how one of gaming’s most iconic characters got left behind
Oh, Spyro. What happened to you? At the turn of the millennium, you were riding high as one of the biggest names in gaming. Since then, you’ve spent the last 25 years gliding into a steep descent, down into the valley of gaming obscurity, left to fester in the same scrap heap as Sly Raccoon, Conker, and all those poor apes from Ape Escape. So, the question is, how did it come to this?
To understand the demise of Spyro, we have to turn back the clock. The first game in the series, Spyro the Dragon, launched in 1998 to critical acclaim. It was a platformer with a difference, as unlike Mario, Crash, and others, who could only jump, Spyro’s wings made him a glider. This gliding factor allowed for more expansive levels and flying missions, helping Spyro to feel more like an adventure game than its 3D platforming rivals. It also had buckets of charm, both in terms of design and the voice acting, the latter thanks to the unrivaled talents of Tom Kenny, or, as you might know him, SpongeBob SquarePants.
At the development helm of Spyro the Dragon was Insomniac Games, the studio that would go on to produce a trilogy of games starring the purple dragon, including Ripto’s Rage! in 1999 and Year of the Dragon in 2000. Then, Insomniac’s contract with the game’s publisher, Universal, ended, and the developer parted ways with Spyro, going on to create Ratchet & Clank before teaming up with Marvel for the recent Spider-Man games.
These first three games set a pretty high standard, and though we didn’t know it at the time, it was a standard no other Spyro game would ever match. They also arrived in the heyday of console exclusivity, and Spyro was one of the big attractions of the original PlayStation, showing off the performance and graphical capabilities of the Sony console. Those were the glory days, but as anyone who’s ever experienced their own glory days can likely attest, they don’t last forever.
Between 2000 and 2006, the Spyro series went through a bit of a development wilderness, with various studios getting a shot at continuing Insomniac’s legacy. During this era, we got a few handheld games, many of which took some serious liberties with the gameplay experience many of us knew and loved from the original trilogy, and two console titles: Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly and Spyro: A Hero’s Tail.
As far as I’m concerned, Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly is where it all started going downhill. I was cynical before about the handheld games, but it was the early 00s, and handheld ports for the GBA had to work with some pretty substantial technical limitations, so Spyro wasn’t the only victim – they weren’t all bad, though, as Spyro 2: Season of Flame has a spot on our list of the best GBA games. However, Enter the Dragonfly didn’t have any excuses. What it had was a successful formula that had worked for three games and newer hardware than what Insomniac had relied on. Despite this, the game was bad. Really bad.
I’m not going to review every Spyro game individually, but Enter the Dragonfly is worth pausing this history lesson for, as I said before, it marks the start of the true decline. It was buggy, it was lacking in imagination, and, compared to the previous games, it was short, with an average runtime of around ten hours. The first three games elevated Insomniac to the level of developer greatness, while those at the helm of Enter the Dragonfly, Check Six Studios and Equinoxe Digital Entertainment, folded within months of the game’s launch.
In 2006, publisher Vivendi introduced the world to a new Spyro trilogy in the form of The Legend of Spyro. For some reason, the first game, A New Beginning, arrived on four different platforms – home console, GBA, DS, and mobile – via four different developers. It was fine. It didn’t get much better with the second title in the trilogy, The Eternal Night, and the final installment, Dawn of the Dragon, fizzled out on arrival, and for a while, it felt like that was the full stop on Spyro’s legacy.
There are countless hot takes inspired by this trilogy, but in the defense of the publisher and developers, at least they tried something new with the emphasis on combat over exploration. Also, you can’t fault the voice cast, with Elijah Wood starring as Spyro himself, with Gary Oldman, Kevin Michael Richardson, and David Spade in supporting roles. It felt like it was intended as a blockbuster, Spyro’s Star Wars moment, but the quality just wasn’t there, and therefore, neither were the sales.
Toys for Bob found itself in the driving seat of the future of the series in 2011, following the second trilogy of Spyro games and Activision’s merger with Vivendi Games. This would lead to a reboot in the form of Skylanders, which, I’ll be honest, I hated. Skylanders can prove pretty divisive these days, as to those of us who grew up with the original trilogy, it’s little more than an affront to God, but to many, it was a first introduction to the character. For that reason, it holds a special place in the hearts of many. Not me, though; that heart-space is for my old friend Moneybags.
I’m not going to delve too deeply into Skylanders here, as that’s a very large can of worms, but it wasn’t necessarily a failure. It just wasn’t Spyro as so many of us knew and loved him. It also felt to me as if his presence in Skylanders had more to do with the availability of the IP rather than to make the game itself better. That’s purely speculation on my part, but it’s what it feels like.
