Investigative journalist Liam Robertson is reporting that the Skylanders franchise could all be over due to declining series sales. The franchise could follow in the footsteps of Disney Infinity which was canceled earlier this year for similar reasons. The toys-to-life market has suffered in recent times with reports suggesting that consumer interest has gone.
Thanks to awesomeaussie27 for the tip!
I sincerely apologize to anyone that was a big fan of the Skylanders franchise, I respect your opinion and I’m sorry…
BUT YES YES YES YES YES! IT’S OVER! IT’S DEAD! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!! WHOOOOO!!!!
I don’t see why you’re celebrating. It’s bad for the industry overall, so everyone loses. Same reason why it baffles me why people want Call of Duty dead.
WHY!?
Because it’s just a bland generic shooter, that inspire other games of the like. COD-esque games have polluted the gaming industry so much, that we don’t even get many platformers anymore (or than Mario, Kirby, Tropical Freeze, and Ziplash). Let’s look the record:
-Mario – Super Mario Maker (Wii U and 3DS). A glorified level editor.
-Metroid – Other M. We all know how that went.
-Sonic the Hedgehog – Sonic Boom (until Project Sonic 2017 proves awesome at Sonic Adventure levels)
-Mega Man – Legends 3 and Universe were cancelled, Mega Man is pretty much dead. Mighty No. 9 failed to reignite the flame, and Man of Action’s Mega Man is going to be the next Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures. Speaking of which:
-Pac-Man: Nothing after Pac-Man World 3, and the series was rebranded into Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures. Disappeared after 2015.
-Banjo-Kazooie – Nuts & Bolts. Also, Microsoft, Now Yooka-Laylee are called to be their successors, but are trying to be their own seperate game.
-Conker – Brought
-Rayman 4 shafted in favor of Rabbids, Rayman becomes 2.5D, and I don’t know what the big deal is about the Legends fiasco that’s been mentioned online.
-Klonoa – Nothing after Klonoa for Wii (although a movie has been announced).
-Ape Escape – Havent heard from this Sony-exclusive title in ages.
Other underrated platformer franchises: Ristar, Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg, Socket/Time Dominator 1st, Tempo (32X), Scaler, Ty the Tasmanian Tiger, Tomba, Mort the Chicken, Croc, Alfred Chicken, Ganbare Goemon, Doremi Fantasy: Milon’s Adventure, Astal, Vectorman (the 2D platformer), Rocket Knight, Aero the Acrobot, Alex Kidd, Mr. Nutz, Bubsy (brought it upon himself), High Seas Havoc, Hebereke/U-four-ia, Trip World, Dynamite Headdy, Gex, Chameleon Twist, Tonic Trouble, Smart Ball/Jelly Boy, Twinbee (yes, he had a platformer game), Voodoo Vince, Blinx the Cat, Punky Skunk, The New Zealand Story, Pulseman, Plok, any Disney game developed by Capcom.
*frowns* You just had to mention Mystical Ninja, huh? I long for the day I can play Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon again!
oh my god the wii u is literally over saturated with 2D platformers i’m so sick of them
It’s not bad for the industry at all. It’s not like this franchise is a pillar of the video game world. The video game industry isn’t going to crash & burn all because of the loss of one little franchise. And it’s a franchise that hasn’t been around very long at that! As for Call of Duty, it will be quickly replaced with a new first person army shooter! Hopefully a better one! If the industry can survive the loss of the Medal of Honor franchise, it can survive the loss of Call of Duty and/or Skylanders. And it pains me to say this but the industry could probably even survive the loss of the Zelda franchise… They are material objects, after all. They can, and eventually will, be replaced.
I think the majority of gamers were tired of the “toys to life” category, so this is good news. Spending up to $20 on a small plastic figurine, just to tap it and unlock content in a game is nothing more than a cash grab. Similar to paid DLC, but more of a hassle than anything else. Disney Infinity was the first to get cancelled. Since then, Amiibo sales and game support have declined considerably. And now Skylanders, the last of the big three, is about to get axed as well. If this is true, then you can bet Nintendo will continue to shift away from Amiibo, until they eventually stop production altogether. Just like 3D, which was also a fad that died out, now this fad is dying out as well.
