Skylanders: Imaginators is the sixth game in the Skylanders series, developed by Toys for Bob and published by Activision, and was released on Wii U, Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation 4 in October 2016. A Nintendo Switch version was released on the console's international launch in March 2017.
In his latest scheme to take over Skylands, Kaos has uncovered the ancient magic of Mind Magic, which was used by the Ancients to create everything in Skylands. With it, he now plans to make an army of his own Skylanders, called Doomlanders. To combat them, the Portal Master must create their own Skylanders, Imaginators, and stop Kaos.
With this game comes the Creation Crystals, which when placed on the Portal, takes the player to a customization screen where they can create their very own Skylander called Imaginators, in one of ten battle classes; Brawler, Sorcerer, Smasher, Sentinel, Knight, Bowslinger, Ninja, Swashbuckler, Quickshot and Bazooker.
Accompanying them are some of the finest senseis in all of Skylands meant to train them, who make up the new lineup of figures for this game. Ten of them (one for each element) are reformed villains from Trap Team, who have become full-fledged Skylanders.
Also featured in this game are Crash Bandicoot and Dr. Neo Cortex, marking the first appearance of those two characters in a console game since Crash: Mind Over Mutant, before that franchise came back with Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy.
Unfortunately, sales for this game were an all-time low for the series, making it the final game in the series released on consoles.
This game provides examples of:
- 11th-Hour Superpower: In the final battle, after multiple arguments with Kaos and being thrown an insult for his lack of hands, Brain switches side to the Portal Master and provides their Imaginators with a boost that makes them amazingly strong for the rest of the battle.
- Absurdly High Level Cap: Everytime you scan in a new Sensei, the highest possible level for all of your Imaginators goes up by one after the initial start of 15. If you scan in every possible Sensei, including in-game variants and chase variants since they increase the cap too, your Imaginators' highest possible level is 65.
- Absurdly Short Level: The Sensei Elemental Realms, which is probably why they are optional. All of them feature a unique gimmick to give them some more meat on their bones, but otherwise, most of them can be cleared in around five minutes, though some of them can be longer than others, like the Magic and Light realms.
- Adaptational Heroism: The tribesmen from Crash Bandicoot (1996) are friendly NPCs in the Crash Bandicoot level and aren't trying to stop you even if they were more anti-villains in their original game.
- Already Undone for You: The entrance to the Cradle of Creation is hidden under fake ground that falls apart when you step on it. Despite this, the Sorcerer Doomlander got inside without disturbing the ground at all.
- Amusement Park of Doom: The penultimate level is an abandoned amusement park, and throughout the level, you hear an intercom voice that gives you an idea of just about how dangerous the park was when it was under management.
- The Artifact: The Core of Light is magically rebuilt in the same way as in Spyro's Adventure and stationed in the Light Sensei Realm even though it was destroyed in the last game. Since it is only seen in this one optional level, it has no purpose to the plot at all, despite how important it has been in keeping the darkness away (but since the Darkness as a whole was destroyed in the last game, it now doesn’t have much of a purpose to the world overall).
- As You Know: At the start of Lost Imaginite Mines, Blobbers uses this phrase to introduce the players to the fact that Imaginite is magnetic (something that was never hinted at all in the main story).
- Barrier Maiden: In the Cursed Tiki Temple level, the titular temple used to worship the dragons was once struck by a curse that made it come alive. To hinder it, the dragons chose a villager to become a stone statue that would seal the curse away.
- Bottomless Pit Rescue Service: This game shows that Skylanders falling off the island they're on and then respawning back on it un-harmed is something that really happens and is not just a gameplay element, as it happens to Pop Fizz in a cutscene.Pop Fizz: Jokes on [Kaos], I'm still alive! Good thing Skylanders can always recover from a fall, huh?
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Sharpfin appears in one of the possible levels in the sewers, and he mentions how he and the Skylanders have met in a previous game, before changing it to previous life.
- Brick Joke: At the start of chapter five, Jet-Vac receives info that his lunch from the Sky Fortress' mini fridge has been stolen, so during the mission to secure the battleship, he scouts around for whoever it was that did it. He has no luck, so he puts it on hold after the Guacamole Monster has been defeated. In the final chapter, Kaos, in an act of complete pettiness, reveals that he was the one who ate Jet-Vac's lunch straight to his face.
