Software:Skylanders: Swap Force

Short description: 2013 video game

Skylanders: Swap Force
Developer(s)	Vicarious Visions Beenox n-Space (3DS)
Publisher(s)	Activision
Director(s)	Jeremy Russo
Producer(s)	Eric Carter Nick Ruepp Chris Wilson Dawn Pinkney
Designer(s)	Mike Stout
Artist(s)	Steven Olds Dave E. Phillips Lee Harker
Composer(s)	Lorne Balfe
Series	Skylanders
Engine	Vicarious Visions Alchemy
Platform(s)	Nintendo 3DS PlayStation 3 PlayStation 4 Wii Wii U Xbox 360 Xbox One
Release	Nintendo 3DS, PlayStation 3, Wii, Wii U, Xbox 360 NA: October 13, 2013 AU: October 16, 2013 EU: October 18, 2013 PlayStation 4 NA: November 15, 2013 EU: November 29, 2013 AU: December 5, 2013 Xbox One WW: November 22, 2013
Genre(s)	Toys-to-life, role-playing, platform
Mode(s)	Single-player, multiplayer

Skylanders: Swap Force (stylized as Skylanders: SWAP Force) is a 2013 platform game developed by Vicarious Visions and Beenox and published by Activision. It is the third main game in the Skylanders video game and toy franchise, following 2012's Skylanders, which was a direct sequel to 2011's Skylanders (the spin-off of The Legend of Spyro series). It is the game before Skylanders and features the voices of John DiMaggio, Jess Harnell, Audrey Wasilewski, Richard Tatum, David Sobolov, Josh Keaton, Keythe Farley, Dave Wittenberg, Joey Camen, Gregg Berger, Troy Baker, Robin Atkin Downes, and Matthew Yang King.

It is the first Skylanders game to be released in North America before other regions, unlike the previous two games where Australia got the installments first. It is also the first Skylanders game not to be owned by Vivendi.

Gameplay

The gameplay for SWAP Force is based on the two previous games, Skylanders and Skylanders. Players use a portal to bring real-life figures into the video game. For the new game, Skylanders are able to jump, and there are new swappable Skylanders. The new game also brings a new Portal of Power (and therefore is only sold as a starter pack). The new Portal was added because of the new technology that makes the SWAP Force characters work correctly. The older portals from the past two games would not be able to sense the top half of these new swappable characters. These sixteen new characters have top and bottom halves that can be separated from each other and recombined with the halves from other characters. This allows for a total of 256 combinations between all tops and bottoms. Another new feature of the swappable characters is that each has one of eight distinct ways of moving. These different movement types are necessary to enter certain side areas in the game called "SWAP Zone Challenges". Only characters with the correct bottom half can enter said areas. There are eight: Rocket, Spin, Dig, Stealth, Teleportation, Bounce, Speed and Climb.

Plot

Premise

For years the SWAP Force protected the volcano that replenishes Skylands' magic every hundred years. That is until an epic battle caught them in the eruption, blasted them apart, sent them to Earth, and gave them the ability to swap powers. Now they must mix and match their tops and bottoms to save the Elementals from being evilised, stop Kaos, and save Skylands.

Characters

SWAP Force features sixteen new core characters and sixteen new swappable characters, in addition to sixteen reposed Skylanders from previous games. The sixteen new swappable characters are Wash Buckler, Blast Zone, Free Ranger, Freeze Blade, Night Shift, Magna Charge, Stink Bomb, Rattle Shake, Hoot Loop, Trap Shadow, Grilla Drilla, Spy Rise, Rubble Rouser, Doom Stone, Boom Jet and Fire Kraken. With the sixteen new core characters being Bumble Blast, Countdown, Dune Bug, Fryno, Grim Creeper, Pop Thorn, Punk Shock, Rip Tide, Roller Brawl, Scorp, Scratch, Slobber Tooth, Smolderdash, Star Strike, Wind Up and Zoo Lou.

