Skylanders Superchargers offers some high-speed fun but hits a few speed bumps

What you won’t like

Some additional purchases don’t feel optional

In previous versions of Skylanders, you found gates attuned to various elements, and you needed characters that matched those elements to open them. These were always optional and usually just contained small areas with collectibles.

In Superchargers, you have sections of each major level that require each of the three different types of vehicles (land, sky, and sea). In fact, after about only 15 minutes with the game, you’ll see a cutscene that shows you something that looks fun to do and then promptly tells you that you need a sea vehicle to attempt it. A mere 10 minutes after finding this first one, you’ll find another prompt that says you need an sky vehicle.

While these are still technically optional, the reality is that you’ll be missing out on some great gameplay if you don’t have at least one of each vehicle. In some cases, failing to do these sections also has gameplay consequences: In one board, having a sea vehicle allows you to unlock an ability that opens up many new areas. Also, on the last full level of the game, completing the additional vehicle sections actually weakens the final boss.

At one point also near the end, Superchargers even makes you feel guilty for not having the right type of vehicle when one of the main characters tells you that you’ll have to switch to “Plan B” and says that he’s going to hold you responsible for the damages incurred. There’s nothing like a little guilt trip to get you to buy more toys. Shame on Vicarious Visions for this.

The bottom line: If you order the Starter Set online or purchase it in a store, do yourself a favor and add at least one sky vehicle and one sea vehicle to your cart. You’ll enjoy the title much more this way. I honestly think it’s a shame that you’ll miss out on so many fun things without these additions, and I can’t agree with this design choice.

Some of your favorite characters may have changed … and not in a good way

Instead of giving the new versions of older characters a single, new power like the developers have done in the past, some of your old Skylander friends have completely changed in their new incarnations. While many may see this as a way of keeping the game fresh, some of these changes are not always for the better.

For example, the starter pack includes the Supershot Stealth Elf figure. For those unfamiliar with the character, Stealth Elf has been a series regular, and her strengths were her agility and fast melee attacks. In Superchargers, however, this once ninja-like character now inexplicably wields a gatling-gun type weapon that shoots daggers and also slows her down tremendously when she fires it.

Gill Grunt goes through a similar 180-degree transformation. In all of the previous Skylander games, he was a primarily ranged-attack character, sporting a harpoon gun and a water blaster. This time around he’s a melee brawler with a trident.

You may find these changes exciting, but some of them made me miss the old versions of the characters that I knew well and relied on.

It has some bugs that are bizarre and other that are just bad

During my time with Superchargers, I encountered more than a few bugs. The first night I played the game, I didn’t have any extra figures available, and the two I had both got defeated on one of the early boss fights. I had no choice but to restart at my last checkpoint. When I selected the option to do so, the game crashed and completely exited back to my Xbox One home screen.

Some of the other glitches I encountered were strange but not as bad. One time, I was playing with one of the Legendary Treasures you collect in the game called the Shrink Ray. I used it, and it shrunk my character down to a minute size for a few minutes, like you might expect. What I did not expect, however, was that when I grew back to full size, my Skylander became bugged and was unable to attack until I removed him from the portal and put him back on again.

Another time, on one of the last boards in the entire game, I was solving one of the game’s many slide puzzles. I looked at it for about 10 seconds and saw the solution immediately. It would only require three moves. After I pushed the first two blocks and was one move away from solving the problem, Skylanders Superchargers decided I was having trouble with the puzzle and asked me if I wanted to try an easier one by lowering the difficulty level. Why this was the only time this happened, especially considering it was on a puzzle that I made no mistakes on, was beyond me.

Another entry in the quizzical messages department happened during the very last level of the game. I had just completed the area of the board that required a water vehicle, and I was back on land again. Seemingly out of nowhere, the game supplied me with the spoken message, “Only a Supercharger Skylander can customize vehicles.” Not only was I using a Supercharger Skylander figure at the time, but this message repeated several times while I was just walking around.

I also had one catastrophic bug (at least by Skylanders’ standards). After loading the game up one night when I was almost finished with the main story, I placed one of my figures on the portal, but it would not load. After attempting the “retry” option several times to no avail, I reluctantly selected “recover” and then lamented when all the abilities that I had purchased over the course of the entire game were locked again.

Conclusion

Skylanders Superchargers is the most diverse and enjoyable entry in the series to date, but it also locks away a lot more of its fun content behind additional purchases. You honestly won’t enjoy it as much unless you also buy at least one sky vehicle and one sea vehicle to go with your starter set. A few bugs also marred an otherwise fun experience. It’s obvious that the developer tried to expand and innovate with this follow-up (likely spurred at least a little by the added competition of Disney Infinity 3.0 and Lego Dimensions this year), and despite a few complaints, Superchargers is still one of the best family-friendly games of this year.

Score: 80/100

Skylanders Superchargers is out now on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Wii U, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360. The publisher provided an Xbox One Starter Set and additional figures for the purpose of this review.