To
Karl Köbke
published 2 hours ago / 287 views
Skateboarding is one of my favorite video game activities. Tony Hawk, professional figure skater (CHP) was the foundation of my childhood, and E.A. skate the series scratched that itch during my college years. Maybe it's because I, like a lot of 90's kids, tried my hand at skateboarding (although I was never good at anything other than ollies), or it might be because my 9 year old recently started his own skateboarding journey, but somehow skating always comes back into my life. To Skate historyall of these games embodied some kind of empowerment fantasy in which I got to be someone I idolized – someone who was good enough at skating to do all the tricks I'd never been able to do and which now I mostly see in Facebook clips. Skate historyhowever, is a reminder that skateboarding can be a means rather than a center of play, and that it is as much an art as it is a sport.
You play as a demon known only as “Skater”, a creature of glass and pain. The devil instructed them to eat all the moons. As the name suggests, Skater primarily interacts with the world through skateboarding, but can also walk and talk with his fellow Hell-bound creatures, including a frog, a skull named Larry, and a bee flower seller. These encounters are mostly comedic in nature, but there is a general feeling that the events you see imply something deeper. The feeling of missing any important message is especially strong in the later stages of the game, where (no spoilers) things get a little more meta. Unfortunately, I'm too much of a literalist when it comes to media and most of it went over my head beyond its comedic value, but I still enjoyed the storytelling as an excuse.
This chaotic narrative fits perfectly with Skate history presentation. When you first start the game you get a seizure warning and I can see why; There's a rough and ever-changing nature to the visuals that might be risqué for some. This is paired with a soundtrack that equally switches between chilly beats and intense rock depending on the action. My only real complaint is that there were times when the volume of the soundtrack changed so dramatically that I received complaints from others in the room.
In contrast to his chaotic style of presentation and sometimes nonsensical narration, Skate history the control scheme is closer to the semi-realistic advisor skate than the bombastic and over-the-top gameplay in CHP. Looking back, I think the biggest difference between the two is whether you prepare your tricks before you leave the ground or after. CHP allowed you to do whatever tricks you wanted in the air, while more realistic games require planning. For advisors skate this was done using the right analog stick, and given that this method is adopted in other skateboarding games such as OllimirI thought this was a new industry standard, but Skate history deviates from these norms by using trigger buttons to prepare moves and a circle button to launch into the air. R1 and L1 are used for spin tricks, and R2 and L2 are used for flip tricks, and can be combined for more complex tricks. Finally, you can double-click the circle button to add body rotation. For example, “L1, O” would be a push, “L1, L1, O” would be a 360 degree version of the same move, “L1, L1, R2, O” would turn it into a 360 degree kickflip, and “L1, L1, R2, O, O” would add a body rotation to the move. Angle your move toward a ledge and you'll add a grind to the end, or press square while in the air and you'll “stomp” the board to the ground to complete a combo and secure your score. If I were to add anything to the overall control scheme, it would be that landing time would be more important. It felt like if I followed the right sequence, I was guaranteed to land the kick, even if the animation made it seem like the flip trick was only halfway done before I started grinding.
The change in controls from what I'm used to required some adjustment, but I appreciated how difficult it was to perform more complex tricks. Trying to get the necessary input quickly while racing to the brink was incredibly fun. When the game uses this correctly, it forces you to quickly gain points and then stomp them into a specific piece of ground to defeat a boss, or perform various tricks in a sequence to break a chain.
However, there are large sections of the game where performing tricks is unnecessary since your only goal is to get to the end of a certain area. I found myself absentmindedly adding tricks to these sections, and I appreciated that they were forgiving enough that I could quickly retry if my added flair caused me to hit a wall or fall into oblivion. In an ideal world, there would be more sections of the game that combined these elements and forced you to try to put together combos while navigating an obstacle course. The few times this actually happened were my favorite moments in the game.
Other issues I noticed with the gameplay were bugs that caused the Skater to go sideways when in the air near a short wall, turning a planned grind into a weird glitchy face plank. This happened quite a few times, but never hindered my progress. I also disagree with the way the game handles grinding. It's obvious from the animation that different types of grinding are possible depending on the angle at which you approach the ledge, but regardless of this they are all simply called “grind”. We would appreciate recognition of the difference between tail slipping and crooked grinding.
I was also disappointed that after spending six hours with the story, I didn't have an easy option to go back into the game and play with the mechanics. During the story, there was a “skater's dream” section that allowed you to play around and go to any previously visited area of the game. Unfortunately, once you complete the main story, I won't be able to find such an option and you will have to start over to play again. While I enjoyed my first playthrough, I wasn't so enamored with the controls that I found myself wanting to revisit near the end of the game again just to experiment.
Although it's not ideal, Skate history is the best skateboarding game I've played in years. Recently E.A. skate series released a new version, and although it had the same controls that I had come to love while playing the first three games, I lost interest after a couple of hours. Bye Skate history you could add your own free roam element, EA skate decided to lean too heavily towards free roaming and didn't include a noteworthy story mode, so it lost any sense of progression and it really dampened my interest in the game. Conversely, there are those who will not like it. Skate history a mixture of semi-realistic skateboarding controls and completely insane storytelling, but I found it compelling and would recommend it to anyone with even a passing interest in skateboarding.
This review is based on the PS5 digital copy of Skate Story.
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