- The Bus Came Back: Wendel from the 3DS version of Spyro's Adventure makes his first appearance since that game in the Switch version, where he helps you store your progress for the Skylander you're playing as in the figure.
- Call-Back: When you win your first game of Creation Clash at the Card Shack, the person you battle will ask you if you’ve already played the game before, just it was called something different.
- Continuity Nod: After the Darkness' destruction in the previous games, Kaos doesn't have any dark powers anymore because that's where he got them from, which is why he uses Mind Magic as much as he can.
- Cutscene Incompetence: During the Doomlander's appearance at Skylander Academy, Spyro and Stealth Elf try to fight it, but are unable to damage him. If you then use one of them against the Doomlander at the end of the first level, then they can fight him just like any other Skylander.
- Developer's Foresight: The NPCs in Thumpin' Wumpa Island have different dialogue depending on if you're playing as Crash or Cortex.
- Disappointed by the Motive: Implied with Brain. He was displeased with his fellow Ancients not using Mind Magic for anything truly exceptional despite the limitless possibilities, and that was why he tried to launch a Mass Hypnosis over Skylands that he was then punished for. He also isn't impressed with Kaos wanting to use Mind Magic to simply create the best bad guy ever, especially since the Skylanders take down this "best bad guy" with almost no issues as they always do. He puts up with this idiocy until the final battle, where one of the reasons why he turns over to the Portal Master's side during it is because he thinks they have a way better imagination than Kaos will ever have.
- Double Weapon: Senseis and Imaginators of the Seninel class uses these types of weapons.
- Dual Wielding: The Swashbuckler and Quickshot class both have the Senseis and Imaginators use two weapons of the same type.
- Dual-World Gameplay: Fizzland becomes the third level to use this gimmick after Darklight Crypt and Wilikin Village. Changes between the normal world and the so-called Fizzworld include bottles that will start spinning, metal blocks turn into cages for giant eyeballs and vats of soda that turn into platforms.
- Escort Mission: In the second half of Lost Imaginite Mines, you have to ride a block of Imaginite through a hallway of enemies. And it can only move when you stand on it.
- Fantastic Racism: Jet-Vac holds a disdain towards vultures, calling them "Nature's cruelest mistake".
- Gameplay and Story Segregation:
- The water in Mushroom River is seemingly toxic, but if you happen to fall in, you don't take any fall damage, due to this game not having fall damage.
- To cap off the giant cake for Kaos, Eruptor claims that they are just gonna put some candles on, only to discover that they have been stolen by rats. Even after you get the candles back, they are never shown on the cake at any point.
- Gotta Catch Them All: There are 1400 pieces of Imaginite to collect after the final update, some of them you have by default, others you get from scanning in Senseis or Imaginite Crystals for the first time, and the rest you get by Imaginite Chests you find in the game. On the case of the last method, just because you've already colleted one piece doesn't mean you won't get duplicates, so prepare to farm a lot of chests.
- Heel–Face Turn: There are ten villains from Trap Team who have reformed themselves and return as Skylanders in this game, and four of them are previous members of the Doom Raiders, including the Golden Queen and Wolfgang.
- Lost Food Grievance: When Jet-Vac finds out that his lunch have been stolen, he sees it as something serious and will track down whoever did it. He finds out who the culprit is in the final level.Kaos: You wanna know something, Jerk-Vac? I’ve got some shocking news for you too. I'm the one who stole your lunch earlier! HA!
Jet-Vac: (stares for a few seconds) Kaos! - Mass Hypnosis: When Kaos and Brain meet face to face in reality for the first time, they combine their Mind Magic to cast a hypnosis spell over the entire Skylands, turning everyone into a mindless zombie, with the only exceptions to this being dragons.
- Musical Gameplay: Thumpin' Wumpa Island has some areas that are rhythm based, like tiki stone walls that are trying to push you off the ledge while moving to the beat.
- Never My Fault: Kaos' tendancy to never see his mistakes reaches its peak in this game. He always lets his impatientness about using Mind Magic get the better of him when he both creates new stuff with it and when he's trying to find shortcuts in coming up with something creative, yet he alays looks for something else to blame for it.
