Skate
Posted October 6, 2007
EA has always been known for its often blasted habit of releasing a new version of an old title year after year. They recently surprised the gaming community with announcements of wholly new titles that won’t see releases updated with the year after the name. One of the first new IPs that EA brought out for the now generation of titles is simply called skate. The name sums up the reason for the game; simplicity, depth and an obvious reason for the game – to let the gamer skate. No need for massive button combos, no extreme air on a cruise ship, and an aural experience that is simple and very uncluttered.
Keeping in tradition with other EA titles, skate moves a majority of the control to the analog sticks, making limited use of the face buttons for gameplay. The left stick essentially controls your upper body, lean to turn and spin while in the air. The right stick controls your feet and the board, which is an extension of your feet. To perform the most simple move, an ollie – rather than charge the ‘A’ button you have to make use of the Flickit controls. Press down on the stick to crouch, then flick it upwards to perform an ollie. All tricks in the game stem from the Ollie, so it’s a necessary trick to learn. Other more complex board tricks are performed by looping and manipulating the stick in a variety of ways; All of which become much more intuitive and make sense when comparing movements of the stick to that of the board. Other advanced tricks make use of either trigger button to perform a grab; using grabs in conjunction with spins and grinds can lead to some very satisfying combos and tricks.
Not something that should surprise anyone, but skate contains a few modes of play both online and off. Career mode kicks off with one of the most outlandish introduction movies I’ve seen in an extremely long time. To be honest, it’s been over a decade since I’ve watched a skate video so for all I know this fits in with the current trend. Regardless, the cinema ends with you taking control of a character just out of the hospital, so what better thing to do than start your rise into the world of professional skateboarding. A valuable training session will walk you through the basics of skating, grinding and tricks – other training sessions are scattered through the city for you to hunt down and learn the intricacies of skating long lines with manuals and linking tricks.
The cool thing about the way the game is structured is that doing anything in the city from completing these training exercises to winning a game of S.K.A.T.E. gets you noticed, and eventually in the pages of Thrasher and Skateboarding Magazine; with the ultimate goal of gracing the cover. Naturally in your rise to Pro status, you’ll attract the attention of sponsors who will pay you cash when you’re noticed and happened to be using their merchandise. Turn this money into buying new clothes and equipment to help improve your board control.
A free skate mode is available within career mode and lets you simply enjoy the city, skating around and finding great hidden locations and learning amazing lines. You can tweak the environment here too such as limiting pedestrians and vehicles to create less obstacles, which allows you easier access to some long grinds.
A Party Play mode is included and basically amounts to a king of the hill type challenge. As you progress through the single player mode, you unlock new locations as you take control of them in career mode. Online also offers a ranking mode for races and trick type variations of play. As you play more and win competitions online, you earn experience which move you from an unranked skater to top of the heap. It’s nice to see a mode like this be honed a little more than simply a high score challenge.
Another large component of skate is the online media sharing that the game enables. As you play through the game, you record and edit specific challenges then post them online to share with the world. Did you manage to hit that massive 50ft drop? Well, according to the game if you didn’t tape it then it’s fiction. The replay editor is quite simple to use and enables the player to speed up or slowdown segments of film as well to add some quirky coloring schemes to make your replay stand out.
The game looks great – the whole city is laid out for you and rendered very nicely. If you see a monument in the distance, you should be able to skate there no problem and even find a line nearby which incorporates the large item. I did see some slowdown when there was a lot happening on the screen but really it didn’t detract from the title too much. I didn’t even notice much clipping when doing the inevitable, getting pummeled by a fast moving car that snuck up beside you.
As mentioned I really was impressed with the audio in this game. Sure the soundtrack features some awesome music such as Booker T and the MGs and Nirvana, but what struck me initially as odd really impressed me the more I played. The music in the game took a major backseat to the environment sounds in the game, almost to the point where you barely can hear the music. What do you hear though is your board and wheels gliding across the different surfaces in the game, the scrap of grinding a curb and the bone crunching sounds of your body hitting the sidewalk. The music does get turned up during the advertisements, wait – I mean clips of the pros in the game, that you’re shown when you meet up with them.
After years of Tony Hawk, I stopped being impressed with that series and have even become Tony Hawked out – until Project 8 however. But after seeing what a more realistic approach to skating can do, I think I’ll be hard pressed to go back to the button mashing, combo fest that is the Tony Hawk series. Sure you can still string together some amazing combos here, but you get a much large feeling of accomplishment when you do make that long line. I doubt you’ll see any 900 degree triple-back flips in this title, unless you manage to hit a glitch section, of which there are a few. So don’t be surprised if you see your character suddenly get thirty feet of air instead of face planting if you hit a curb just right. This really is the only detraction from the game I noticed, and really – it’s not too bad. The best part is that if you happened to be recording at the time, you can create some great clips for the online media portion of the game. EA – thank you for taking the chance on a new type of skating game. You’ve done well. I highly recommend this title.
