Let's talk about Toy to life games ?

[Yaramaki]

Doesn't seem like we have had a topic about this yet.

Right, toy to life games, did you ever buy any of them, did you enjoy them or did you ignore it all together and diden't care at all.

And offcourse the most important question do you still own any and would you like them to make a comeback. Let's kick things with what came to my mind first when i tought about this subject.

Do you remember Skylanders and all it's sequels, disney infinty, hell probably the most suitable brand for this type of games namely lego jumped ship with lego dimensions and offcourse how can anyone forget the amiibo craze, pretty much 15$ figurines with nintendo characters that did the bare minimum. 

A little over 10 years ago up until let's say 2016-17 these things were everywhere, in skylanders case they are still everywhere only now dumped in a forgotten corner of the house, laying to rot in the attic or being sold at a flea market for a few euros a piece (in skylanders case).

What happened? Pretty simple answers oversaturation and in skylanders case games that declined in quality over time. I doubt anybody is really waiting for a toy to life comeback so nah i don't really want it to make a comeback unless they come up with an adult version of the concept like a open world rpg or something along those lines.

Obviously by the time these games come out i was already well in my 20 ies so i never really cared about the whole concept too much as it was just another may i add brilliant way of getting more money out of mostly parents their pockets, i do own a few sets myself but those are mostly for collectors purposes. 

Pretty sure folks who are younger then me can chip in with a better view like do you have found memories or any nostalgia for these games? 

Edited July 23, 2022 by Yaramaki

[Withywarlock]

49 minutes ago, Yaramaki said:

Doesn't seem like we have had a topic about this yet.

If there have been any they would've been discussed a very long time ago. The toys-to-life craze ended quite a while ago, but I still enjoy talking about them and what could have been. Were I a lot less environmentally conscious I'd probably be glad to hear news of their return if that were to happen. It appears that won't be the case, seeing as there's no word on Guitar Hero - the fantastic plastic before TTL - coming back yet.

51 minutes ago, Yaramaki said:

Right, toy to life games, did you ever buy any of them, did you enjoy them or did you ignore it all together and diden't care at all.

I'd bought practically all of the Skylanders games but didn't have a phone compatible for the mobile games, which only used the codes that came in the boxes with the stickers and Top Trumps-like cards. They were the best out of the 'big three', the other two being Disney Something or Other, and Lego Dimensions. Disney didn't really offer much to me, bearing in mind I was in my early 20s and I wouldn't have much joy with it as a child because sandbox gameplay was never really my thing. As for Lego it was too much effort setting up the portal, but the game itself pretty decent. It's more Lego for those who want it, now with actual Lego.

53 minutes ago, Yaramaki said:

And offcourse the most important question do you still own any and would you like them to make a comeback. Let's kick things with what came to my mind first when i tought about this subject.

I do still own a lot of my figures, which I've kept in case I play D&D with them one day, or some other purpose. But would I like them to make a comeback? ...no. As much as I like physical media, toys like this which aren't really built or made to last that long shouldn't be made. I appreciate that they're a drop in the ocean (no pun intended) compared to the other environmental impacts of plastic in our waters, but the less there is the better. If TTL have to stop existing to help that, so be it.

56 minutes ago, Yaramaki said:

[...]and offcourse how can anyone forget the amiibo craze, pretty much 15$ figurines with nintendo characters that did the bare minimum. 

I will say that at least Nintendo characters are recognisable and have developed a fan following. You could have one on your desk and say "oh, that's so-and-so, from this-and-that." But even then they would mostly gather dust once you'd linked it to your device/game. Plus they were decently modelled, and didn't have elaborate designs that made for poor machine-painting.

57 minutes ago, Yaramaki said:

A little over 10 years ago up until let's say 2016-17 these things were everywhere, in skylanders case they are still everywhere only now dumped in a forgotten corner of the house, laying to rot in the attic or being sold at a flea market for a few euros a piece (in skylanders case).

