Skylanders: Giants

Overview

Skylanders: Giants is a 2012 toys-to-life action role-playing game and the direct sequel to 2011's Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure. As the title says, it adds larger Skylanders called Giants, along with new gameplay mechanics. Sixteen new Skylanders were introduced, including eight Giants: Bouncer, Crusher, Eye-Brawl, Hot Head, Ninjini, Swarm, Thumpback and Tree Rex.

The game builds on the first one by merging a line of physical toy figures with a video game world. You place a toy on a Portal of Power connected to the console and that character appears in the game. Over 40 new figures were released, some more than twice the size of the originals. Figures from the first game work in Giants, and new Series 2 versions are stronger. A new LightCore line glows on the portal and has a flash bomb attack in game, and Battle Mode for head to head play was expanded.

Ten thousand years ago the robot Arkeyan Empire enslaved Skylands until the Giants, the first Skylanders, rebelled and defeated the robot king who held the Iron Fist of Arkus. The Fist then sent the Giants to Earth, where they froze into toys. In the present day Kaos, shrunk and put on display in a toy store, returns to Skylands and wakes an ancient Arkeyan Conquertron. The Skylanders race Kaos to the Lost City of Arkus and have to pull the Fist off him to stop him.

It was shown at E3 2012 and released in October 2012 for Nintendo 3DS, PlayStation 3, Wii and Xbox 360, and as a launch title on the Wii U. Toys for Bob made the main versions, with Vicarious Visions on Wii U and n-Space on 3DS. Hans Zimmer wrote the main theme and Lorne Balfe the rest of the music. It was the last Skylanders game published while Vivendi still owned Activision.

The console Starter Pack held the game disc, a poster, the Portal of Power, three trading cards, stickers and codes, and three figures: Tree Rex, Cynder and Jet-Vac. Reviews were generally favorable on most platforms, a little lower than the first game, and the 3DS version got mixed reviews. It won Family Game of the Year at the 16th D.I.C.E. Awards and made over 195 million US dollars in the US in 2012.

Official trailer

Skylanders Giants Game & Features Trailer, SkylandersGame. Watch on YouTube

Gameplay

Skylanders: Giants - PS3 Gameplay (RPCS3), John GodGames Emus. Watch on YouTube

Screenshots

Game details

Genres

Toys-to-life, Action role-playing

Developer

Toys for Bob

Publisher

Activision

Series

Skylanders

Engine

Vicarious Visions Alchemy

Composers

Lorne Balfe, Hans Zimmer (main theme)

Designers

Vince Castillo

Writers

Alex Ness

Modes

Single player

Yes

Local multiplayer

2

Online multiplayer

No

Release dates

Editions

Buy this game

Disc IDs

The serial printed on the disc and the case. It tells you which region a copy is from.

Trophies

Trophies46

Platinum possibleYes

Platinum

1

Gold

3

Silver

6

Bronze

36

Total

46

Points

1290

Platinum time

15 hours

100% time

15 hours

Difficulty

4 out of 10

Playthroughs for platinum

2

Playthroughs for 100%

2

Platinum without online

Yes

Online trophies

0

Boosting needed

No

DLC has trophies

No

Platinum includes DLC

No

100% includes DLC

No

Missable trophies

0

Separate trophy lists by region

No

Only in a language other than English

No

Online-only version

No

Digital-only

No

Disc-only

Yes

Trophy list shared with other versions

No

Needs

Portal of Power, Skylanders figures

Players with the platinum

5.54%

Grind

• Amass 65,000 treasure with one Skylander
• A second run on Nightmare difficulty

