Skate

"An Innovative Spark in a Tired Genre"

**Please note that the following review references only the single-player portion of the game.**

The so-called "extreme sports" genre peaked with Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 and 3. It's kind of sad when you think about it, really, that's it's been six years since the genre has seen any real innovation. Finally, though, that has changed. With skate, EA, the most unlikely of sources, has delivered a game that, in a genre filled with six years of rehashes, actually feels fresh.

Where the Tony Hawk series has, for many years, relied on controller buttons to execute a wide variety of moves, EA throws all of that out the window in favor of a more natural, but at the same time more difficult control scheme. All of your moves in skate are controlled entirely by the two analog sticks, and it makes the game challenging yet rewarding, which is something that the Tony Hawk games haven't provided in years.

GRAPHICS

The graphics in skate are merely all right. They basically do what they need to do and not much more. Textures are a bit muddy most of the time, but it's somewhat excusable given the vast amount of city that EA has built for you to explore and shred.

And speaking of the city, EA has easily built the best, most accessible city in any skating game ever made. Gone are the days of moving from one level to another. The city here is one gigantic area divided into districts. Travelling between the districts can be done on foot or, to make things easier, by using your mini-map to take a subway. The subway system makes the city very easy to navigate, which means you'll easily be able to get to where you need or want to go. However, the use of the subway is never forced upon you, which means that you're free to do things pretty much however you want.

The character creator in skate is mediocre at best. You can probably create a skater that looks like you, but the creator is anything but friendly. Also, hats look completely awful, which is a mark against the game. The other clothing in the game does look pretty good, though, and it's cool to be able to see the brands you're sporting during instant replays. Models of other skaters are all right. Nothing special, but not terrible. Civilians look bad, though, which is something most of us have come to expect in free-roaming games. Still, this being the 360 and all, I expected them to be a bit better.

The architecture in the city is quite amazing, however, which makes up for some of the bland visuals. Each of the four major areas of the city has a distinct look to it, and each area also requires you to utilize different types of tricks. EA has also done a good job of making the layout of the city seem natural. While countless objects are obviously set up just to make the life of a skater easier, the design never feels quite as forced as it did in the Tony Hawk games. You can tell it's artificial, but it still feels at least somewhat real, which makes the game as a whole more immersive.

Overall, the city itself is very well-designed, but the graphics as a whole are largely mediocre. Still, the graphics don't sell a game like skate, so it's hard to knock the game too much for them.

6/10

STORY

The story in skate is minimal. Basically, your character gets into some sort of massive accident and is rushed to the hospital. You are told that your face was seriously messed up, and as a result you are able to choose what you look like. It's an interesting take on character creation, but it comes off as resoundingly stupid because, for some reason, you can also change your weight and your height as well. Honestly, I think EA should have just cut the crap and let you create a character without the needless backstory. Additionally, the opening cutscene starts off mildly entertaining, but quickly degrades into something quite awful. It does its job in introducing all the pro skaters, but I honestly would've preferred a montage of the pros in the game doing tricks in real life rather than what EA has produced here.

From there, you are free to either free skate or take on a variety of challenges. Doing the challenges nets you cash (which can be used to buy clothing and skate accessories), and also lands you on the cover of two real skate magazines used in the game. There's not a whole lot to the story, and it's somewhat of a disappointment that there aren't more challenges. You basically get to meet all of the pros, do some tricks for them, and then undertake a few additional races, lines, and photoshoots before the game is over.

Granted, I don't expect a skating game to include some ridiculous story like some of the later Tony Hawk games did, but what's here just doesn't feel like enough. The actual career mode of the game can be beaten in a couple of hours once you get good with the controls, and that's kind of unfortunate. More challenges would have merely made me have something new to work toward, and that's never a bad thing. Still, I do like that EA opted to keep it relatively simple, even if they went a little overboard in doing so.

6/10

GAMEPLAY

The gameplay in skate is about what you'd expect from a skating game, with a few added ideas thrown in for good measure. The core of the game is free skating, which you can tell due to the stripped-down story mode. EA created a city and pretty much set you free to shred it, and only offered a few meager bread crumbs along the way to keep you informed of cool new areas.

If you opt to tackle the career missions, you won't find anything too earth-shattering. Your missions will involve doing a specific set of tricks for a pro, which can become frustrating from time to time due to the somewhat inaccurate nature of the controls (see below), challenging a pro or another skater to a game of S.K.A.T.E., which is essentially the skateboarding equivalent to H.O.R.S.E., photo ops, which generally require you to jump over a particular object or do a particular trick, and making videos, which require you to do several tasks within thirty seconds. That's about all there is to career mode, and the amount of missions are sadly lacking. What's there is pretty fun, though, and gives you a bit of structure in a very open game.

