Skylanders Giants Starter Pack - Exclusive Glow in the Dark Edition Xbox-360

Released on 19-Oct-2012

• Ninjini joins Skylanders Giants line-up

  The final new character for Activision's runaway hit Skylanders Giants is out this week. Ninjini is a giant character, and belongs to the magic element.

  According to Activision, she's "the most renowned magical ninja from ancient times" and her backstory has an Arabian Nights feel. "Jealous of her skills as a warrior, a dark sorceress trapped her within an enchanted bottle to be imprisoned for all of eternity," reads the official character biography. "But Ninjini was strong and over the years, her strength continued to grow until through sheer force of will, she broke free! From that moment on, Ninjini made it her mission to help those in need always carrying the enchanted bottle as a reminder of her own resilience."

  Skylanders Giants was released last November and was a roaring success, earning almost $200m in America alone. The toys, which come to life in the game when placed on the "portal of power" outsell the likes of WWE and Star Wars, and Giants made more money than blockbuster kid flicks such as Wreck It Ralph and Rise of the Guardians.

  The next entry in the series will be Skylanders SWAP Force, due later this year. It will feature toys that can be split in half and recombined to create hybrid characters.

  Published: 10/05/2013

• Video game board games on the way

  Board game company USAopoly has reached out across the digital divide and will be bringing some of our fave video game properties to the world of dice and plastic pieces.

  Among the upcoming titles are Trivial Pursuit: World of Warcraft, Monopoly: Skylanders and Risk: Plants vs Zombies. The most promising of the bunch would seem to be a "Galaxy at War Edition." of Risk: Mass Effect. For old school retroheads, there'll also be Yahtzee: Pac-Man and Jenga Space Invaders.

  This isn't the first time USAopoly has dipped into the digital realm for variations on beloved games. You can already get Risk: Halo and Risk: Starcraft, not to mention Monopoly: Sonic the Hedgehog. The new games will be launched in America later this year before hopefully making their way around the world.

  What do you think? Would you switch off your console to play Mass Effect around the kitchen table?

  Published: 12/02/2013

• SONY's Journey dominates DICE Awards

  Journey, the stunning ambient explore-em-up from designer Jenova Chen, swept the board at the annual DICE Awards. Voted for by the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences, the awards are the closest thing the games industry has to the Oscars, although the ceremony inevitably involves less dance numbers.

  Already a favourite with critics and a top selling game on SONY's PlayStation Network, Journey took home eight awards, including the big three: Game of the Year, Outstanding Achievement in Game Direction and Outstanding Innovation in Gaming.

  No other game came close to Journey's haul, but several games came away with multiple awards. The brutally brilliant XCOM: Enemy Unknown took home prizes for best strategy/simulation game as well as Outstanding Achievement in Gameplay Engineering. Microsoft's Halo 4 also took home two gongs, for Outstanding Achievement in Visual Engineering and Outstanding Achievement in Connectivity.

  Topping off a 2012 that was stuffed with superb titles across all genres, the exuberant Borderlands 2 was crowned Action Game of the Year, while Need for Speed: Most Wanted took the prize for best racing game and Mass Effect 3 was dubbed best role-playing game. Skylanders Giants beat Lego Batman 2 and Nintendo Land for Family Game of the Year, while PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale provided an upset in the fighting game category, as SONY's character crossover mash-up beat such genre mainstays as Tekken Tag Tournament 2 and Street Fighter X Tekken.

  Telltale Games' gruelling episodic adventure series The Walking Dead, based on the hit comic, also won big. It was awarded Adventure Game of the Year, and also took home honours for story and voice acting.

  Published: 08/02/2013

• New Skylanders game, Swap Force, coming this Autumn

  Given the soaraway success of the Skylanders series, which has dominated the kids gaming market for the past two Christmasses, it's no surprise that Activision is preparing another entry for later this year.

  Skylanders: Swap Force is the title and it introduces a new kind of toy to the franchise. These come in two halves and, as the name suggests, can be taken apart and recombined in new forms to mix and match your powers in the game. The toys themselves are held together with magnets, and will need a new Portal of Power to unlock their abilities. All the previous Skylanders figures will be compatible with the new portal.

