I've seen pre-orders and promotions in UK as well, the figure thing seems unique
also, the game is really a Spyro game, developers said they were developing the game originally just for Spyro but was more hard-core, then they decided that it was too bloody for Spyro, and they choose to use the figure thing and add more characters, and changed it to a more kid-friendly graphics, as Spyro was before the dark 'Legend of Spyro'' games
don't mind my username, that was more than 10 years ago, I'm a different person now, amazing how people change ^_^