I honestly think amiibo will continue. Many people like the idea of buying official figurines of their favorite Nintendo characters. That & amiibo can be used for more than just one game. Which is the exact opposite of Skylanders & Disney Infinity to where those figurines only work with one set of games.
As for Skylanders & Disney Infinity’s figurines themselves, I don’t see why they’d stop making those. The games, sure, but the figurines, they’d be foolish to stop making them. There are plenty of collectors out there that they can sell these things, too. I don’t own Skylanders but I’d be lying if I said my eye wasn’t distracted by a few of the nice looking Skylander figurines that I pass by when I go into GameStop as they are right next to the entrance. Pretty hard to miss them.
Only Amiibo will stay :)
Let me just say I love amiibo, I own a bunch and I’m looking forward to the Zelda amiibo releases, but you’re kidding yourself if you think they’ll be around much longer
But amiibo’s literally coming to the Switch. I’m pretty sure this is a gimmick here to stay….
I wonder how LEGO worlds is doing
Though I now own several Skylanders games, I still have never played a single one. I never have any desire.
Not really, you chop of one of the snakes of medusa and your still left with another hundred to go
“R.I.P. Skylanders. You will be missed.”
Said no one ever.
Honestly, the game just seems like a huge cash grab and not its own actual series. Let’s hope that there’s a new, standalone, non-Skylander game featuring Spyro or Crash again.
Crash is getting a remaster next year, so that is a start!
||Good, useless civilian weaponry…||
So nice how they CANCEL a FRANCHISE that receives a game per year, so it won’t receive any more games FOREVER, because the sales are low.
In my time, games were individual, you’d expect another completely new installment in the franchise when it was ready, not this kind of shit treatment. I say the same for all the CODs, BFs, ACs, etc. That’s really sad.
This franchise deserves to die.
same as call of duty that’s the same damn thing and only foul mouthed little bastards play it
Actually Battlefield does not come out every year which I was expecting Dice to do but they don’t.
About time! Thank God.
If this is true then it seems like the toys to life genre might be coming to end, consideing how Disney Infinity is already dead and Lego Dimensions only has one more year planned. I think the only ones that will actually stay on the market is amiibos, and even then I don’t think they’ve been selling nearly as much as they have back when they first came out.
Amiibo haven’t gotten many new releases of big series or big games that use them extensively, like Smash Wii U or the Super Smash Bros. line, so you can’t compare their sales now.
Wait, Disney Infinity is dead?
And not one Scrooge McDuck figure……
Oh well, Disney was getting too obnoxious with its figures anyway, especially when it came to Star Wars, Marvel, and FROZEN!
I think they need to space it out. I don’t mind collecting the figures, but they make it so that you can’t ever stop. They should maybe just release a value digital only title that uses pre existing figures for one year, then release a full title the next.
If they do cancel it hopefully they give Spyro his original design back and make an ACTUAL Spyro game.
I thought this was already old news. Skylanders has been on a steady decline for years now. The creator already said this could be the end and last of the series
}{ Finally… Now can we get a real Spyro game? }{
Instead of makin these games they should return Spyro to its roots where he gained a place among the 3D adventure games.
The whole “toys-to-life” genre is failing because nobody is really bringing it to its fullest potential. There needs to be more replayability to the games themselves like an online competitive environment instead of just a single-player/co-op campaign. Not everyone is going to want to buy figures they will only need for about a month.
Infinity was not discontinued due to sales. Playmotion took major losses and Disney decided to abondon everything.
I only want the crash figures to be honest
I almost bought Imaginators just for Crash but I’m not paying $80 for the bundle. It didn’t go on sale during black friday either…
screw that
FINALLY! Its about time this crap pay-to-play series ended! Now make Spyro about Spyro again!
First Disney Infinity, now Skylanders…..the fad has run it’s course. It was fun while it lasted, but it was only a matter of time. It’ll be interesting to see how Lego Dimensions and Amiibo do as the last big 2 of the 4 left.
