Skylanders: SuperChargers

Genre: Action-RPG / 3D Platformer / Kart Racing

Players: 1-2 Co-Op / Competitive (Local), 2-4 Competitive (Online)

Game Company Bad Behavior Profile Page: Activision Blizzard

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Review:

Note: Are you confused by all this “Toys to Life” stuff? Check out eShopperReviews’ helpful guide here!

Skylanders: SuperChargers is a family-friendly Action-RPG with 3D Platformer and Kart Racing elements released in 2015 on mobile devices, PC, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, Xbox One, and Wii U, with an entirely separate Kart Racing game called Skylanders: SuperChargers Racing released on Wii and Nintendo 3DS the same year. This is the fifth game in the Skylanders franchise, the series that started the “Toys to Life” craze that has largely died out by 2022, save for Nintendo’s own Amiibos, which continue to linger on. Much like Amiibos, Skylanders figurines have NFC chips in the figurines, which can be read by a “Portal” device that connects to your Wii U via a USB port.

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Getting Started

For those wondering about what additional toys/gadgets/doodads you’ll need to get to enjoy this game, know that in order to play this game, you need to get a compatible Skylanders portal – specifically, a Wii U-compatible Skylanders Portal from Swap Force or later games (portals from Spyro’s Adventure and Giants will not work with this game). This includes portals made for the PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, and Wii platforms (not the 3DS, Xbox 360, or Xbox One platforms though – those won’t work). The Wii U Trap Team portal is highly recommended, as this is the only portal that works with all Wii U games in the series.

You will also need at least one compatible Skylanders figurine (this game only works with Spyro’s Adventure, Giants, Swap Force, Trap Team, SuperChargers, and Eon’s Elite figurines) – Different figurines have different abilities, and some types of figurines are required to access certain areas or get bonuses in some areas, but no specific figurine is required to play the game.

In addition, this game requires that players have at least one Skylanders SuperCharger vehicle, and specifically players need to have a land-type vehicle.

In addition, Traptanium Trap figurines from Trap Team and Adventure Pack figurines from Spyro’s Adventure can supposedly be used to get bonus items in the game, though I haven’t been able to test the latter.

Finally, if you want to play this game’s multiplayer Co-Op, you’ll need at least two Skylanders figurines.

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SuperCharged Performance, or Stalling at the Starting Line?

Of course the first big question with any Skylanders game is what the new “gimmick” for the toys is, and this time, the Skylanders toys are joined by vehicles that players can swap out. These vehicles are used in various parts of the game, as well as in a Kart Racing mode that both forms a part of the main adventure, as well as being a different gameplay mode on the main menu.

Before moving on, I need to bring up four figures made exclusively for the Nintendo platform versions of the game: Donkey Kong and Bowser Skylanders, and Barrel Blaster and Clown Cruiser vehicles (the Wii U version comes with a Donkey Kong Skylander and Barrel Blaster vehicle, and the Wii and Nintendo 3DS versions of the game come with a Bowser Skylander and Clown Cruiser vehicle). As you might guess, these exclusive Skylanders toys are only usable with Nintendo versions of Skylanders SuperChargers. However, the Donkey Kong and Bowser figurines have an extra bonus – they also double as Amiibo figurines. By turning the base of the figurine, players can change the figure so it scans as either an Amiibo or a Skylander, a really nice bonus.

As for the game itself, Skylanders SuperChargers doesn’t have the same sort of polish and visual fidelity that Swap Force and Trap Team did. The water and lighting effects I complimented in those games aren’t nearly as impressive here. In their place is a good sense of speed and large areas for players to ride their vehicles in strewn throughout the game, something of a tradeoff. Of course, the game still features the series’ signature excellent 3D character designs and animations as well. On balance, I think this is a visual step down from the previous two games, but it’s not without its good points too.

And of course, once again, topping all of this off is a wonderful orchestral soundtrack and some absolutely fantastic voice acting from well-known veterans like Richard Steven Horvitz and Patrick Warburton.

