Spyro the Dragon (series)

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Spyro the Dragon (1) PlayStation cover

Spyro the Dragon is a platform game series starring the video game character Spyro, which was originally released for the PlayStation. The Spyro series has gained substantial popularity since the first game and several sequels and spin-offs followed the original.

Contents

Console games

Spyro the Dragon

In the first game of the series, Spyro sets out into the Dragon Realms to defeat Gnasty Gnorc, while freeing the realm's imprisoned dragons and recovering their hoard of treasure. It is considered by many to be one of the best PlayStation games -- most reviews were highly favorable^{[[Citing sources citation needed]]}, and it also received acclaim for its musical score by Stewart Copeland.

Boxart of the PlayStation game.

In Spyro 2 (also known as Spyro 2: Gateway to Glimmer in Europe and Spyro x Sparx: Tondemo Tours in Japan), Spyro and Sparx, while looking for a holiday at Dragon Shores, accidentally stumble through a portal into the realm of Avalar, where the malicious wizard Ripto is taking over the once-peaceful lands. Spyro was looking forward to having some rest but instead is dragged into a new adventure. In this episode of the series, the small dragon also meets a number of new allies, including the Professor, Hunter the cheetah, Elora the faun, and Zoe the fairy, and must face a new foe: Ripto, a tiny mean Riptoc, equipped with a magic sceptre, and protected by Crush and Gulp, two dim-witted dinosaurs. The worlds are Summer Forest, Autumn Plains, and Winter Tundra. The game introduces some new movements which Spyro can execute to advance in his quest, including hovering after a glide, swimming underwater, climbing ladders, and head-butting.

Spyro: Year of the Dragon logo.

In Spyro 3, the dragons are celebrating the coming of dragon eggs, an event that takes place every twelve years. A mysterious anthropomorphic rabbit girl, Bianca, along with an army of rhynocs, come by and steal all the eggs, Spyro, Sparx, and Hunter must follow her down a rabbit hole to the other side of the world - to the Forgotten Realms. There they meet many new allies, which are also playable characters - Sheila the kangaroo, Sgt. Byrd the flying, missile-shooting penguin, Bentley the kindly yeti, and Agent 9 the hyperactive, laser-wielding monkey, as well as a brand-new foe: the Sorceress. The worlds are Sunrise Spring, Midday Garden, Evening Lake, and Midnight Mountain. The worlds are named after times of the day, as opposed its predessor which the worlds were named after seasons. Sunrise Spring, as well as being a time of the day, is the season missed out in Spyro 2. The third installment of the Spyro series also feature levels in which the player controls Sparx in a bird's eye view shooting game. The player also gets to control Hunter in several hidden minigames. Spyro and his new friends must find out why the Sorceress stole the eggs, what she plans to do with them, and how to stop her. This game is host to one of the most infamous glitches in the series: in Sunrise Spring, if you exit the Mushroom Speedway level without getting the second egg there (in the Butterfly Race), then you will not be able to get that egg unless you start over from scratch, thus preventing a player from getting a full completion in the game.

was the first game in the Spyro series for
The story kicks off right after the Sorceress was defeated in Spyro: Year of the Dragon. The baby dragons are now preparing to receive their dragonflies, a rite of passage in any dragon's life (although in the earlier games, none of the dragons besides Spyro has a dragonfly). It's a huge celebration, filled with joy and happiness, until Ripto, (from Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage) returns! He has come to capture the dragonflies, making the dragons helpless. He casts his spell but messes up. Instead, he scattered the dragonflies all over the Dragon Realms.

Spyro: A Hero's Tail (Fall

According to Vivendi Universal Games, the publisher of the Spyro series, a new Spyro game is currently in development. This game seems to take some leaves from Shadow Legacy's book, including level-up features and physical combat, as opposed to the classical Spyro gameplay like puzzle-solving and item quests. Also, a cast has been made that includes the likes of
It has been advertised as a prequel to the first Spyro game.

Handheld games and other systems

On
The Game Boy Advance series of Spyro was made by Digital Eclipse (the first three games) and Vicarious Visions (Spyro Fusion/Orange).

(known as Spyro Advance in Japan) (July 2001), probably the most challenging in the series as you are required to collect ALL of the missing "main items" in order to beat the game.
(October 2002), this release has an improved 'collect all of these (specific) items on this level' method (to receive a reward) — if Spyro is defeated, the current count is retained, as-opposed to 'Spyro: Season Of Ice', where all of the 'collection items' must be collected/activated within one life.
(known as Spyro: Adventure in Europe) (October 2003), disliked by many fans as it features a more RPG-based gameplay model (i.e. the collecting of numerous items required to revisit areas over-again, and long sections of dialogue).
(known as Spyro: Fusion in Europe and Spyro Advance: Waku Waku Tomodachi Daisakusen! in Japan) (June 2004), half of a crossover with Crash Bandicoot, is another disliked title, though not more so than Spyro 3; although a true platformer, it has a basic gameplay model and fans dislike the 2D gameplay. The Crash Purple counterpart works far more successfully, as Crash Bandicoot games have always had 2D levels.
Overall, the GBA games has been successful and pleased its fanbase. Although, the games have been criticized for having tough camera angles and the gliding jumps hindered by the graphics of the GBA.