Amen. It was like the plastic instrument phases: everyone loved them... until they didn't, and it came to the point where - among other collectable tat with physical media, Ubisoft being the worst for this - stores simply stopped taking them because they didn't have the room for it. My local CeX would only take the games, not the instruments because it was that bad. Not even charity shops were picking them up in my area, including the one I worked at for a while.

59 minutes ago, Yaramaki said:

What happened? Pretty simple answers oversaturation and in skylanders case games that declined in quality over time.

I agree with oversaturation, even Skylanders alone struggled to stand on its own two feet with the amount of releases it had and staggered content. People just couldn't afford multiple of these games, even when they were in their final days selling the larger gimmicky figures 3 for £15 (given they were £15+ per figure on release). I found the games to be good, but not £60+ good on launch.

1 hour ago, Yaramaki said:

I doubt anybody is really waiting for a toy to life comeback so nah i don't really want it to make a comeback unless they come up with an adult version of the concept like a open world rpg or something along those lines.

What's left of the darkSpyro forum would like to have a word with you. 😅

Only joking. Missing those times greatly!

In closing, I think I said everything I wanted to in this video about why they came and went. It's a fairly long unscripted talk, but it covers the various reasons why I think Skylanders at least struggled.

The TL;DR for why Toys-to-Life struggled could be accurately summed up as "Activision-Blizzard," given their handling of Guitar Hero. However it's nice to talk about TTL in general and the specifics as to why they went down the portal of power.

Thanks for this thread, Yaramaki. It's nice to look back on these things every now and again, and maybe their future with Amiibo still going.

[The Blackangel]

@Rain Dew loves Skylanders. She has damn near every figure from every game. She's going to be doing reviews throughout the series for our gaming channel.

As for me, I have some collectibles like a few Master Swords, but I don't know if that really answers this question.

[Yaramaki]

Kinda feel bumping this thread as somebody else here has to have an oppionion about this? Did you buy any amiibo, skylanders whatever else there is? Do you have any memories or nostalgia you like to share with us, did you love or hate the toy to life gimmick when it was a thing a decade ago?

[Heatman]

My brother have a big thing for LEGO Dimensions. It's quite a decent one in my opinion but the only issue or a downside that I see in LEGO Dimensions is the price. A starter pack of it retails for $100.

[Withywarlock]

44 minutes ago, Heatman said:

My brother have a big thing for LEGO Dimensions. It's quite a decent one in my opinion but the only issue or a downside that I see in LEGO Dimensions is the price. A starter pack of it retails for $100.

Good grief. They're still quite pricey here: £45-50 isn't bad especially for a Toys-to-Life game, but that's the thing: this came out seven years ago. At launch they never tried competitive pricing either, so confident in their product that they'd charge the same or more as their competitors for the starter packs and additional figures.

It's hardly any wonder they died, and charging $100 continues to show why it's unlikely they'll come around again any time soon.

[Kane99]

I never played any of the games where you used toys and such. I'll admit though, the figures they released were pretty cool. I got a Mario Amiibo and that's about it. I never saw a point to buy them for gaming, instead I just bought to collect. 

I hear they were so mass produced though, that they are still quite cheap these days, so there's that. 

[Heatman]

8 hours ago, Withywarlock said:

Good grief. They're still quite pricey here: £45-50 isn't bad especially for a Toys-to-Life game, but that's the thing: this came out seven years ago. At launch they never tried competitive pricing either, so confident in their product that they'd charge the same or more as their competitors for the starter packs and additional figures.

It's hardly any wonder they died, and charging $100 continues to show why it's unlikely they'll come around again any time soon.

Seriously, I would have given it a go but looking at what they are asking for it, that's a killer for me or even most people because that's too much. 

No matter how good it supposedly is, asking for that amount would make it all easier for most gamers to stick to it. 

[Yaramaki]

18 hours ago, Withywarlock said:

Good grief. They're still quite pricey here: £45-50 isn't bad especially for a Toys-to-Life game, but that's the thing: this came out seven years ago. At launch they never tried competitive pricing either, so confident in their product that they'd charge the same or more as their competitors for the starter packs and additional figures.