Since the demise of Skylanders, we’ve not had anything new in the series, but we did get Spyro Reignited Trilogy back in 2018, which remains one of my favorite Switch games. As the name suggests, this game is a remaster of the original Insomniac trilogy, with updated visuals and a slightly revamped soundtrack. The game didn’t come as a massive surprise, as it seemed almost inevitable following the launch of Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy in 2017, but it still delighted long-time fans of the series.
This is where the story gets a little peculiar, as Spyro Reignited Trilogy was a massive hit, selling over ten million copies before the end of 2023 and boasting a respectable Metacritic score of 82/100 on PS4 and 83/100 on Xbox One. However, despite the success, which seemingly suggested that there was an audience appetite for Spyro, we’ve not seen any more games in the series since the 2018 launch.
While we’ve not seen any new Spyro games, our purple friend has popped up in a couple of games after the release of Reignited Trilogy, including Crash Bandicoot: On the Run! and Crash Team Rumble. For me, though, Spyro’s appearance in those games just makes the story of the IP all the more depressing. The friendly dragon was once a headliner, and now he’s a supporting act in the world of Crash Bandicoot, relegated to the same level as the likes of Dingodile and N. Tropy. Worse still, neither of the titles features on our list of the best Crash Bandicoot games, and you can take from that what you will.
In my opinion, Spyro serves as an example of why, despite some complaints from fans, it’s likely for the best that Nintendo has always so closely guarded its big-name IP. At the turn of the millennium, the Spyro series was in an incredible position, and a lot of that was thanks to the consistency of the first three games. Then, consistency went out the window entirely, and at least until The Legend of Spyro kicked off in 2006, we didn’t get much in the way of consistency from the games in between, and the second trilogy failed to live up to the original.
That analysis moves us neatly on to the big question: who’s responsible for the demise of Spyro? Well, as is often inconveniently the case, we can’t really pin the blame on any individual, or even any one publisher or developer, for that matter. It also depends on your interpretation of some behind-the-scenes decisions. For example, you could blame Universal for not finding a suitable replacement for Insomniac during the height of Spyro-mania, or, if you’re so inclined, you could even point the finger at Insomniac for leaving the little purple dragon behind.
Ultimately, trying to figure out who’s at fault for the fall of Spyro is a thankless and pretty useless task. What’s more important is the future, but sadly, at the time of writing, that doesn’t inspire much hope either. In the last couple of years, we heard rumors that Toys for Bob had cancelled a new Crash game that supposedly heavily featured Spyro as a playable character, but outside of that, we’ve had no information to suggest that a new game in the series is on its way.
So, what does the future hold? Well, that’s the problem. That’s the whole reason I started writing in the first place. We don’t know, and with the current state of the industry, we might never know. I don’t know what’s going on behind the scenes, but to me, it feels like someone, somewhere, is missing out on the opportunity to print money. It makes me feel the same way that I do about the first three generations of Pokémon games, which, for some reason, aren’t available on the Nintendo Switch. Do publishers and developers just not want my money now? Is that a thing?
Still, I’m remaining hopeful, thanks to a few factors. For a start, Astro Boy and Donkey Kong Bananza have proven that there’s still life in the 3D platformer genre just yet in the last couple of years. Not only that, but thanks to years of mergers, Microsoft currently holds the rights to Spyro after purchasing Activision Blizzard back in 2025. I don’t know if you’ve heard, but Xbox is struggling, and it could turn to a fan favorite, while reigniting the exclusivity war, to bring the dragon back to life. Again, this is speculation – or at least wishful thinking – but I’ve seen stranger things happen in this industry.
While I’m optimistic about Spyro, if he doesn’t return, I hope developers and publishers learn from his demise. The lesson is pretty clear. Ultimately, an IP is worth nothing without stewardship. I’ve already given the example of Nintendo and its tight grasp of Mario, but that’s not the only case study. Just look at Mickey Mouse. Look at Winnie the Pooh. Taking care of the image and perception of a set of polygons in the shape of a dragon might not have seemed like a big deal in 2000, but all these years later, with Sonic and Mario and even Steve from Minecraft dominating the box office, it feels like a missed opportunity for someone to make a lot of money.
As for me, I just want a new adventure with the character that first made me fall in love with gaming in the first place. Given the state of the industry today, with live service games everywhere, predatory microtransactions in all directions, and studios sacrificing developers for AI, maybe Spyro is better off down there in the pit with the rest of his forgotten friends. In fact, maybe we’d all be better off if we were down there with him.