- Never Shall The Selves Meet: Averted, as even though some previous Skylanders are NPCs in this game, you can still play as them as Skylanders and have their interact with each other no problem.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: After chapter 6, the Skylanders find out that Kaos is gonna head to the Golden Arcade to release Brain from being imprisoned there, so they head over there to find him before Kaos. They get to Brain first, but because he's already sweared alligance to Kaos, he leaves to meet up with him, and what follows is the two of them using their combined Mind Magic to create a Mass Hypnosis over the entire Skylands.
- Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Kaos sends his Sorcerer Doomlander to Skylander Academy to take a book about Mind Magic and Imaginite so he can make even stronger minions and destroy the Skylanders. However, he is unable to comprehend the text of the book and basically the entire concept of Mind Magic, meaning the entire plan for the book stealing was for nothing and in doing so, allowed the Skylanders to find out that he was up to something.
- Not Me This Time: At the start of Thumpin' Wumpa Island, Cortex tries to use a machine that will let him control the rhythmic energy of the Great Synchronization Celebration that's happening. However, Fake Crash takes control of the machine that causes a malfunction to the rhythm of the islands. Since Cortex is known for wanting to take over the world, he is at first blamed by Aku Aku, Spyro and Mags until they discover that someone else entirely is at fault here.
- The One Guy: A first for the series that happens here is that some elements and Sensei classes has two females and one male in them. Like how Tri-Tip is the only male Earth Sensei, Chain Reaction is the only male Swashbuckler, and Hood Sickle is the only male Sentinel.
- Photo Mode: A unique feature to this game is being able to take a picture of your current Skylander at any point. Around the levels and hub world are also spots known as Selfie Spots, where if you take a picture there, you will be rewarded with extra treasure.
- Power Creep:
- You can still use any Skylanders figures from previous games, just be prepared for them to not get anywhere close to the same damage the Senseis or Imaginators. This is because they are the first kinds of Skylanders whose stats level up with every level-up, which leaves every other Skylander in a case of Can't Catch Up. Even Eon's Elite Skylanders, while having a high amount of health, deal as much damage as their regular counterparts.
- Hats add a boost to some stats like in previous games, but here, Imaginators are the only Skylanders who can equip them, and the hats section has been completely removed from the character menu for non-Imaginators, including Senseis. It's not even there if the Skylander is already wearing a hat that they equipped in a previous game.
- Randomly Generated Levels: The Undead Sensei Realm mixes up its layout everytime you replay it.
- A Rare Sentence: Said by Pop Fizz in chapter 6 after you have sucked in globules that are running amok.Pop Fizz: Goodbye globules! Ever heard someone say goodbye to globules before?
- Recurring Element: To get access to the Sensei Realms, you will need a Sensei of the corresponding element, making them Imaginators' take on Elemental Gates.
- Recycled Soundtrack: The main theme of Glacier Gully is used during the snow part of Dragon Temple.
- Remember the New Guy?: Just like previous Skylanders groups, the Senseis have been Skylanders for a long time, yet they were completely unmentioned until now.
- Crash Bandicoot and Spyro have appearently met each other before, as Aku Aku calls them old friends. It is most likely a reference to Spyro Orange: The Cortex Conspiracy and Crash Bandicoot Purple: Ripto's Rampage, but because of the uncertainty if the original Spyro series and the Skylanders series take place in the same universe, it feels more like Crash has always been friends with the Skylanders and this is just the first time we see him with them.
- Token Evil Teammate: Brain was this to the Ancients, and that's why it is easy for him to team up with Kaos to take over Skylands, because their goals go together well. Back in the time of the Ancients, Brain didn't like that Mind Magic was never used to its fullest potential and tried to use it to unleash a mass hypnosis spell over the entire Skylands, similar to the one we see after the Golden Arcade, and for it, he was locked away in a jar. With their team-up, both end up getting what they want: Kaos gets control over Skylands while Brain gets to use Mind Magic however he wants.
- Version-Exclusive Content: Inverted. The Switch version doesn’t have the racing mode that the other versions reuse from SuperChargers.
- Viewers Are Goldfish: Imaginators are the only Skylanders who get a power boost in the Doomlander fights, as evident by the symbol in the top left corner just like how it was in previous games, and Eon will say it when you arrive as usual. Despite this, when the fight starts, Kaos will drop a comment on if the player is playing as an Imaginator or not, saying that they are stronger, as if there weren't already signs for it.
- The Worf Effect: In the introduction, Spyro and Stealth Elf's first fight with a Doomlander has them losing badly...until the Senseis show up.
