Jack Skellington

The Disney Infinity game is actually a series of different games based on different movie properties. Each game can only be accessed with characters associated with that movie license, so your replayability is limited. That's because the big thing in Disney Infinity is supposed to be the toy box, which is essentially a level creator. In user-created levels, any character is accessible, which is good because...

Some of the Disney figures can't be used in any of the games. That's right. From the 2nd wave of 12 figures, only 3 can actually be used in actual pre-made game levels. The other 9 are only usable in the toybox mode. But hey, who wouldn't want to buy a figure of Jack Skellington even though if you want to play as him in the game you have to build a game level yourself... WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?!

But I pre-ordered him because I was curious, and after having him run around my horrible pre-made level... I don't know if I'm going to buy any more of these non-game figures. Because really, without goals and objectives, it's all pretty damned dull. Which is insane, because the way they designed Jack's moveset, they could have just dropped him in the Monsters University game with no problems.

At this point, if Disney Infinity wants to become "fun," or at least justify its price, it needs to let you play as different characters from different properties in all the levels.

And leveling up doesn't get you anything. No increase to stats, no unlocked abilities. It's just leveling up to make a number go up. That completely ignores the addictive property of level grinding.

All these problems I'm mentioning here, they've all been addressed by Skylanders Giants, which is costing me more money, but which I'm having a LOT more fun with. When you level a character up, your stats increase. When you acquire money, it doesn't just unlock the next part of a game level, you use it to buy new abilities for your character. Oh, and EVERY CHARACTER CAN BE PLAYED IN EVERY PART OF THE GAME! Replayability is all there. And the game play is combat based and fun, it's not just a bunch of fetch quests or collectathons which is pretty much what most of the Disney Infinity Game feels like. (Although Skylanders has both, they're not required to advance gameplay, just to unlock bonus items.)

Skylanders Giants

So I've been struggling with whether or not to get Skylanders Giants figures for about a year. That's when I found out that Bobcat Goldthwait did the voice of one of the Skylanders. But to hear that voice in gameplay, I'd have to get the game starter set and then the figure. Too expensive, I thought.

Of course this year, in fact just couple days ago, they released the NEW Skylanders game: Skylanders SwapForce, which has an even more gimmicky (and more expensive) new feature for the figures. But as a result, there was suddenly a sale on Skylander starter sets that I felt very reasonable for a video game. (They were at Target for $40.) So I picked it up... and holy crap everything in the game is designed to make you addicted. You get in game bonuses for owning as many of the characters as possible. Want to be a little more powerful in game? You just have to have at least 12 characters... but with 16 you'd be even more powerful... You have 3 characters from the machine class? Then all your machine characters get a bonus... and if you had 5 they'll get an even bigger bonus...

There's even a bonus for having characters from the previous game that are retired and thus hard to get. What I'm saying is that the makers of the game get the collector mentality. Thank god the figures are decent enough that if you get them on sale the price doesn't feel like too much of a rip off. They're insanely more detailed than the Disney Infinity figures, but are all original characters from the video game developers.

Two things keep me from feeling to bad about this spending. 1) The game is decent and using the different characters actually extends the fun of the game. (The RPG leveling up aspect plays well to the collector mentality as well.) 2) More importantly, the voice acting in the game and for each character is really well done. And they've got some great voice actors... to the point that the majority of the figures I've bought so far are due to who does their voice. Also, NPCs include George Takei.

Those characters in the picture immediately above are voiced by Kevin Sorbo (Hercules the Legendary Journeys), Dwight Schultz (Barclay from Star Trek: TNG and Murdock from A-Team), and Bobcat Goldthwait (Too much to mention). I've also picked up figures voice acted by John Kassir (who does his cryptkeeper laugh), EG Daily, Kevin Michael Richardson, and hope to get some Tara Strong in there soon.

Mousers

Mousers! Because Mousers!

Each one has 4 points of articulation, and their Center of gravity means they can only stand with both legs, but that ball joint head allows for some cool poses and ARTICULATED JAW!