  Also incoming for the sequel are eight new Lightcore toys, sixteen brand new Skylanders characters and sixteen new toys of existing characters. That'll be Santa's wish list sorted then.

  The game follows Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure and Skylanders Giants, both of which sold in huge numbers. You can already get Skylanders lunchboxes and children's books. Activision has admitted it's considering movies and TV shows using the characters.

  Skylanders: Swap Force will be released later this year for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii U, 3DS and Wii.
  

  Published: 05/02/2013

• Bigger And Better: Skylanders Giants Will Stomp All Over The Charts

  
  

  

  What was the best-selling new game of 2011? LA Noire? Or Dead Island, perhaps? Nope. It was actually Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure, an oddity of a game that became an overnight phenomenon. The first game was able to surprise people who didn't know what to expect from a game starring forgotten gaming mascot Spyro the Dragon. The concept of placing real world toys directly into the game had to be seen to be believed. Now, with the the sequel Skylanders Giants set for release this week, expectations are much higher. Will Activision be able to meet them? It certainly looks that way.

  If you've never played Skylanders, the premise is as simple as it is magical. Rather than swapping characters using a menu or button press, you physically change them over in the real world by placing the special Skylanders toys on the Portal of Power, which connects to your console (don't worry - the Portal comes in every Starter Pack). That character then appears in the game. Most impressively, each toy uses contact-free technology to store gameplay stats and other information, so you can take your own powered-up toys to a friend's house and drop them into their game.

  

  It's an idea that immediately wowed kids all over the world, and as the name suggests Skylanders Giants is aiming to be both bigger and better. There are sixteen new character toys to collect this time around, and eight of them are twice the size of their Skylander pals. These giants are not only double-sized in toy form, they appear as giants in the game as well, capable of unleashing even more powerful attacks, and using their immense strength to alter the scenery by throwing vast boulders or pulling floating sky islands together.

  

  Show Your Character

  Among them are the aptly named Crusher, an armoured rock creature wielding an enormous hammer, and Swarm, a giant bee-themed fighter. Tree Rex is, as you'd expect, the sort of wooded warrior who would give Ewoks nightmares and comes in the Giants' Starter and Booster packs. Of the normal Skylanders, the trend for weird and wonderful designs hasn't changed. ShroomBoom, for example, is a catapult-wielding mushroom cyclops. There's even a little something for those who remember Spyro from his older adventures - Cynder, the female dragoness first introduced in the 2006 game, Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning, is joining the Skylanders line-up.

  

  Those aren't the only new additions to the roster though. Joining the normal Skylanders and the Giants are the new Lightcore characters. These toys light up and glow as they get closer to the portal, and their illuminated forms offer secret in-game abilities too.

  As with the original Skylanders toys, they look fantastic. These aren't cheap throwaway things, but solidly made and charmingly sculpted collector's items. The designs are incredibly fun, and even without the game it's easy to see why kids are hoarding them.

  

  Giant-Sized Gameplay

  New toys are one thing, but creating a game to contain them is another matter entirely. Emboldened by the success of the first game, developer Toys For Bob has been able to expand the gameplay in lots of directions. Most notably, character toys from the first game are still compatible with the sequel, so fans can continue to use their favourite figures with all the powers and customisations they're used to.

  The two-player battle mode has been improved, with more intricate and interactive arenas, and the Elemental Zones unique to each character class - earth, fire, water and so on - are also more ambitious in scope this time around. There are also new character challenges, giving players more gameplay options for each toy, and even greater crossover with the free Skylanders Universe browser game. Certainly, parents looking for a cost-effective Christmas present are going to be happy with something that is both toy and video game in one, with bonus online content as well.

  And, of course, there's the console game itself, in which this bizarre cast of characters explore cleverly designed levels, battling enemies with their unique powers, and finding secrets. Accessible for kids, but also charming fun for grown-ups as well, don't be surprised to find Skylanders Giants giving the likes of Call of Duty: Black Ops II a run for its money in the Christmas charts.

  Published: 17/10/2012

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