darkSpyro

How do you guys play Skylanders? I will share how I play as an example.

First - I play through the story on hard so that I can enjoy it. I don't do all of the side zones, but some if I happen to have a Skylander handy that can open it. My goal is not to get all the collectibles, but to simply enjoy the story. I often play this round with my wife.

Second - I play through the story on Nightmare. This time I am more mindful of the collectibles and other zones. By this time, I am a month or two into the game (I play slow) and have had an opportunity to build up a good amount of Skylanders for the game.

Third - complete 3 stars on all levels. Find any collectibles that I have missed.

Fourth - finish "end-game" stuff. i.e. races, time races, scoring challenges, mini games, bonus missions, etc. 3 stars on each.

Fifth - Complete trophies for game on PS4.

Sixth - Completely max level characters that I love and enjoyed during the process.

That is how I play Skylanders. I am really interested to see how you guys play the multiple Skylanders games. I haven't bought Imaginators yet. Unfortunately, I took a hiatus from Skylanders during Super Chargers and am catching up. Super Chargers is okay...

Play through the story with Wave 1 and 2 characters on normal

Do all the side stuff after main story is complete.

Finally, I'll most likely make a 100% Nightmare mode run once the DarkSpyro guide has released

I try to drag it out as long as possible. The quickest I beat a game previously was Trap Team, which I got on launch day and beat a little after the Dark and Light expansions were released. This is at least partially because I play through the game with my roommate, who isn't much of a gamer and is only interested in playing for an evening every week or so. (She's pretty keen on Imaginators, though, so we may actually finish the main story shortly after wave 3.)

We still haven't beaten SuperChargers. We beat Swap Force a month or so after Trap Team, and I (alone) beat Giants even after that.

It always goes like this for me :

1) Play through the first half of the game with my wave 1/2 Skylanders, usually 2-3 levels per day, taking my time finding everything and goofing around.
2) Wait for wave 3 and replay a few older levels with the new guys to upgrade them to be on-par with my wave 1/2 characters and unlock what I couldn't before (like the Magic/Light/Dark Elemental Gates in TT for exemple).
3) Then either finish the game, or if wave 4 has a lot of characters I want I will wait until I have them, repeat the second step and then finally finish the game.
Note that I only play on hard and never use Skylanders from previous games until I finish the story.

Once the story is done I mostly just fight in the arenas/bonus missions/doom challenges with any characters I want to play with and occasionally replay my favorites levels until the next game is out.
I may also try to 3 stars all levels, do all side-quest stuff and replay the game on nightmare, though I actually never bother to do it 100%.
And then 2-3 years later I go back replaying the game on a new save file, still on hard, still with only the characters released with that game.

Quote: McMurderpaws

I try to drag it out as long as possible. The quickest I beat a game previously was Trap Team, which I got on launch day and beat a little after the Dark and Light expansions were released. This is at least partially because I play through the game with my roommate, who isn't much of a gamer and is only interested in playing for an evening every week or so. (She's pretty keen on Imaginators, though, so we may actually finish the main story shortly after wave 3.)

We still haven't beaten SuperChargers. We beat Swap Force a month or so after Trap Team, and I (alone) beat Giants even after that.

With my schedule, I usually only play a night or two a week a well. Hence why it takes me so long to play through the game on hard (1-2 months). My wife plays occasionally, but not every time.

I play through the story on Expert mode and typically beat it in a 3-5 days (I just beat Imaginators yesterday). I do one or two side activities during the story, but I like to save most of it for the post-game. With my launch day haul being pretty big, I like to take as much time as possible to upgrade them all, usually focusing on one at a time (I only just got to the last Imaginite crystal I bought on day 1). For later waves, I just focus on upgrading them and having as much fun as possible. It's around wave 4 where I really start to get serious about trying to 100% the game.

I play it on Easy, but still have a hard time finding every area and/or item

I play it with a controller.

Usually I start on casual, but with imaginators I started on expert because you get more exp and money.
I try to find as many collectibles that I can and if I miss something I try to find them on next playthrough.
I always use only 2 skylanders / playthrough unless I need more on boss battles. With Imaginators I used my own character and golden queen on first playthrough and next I will be using wolfgang and king pen.
I bought the dark edition so I still have two crystals left and I should receive five more senseis next week so I will be playing those levels a lot.

Well, I play through the story with the Wave 1 & 2 characters and maybe afterwards if they're not all fully upgraded. I don't really play that much until later waves comes out, where I play the new characters and finish some challenges with them.