So awesome. I bought 2 packs, one of which I'll probably give as a gift to someone I know will appreciate Mousers as much as I do. Or maybe I'll open it and give 7 people 1 Mouser each.

Santino Marella

I didn't buy this figure, but holy crap did I want to. Not because I know the character or follow wrestling, because I don't, but it's a 6-inch wrestling figure with a sock puppet on his hand.

Shy Guy

I've bought 4 of these guys. Any time I see a sale I pick one up. I get why I might buy one or two but four?

They can't hold anything, they barely have articulation, but I love them so much...

And I don't know why.

Never has the name of this blog been so accurate.

Buyer's remorse, This weekend In buying toys edition

Spent way too much on costume accessories this week at Target, but that's a blog I gave up a while ago. But toys...

 

Picked up a Hot Wheels car of a rocket powered school bus, which is an odd way to power a school bus, and speaks to a growing trend toward fantasy that I'm not entirely comfortable with for Hot Wheels, but I suppose that's what they use the Matchbox line for. Meanwhile, I wanted a Hot Wheels school bus.

Also picked up a Walking Dead minimate pack because it has a good minimate zombie and a comicbook version of the Governor with bonus eyepatch head. Mostly for the minimate zombie.

Then theres a TMNT lego polybag set which I only picked up for the minifigure with a krang image printed on the torso, simulating the awesome giant alien brain in a robot body torso idea.

 

Also got a Daphne minifigure because some asshole opened all the blind bags so I could look inside them and find the ones I wanted. Kinda mixed feelings on this. On the one hand I got what I wanted, on the other hand this is just a huge dick move. If I saw whoever did this I wonder if I would have yelled at the person doing it, adult or kid. I told a store clerk... And they just walked away and I later saw them working an empty cash register. (The box holding the blind packs had been moved to another part of the store too, so they weren't even near the other Scooby Doo building sets.)

 I also picked up the Voodoo Man becuase he's actually the Freak of Crystal Cove from the recent Mystery Inc. series. In that continuity he's actually Fred Jones' father and town mayor who in realitty kidnapped an infant Fred Jones from his real mystery solving parents in order to extort them into staying away from his criminal plans. In an ironic twist, Fred Jones sr learns to love his adopted son and when Fred'ss real parents return The Freak is also revealed to be a better parent and more loving than Fred's real family who are now corrupt adventurers. Man that was a good show. Anyway, they made a figure of the Freak... And then gave him a new name which makes absolutely no sense.

Of course if you check the Character Building website you realize that in the UK, where CB is located, they do things differently there. Like have all 5 members of the Mystery Inc. gang available through the blind packs. It also turns out that 7 of the monsters aren't part of the Scooby Doo line in the UK. For the US Scooby Doo Character Building release CB folded in minifigures from their Monsters vs. Zombie line, possibly to fill out the Scooby line but more likely because it was the only way to get those figures into US stores. 

Borderlands 2 Swag-filled Limited Edition Diamond Plate Loot Chest

What a long ass name for this product. Basically, it's a replica of a Loot Chest from the Borderland game filled with various Borderlands memorabilia. You've got some trading cards and a mask of a Borderlands baddie, all of which have codes that can be entered in the game to unlock those items in the game. Which is pretty cool since the drop ratio of those items in the game naturally is about 0.05%. I actually got one of the guns once, but a power failure corrupted my save file and it was lost forever.

 Other items inside the chest include wanted posters for all the Borderlands 2 playable characters (including the DLC ones, which the previous chest did not). There's also some pretty neat crumpled up newspaper pages that act as packaging materials but you quickly realize are even more bonus content, since they're actually from a newspaper written by characters in the game. Also, some window decals.

The chest itself is pretty solid. Which is good, because the cost for the whole package is $100. If this was some flimsy plastic (like the mask) I'd be pretty  pissed. But this thing could probably survive a few drops and I wouldn't mind using it as a toy chest for some collection or other.

Even cooler: the box the chest comes from simulates an in-game shipping box with additional jokes scrawled over it by various characters. It's pretty great.