On

(October 2005) added RPG elements to the series, as well as a parallel Shadow Realm of each of the individual realms of the Dragon Kingdom, Avalar, and the Forgotten Realms.

On Mobile phones

Spyro (June 2003) In this game, Spyro is the special guest of the Fairy Queen for the Royal Ball. But just before the beginning of the party, none of the fairies are ready: their dresses are still locked in the magic chests. The player must help Spyro give each fairy her clothes in the right order or the party will be cancelled! In 'classic mode' Spyro has eighteen levels, the first three of which are practice tutorials. In 'arcade mode' the game is unlimited. Spyro has to help the fairies to find the right costume for the Great Ball of the Millennium. Each fairy has its own look and it is Spyro's job to locate the right clothing and accessories. If the clock runs down, as traditionally happens, the fairy can change her mind and throw off her costume. In arcade mode, the fairies are more impatient, ultimately leaving their dressing room. After two failures, it's game over.
(November 2004), Ripto and his army have attacked the three worlds of Ice, Grass and Fire. They've managed damage the machine that protects the worlds. Spyro and Sparx must recover the 4 damaged machine parts and return them to the Professor. Spyro breathes his traditional fire, casts spells, can teleport, jump and fly around 3 magical worlds and 7 levels of gameplay. Along the way, Spyro must talk to various characters to obtain new missions to defeat Ripto's rhynoc army. At the end, a new villain appears: a giant snake that Spyro has to defeat to beat the game.
Spyro the Dragon (Not the same game as the PS1 title. Despite the name, it is similar to Shadow Legacy.) (August 2005), A powerful, evil sorcerer has captured all of the dragons. It is quite a disaster to the Dragon Realms, everyone has disappeared! Spyro's friends are counting on him becoming a true kata, the magic/martial arts dragon power master to free the dragons before they are trapped in the alternate dimension known as the Shadow Realm forever! Each world has two versions of itself, a normal version and its shadow counterpart. Swapping between the two allows Spyro to advance past obstacles that appear on one version of the Realm but not the other. Spyro has three different types of moves, one for attacking in the normal Realm, one for attacking in the Shadow Realm and one for smashing breakable objects. To 'level-up' Spyro's moves (as in a Role Playing Game) gems need to be collected. There are 25 gems in all. There are three different colors, for each of the three different moves. The more gems of a specific color that are found, the higher Spyro's level is for that color.
Legend of Spyro (October 2006) This will be the mobile phone version of .

Appearances in non-Spyro games

Spyro appears in several Crash games. In ', there is a demo of the first Spyro game; similarly, Spyro features a ' demo. Crash Team Racing also contains a demo of Spyro 2 and vice versa. Crash Bash and Spyro 3 also contains demos of each other.

Crash Bandicoot Purple: Ripto's Rampage (known as Crash Bandicoot: Fusion in Europe and Crash Bandicoot Advance: Waku Waku Tomodachi Daisakusen! in Japan) (2004), for the Game Boy Advance, also features worlds and characters from the Spyro universe, but Spyro isn't a playable character in the game. Likewise, Spyro Orange: The Cortex Conspiracy features Spyro in a universe familiar to the orange bandicoot. This idea is intentional, as these two games were produced with a sharing intention, whereby items collected from each title need to be traded with the opposing game in-order to complete a joint-collection between the two.

In Crash Twinsanity, Spyro makes a small cameo protecting some of his treasure toward the end of the game.

In Crash Nitro Kart for GBA, Spyro can be unlocked by beating Velo with Team Bandicoot.

Flash Games

There have been many different games available online, notably the "Crash and Spyro Adventure World", a promotion by Kraft foods. Inside Nabisco Fruit Snacks and Jell-O Pudding Bites consumers found cards with codes. These codes could be typed in online to unlock up to eight different games.

The first Spyro flash games were on Universal Interactive's (now VU Games) Spyro website. These games nor the website can no longer be found.

