Head to any Toys R Us and take a look at their video game section and look for the large space where the Skylanders figures should be and you will see a trail of utter decimation. In talking to a Toys R Us employee, we were told that the only day the Skylanders’ rack isn’t empty is the day deliveries come in. And by end of that day, it is already down to half of its stock. So, it’s no surprise that Activision will be officially unveiling the follow-up to Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure at Toy Fair in New York City next week with Skylanders Giants.

With promises of eight brand new regular Skylanders and eight completely new Giant Skylanders that also light up when close to the Portal of Power, it looks like the creators are going to have a ton of fun expanding on the Skylanders universe.

Skylanders Giants builds upon the breakthrough fundamentals of the first game-merging the physical and virtual realms with an innovative line of cross-platform toy figures that have “brains,” which players everywhere can magically bring to life in the world of Skylands. This next installment of the franchise features a variety of new characters, new challenges, a thrilling new story-driven adventure, and advanced integration across console, handheld, mobile and online:

Going Big: Skylanders Giants introduces eight new highly collectible figures that are more than twice the size of the main skylanders cast in both physical and virtual form. Their in-game powers and abilities reflect their colossal scale.

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The Flickcast and the world got their first look at Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure back at Toy Fair.  Activision has come up with a way to combine the collectible aspect of high detail model toys along with the addictive nature of a classic dungeon crawling action game. Don’t let the word “toy” or the game’s lighthearted graphics fool you. Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure is going to be full of depth.

While the game won’t be as intense in terms of upgrades and item management like a title like Mass Effect, it won’t be a slouch either. Players will need to work through levels, upgrading powers to further both their exploration experience and combat prowess. Being able to save these stats to a fancy action figure that they can bring to their friend’s console to play is just an added bonus.

With PAX this weekend, Activision has released a bundle of new screen shots and character vignettes for the game. This batch focuses on Dark Spyro, Bash, Sonic Boom, Stealth Elf and Voodood. Make sure to take a look at all these characters have to offer below.

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At Toy Fair, Senario gave us a look at their latest line of the Zibits, a series of unique, collectible, miniature RC robots. Unlike most action figures from Toy Fair, the Zibits stood out to us at the Flickcast because they make a perfect little desktop toy.

They are cost effective ($10), small and geek friendly. What geek doesn’t want their own little robot servant?

Now while the Zibits are too tiny to do any real damage, they can definitely be a conversation piece or a time killer in any office. And that makes them perfect as a giveaway for the Flickcast.

How would you win such an awesome prize? Well, it’s simple! Just keep an eye on our Twitter account next week, and we’ll give you some classic robot trivia for you to answer. Get it right, and you can win!

In the meantime, take a look at another one of these cool RC Robots that you can win after the jump.

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With 2011 in full effect, so has begun Con season. While so far it has been mainly industry and media events like Toy Fair or this week’s Game Developers Conference, the big boys like C2E2, San Diego Comic-Con and the New York Comic Con are all just around the corner. And while most of The Flickcast have earned our geek merit badges (as well as Foursquare badges) by surviving numerous conventions, we realize not everyone has had the chance to experience the Con world like we have.

The world of conventions can even be a little intimidating. While shows like Wizard World can be good day trips where someone can just go in and out, others like San Diego are week long vacations that take some actual time and planning. To help prepare Con goers, we have put together this post loaded with advice for both new and veteran geek adventurers.

Know Your Con

As mentioned before, some cons are large epic events while others can be treated as just quick day trips. When picking your Con, make sure you know which of these two categories it falls into. Don’t expect to see San Diego Comic-Con all in one day.

It will be damn near impossible to spend any decent amount of time at every booth that catches your interest if you are only there for one day. Plus, you won’t have any time for autograph signings, panels or other con events as you will just be rushing through to see a little of everything but not having enough time to really enjoy any of it.

On the same token, smaller shows like ComiCONN, a local level show with only a hundred or so booths, don’t have nearly as many special events going on, or fellow con goers to wade through. Planning a full weekend around the con alone might leave someone looking for more to do.

