Skylanders: Swap Force has lots of variety … and repetition (hands-on preview)

The season draws close for a spate of new titles, and Activision Blizzard — the newly independent gaming behemoth — plans to make sure you won’t forget about the next installment of the billion-dollar franchise Skylanders.

Last week, Activision let us preview a new level from the latest entry in the toy-meets-game series, Skylanders: Swap Force. I am still stunned at two things. The new release, hitting multiple platforms on Oct. 13, has an incredible amount of variety. You can swap the top and bottom halves of the real-life figurines representing 16 new characters, resulting in 256 combinations. At the same time, the gameplay seems repetitive as ever.