Then the original Insomniac Spyro game websites included minigames to play, with the exception of the website for the first game which did not contain any proper flash games. One of these games still survives, Spark's Pond, which can be played below and also be downloaded from [Spyro-yearofthedragon.com]

[Spark's Pond]

As well as that another game that came out during the release of Spyro: Season of Flame, Super Spyro Speedway, can also still be played:

[Super Spyro Speedway]

[Neopets.com] has had several promotional flash games on their site. Three surviving games (which can be played without logging in or signing up) are as follows:

[Spyro: Power Blast]

[Crash and Spyro]

[Spyro Shadow Legacy: Magic Attack]

Other than that every other Spyro flash game has now either been lost over time as the website has shut down or discontinue the certain promotion.

Characters

Protagonists

Spyro, an eager, headstrong, purple dragon and the main protagonist.
Sparx is Spyro's constant companion. In the game, Sparx acts as a "living" health bar: his color indicates how many hit points Spyro has. (Yellow- full health, blue- 2 hit points, green-1 hit point. If Sparx is gone, Spyro has to take one more hit to lose a life). Sparx can regain his hit points if Spyro kills various neutral animals (sheep, frogs, etc.), known as fodder. Killing these animals releases butterflies which Sparx eats to regain his points.
*In some Spyro games, Sparx can earn one extra hitpoint (he turns red) before disappearing. Though in the third installment of the Spyro Series, the extra hitpoint was just an addition to his gold phase.
Hunter is a cheetah that was introduced in Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage. Helps the player learn different abilities and occasionally challenges Spyro to various races. He is dim-witted and forgetful. In The year of the Dragon he falls in love with the training sorcerous Bianca, he sometimes forgets to teach Spyro new things or warn him as he is to interested in her.
Moneybags, a wealthy (and greedy) bear who sells Spyro the ability to climb, swim, etc. as well as unlock bridges and passageways. His prices for these services are usually absurdly high. In Spyro: Year of the Dragon, there is a level in which he offers to open a bridge with his "magic powers," but he needs gems to jog his memory. If the player responds with "no," he threatens to turn Spyro into a blue hedgehog.
Sheila, a young outgoing kangaroo who acts like a mother to the three billy goats gruff in her home world.
Sgt. Byrd, a fearless military penguin who uses his jet-pack to fly.
Bentley, a mighty yeti with a heart of gold. He's very intelligent and has a big vocabulary.
Agent 9 is a hyperactive monkey armed with a laser and is an ally to Spyro.
The Professor, the creator of the Super-portal in Avalar. He is the genius of Avalar (and the Dragon Worlds, as of A Hero's Tail).
Elora, a faun and one of Spyro's friends. She's friendly and wise.
Bianca, an anthropomorphic rabbit who onced served the Sorceress; debuted in Year of the Dragon and has appeared in most games since. She's a training sorceress.
Zoe, a fairy who helps Spyro in games Ripto's Rage! onwards, to save his progress.
Ember, a small pink dragon that appears in A Hero's Tail and Shadow Legacy. In the latest game, she meets an armadillo named Bandit and the two fall in love. In A Hero's Tail Ember is obviously in love with Spyro as she asks Spyro to smash the dark gem beside her into little tiny heart shaped pieces as well as it would look nice on an engagement ring. Ember is flirty.
Flame, a young, fiery orange dragon, appears in A Hero's Tail and Shadow Legacy much like Ember. His appearance in each is brief, and he neither activates minigames nor advances the plot.
* Both Flame and Ember can be unlocked as skin modifiers in A Hero's Tail, allowing the player to effectively live the adventure as them.
Blink, an anthropomorphic young mole, and The Professor's nephew. Equipped with special gadgets for digging, He explores the underground regions for the sake of his "fresh-air-a-phobia".
Dragon Elders, the dragons that serve as the government of the Dragon Realms, and are also the primary meditating body.
Nanny, is an old pink dragon whose job is to watch over the Dragon Eggs. After the thieves robbed the Nursery in the Dragon Realms, she sent Spyro to retrieve the eggs in return for Light Gems.

Antagonists

The Spyro series has seen a wide array of antagonists, with each game generally centered about a single villain which Spyro sets out to defeat. As such, very few enemies or antagonists have appeared in more than one game in the series.

Cynder, a black dragon with red and yellow markings, will serve as the main villain in the upcoming Spyro game (and prequel), The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning.

Gnasty Gnorc was the main antagonist in the first Spyro game, who attempted takeover of the Dragon Realms by imprisoning the resident dragons in crystal; Gnasty later appeared in A Hero's Tail as the boss of the first world. Gnasty's minions are called Gnorcs.

Ripto, the title villain of Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage; a short but powerful sorceror who, upon being transported to the realm of Avalar, announced that he would be taking it over. Despite his defeat at the end of the Spyro 2, he has appeared in several later Spyro games, along with his two minions, Crush and Gulp.

The Sorceress was the antagonist of Spyro 3: Year of the Dragon, an evil witch who ruled over the Forgotten Realms and sent her apprentice, Bianca, along with an army of creatures called Rhynocs, to steal the eggs of the Dragon Realm.

