darkSpyro

When it all began, the toy aspect was the front runner for the story. Now, does the "toy" aspect actually have anything to do with the games any more or have they now become strictly more of a collectible aspect of the series?

The start of SC has Hugo talking to you before you first place your vehicle on the Portal after the intro.

Also Master Eon and Kaos still talks to us directly. In the intro, Kaos even mentioned cutting off the connection between Earth and Skylands so that the Skylanders will remain the "helpless toys he's always known them to be".

The games do at least try to tie in the toys to the story, but let's face it: The toys were created on a money making standpoint, not to simply enhance the game play experience.

Reposed Skylanders and variants are certainly there to enhance the "collect them all" experience, while are never outright given an explanation to existing.

The only toys that actually have any connection to the story are the original 32 Cores, the Giants, The Swap Force, The Trap Team, the Traps and the Superchargers and their Vehicles. Everything else is purely for the collector experience.

The general idea is still nicely tied in; ("so they'll go back to being the tiny plastic toys I've always known!" was a nice wham line) but the specifics the devs just threw their hands in the air and gave up. Reposes make sense once,but the dozens now would feel like Persephone is wasting work time; some variants get backstories or funny happenings,some don't.

And don't even get into how co-op works. You can play as the same person, the person pre-Persephone's magic and post-Persephone's magic, the person pre-enchanted by the Core and after, the person and their variant in the day mentioned they're JUST the variant,the one where they can go any form and their super forms, and the one I already mentioned a ton where you can play as SSSE and Whisper Elf despite the fact the former's soul gem summons a second one. Yeah.

Honesty STT mentioned the portal master a lot especially towards the beginning and ending. I should know since STT is my favorite Skylanders game and I play the levels on it the most.

Going by Roller Brawl's micro comic, the reposes are just a new power for the Skylanders to use. Spyro was able to grow his horns to use his mega ram attack.

Now the toy aspect still exists in the lore, but it is a little hided. SuperChargers has a explanation of how the Skylanders and Vehicles have come to Earth, and also try to explain why you always need a vehicle in the portal. In my opinion, it's the best explanation in the series. It's not simply "your Skylanders have come to Earth as toys for some reason (almost always a explosion) and now you need to put then on the portal to bring they back". It's a bigger explanation of why and how.

Its always kinda confused me a little. In the Skylands, they continue on their adventures(comics, etc) and every day lives all together not needing their toys to be placed on the portal. Yet the moment you play the game, they need you?

I guess you're not supposed to think about it. I guess the moment you find(buy) a Skylander, then that technically releases them back into the Skylands?

Most people take that headcanon,yeah. But the Skylanders are always said to be independent, it's just that a portal master needs to activate faster transportation... But then we have Flynn and co. carrying them everywhere, and even in SC the rift engines seem to act even without your interference. So after SSA that explanation is bull.

As others have said the latest game still recognizes toys a lot and even created some really interesting meta (Portals disconnection, Kaos aknowledging Earth, the comics somehow hinting at reposes) but indeed it is also a game where characters themselves don't count that much.

Yes, toys are important... Only vehicles, not Skylanders.
Story wise I agree with Nroc-Nuika: the important characters are the 32 SA Cores and all the different Gimmicklanders.
I'd add the various unique Cores from a pure gameplay point of view.

All the other type of figures (Legendaries, Lightcores, Dark, chase variants and reposes) whether they got a lore explanation or not, are nothing but a way to make more money.

Yea, unless it's one of the original game's core characters, story wise, it makes no sense why say Splat or Smash Hit for example would be toys. So while we the "Portal Masters" are still a part of the lore, toy-characters are kinda left up to individual interpretation.