Synopsis

Every 100 years, four ancient creatures known as the Elementals, The Flashfin, the Terrasquid, the Frost Hound, and the Tree Spirit come together to replenish the magic in Skylands via a volcano known as Mount Cloudbreak. During the last eruption ceremony, Kaos' Mother Kaossandra aimed to destroy the volcano, but a team of Skylanders defended it. After that, the volcano erupted, sending these Skylanders to Earth. The volcano's eruption gave these Skylanders the ability to swap their tops and bottoms, transforming them into the SWAP Force.

100 years later, Captain Flynn goes to see the eruption, when he suddenly find a girl riding on a giant bird. She explains that her home is in danger and asks Flynn to fly his ship through the mountain to lose a fleet of attacking creatures known as Greebles. After losing them with the help from the Skylanders and Flynn's ship is damaged in the crash, Flynn introduces himself and the girl introduces herself as Tessa. The two of them make their way to Woodburrow, Tessa's home village and meet the village crier; Rufus, where they discover that the chieftess has been captured. It is revealed that Kaos is the one leading the Greebles, and decides to test out his new creation on them: The Evilizer, which uses Petrified Darkness to turn anything into a purple crystal-covered version of itself with great power and high aggression.

Flynn and Tessa make their way to where the chieftess is, and the Skylanders rescue her and bring her back to the village. However, Kaos has learned of the whereabouts of each of the Elemental's locations. He plans to evilize one of them, which will cause Mount Cloudbreak to turn evil and spread the darkness all across Skylands. Glumshanks begins to doubt Kaos's ability to take over, so Kaos then evilizes him and sends him to his dig site. Tessa takes the Skylanders to Mudwater Hollow, the location of the Flashfin and stop Kaos from evilizing it. They make their way to Kaos' dig site, and use a giant Stone Monkey to stop the operation before the Skylanders take care of Evil Glumshanks, turning him back to normal.

Glumshanks returns to Kaos who is disappointed in his failure, before he is greeted by his mother Kaossandra, who mocks him for his incompetence. After hearing a tip, the Skylanders attempt to find the Terrasquid and make their way toward the town of Motleyville hoping to find the town's baron, Sharpfin, and gain his help. When they arrive they instead find a servant of Kaos named Baron Von Shellshock, who evilizes Tessa's bird Whiskers and forces him to attack them. After dealing with Shellshock and turning Whiskers back to normal, Sharpfin promises to help the Skylanders find the Terrasquid and send his crew to fix Flynn's ship. They arrive at the location of the Terrasquid, but have to deal with one of Kaos's most deadly monsters; the Fire Viper. After the Skylanders defeat the Fire Viper, Kaossandra shows up at Kaos' lair to help him.

Sharpfin takes Flynn and the Skylanders to a small village of elves in the tundra, where they meet a frost elf named Avril. After helping her deal with a cyclops invasion in her village, she gives them the location of the Frost Hound, which is the Frostfest Mountains. After getting a lamp known as The Illuminator which is needed to see through the blizzard of the mountains; the Skylanders make their way to the Frost Hound and Kaossandra sends her servant Mesmerelda to stop them with her evil puppets. The Skylanders defeat Mesmerelda and rescue the Frost Hound.

Kaos then attacks Fantasm Forest, the home of the Tree Spirit, arming his trolls with fire, using Petrified Darkness as a fuel source to evilize her and burn down her domain. The Skylanders make their way to the forest and defeat the trolls while also capturing Kaos. The eruption ceremony begins as the chieftess names Tessa the new chieftess of Woodburrow and the Elementals go to begin the eruption, when Kaossandra shows up, and takes back Kaos while kidnapping Tessa as well. With Flynn's newly repaired ship, the Skylanders, Flynn, and Sharpfin make their way to Kaos' fortress and enter to a confrontation with Kaossandra. She attempts to stop the Skylanders by sending her evil minions to attack, but the Skylanders trap her inside a mirror prison and rescue Tessa. Kaos then reveals that while this was happening, he was filling the volcano with Petrified Darkness to turn it into one massive Evilizer.

