Skate Review

BY Rohan Anchan | POSTED: 22 January 2008

Ollie takes is practice, dude!



Year in and year out, we see Electronic Arts churn out one sports title after another, with no indication of slowing down, let alone stopping the process entirely. FIFA, NBA, NFL, NHL…you name it, and EA’s got it out – every single year! I don’t know if they themselves got bored of doing the same stuff over and over again, or whether it was a genuine attempt to bring out something entirely new, but EA finally brought out a new game based on a totally different type of ‘sport’ – skateboarding.  Skate – EA’s take on the world of grinds, flips, ollies, and what-nots - has some pretty good stuff going for it, but it isn’t exactly without its niggling little issues either. So let’s check out the pros and cons here…

To begin with, Skate features a very clichéd sort of minimalist storyline, which is somewhat reminiscent of the Fight Night / Def Jam / NFS series – create your personal avatar, deck him with some fancy-ass branded apparel & bling, and then work your way up from n00b to pro while earning sponsorships and magazine coverage. That’s pretty much it. There’s absolutely nothing else to look forward to in terms of storytelling. That being said, a much bigger and more serious issue is the control setup in the game, and the way tricks are performed.

 

Skate has got to be one of THE toughest games in terms of control that I’ve ever come across. Sure, the controls respond well and speedily, but the core functionality itself is pretty messed up. The left analog stick controls your ‘steering’, while the face buttons are used to propel you forward, brake, and accept challenges. Right, so where’s the problem, you ask? It lies in the right analog stick. This particular stick is used to pull off all your fancy tricks and maneuvers, and the problem lies in the fact that you have to flick it in different directions and around different preset paths to pull off your tricks successfully. Ollies, flips, manuals, grinds, shuv-its…every single trick requires you to use just the right stick (in conjuction with the triggers, at times). Now this can even be forgiven when it’s just a single trick we’re talking about. However, when you have to start chaining your moves, or perform 3 different maneuvers and rack up 1,500 points in 30 seconds, that’s when the game starts to get a bit annoying. Another big problem with this control layout is that the game screws up with detecting the right stick’s movement. As a result, you’ll sometimes end up pulling off a kickflip when you wanted to pop-shuvit, and an ollie when you want to pull off a manual. And because of this, you won’t find it fun to redo a challenge over twenty times just to get some rep!
In short, the learning curve is pretty damn steep for this game, and even skateboard fanatics may get a wee bit put off by the complexity.  

The career mode is where you’ll be spending most of your single-player game time, so let’s see what exactly it has to offer.
You get to watch a pretty cool intro video, after which you’re sent to the ‘Create a Skater’ screen where you can modify the physical appearance of your boarder and give him some new threads and kicks, as well as trick out your board from different vendors. As you play through the game’s myriad challenges, you’ll unlock tons of apparel, shoes, and boards from various real-world brands for your skater to toy around with.
Once you’re done tinkering around with your dude, you’ll find yourself out on the streets of San Vanelona. A few tutorials down the pipeline, and you’re left on your own to explore the streets, shoot videos, and take up challenges at your leisure. Exploring the city actually pays off in Skate, because you can find certain ‘hidden spots’ scattered all over the place. These spots are basically hard to pull off tricks on, but if you manage to top the challenge, you’ll “own!” that particular spot and unlock it for the game’s ‘Party Mode’ as well. Other than this, the city is just teeming with objects waiting to be tricked on – benches, picnic tables, low walls, staircase rails and banisters, sidewalk edges, curvy walls – the list is endless. Just be careful of those pesky motorists who seem to be rather happy and more than willing to break a bone or two of yours! Of course, nothing actually happens to your character, so it’s sometimes fun to just skate into an oncoming truck…

 

Completing skate challenges is where the meat of this game lies, and you’ll find a ton of these scattered around various locations in and around San Vanelona. You’ll meet up with different skaters of varying skill, and each of them will challenge you to pull off a certain bunch of tricks, or invite you to take part in competitions. Competitions are basically a bunch of timed skate events, which are played in succession, and reward you with points based on your finishing position. At the end, the skater with the most points wins. Winning in Skate nets you a decent amount of green, plus new challenges, unlocks, sponsorships, mag covers, and playable characters.  

One of the coolest aspects of the game has got to be the Replay Editor. Every challenge you take up is ‘filmed’ by your cameraman, and at the end of the event, you can go in and tinker around with a plethora of options. The best part is watching your skater do his stuff in slow-mo, with the sound effects all magnified and echoing. Additionally, you can change the colour tone to sepia, grayscale, and even 80’s style. There’s a bunch of camera angles to choose from as well. After you’re done messing about with the video, you can save it to your X360 hard drive, and even upload it onto the net for other Skate fans to check out. Pretty cool stuff.

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