Quote: Takadox360

I play it with a controller.

Same!

Quote: ToonLink04

Quote: Takadox360

I play it with a controller.

Same!

Clever?

For each game, I go through the Story Mode by dividing the main story levels (minus Adventure Pack levels, of course) by the number of gimmicklanders per wave. Once I get every character I want upgraded, Soul Gemmed (and Sky-Chi in this case), I head to the final chapter and defeat

For example; in this game, since Waves One and Two have more than half of the Senseis (and not even including Chompy Mage, Kaos, Crash and Cortex), I will go through Cradle of Creation, Mushroom River, Scholarville, Shellmont Shores, Sky Fortress and Gryphon Park Observetory. When Wave Three comes out, it is time to go to Fizzland, Golden Arcade, Enchanted Elven Forest and Thumpin Whumpa Islands (good news is that all the Shrines are in the first seven levels, so I can get and 's Sky-Chi Powers as a Christmas Present basically) I'll go to Dragon Temple and the Abandoned Amusement Park after Wave Four and after the last character reaches my possession, off to Lair of Kaos.

As for the upgrades, I got a strategy. At the end of Wave One/Two, I get all the characters main upgrades. After I got all the Wave Three character's caught up, I'll get to everyone's Upgrade Path. The Soul Gems wouldn't be there until I get EVERYONE UPGRADED

I usually have two playthroughs going on.

One is on Hard, and it's just me playing through on my own.

One is on Normal and it's playing co-op with my younger sister so she doesn't get frustrated by the higher difficulties.

Then after I beat Hard I start a Nightmare playthrough and... unfortunately I don't usually finish those, because I end up playing other games instead somewhere along the way through that.

Play through the game on normal
Find any collectibles I missed
Work on any extra stuff required for 100%
Play on Nightmare
Max everyone out on level
Max everyone out on quests/heroic challenges
Max everyone out on gold

Of course, the sixth one no longer applies, but then again I still haven't done it.

First I play through the game for the story, and so that I can just enjoy it. I pretty much max them out and upgrade them while I'm at it. Then I slowly start replaying to find soul gems and other goodies that I missed in the levels. I don't really play through the game in Nightmare at all, sometimes I'll give it a bit of a go, but it's just not for me.

I usually use a controller and an xbox one

How it's been the last few entries:

- Wait until Spring so that the game's cheaper and most if not all the characters are out
- Get the game and a few of my favorites, getting the rest during the coming weeks as I feel like using new guys
- Grab a cast of one of each element (although since Trap Team this has changed slightly), plus Spyro and Breeze, off my shelf and start playing on Medium
- Go through the game focusing on Story Mode and trying to get as many collectables as possible.
- Decide whether I liked the game enough to buy into its gimmick and do so if it was, watching for sales
- Play through on Expert focusing on just getting it done, since invariably there's an achievement whether in-game or out, for doing so
- Intersperse this with side challenges
- Get all the characters I want, get bored, move onto something else

- Realize a few months/a year later that I still have things to do
- Get Adventure Packs since now they're about the price I want to pay for them (Except Light Expansion Pack because lol)
- Play the level and continue other challenges until I get bored again, hopefully moving onto Nightmare Mode eventually

- Process repeats every now and then - still working on Swap Force believe it or not! Portal Master Rank will be maxed eventually!
- Once I've fully completed the game, it is on the list of games that I can replay if I so desire, with different rulesets!

I think right now: I'm in the middle of Nightmare Mode on Swap Force, trying to get through the Kaos Doom Challenge on Trap Team and wondering if Nightmare Mode is worth it, and I'm either on Expert or Nightmare in Superchargers, focusing on Quests and races. Plus I've just ordered Mirror of Mystery and the Sky Racing Pack for when I get home from school this Winter. So if you think you're slow... look at that!

Quote: ToonLink04

Quote: Takadox360

I play it with a controller.

Same!

Little-arm players, try an activision plastic guitar, that IS the real way to play!!!

For me, i do one run in difficult mode (for warming)
One run in nightmare mode (to enjoy the game)
Complete the missing stars in nightmare mode and max those cheated sensei/imaginators
Do the after-game modes, (here not that much), and for this game, redo all the racing challenges
Finally, Re-do the nightmare game with my favourites old landers,
it's not insanity, it's the way of the real warriors

And obviously doing a lot of PVP which makes the game endless.... ok thanks so much acti-pognon