It's hardly any wonder they died, and charging $100 continues to show why it's unlikely they'll come around again any time soon.

I coulden't believe it either that lego dimensions is still going for over 100$ on the secondary market but after looking at sold listings on ebay brand new ones are like 150-200$ (just the ps4/xbox one platforms seem to be worth money as the other platforms it was released on like 360/ps3 are like little over 30 bucks for a brand new set on amazon) makes me wonder wheter i should sell the one i bought on clearance for xbox one a couple of years ago, because pretty sure i'll never get around playing it anyway. Crazy how the market changes for certain items, during their lifecycle stores coulden't get rid of these things and after a put them on clearance after a while, now these lego sets are suddenly worth almost double the price then what they were originally selling for. 

Offcourse lego is a timeless toy that is probably going to be relevant for pretty much ever, maybe lego collectors are skooping up these sets instead of videogame collectors. Don't know much about lego myself but i suspect quite a few of these lego figurines are exclusive to the lego dimensions video game.  It's strange that only the ps4 and xbox one platforms are worth money and the ps3/360/wii u are not because one would think those platforms had a much lower print run then the ps4/xbox one versions. 

[Heatman]

On 8/15/2022 at 10:08 PM, Kane99 said:

I never played any of the games where you used toys and such. I'll admit though, the figures they released were pretty cool. I got a Mario Amiibo and that's about it. I never saw a point to buy them for gaming, instead I just bought to collect. 

I hear they were so mass produced though, that they are still quite cheap these days, so there's that. 

If you're into collection, Toy games are so perfect for you to start from it. I have a guy who's living in the same neighbourhood with me and he's a big collector. The first day he showed me his pick ups, I was speechless. He's been collecting for more than 8 years now. 

[Kane99]

8 minutes ago, Heatman said:

If you're into collection, Toy games are so perfect for you to start from it. I have a guy who's living in the same neighbourhood with me and he's a big collector. The first day he showed me his pick ups, I was speechless. He's been collecting for more than 8 years now. 

Yeah the figures are popular, at least when it comes to the Amiibos and some of the other ones out there. I think a lot of those skylanders toys have since gone down in price, as they really mass produced them. I remember seeing a bin of them for cheap on ebay a while back. At least for the skylanders and other ones. With Amiibos they are a bit more profitable I think. 

[Heatman]

1 hour ago, Kane99 said:

Yeah the figures are popular, at least when it comes to the Amiibos and some of the other ones out there. I think a lot of those skylanders toys have since gone down in price, as they really mass produced them. I remember seeing a bin of them for cheap on ebay a while back. At least for the skylanders and other ones. With Amiibos they are a bit more profitable I think. 

I saw a guys YouTube video where he said to have spent $1000 on rare Mario Toys on ebay. 

Here's the video. 

 

[Yaramaki]

9 hours ago, Kane99 said:

Yeah the figures are popular, at least when it comes to the Amiibos and some of the other ones out there. I think a lot of those skylanders toys have since gone down in price, as they really mass produced them. I remember seeing a bin of them for cheap on ebay a while back. At least for the skylanders and other ones. With Amiibos they are a bit more profitable I think. 

The difference between amiibos and skylanders is that amiibos figures feature timeless classic characters, something that cannot be said about skylanders + you know it's nintendo. You just know their hardcore fanbase is going to scoop them up and want to get as much as possible. A quick ebay search trough sold listings you'll notice some have sold for a couple of hundred dollars offcourse has to be brand new. Now i know why a particulair japanese 3ds set goes for so much money apperently the amiibo included is one of the rarest out there.

You know this makes you wondering why disney infinity flopped, like you couldn't possible have more iconic characters then from disney themselves or maybe i'm giving disney a bit to much credit.

In the end i always stayed away from amiibos and the toy to life genre as i didn't want to start collecting even more crap and 3 rooms of my house are already full with videogames and consoles and whatever else there is. Then i haven't even talked about all the stuff that i haven't moved from my parents place yet lol. Sure i've got a few toy to life starter sets myself but i bought them all on clearance.