I imagine a big part of Skylanders’ lower sales was likely from kids simply growing out of it. Spyro’s adventure came out 5 years ago. Kids who were playing the series in elementary school would have hit high school in that same period of time.
it was a bull shit idea anyway. People ended up forking out more cash than it would be for one normal style of game.
Honestly it’ll be nice just to NOT see it everywhere when in a game shop or major retailer.
They should take them all and make a Coral reef out of them. Save the planet broskie.
Also, save your local Honey Bee’s, Earth is going to need them.
Maybe if the starter sets weren’t so much money? I mean, you buy one, and the next year there’s a new version. And you have to buy them to use the newer figures. IE, Disney. Can’t play 2.0 on 1.0. So you must buy 2.0 if you want to play as the new figures. Ridiculous in this day of patches & updates.
I never even bothered with buying Lego Dimensions starter because of it’s initial price tag. Too rich for my blood. Disney Infinity I got a free download of the game for PC (no figures, but oh well). While I don’t expect free, I would buy more with better pricing. Walmart offers basically a 2 for 1 deal on Mario Anniversary Amiibos, and I jump at it.
Possibly lower figure costs, too. In and of itself, not so bad. But if you want several, it starts to add up. perhaps the lack of sale sis not from interest, but from affordability.
With most people buying figures to collect, I say drop the game and just sell the figures.
Never heard of this Leem guy
#BringBackSpyro
Just watch Skylanders Academy on Netflix, or better yet:
Stick to the first three Spyro games!
It lasted longer than I thought it would. I quit out after I noticed the annual-release trend. It’ll be nice to see less of the toys cluttering up aisles though.
I hope this won’t mean the end of the Skylander figurines. I can’t help but stop by that section at GameStop whenever I stop by that store for something I just don’t feel like waiting to arrive in the mail for and Wal-Mart just next door doesn’t have any of. I could give a flying fuck about the games but those figurines look pretty damn cool. I’m surprised I resisted the urge to buy one this long!
I wish I had time to leave this the past few days. First the number of units Mr. Robertson mentioned is for Europe only. The actual first week sales is over 157k world wide. This number was expected as the economy in Europe is not that great. In the US a good portion of the southeast was in recovery from a hurricane. The second week did not do as well but the last 2 weeks in the US the sales are very strong. I have been seen the numbers of the 2 biggest retailers of Skylanders and you can see a spike. There was even retailer issues in regards to displaying the game in the beginning including TRU, Walmart and BB. Amazon had a supply issue in the US because of sales over projection.The quarterly statement from Mr. Robertson was more of the disappointment from Vicarious Vision’s last few games, they laid off 200 employees and a few key executives left. Toys for Bob is currently hiring programmers, that is to be a sign. For those that wondered why Disney pulled Infinity there a key issue that is missing. Disney is not a company that is patient. They are used to 4 to 5 weeks of strong sales of their movies. Then they rest of the time is just additional profit. The Infinity did not match their business plan. Adding in their stock was at a very low. Activision is more patient with how video game sales trends has changed. More people wait a few weeks to get the better deal pricing. Just the way it is, people want more value for their money. So past practice of measuring a video game of the first two weeks is no longer key. Look at the big name games that did not do well around the time Imaginators was released, then see the issues we had in the US. September/October is not a very strong month in video game sales as it used to be. One interesting trend in the US sales is the Wii U is out selling the XB1. You can confirm by the low supply of starter packs of Wii U in retail locations. With a new Nintendo system, you can guarantee there will be a game in the first 18 months after release by Toys for Bob. The new hybrid system will cure two lost area of sales lost. First getting Nintendo sales back, Wii was 70% of sales during the first three games. Second portability. Activision will not throw away a franchise that has value of in the billions, they just need a time out to improvise the product to match the trends of today. I will patiently wait for the 2015 year end conference call in February or the announcement in April.
Yessss!!! Woohooo!!!!! Finally, Skylosers is getting killed! :D it’s about time! I hope Kaos destroys all evidence of Skylands and the good old Spyro comes back to replace the stupid fucking Skylanders franchise PERMENANTLY.