Keeping in tradition with other EA titles, skate moves a majority of the control to the analog sticks, making limited use of the face buttons for gameplay. The left stick essentially controls your upper body, lean to turn and spin while in the air. The right stick controls your feet and the board, which is an extension of your feet. To perform the most simple move, an ollie – rather than charge the ‘A’ button you have to make use of the Flickit controls. Press down on the stick to crouch, then flick it upwards to perform an ollie. All tricks in the game stem from the Ollie, so it’s a necessary trick to learn. Other more complex board tricks are performed by looping and manipulating the stick in a variety of ways; All of which become much more intuitive and make sense when comparing movements of the stick to that of the board. Other advanced tricks make use of either trigger button to perform a grab; using grabs in conjunction with spins and grinds can lead to some very satisfying combos and tricks.
Not something that should surprise anyone, but skate contains a few modes of play both online and off. Career mode kicks off with one of the most outlandish introduction movies I’ve seen in an extremely long time. To be honest, it’s been over a decade since I’ve watched a skate video so for all I know this fits in with the current trend. Regardless, the cinema ends with you taking control of a character just out of the hospital, so what better thing to do than start your rise into the world of professional skateboarding. A valuable training session will walk you through the basics of skating, grinding and tricks – other training sessions are scattered through the city for you to hunt down and learn the intricacies of skating long lines with manuals and linking tricks.
The cool thing about the way the game is structured is that doing anything in the city from completing these training exercises to winning a game of S.K.A.T.E. gets you noticed, and eventually in the pages of Thrasher and Skateboarding Magazine; with the ultimate goal of gracing the cover. Naturally in your rise to Pro status, you’ll attract the attention of sponsors who will pay you cash when you’re noticed and happened to be using their merchandise. Turn this money into buying new clothes and equipment to help improve your board control.
A free skate mode is available within career mode and lets you simply enjoy the city, skating around and finding great hidden locations and learning amazing lines. You can tweak the environment here too such as limiting pedestrians and vehicles to create less obstacles, which allows you easier access to some long grinds.
A Party Play mode is included and basically amounts to a king of the hill type challenge. As you progress through the single player mode, you unlock new locations as you take control of them in career mode. Online also offers a ranking mode for races and trick type variations of play. As you play more and win competitions online, you earn experience which move you from an unranked skater to top of the heap. It’s nice to see a mode like this be honed a little more than simply a high score challenge.
Another large component of skate is the online media sharing that the game enables. As you play through the game, you record and edit specific challenges then post them online to share with the world. Did you manage to hit that massive 50ft drop? Well, according to the game if you didn’t tape it then it’s fiction. The replay editor is quite simple to use and enables the player to speed up or slowdown segments of film as well to add some quirky coloring schemes to make your replay stand out.
The game looks great – the whole city is laid out for you and rendered very nicely. If you see a monument in the distance, you should be able to skate there no problem and even find a line nearby which incorporates the large item. I did see some slowdown when there was a lot happening on the screen but really it didn’t detract from the title too much. I didn’t even notice much clipping when doing the inevitable, getting pummeled by a fast moving car that snuck up beside you.
As mentioned I really was impressed with the audio in this game. Sure the soundtrack features some awesome music such as Booker T and the MGs and Nirvana, but what struck me initially as odd really impressed me the more I played. The music in the game took a major backseat to the environment sounds in the game, almost to the point where you barely can hear the music. What do you hear though is your board and wheels gliding across the different surfaces in the game, the scrap of grinding a curb and the bone crunching sounds of your body hitting the sidewalk. The music does get turned up during the advertisements, wait – I mean clips of the pros in the game, that you’re shown when you meet up with them.
After years of Tony Hawk, I stopped being impressed with that series and have even become Tony Hawked out – until Project 8 however. But after seeing what a more realistic approach to skating can do, I think I’ll be hard pressed to go back to the button mashing, combo fest that is the Tony Hawk series. Sure you can still string together some amazing combos here, but you get a much large feeling of accomplishment when you do make that long line. I doubt you’ll see any 900 degree triple-back flips in this title, unless you manage to hit a glitch section, of which there are a few. So don’t be surprised if you see your character suddenly get thirty feet of air instead of face planting if you hit a curb just right. This really is the only detraction from the game I noticed, and really – it’s not too bad. The best part is that if you happened to be recording at the time, you can create some great clips for the online media portion of the game. EA – thank you for taking the chance on a new type of skating game. You’ve done well. I highly recommend this title.