Speaking about clearance this makes me wonder does anybody remember Starlink : battle from atlas from ubisoft that released in late 2018, i don't know who at ubisoft tought it was a good idea to release something like this when the whole toy to life trend pretty much died already?Funny thing is i still see these starter sets in toy stores all the time for as low as 10-15 bucks that is what i paid for the one i have atleast. 

[Withywarlock]

2 hours ago, Yaramaki said:

You know this makes you wondering why disney infinity flopped, like you couldn't possible have more iconic characters then from disney themselves or maybe i'm giving disney a bit to much credit.

The toys weren't particularly good quality nor were they that accurate in representing the characters they were based on. The only positive thing about them I can say is that they were difficult to break as they were fairly solid and didn't contain additional flimsy parts, and the paint work was good. Beyond that, the sandbox content wasn't enough to keep people interested and the abilities per figure weren't worth the cost.

I've always loved the Jungle Book and wanted the Baloo toy but from what I gather from the wiki he was only available for the Toy Box mode of the third game , where you make your own maps. There were other Jungle Book items such as King Louie's Monkeys from the second game... but that meant owning two games. There were a couple of other figures that I would've liked, but between the pricing and their functionality it wasn't worth it. I decided to quit Disney Infinity so not to get down about it. What you never had, you'll never miss.

You are right to ask why Disney Infinity flopped though. It's strange because they've got some of the world's most well-recognised brands and didn't give them the attention they deserved. Toy Story 3 had a better sandbox mode, and that was based on only one of their intellectual properties and didn't have any toy supplements to go with it! 😖

2 hours ago, Yaramaki said:

Speaking about clearance this makes me wonder does anybody remember Starlink : battle from atlas from ubisoft that released in late 2018, i don't know who at ubisoft tought it was a good idea to release something like this when the whole toy to life trend pretty much died already?Funny thing is i still see these starter sets in toy stores all the time for as low as 10-15 bucks that is what i paid for the one i have atleast. 

Oh God aye. I remember walking into GAME one time and not 6 months after its launch the game was down to £15 for the Starter Set. NintendoLife penned this article talking about a price reduction to £10.99 before it'd been out for a year.

The decision astonished me. Ubisoft announced it after Toys to Life had died already, committed to releasing it and quietly vanished into the ether. The only interest it got thereafter was news of its discounts. If I do get it, it'll be out of morbid curiosity and to achievement farm, not because the concept is particularly good and the toys didn't look all that great either. The way it hooked onto the Switch controller was neat though.

[Kane99]

On 8/19/2022 at 3:19 AM, Yaramaki said:

The difference between amiibos and skylanders is that amiibos figures feature timeless classic characters, something that cannot be said about skylanders + you know it's nintendo. You just know their hardcore fanbase is going to scoop them up and want to get as much as possible. A quick ebay search trough sold listings you'll notice some have sold for a couple of hundred dollars offcourse has to be brand new. Now i know why a particulair japanese 3ds set goes for so much money apperently the amiibo included is one of the rarest out there.

You know this makes you wondering why disney infinity flopped, like you couldn't possible have more iconic characters then from disney themselves or maybe i'm giving disney a bit to much credit.

In the end i always stayed away from amiibos and the toy to life genre as i didn't want to start collecting even more crap and 3 rooms of my house are already full with videogames and consoles and whatever else there is. Then i haven't even talked about all the stuff that i haven't moved from my parents place yet lol. Sure i've got a few toy to life starter sets myself but i bought them all on clearance.

Speaking about clearance this makes me wonder does anybody remember Starlink : battle from atlas from ubisoft that released in late 2018, i don't know who at ubisoft tought it was a good idea to release something like this when the whole toy to life trend pretty much died already?Funny thing is i still see these starter sets in toy stores all the time for as low as 10-15 bucks that is what i paid for the one i have atleast. 

Was Skylanders the ones that featured the likes of Spyro? Or was there another one I'm forgetting? 

I remember seeing a listing on Facebook marketplace for a box of figures lol for next to nothing a while back. 

Also, wasn't there another game where it utilized cards much like amiibos and such?