It’s been over 10 years since we got the last game in the hit Skate series, and ever since, fans of the series have been asking when EA will finally return to this unique take on the skateboarding genre. In that time, the skating genre has seen a major resurgence. Not only has the Tony Hawk series made a comeback with the Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 & 2 remake, but other games like Skater XL and Skatebird have appeared to fill in this gap in the market.
However, no game has quite filled the void that Skate filled. Thankfully, we do know that Skate is happening. First announced way back during EA Play in 2020, there has been precious little information about this highly anticipated return to a more grounded style of a skateboarding video game. Even so, there are still a few details we’ve learned about what this next Skate game will look like and when we can hope to finally play it. Here’s everything we know about Skate.Â
Further reading
Release date
Again, we’ve already been waiting for over a decade — and now over a year — since Skate was officially announced as being in development, and yet we still have no indication of when it will be done. Developer Full Circle hasn’t even given us a year yet, meaning that we probably still have a long wait ahead of us before we’ll be grinding and kick-flipping on our consoles anytime soon. If we had to guess — and at this point, guessing is the best anyone can do — we’d hope for a late 2022 release to keep expectations in check. It might come early, but better to assume the worst-case scenario.
An earnings call at EA, in which Andrew Wilson stated that the game “will launch soon,” was later followed up by leaker Tom Henderson claiming that the game was already in playtesting, which could bode well for a 2022 release. However, the most recent video we saw of the game in action still looks very, very early. In fact, they even self-describe it as being “pre-pre-pre-alpha gameplay.”
The Board Room video from the development team had only the classic “when it’s ready” line for when to expect the game.
Platforms
With no release date, platforms are far from a priority for EA to give any details on. But, based on what we have to assume the game’s timeline is, we think it’s pretty easy to say this game will be on the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and S consoles, at the very least. PC was initially kind of a wild card since the previous games didn’t show up on that platform. However, the official Skate Twitter account posted a simple video of a live-action skater performing a kickflip over an old computer monitor. The monitor then comes to life with the Skate logo on it. If that wasn’t obvious enough, the text accompanying the video is simply “PC_Confirmation.exe,” meaning this new Skate is confirmed for PC.
One announcement made from the first Board Room video series was that Skate would be launching as a free-to-play title. It will also be fully cross-play and cross-gen, meaning it will be coming to PlayStation 4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PC, and even mobile.
Trailer
The first trailer (although they are really stretching the definition of “trailer”) we got was in the summer of 2021. This trailer is titled We’re Working On It and might as well have been a picture of a sign that said just that. There was no gameplay, no cutscenes, not even any bullshots or pre-rendered assets here. What we do see are performers doing stunts, developers telling us how early-on the game is, and reactions to people who have supposedly seen the game. Not us, though — we don’t get to see it yet.
The only natural follow-up to the We’re Working On It trailer is the Still Working On It trailer. This trailer at least shows a lot more progress and actual footage of the game, though it’s still clearly missing a ton of textures and polish.
The trailer is honest in showing plenty of glitches and bugs while stating that they are, in fact, still working on it. They state that they’re listening to feedback and trying to figure out the direction of the game as they go along but emphasize the goal of giving players more tools to express themselves and customize the game.
While not technically a trailer, The Board Room shed some light on a lot about Skate. First, the team was clear that they wanted to make Skate true to what players found fun in the originals, namely the toybox, chaos, physics interactions, and feeling. Somewhat contradictory, however, they made it clear that Skate was not a sequel, reboot, or anything else like that. The intention is to treat this game as a platform they iterate on for years, rather than sending it out and then working on sequels. This means new items, features, events, and content of all kinds will be added regularly.
Skate will take place in a new city called San Vansterdam, which they describe as being a kind of sister city to the setting of the previous games.
Gameplay
Without us getting the chance to see much gameplay, we have to do some detective work and interpretation to put a little picture together of what to expect from Skate. To get the obvious out of the way, yes, this is still going to be a skateboarding game in the style of the original games. What’s different or new? Well, based on some key things the people in the reaction trailer have said, we have a few nuggets to consider. First up, one person remarked that the character would be able to climb. From what we can deduce, that means you will have some ability to get off your board and parkour a bit around the environment to set up big tricks or bomb down ramps from the top of structures.
We also heard someone mention how the open-world looked, making that an easy point to add to the list. Skate 3Â had zones that you had to use a menu to travel between, so having one seamless playground to skate your way through feels like a natural, if not overdue, evolution for the series.
The last clue we picked up on was someone commenting that they didn’t want to look like anyone else. To us, that clearly means there will be a robust character creator. Character creators have been a staple in most skateboarding games since the beginning, and we love decking out our skater in cool clothes and accessories and even customizing our boards. How deep the system will go and how many options there will ultimately be remains to be seen, but this tiny tease makes it sound pretty substantial.
The latest trailer also showed off plenty of new ways of movement aside from regular boarding. We see characters luge on their boards, as well as ditch them completely to parkour, swing, and run around the world.
There also may be some sort of level editor system, assuming that isn’t just developer tools, which could greatly increase the game’s longevity.
DLC
Yes, Skate will explicitly have DLC via microtransactions to support the free-to-play model. The rules the team listed out for how these microtransactions will work is that they will not be pay-to-win, no loot boxes, no maps locked behind purchases, and no gameplay advantages. They cite Apex Legends as an inspiration for their model.
Multiplayer
Full disclosure again, nothing about multiplayer has been announced. That being said, what kind of skateboarding game, let alone one released after the year 2020, would dare not include multiplayer? The series has always had a multiplayer component, and we expect Skate to continue that trend. Previous game modes like 1-Up, Domination, and Own the Lot were great experiments in how they can adapt skateboarding into new competitive modes that are more complex than just beating each other’s scores. Hopefully, the team at Full Circle will come up with even more new ideas to make this game have some legs.
One thing we don’t want to see repeated is the way Skate 3 handled offline multiplayer, which required you to purchase separate DLC in order to play with more than one person offline.
Pre-order
It should come as no surprise that there’s no information on pre-orders for Skate since it will be free-to-play, though we still don’t know when we will be able to download it.
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