It’s not terrible.

Been a skate player for a very long time and I can honestly say that the game is almost what it needs to be but that “almost” is extremely optimistic.

I immediately boot up the game and im already a little disappointed by the music, I went throughout the entire games music collection and there is not a bit of love for actual skate culture, however music is not so important.

The customization though much better than previous skate games was extremely underwhelming, once again, it seems that there was no regard for skate culture.

For example: lack of punk, emo, and rock incorporating, on both the music and customization aspects.

The gameplay honestly isn’t bad, it honestly just feels like skate 3 on normal mode that’s watered down a bit; lack of dark slides and catches, less air on flip tricks, I also noticed that the game seems to have a window where your jumps will receive more or less air. I immediately loaded up skate 3 to test and I could feel that it was not the same. Skate 3 rewards creativity on when and where you begin your line, it doesn’t have to align with any designated areas. I think adding a difficulty mode, much like skate 3 would already be enough to make many more players satisfied enough to play for a long time.

For Example: Introducing an easy mode for old school competitive skate 3 players who enjoyed trick-lining and flat ground comp would absolutely return much of the missing player base that would have been expected.

 I do believe the current “difficulty” is great for many players but who always preferred a more “realistic” experience but skate 3 introduced a new style of competitive skating gameplay and it deserves to be honored in this new modern game. 

Still on the topic of gameplay, I find the bearing challenges extremely distasteful, once again straying away from creativity, and placing the player into a position where they are simply following rules and not creating their own fun to compete challenges. 

The game has solid bones, you can definitely feel the bones of previous skate games but it seems like this game was designed for children or people who have never experienced skate. The handholding throughout the game is also discouraging and the lack of exciting challenges makes the world feel bleak and disappointing. I hate to reference old work over and over but incorporating similar contest like **bleep** contest, 1up, DeathRaces, etc, is absolutely necessary.  It seems like the devs of this project had too much desire to stray from what made the series so loved in the first place, and are attempting to rebuild it completely. As of right now, this game has no real attraction or value of a game that’s had 15 years to have been something beautiful.