Flynn, Sharpfin, and Tessa go with the Skylanders into the volcano and as Kaos tells Glumshanks to finish the pile of Petrified Darkness, it all comes falling down on top of him, transforming him into a giant Evilized version of himself known as "Super Evil Kaos". The Skylanders battle him and destroying the crystals on and in his body, reverting him back to normal. They escape the volcano and Kaos and Glumshanks discover they have been swapped. The volcano then erupts replenishing the magic in Skylands as everyone returns to celebrate.

3DS Plot

Setup in another part of Skylands, Hugo, Flynn and Cali visit Flynn's home, Boomtown and the people celebrate in honor of him. The celebration was interrupted when a coffin gate appears and unleashes an attack caused by Count Moneybone lord of the Undead. He steals Flynn's Statue and turns Cali into an undead slave. Now the Skylanders along with the Swapforce must find a way to open the coffin gate to Moneybone's villa and stop him before he turns all of Skylands undead.

Starter Packs

As with the previous installments of the game, Skylanders: SWAP Force is available for purchase in starter kits that include a copy of the game itself, the Portal of Power, three characters to begin or supplement a player's collection, a poster of the entire SWAP Force collection, cards, stickers, and Web codes. The current starter packs and the characters include the following:

Console Starter Pack

• Wash Buckler (SWAP Force - Water - Climb)
• Blast Zone (SWAP Force - Fire - Rocket)
• Ninja Stealth Elf (Series 3 - Life)

Nintendo 3DS Starter Pack

• Rattle Shake (SWAP Force - Undead - Bounce)
• Free Ranger (SWAP Force - Air - Spin)
• Volcanic Lava Barf Eruptor (Series 3 - Fire - Alt Deco)

Pre-order bonuses

• People who pre-ordered the Console Starter Pack or Gamestop Exclusive Dark Edition Starter Pack from GameStop received a never before released Skylanders Lightcore Hex figure and a poster.
• People who pre-ordered the Console Starter Pack from Toys "R" Us also received a Lightcore Hex figure, a poster, and any single Skylanders: SWAP Force character they chose.
• People who pre-ordered the Console Starter Pack from Walmart or Best Buy also received the Lightcore Hex figure.
• People who pre-ordered the Console Starter Pack from Target Corporation received a free, exclusive, physical magic/trading card that granted a hat (UFO Hat) when placed on the new Portal of Power, as well as the Lightcore Hex figure.

Reception

Reception

Aggregate score Aggregator Score Metacritic X360: 83/100 WIIU: 89/100 PS3: 83/100 PS4: 79/100 3DS: 68/100 Review scores Publication Score Destructoid X360: 8.5/10 Eurogamer 8/10 Game Informer 8.5/10 GameRevolution PS3: 8/10 GameSpot PS3: 7/10 GamesRadar+ X360: IGN 8.2/10 3DS: 7.1/10 Joystiq X360: Nintendo Life WIIU: 3DS: Nintendo World Report WIIU: 8.5/10 3DS: 6/10 OPM (UK) PS3: 7/10 OXM (UK) XONE: 7/10 OXM (US) X360: 7.5/10 Pocket Gamer 3DS: Polygon X360: 7.5/10 Push Square PS4: The Guardian X360: VentureBeat PS3: 90/100 VideoGamer.com X360: 9/10

Skylanders: Swap Force received "generally favorable" reviews for most platforms according to review aggregator Metacritic; the Nintendo 3DS version received "mixed or average" reviews. The Metacritic scores for the game were the highest and most positive of the series on most platforms. Gaming website Quarter to Three gave both the Wii U and Xbox 360 a perfect score of 5/5. Video game website Gaming Age gave the PlayStation 3 version the highest grade of an "A" and further commented that "whether you’re a Skylanders fan or a gamer who’s looking for a charming and unique family-friendly game series to get into, Skylanders Swap Force comes highly recommended."

During the 17th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards, the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences nominated Skylanders: Swap Force for "Family Game of the Year".

External links

• Skylanders: Swap Force at MobyGames
• Skylanders: Swap Force (Nintendo 3DS) at MobyGames

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