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At Toy Fair, we were lucky enough to get the chance to see one of the newest undertakings by Activision called Skylanders Spyro’s Adventure. Under developer Toys For Bob, Activision is combining the much loved Spyro video game series with a brand new toy line.

But this isn’t just a tie in with action figures modeled off characters from the game. Instead, players will take these figures and place them on an attachment for their Nintendo Wii to load any of the 32 characters in to the game. Young players will be given the opportunity to do something they never have before, watch their toys come to life in front of them on a video game screen.

Seeing these toys in person, they look as if they were all beautifully hand sculpted. Spyro even has a little bit of a badass feel to him instead of the super fluffy dragon he started out as. What you don’t immediately see is the technology hidden underneath that gives these toys the read/write ability to load information in to the Wii using the Portal of Power and then take the experience and treasure that player has found with them to their next destination.

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This week on the radar we’ve got news on Steven Spielberg’s potential return to dinosaurs, the status of the third Mortal Kombat film, NBC gets a Gold in the ratings competition, and what comic book legend may show up on one of our favorite shows, The Big Bang Theory.

Let’s see what blips are on the radar this week.

Boba Fett, finally the deadliest action figure in a galaxy far, far away

If you’re like me, you grew up on the first generation of Star Wars toys and action figures. You know the ones, they had a massive (sarcasm) five points of articulation. Well, one figure that was sort of an urban legend was the missile-firing Boba Fett.  We all heard of it, but rarely saw it.  Well, now it can be yours with the purchase of five other figures!  Offer expires 3/31/2011, while supplies last, only valid in US and Canada…and a whole lot of other legal fine print I’m sure.

Tron: Legacy viral campaign starts to gear up

Disney teased everyone at last year’s Comic Con about a Tron viral campaign. With the highly anticipated film set to open this December online viral goodness have started to trickle out.  The first is a new site with a somewhat enigmatic theme to it.  Can you figure out what it is?  I don’t want to ruin it, but if you must know check this link out.

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Yesterday, we showed you some of the cool new movie toys from this year’s Toy Fair at New York City’s Jacob Javits Center. Diamond came in with lots of new and exciting movie properties, but some of their coolest new toys were for their existing DC and Marvel lines.

Among the new toys we got to see were some cool new Marvel MiniMates for the upcoming Iron Man 2 film, including a neat Whiplash, Justin Hammer, and Stark Drones. Marvel Selects announced a gigantic new Abomination figure, as well as The Thing and others, each heavy enough to be used as a murder weapon.

From DC and Diamond, we got to see some cool new statues from the DC Dynamics line, the first ever line of Vertigo busts, and some great statues form the upcoming Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths film. Also from DC, we got to see some great new “then and now” style figures, including the original Superman vs his current incarnation.

Check out the full gallery after the jump, and be sure to keep it here for more upcoming news and features from the wonderful world of toys!

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This week in New York City, the annual Toy Fair convention hits the Jacob Javits Center and thousands of new and popular toys and toy properties are shown off. There were, of course, some less-than-interesting booths, but we know what you want to see, so we went straight to the newest lines of toys and statues based on some of the upcoming movie and TV properties.

Obviously, Toy Story 3 had a huge presence at the show, given the fact that it’s the best hybrid of toys and film out there today. Tim Burton’s Alice In Wonderland had some great new figures of the whacked out Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter. LEGO stepped up their game with some brand new LEGO Star Wars playsets, including a great “Luke on Hoth” scene.

Diamond was also in attendence with some great new Ghostbusters products, including a new Ghostbusters replica sign for those hardcore fans. Finally, there were some great new 12-inch figures for the upcoming Jonah Hex film, including our first look at John Malkovich from the film.

Check out our Movie Toys picture gallery from the show after the jump, and be sure to check back in tomorrow to see what else we’ve got to show you from this year’s Toy Fair.

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