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Charging Into New Territory

By this point in the life cycle of the Skylanders series, I think it’s fair to say that many saw the franchise as getting into something of a rut. Despite that recent entries in the series were, in my opinion, the best that the Skylanders franchise had yet seen, the series as a whole was starting to feel somewhat samey, with repetitive gameplay and nothing to truly shake up the status quo. The vehicles in this game seem to be a clear attempt at doing just that.

As it happens, about half of the action in Skylanders: SuperChargers still follows the traditional Skylanders formula of Action-RPG gameplay with some Platforming and a focus on exploration and combat. However, interspersed with these sections are land, air, and water vehicle sections that infuse the gameplay with a ton of variety.

Unlike previous Skylanders games, you can’t just opt out of these sections because you don’t have the requisite toy. At the very least, the Wii U version of the game absolutely requires you to have a ground vehicle to play the game, and while there are ways to bypass parts of the game involving the other vehicle types, those bypasses generally require the use of the ground vehicle.

These vehicle sections are mostly a ton of fun – racing areas are simple yet fast-paced and enjoyable, flight sections make for a great simple and cartoony Flight Combat Sim, and water vehicle sections… okay, I wasn’t able to test those, but I would guess they’re probably fine. However, on occasion in land vehicle sections you won’t be driving on a race course but exploring an area, and the controls in these sections are atrocious, with your vehicle controlling relative to the camera rather than the vehicle, with no way to change this. What’s more, some sections wrest control of the vehicle from you if you try to double back to pick up a missed item, something that’s really frustrating.

And once again, the lack of camera control bites this series in the rear, and it’s most noticeable in the roaming vehicle segments, where the camera’s position can make it more difficult to judge how to aim the vehicle in the direction you want. This results in terrible, clumsy controls.

It’s a shame that the quality here is all over the place, because the Kart Racing in this game is delightful, with some absolutely phenomenal and wildly inventive track design, and the split between three different vehicles makes it feel a lot like Diddy Kong Racing, with this comparison being underlined further by the attached adventure mode and the presence of Donkey Kong himself, with Diddy even taking up the sidecar position when D.K. sits in his signature vehicle. The mechanics here aren’t as deep as something like a Mario Kart game, but it’s a lot of fun all the same.

Having said that, this game makes multiplayer play needlessly difficult. Players can jump straight to the racing from the main menu, but doing so only allows for online multiplayer matches (with completely abandoned lobbies, sadly). Likewise, players can still play co-op together during the adventure mode. In order to race competitively, players must reach the point in the adventure mode where this feature unlocks as a part of that mode, and then select it while already playing in two-player co-op. Why such a feature would be made so needlessly difficult to access is a complete mystery to me.

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Should You Charge Ahead and Get This Game?

All things considered, Skylanders: SuperChargers presents players with a lot of fun and an outstanding amount of variety, but it’s also kinda’ a hot mess, nowhere near as polished as Trap Team or especially Swap Force. The need to have a specific type of Skylanders toy for the first time in series history, the way the game makes it absurdly difficult to race against a friend in couch co-op, the way the game fights the player for control in some sections of the game… it feels like this game probably needed a bit more time in playtesting to work out some of its odd and frustrating quirks. However, it finally does what many Skylanders players had been saying the series needed for years – it changes up the series formula, for better or worse. And despite all its issues, it is still a delightfully fun game, well worth playing, if you’re willing to put up with those frustrations and eccentricities.

tl;dr – Skylanders: SuperChargers is the fifth game in this Toys-to-Life series, a family-friendly Action-RPG with Platformer and Kart Racing elements that actually shakes up the Skylanders formula somewhat for the first time in series history. Everything here is still fun and there’s a wonderful amount of variety, but there’s also a lot of odd problems that really should have been ironed out before the game was released, including a requirement that players have a specific type of Skylanders toy to play, a multiplayer competitive mode that’s absurdly convoluted to access, and sections of the game that fight the player for control. This is still a game that’s well worth playing, especially for Skylanders fans, but it definitely comes with its fair share of issues too.

Grade: B

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