darkSpyro

...does it ever get filled? The one I'm talking about is the one that is next to the Kaos statue. I would imagine that there would be some sort of other statue there. If so, how do you acquire it?

A large golden statue of Flynn should appear there after you collect the Legendary Treasure in the Nightmare Express.

By the way...speaking of open areas, you know how when you start the game, you spawn next to the rigt of the Wanted Villain Posters? What;s that open space toward the right of spawn?

Pretty sure it's nothing,you just activate one or two Legendary Treasures from there,but the docks don't seem to ever have anything on their own as far as I know. Same for the Turret Tower.

Ugh, the turret room is completely pointless. Clearly they didn't have a enough time to put, ya know, THE TURRET IN!

With the bug testing the game had I think that TFB was forced by Acti to rush the game out of the door. And since Acti hates patches for this series not even something as simple as reusing models from Skyhighlands would happen.

Quote: Bifrost

With the bug testing the game had I think that TFB was forced by Acti to rush the game out of the door. And since Acti hates patches for this series not even something as simple as reusing models from Skyhighlands would happen.

It was clear both in the pregame marketing and delivered results they needed more time. Or was bad at managing the time they had.

Usually the latter,since it's a yearly game. You're expected some mismanagement if it's a small or indie company but with two years they could've at least thought to cut those unfinished features to save disk space. Heck,might even be because of the trap technology, with so many VAs and scripts to activate their lines to coordinate they must've had to wait for third party companies to finish things before they could.

I also think that the Trap gimmick came late into development.

Quote: HeyitsHotDog

I also think that the Trap gimmick came late into development.

If anything truly came late that would be the Trap Masters in my opinion.
Trap Team revolves around the trapping mechanic.

Trap Masters are a nice extra.
But they could have been better.

Skylanders Giants 2: Trap Team!

Actually, I remember in interviews the first thing they did when given the go to start Trap Team is make the new gimmick - but they specifically said it was the speaker in the portal,not traps. Considering the portal never really responded to ingame scripts(it changed colors depending on the skylander and that's it), one can only wonder how long they took to do that, and how long it took until Acti decided it was worth publishing the gimmick as it was.

It's pretty much like Iwata said one, paraphrasing; if you delay a game it might be good one day but if you rush it out of the door it might be bad forever. Too bad Activision is going to axe the franchise for a possible rushed mess before they admit they're the ones making the wrong choices.

It's weird how the game does feel incomplete.


The villain mechanic is decent but I don't understand why they put soo much effort into making 50 villains. With the voicing, cut scenes quest things etc. they wouldntbe easy additions. Why not have just made 1 villain for each level so that all up there would've been 2 for each element .

Having 50 villains would usually give players diverse tag team options but when the villains having the same thing wrong with them that hats do ( gradiented power ranging from pointless to OP), there's only ~10 good ones .

It just feels completely like they forced out 50 villains so they could force out 50 different traps people could possibly buy. Its hard to tell who is responsible for making these types decisions . Activision, coz they wanted more prophet, or toys for bob coz they wanted the game to look more successful then SF.

All we can hope for is that with the rising toys to life game options people have, activision will encourage the games to be more reserved, with a bigger focus on game play and content and a secondary focus on toys gimics.

"Cool, a new Skylanders game! Ah... no gimmick? Boring..."

Quote: Bifrost

And since Acti hates patches for this series not even something as simple as reusing models from Skyhighlands would happen.

That's probably just due to the fact that the game is on the Wii as well, and it's not capable of downloading patches. Not to diss on the Wii too much, but I think if they stopped making Skylanders for it the games will go up in quality. It is such an obsolete console by today's standards, making the games for it in mind is only hindering them. Actually, maybe instead of cutting off that console, hand the Wii version to another developer to make a totally unique game each year different from it's Wii U counterpart.

Quote: TJRedeemer

That's probably just due to the fact that the game is on the Wii as well, and it's not capable of downloading patches. Not to diss on the Wii too much, but I think if they stopped making Skylanders for it the games will go up in quality. It is such an obsolete console by today's standards, making the games for it in mind is only hindering them. Actually, maybe instead of cutting off that console, hand the Wii version to another developer to make a totally unique game each year different from it's Wii U counterpart.

That excuse stopped being valid after SF. They ignored the Wii hard this time with even worse graphical downgrades than before and gamebreaking bugs abound, if they care so much to release that as it was,they could've given patches to the other versions and let it sink with the Wii as its last non-shovelware game. Really can't let the current-gen games suffer because of last-gen, especially for things like fixing major bugs and finishing features.

Quote: newkill

"Cool, a new Skylanders game! Ah... no gimmick? Boring..."

"Cool, a new Skylanders game! Ah... No gimmick?
Let's first see how the gameplay, the Story, the characters, the graphics, the replayability, the levels and the extra content are since they have nothing else to focus on, now."

Quote: wild_defender

It's weird how the game does feel incomplete.


The villain mechanic is decent but I don't understand why they put soo much effort into making 50 villains. With the voicing, cut scenes quest things etc. they wouldntbe easy additions. Why not have just made 1 villain for each level so that all up there would've been 2 for each element .

Having 50 villains would usually give players diverse tag team options but when the villains having the same thing wrong with them that hats do ( gradiented power ranging from pointless to OP), there's only ~10 good ones .

It just feels completely like they forced out 50 villains so they could force out 50 different traps people could possibly buy. Its hard to tell who is responsible for making these types decisions . Activision, coz they wanted more prophet, or toys for bob coz they wanted the game to look more successful then SF.

All we can hope for is that with the rising toys to life game options people have, activision will encourage the games to be more reserved, with a bigger focus on game play and content and a secondary focus on toys gimics.

Watched the Trap Team reveal and demo again (for reasons unknown) and it felt just as meh as when it first came around. Like you, less with higher quality would've been good. Amazing they were pushing the "teaming" aspects but there REALLY isn't too much strategy with the villains, except for ones like Rage Mage and Broccoli Guy where they actually help the skylander. I also couldn't really get into the fact that an ugly bad guy was fighting for me and was ultimately more effective even with a skylander you worked to buy all the upgrades. They actually cheapened their prize and the experience for a cheap gimmick. Unlike the other games, this one really fits the term.

I feel gameplay has to be the innovation...two games of nothing really changing in the game itself is unacceptable. There's a huge debt that has to be balanced with the toys. Still interesting Trap Team is at a 1.6 million gap to reach Swap Force sales. That means fewer customers have to buy the ever expanding toy line. I'm betting we'll actually see a toy reduction this year.

Paint me gloom and doom, but I sense a higher level of of frustration and exasperation.

Obviously both Disney and Nintendo's research taught them that quality of in-game content was practically irrelevant. Which means Acti doesn't have to make it that amazing to still be the best. While it was imperative that Swap Force raise the bar (to validate VV's new role), after that sweet billions mark was reached, they knew that the Skylanders brand could sell almost on the power of that brand alone, hence a drop in quality. Sould we expect the same this year?

Why offer traps capable of holding multiple villains if people will buy one per villain? Why release only 2 total villains per element when people might buy six traps per element? Does the massive and varied amount of merchandise distract from the rip-off? Or would only a couple traps per element be boring?