of the toys to life mechanic that has the quality of the social aspect of sharing toys, but less of the financial burden and fear of toy decay.
2. a reason to put all of the skylanders from spyros adventure to imaginators back on shelves and in quantities that would prevent price hiking.
3. a story that not just revives the series for a single game (i.e. new self contained gimmick) but one that breathes life back into the entire series.
so with all that said, heres my pitch:
Title: Skylanders Returns (in a similar vein as donkey kong country returns)
Character Roster: instead of having a set of gimmick characters, some new skylanders, and some returning skylanders, the roster of this game will mostly prioritise the return of characters who have never gotten a series 2 and bringing back old gimmick characters. each element will get one new character, and then a representative from each game in the series, totalling in 7 characters per element. here are my choices:
Magic - new base magic skylander, voodood series 2, ninjini series 2, hoot loop series 2, enigma series 2, splat series 2, buckshot series 2
Earth - new base earth skylander, dinorang series 2, crusher series 2, doom stone series 2, head rush series 2, smash hit series 2, barbella series 2
Water - new base water skylander, slam bam series 3, thumpback series 2, wash buckler series 2, snap shot series 2, diveclops series 2, king pen series 2
Fire - new base fire skylander, sunburn series 2, hot head series 2, blast zone series 2, wildfire series 2, spitfire series 2, flare wolf series 2
Tech - new base tech skylander, boomer series 2, bouncer series 2, spy rise series 2, gearshift series 2, high volt series 2, ro bow series 2
Undead - new base undead skylander, ghost roaster series 2, eye brawl series 2, rattle shake series 2, krypt king series 2, fiesta series 2, pit boss series 2
Air - new base air skylander, sonic boom series 3, swarm series 2, free ranger series 2, gusto series 2, stormblade series 2, wild storm series 2
Life - new base life skylander, stump smash series 3, tree rex series 2, gorilla drilla series 2, bushwhack series 2, thrillipede series 2, chompy mage series 2
Light - new base light skylander, spotlight series 2, new light giant, new light swapper, knight light series 2, astroblast series 2, aurora series 2
Dark - new base dark skylander, blackout series 2, new dark giant, new dark swapper, knight mare series 2, nightfall series 2, starcast series 2
Plot: at skylanders academy, eon senses a great terror threatening all of skylands. we see the previous hub worlds from the past games all being corrupted by black shadows, not dissimilar to what happened while the core of light was destroyed. the game sees you play highlights of levels from previous skylanders games, remixed to accomodate for giants and other gimmick characters, uncovering the lingering affects of kaos’s magic. kaos is not the villain but reluctantly helps, also unsure of why his actions long past are still lingering.
Mechanics: skylanders can be read either with a portal of power or the consoles native NFC reading capabilities, if it has any. once a skylander is read, it’s save file is uploaded to the game and can be selected from a menu at any time. a single skylander figure has no limit of how many consoles it can be put on. 4 player online and couch co-oo supported, with no limit on how far players can be from one another with the exception that players cannot load new rooms if the other players arent within a certain range. series 2 skylanders get new upgrade paths, with third upgrade paths being accessible to all returning skylanders. all previous skylanders are backwards compatible.
Portal Pack: it would be to have a collection of skylanders included with the portal pack that has never been seen before, so here’s what the past games have done:
- magic, water, tech
- life, undead, air
- water, fire, life
- water, life
- fire, life
- water, earth
it seems that magic, undead, tech and earth are the types that have been in the portal pack the least, excluding light and dark who have never appeared. so heres my pitch, for an insane deal to surely get people to buy the portal pack:
four skylanders figures - the new base magic skylander, bouncer series 2, rattle shake series 2, and head rush series 2.
Digital/Non-Portal disks: assuming the game comes out digitally on console stores and on steam, i think these versions should also come with skylanders accessible digitally. in an attempt to keep the toys to life magic, physical copies of the game without the portal will come with two cards with NFC chips that each unlock a skylander when pressed against either a portal of power or an NFC reader, or there will be a short code to type in if no reader is available. digital game owners will simply receive this code. the code will unlock a light and a dark skylander - spotlight series 2, and the new dark giant.
with the release of this game, all main skylanders will be rereleased into stores. none of the special variants, just so that rarity is kept, excluding only the dark skylanders from each game. they will be released in equal quantity and at reduced prices the older the game is, as the older the skylander the less moves they have available to them of course.
this is like insane, crackpot, pie in the sky dreaming stuff here… but i do think this is the way to maximise interest in the series again after reviving it. make all the games accessible again, make all the toys accessible again, and don’t introduce new audiences to too many gimmicks and expensive new figures. make it the most accessible game possible while still retaining as much as the toys to life aspect that gives the games its core appeal