Grendor, the antagonist of Spyro: Season of Ice for the GBA, was a Rhynoc who worked as a librarian of sorts for the Sorceress. In an attempt to cast a spell to become stronger and smarter, he wound up with two heads; the only way he could find to reverse it required wings from one hundred fairies, so he captured and froze fairies in ice for use in the spell.

Red the Dragon, the main antagonist from A Hero's Tail, was a former elder of the Dragon Realms. Having been banished from the realms by the other Elders, he returned to seek revenge and plunge the realms in a layer of darkness under his rule, bringing along with him Gnasty Gnorc (and correspondingly, Gnasty's Gnorc army), and Ineptune, an evil sea queen (whose name is a pun on the Roman god Neptune).

The Sorcerer, the antagonist in Spyro: Shadow Legacy for the Nintendo DS, was a darkly-cloaked wizard who could also shapeshift into a dragon-like monster.

Neo Cortex, from the Crash universe, serves as the antagonist of Spyro Orange: The Cortex Conspiracy, one game in a crossover pair between the Spyro and Crash Bandicoot universes.

Other

Egg Thieves: While most enemies in the Spyro series are either level-specific, or in the service of the game's main antagonist (such as Gnorcs and Rhynocs, henchmen of Gnasty and the Sorceress, respectively), one enemy type has recurred in several Spyro games with little variation each time. Referred to simply as "thieves" (if at all), these are robed enemies which have appeared in all three of the first Spyro games, as well as Season of Ice and A Hero's Tail. They cannot harm Spyro directly, but instead are seen in posession of an item (often a dragon egg), and flee quickly when Spyro draws near; recovering the item they hold requires the player to pursue the thieves across the level until Spyro catches them. When not being pursued, they taunt the player with a simple "nah, nah, nyah nah nah!" like shout.

Items

Gems, the hoard of dragons and often used as currency (especially to pay the character Moneybags). In many of the Spyro games, there were a set number of gems per level, and these were counted towards the player's overall percentage of game completion. In some of the most recent games, however (such as A Hero's Tail), this is no longer the case: gems can be collected by defeating enemies, and used to purchase consumable power-up items from shops.

Dragon Eggs have appeared in several of the Spyro games. Depending on the game, collecting enough Dragon Eggs can unlock secrets or allow passage to consecutive worlds. Some Dragon Eggs may be found lying on the ground or hovering in the air; other Dragon Eggs are in the possession of thieves, who must be chased down and attacked to recover the egg. Collecting these eggs was the main objective in Year of the Dragon.

Music by Stewart Copeland

Stewart Copeland, the former drummer of the band The Police, is credited with composing the soundtracks for the first three Spyro games as well as Enter the Dragonfly. The score for Spyro the Dragon was given high praise for its originality, portraying oriental/fantasy-like themes for the Dragon Worlds. All music was performed on a computer which he says were rather shallow compositions but one of the most fun gigs that he ever had. The original titles of the music tracks were named after the first noun that came into his head before he hit the "save" button.

Copeland made music for each world in the games as well as music devoted to each level, giving them each their own feel according to the natural surroundings, architecture and inhabitants of the place. For example, in Spyro the Dragon the Artisans' world of shepherds, sheep, medieval towers and endless green hills has an oriental-sounding mixture of bells and drums where as the Beast Makers' midnight swamp has a solid rhythm overlayed with the melancholy calls of an owl. Ambient music features in Spyro 2 such as Autumn Plains. Mainly, the music is very "busy", i.e. full of different percussion intruments underlying the melody. Ted Price, the head of Insomniac Games believed Copeland's work for Spyro: Year of the Dragon, which he co-wrote with Ryan Beveridge, was some of his best to date. It is the stage for all kinds of sounds, including strange vocals and exotic instuments in styles from all over the world.

The diversity of sounds used in the Spyro soundtrack by the creative spirit of a passionate rhythmist make it fresh and different from other game music. The music has never been released on CD.

The music has been compared to that of Mutato Muzika's score of the original Naughty Dog Crash Bandicoot games, both game series have some of the best video game scores on the Playstation 1 and are somewhat similar.

External links

[Vivendi Universal's (publisher) official The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning page]
[Insomniac Games (developer) official Spyro page]
[Vivendi Universal's (publisher) official Spyro page]
[A very popular Spyro fan site] for the first 3 games (no longer being updated)
[A Spyro fan-forum (Spyro Fans Anonymous)] for discussion of the Spyro games
[GameRankings.com's results.]
[Spyro Universe]
[MobyGames' entry for the Spyro the Dragon Series]
[Dark Spyro]
[SpyroForum: An Online Spyro Community]

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