• NO WAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Earn all other Trophies Platinum 5.55% of players
• Rumbletown Ranger Complete Chapter 3 Bronze 78.78% of players
• Skystones Superstar Complete Chapter 4 Bronze 73.19% of players
• Glacier Great Complete Chapter 5 Bronze 69.88% of players
• Vault Victor Complete Chapter 6 Bronze 65.51% of players
• Wilikin Winner Complete Chapter 7 Bronze 61.59% of players
• Security Breacher Complete Chapter 8 Bronze 59.04% of players
• King of the Castle Complete Chapter 9 Bronze 56.86% of players
• Sky Survivor Complete Chapter 10 Bronze 53.58% of players
• Drill-X Defeator Complete Chapter 11 Bronze 51.97% of players
• Molekin Liberator Complete Chapter 12 Bronze 50.44% of players
• Trial Taker Complete Chapter 13 Bronze 49.67% of players
• Copter Captain Complete Chapter 14 Bronze 47.72% of players
• Arkus Adventurer Complete Chapter 15 Bronze 45.93% of players
• Savior of Skylands! Complete the Story Mode by recovering the Iron Fist of Arkus and defeating Kaos on any difficulty Gold 44.2% of players
• Nightmare Avenger Complete the Story Mode on Nightmare difficulty Gold 6.83% of players
• Completionist Earn 3 Stars on any Adventure Level Silver 16.6% of players
• Elemental Explorer Unlock your first Elemental area Bronze 90.74% of players
• A New Hero Complete 1 Heroic Challenge Bronze 54.24% of players
• 1 and 0 Complete your first arena challenge Bronze 61.81% of players
• Great Gladiator! Complete all 21 Arena Challenges Gold 14.19% of players
• Elemental Enthusiast Chapter 1 - Open all the Elemental areas Bronze 32.52% of players
• Chain Champ Chapter 2 - Complete the Chain Pull Feat of Strength Bronze 69.85% of players
• Log Lifter Chapter 3 - Complete the Log Lift Feat of Strength Bronze 51.23% of players
• Skystone Sampler Chapter 4 - Collect all of the Skystones Bronze 43.1% of players
• Snowman Slammer Chapter 5 - Destroy 7 snowmen Bronze 61.81% of players
• Autogyro Pyrotechnician Chapter 6 - Destroy all the Arkeyan Autogyros Bronze 6.73% of players
• Talker in a Strange Land Chapter 7 - Talk to all of the Wilikins Silver 9.12% of players
• Cannon Confounder Chapter 8 - Complete the level without getting directly hit by a cannon Bronze 9.04% of players
• Kaos Buster Chapter 9 - Destroy 10 Kaos Bust Statues Bronze 39.64% of players
• Mine Menace Chapter 10 - Shoot down 10 mines Bronze 55.96% of players
• Pipe Petard Chapter 11 - Damage Drill-X by throwing a pipe at him Bronze 30.92% of players
• Hut Wrecker Chapter 12 - Destroy 3 enemy huts with boulders Giants can lift Bronze 19.45% of players
• Column Crusher Chapter 13 - Destroy all the columns in the second trial Bronze 36.19% of players
• Pedal to the Metal Chapter 14 - Collect all 16 speed boosts in "The Long Haul" section Silver 12.87% of players
• Freebot Isn't Free Chapter 15 - Defeat Freebot in a game of Skystones Bronze 21.5% of players
• Keepin' Cool Chapter 16 - Complete the chapter without taking damage from fire traps Bronze 11.01% of players
• Skystones Strategist SkyStones - Capture 2 stones with 1 single stone Bronze 63.01% of players
• Clean Jersey Don't take any damage from Kaos' rockets during the mini-game on the Dread-Yacht Bronze 16.72% of players
• Soul Surfer Collect soul gems for Tree Rex and Jet-Vac Bronze 19.59% of players
• Seeker Adept Collect 10 Legendary Ship Parts Bronze 20.25% of players
• Hint Scholar Collect 10 Story Scrolls Bronze 31.1% of players
• Fashionista Collect 10 Hats Bronze 56.16% of players
• To the Max Level up any Skylander to level 15 Silver 30.28% of players
• Upgrade Uniter Purchase all upgrades for any one Skylander Silver 46.74% of players
• Spend That Loot! Amass 65,000 Treasure with any one Skylander Silver 7.67% of players

Space and patches

Update patchNo patch

DLC

The game had no downloadable content. New characters came as figures.

Playable today

Playable offline todayYes

Single-player only, with no online features.

Online

Plays offlineYes

Reception

Aggregates

Outlet	Platform	Score	Scale
Metacritic	PS3	77	100

Critics

Outlet	Score	Scale
IGN	8	10
Eurogamer	8	10
Joystiq	3.5	5

Staff and cast

Staff

Role	Name
Designer	Vince Castillo
Artist	Terry Falls
Writer	Alex Ness
Composer	Lorne Balfe
Composer (main theme)	Hans Zimmer

Notes for collectors

• The game needs a Portal of Power and at least one Skylander figure to play. Figures from the first game work, and Series 2 figures in the first game act as their Series 1 counterparts.
• The Starter Pack figure Jet-Vac is swapped for Punch Pop Fizz in the 3DS pack.
• The trophy Soul Surfer asks for soul gems for Tree Rex and Jet-Vac, the Starter Pack figures.
• The platinum trophy is named NO WAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and is awarded for earning all other trophies.
• There are no DLC trophies. All 46 trophies come with the base game.

Credits

Publisher

Activision

Developer

Toys for Bob

Released

2012-10-21

Age rating

ESRB E10+

Disc ID

BLUS30968

Region

US

Time to beat

about 11 hours

Copies in the shop

• Skylanders Giants (PS3) CA$14.99