The actual skating gameplay is remarkably solid for a new franchise. While there is a steep learning curve, once you break past it you'll find that grinding and doing any wide variety of tricks is a snap so long as you can find an appropriate place to do them, which is never terribly hard in skate. There are, unfortunately, quite a few actual skating tricks that didn't make it into the game, though, and it's disappointing that so many didn't make the cut. Still, that is forgivable given that this is the birth of a new franchise, and I'm fairly certain that most of them will be added in subsequent installments.

In addition, the developers added several spots in the city for your player to "own." Doing so opens up that area for use in multi-player. The only real problem with the spots (along with a lot of the challenges) is that the game doesn't always give you a clear idea of what you need to do. It will tell you how many points you need to get, but quite often the actual object you need to get them on is unclear, which can lead to fits of anger on occasion.

Luckily, the game includes a feature that allows you to create a marker that you can return to after screwing up a line. This ensures that, most of the time, you can salvage yourself without having to spend five minutes getting back to the top of the hill. The only problem with this system is that, if you move to far away from the marker, you're subjected to some pretty ludicrous load times when you try to return. I understand that this city is huge, but a fifteen to twenty second load time can really take you out of the game, especially when you're trying to execute a particularly tough line and know you'll be reloading frequently.

Skate also offers players the ability to save clips of their biggest triumphs or greatest defeats and upload them online for all the world to see. It's a great feature and, while the editor itself isn't anything special, it's still nice that it's there at all. Editing clips together is relatively easy once you figure out the quirks of the system, and uploading them is generally quick and can be done right from in the game after setting up an account with EA (which is an annoyance).

The video editor is made all the more fun due to the epic nature of some of the game's bails. My only real gripe with the bail system is that, unfortunately, your character becomes a lifeless rag doll as soon as he loses control of his board. So, rather than trying to protect himself, you character just slams into the ground. It's funny at first, but after a while you really start to wish that EA had programmed their physics engine so that characters actually appeared to have bones. One thing that is great about bails, though, is that after any good one, a screen will pop up telling you how many bones you've broken, bruised, and strained. It's a hilariously great feature, and it will undoubtedly lead to players trying to find the sickest spots possible to bail and break their records.

Gripes aside, though, the gameplay in skate is just fun and fresh, which help it overcome its flaws. After spending countless hours playing, I still want to play, and that's a testament to the quality of the game. Even writing this review has made me want to go and play the game some more, and that's a feeling not many games can provide.

9/10

CONTROLS

As mentioned above, skate offers up an entirely new control method. Gone are the days of button mashing to execute a sweet line. Now, you're expected to do all (well, most...you have to hit the occasional button and you use the triggers to do grabs) of your tricks using just the two analog sticks. If it seems overwhelming at first, it is, and it takes a ton of getting used to, particularly if you were ever a big fan of the Tony Hawk games as I was. However, after using skate's controls for countless hours now, I can honestly say that I much prefer this new method of control. While it loses the precision of the Hawk series, it adds a more natural touch to a more realistic game.

The controls are not perfect in skate by any means. The vast amount of moves you can do with just the right stick means that you'll be flicking the stick every which way to execute them. Unfortunately, sometimes it just feels like certain tricks are almost impossible to pull off with any kind of precision. I guess this adds to the realistic nature of the game, as harder tricks are harder to nail, but it is somewhat frustrating when a challenge requires you to pull off a specific move and you are apparently moving the stick a centimeter off and are thus doing the completely wrong move. Even after so many hours with the game, there were at least half a dozen tricks that I can still only pull off if I'm lucky.

Overall, though, the controls feel right for a skating game. They're not perfect, and the right analog stick feels ridiculously cluttered (God help us if they add more moves in the sequel), but it does add a certain sense of satisfaction when you pull off an incredibly tough trick. Here's hoping for some refinement in the inevitable sequel.

9/10

CONCLUSION

Skate is exactly what the extreme sports genre needed. It's a breath of fresh air in an area of gaming that has been stale for years. Not only that, but the game is quite a bit of fun to boot. While it's not perfect, any fan of skateboarding or sports games in general will probably find something to like in skate. While the career mode is bare-bones and nothing terribly special, free skating is a blast and there are numerous online modes to check out as well, which gives even more life to a title that has plenty of it already.

All in all, it's a game I can't help but recommend for anyone who used to love the Tony Hawk games but has since grown tired of their yearly rehashes. While it is by no means perfect, it will undoubtedly set the bar for all extreme sports games that follow, and this is a franchise that will almost assuredly get better with time. Regardless, this is an impressive, fun game, particularly given that it is a brand new sports franchise, a genre that rarely gets so much right in its first outing.

Say what you want about EA, but skate is a testament that, when they want to, they have the ability to do great things.

8/10

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 10/29/07

Game Release: Skate (US, 09/14/07)