MEGA DISAPPOINTED!!
- All of this Review/Feedback is based on my personal experiences and opinions. though I have proof from other players across multiple platforms stating similar issues.
first off, No story/offline mode! No death races! No S.K.A.T.E! Not even 1UP challenges. C’mon guys, the forefathers have been playing S.K.A.T.E since the beginning of time. Avatars not getting cut up/bruised like they used to after hours of bails and wipeouts. Now before I get to deep. I fully understand that this is early release. But how many pre pre alpha/beta tests did you guys have. not to mention, over 10 years to give us the game we’ve been screaming for. You had an amazing baby, but you haven’t raised this one right (so far). - “free to play” terrible idea concept for any gamer(at least it should be) we’ve grown a custom to the $50AUD-$100AUD price tag for games. because hey, at least we can get 100’s easily 1000’s of endless hours of fun and the odd rage here and there. But we own the game and it’s content forever. Whereas “free to play” means that if you don’t have internet, You can’t play the game! huge issue for more people than you’d think. Also the fact that, we never actually own the game! you’re just letting us play it, until you decide to turn off the servers!!! Which that leads me to the biggest point of all….. and one that is seriously flawed with the gaming industries in general.
- MEGA TRANSACTIONS!!! WHAT THE ACTUAL F&%#!! Putting the in game unlockables at the very bottom of the transactions store! not even at least making it a seperate page, better yet a different store all together! geez real smooth! I bet you just love watching those $$$$ signs roll in from all the suckers you’ve got spending copious amounts of money on fake currency and fake apparel that do nothing to enhance the game play. almost $8.00AUD on a fake jumper!!! Also let’s keep in mind… WE NEVER ACTUALLY OWN ANY OF IT!! What happens to someone who’s spent $20-$30 heck $100+ on your “super cool” items, from the store. The day you turn off the servers. “POOFFF” it’s all gone, literally wasting money for what!! Some board skins and a jumper that, YOU NEVER OWN. even casinos give better pay out odds than 0.00%. But fare enough, you’re a company and you NEED to make money. However you WANT, to make too much money. 12,000 store credits cost $150.95AUD. That’s the equivalent if not more than the average price of most Deluxe/Special Edition versions of games that come with a lot more content than a lousy bag of fake currency.. but at least with that overpriced game we own it, forever! Thus through our irrational minds, we can justify the ridiculous price tag on those games. But with the store on this game, how can you as a company, release a game “for the people” then spit in the face of your fanbase like this! it’s not just you BTW. this goes out to a wide array of company’s that even worse, make us purchase the game initially. Then to justify spending up to and or over $150AUD for content that you don’t actually own, you’re just letting us rent it. Getting kicked in the groin would hurt less! Sadly I feel, This game has done to the “skate” franchise. what “riders republic” did to “steep”. Taken one of the greatest games(of its genre) ever created and delivered, a sequel (not sequel) sellout, knock off game. branded to be the next amazing “realistic” game of the franchise and released this “free to play” Arcade, “Fortnite” styled game with some of the worst MEGA transactions, I’ve ever seen in game..! not sure if I made my point on that one clear enough…these are MEGA TRANSATIONS! I sincerely hope I’m not the only one thinking or experiencing this!! However I’m not completely dissing the arcade style graphics. The game does look really cool & the team have done a great job with the map, some decent looking graff and artworks around San Van as well as the architecture, lots of fun spots to sus out. As for the challenges, Some are stupidly unrealistic & OTT but others are realistic & technical, making you have to really think like an urban skater. seems to be a fine balance of the two. I do apologise, Largely my negativity comes from the stores & taking advantage of people.
For instance, why not implement a 12month store cap limit. So if someone within a week a month or 4 months Etc. is pumping out transactions, it will either completely stop them at the cap limit for X remaining time until 12 months has ticked over, because they’ve already mindlessly given you guys a bucket load of real money. or at least say “hey, You’ve spent this much already, are you really sure you want to continue with yet another transaction??” Make people aware of how much money they are throwing away. If you really care about “the people” that is. “TRIGGER WARNING”. Now this next bit may seem brutally harsh.. but let’s face it, it’s happened countless times before from company’s being to money Hungary!! . Imagine someone racking up a huge amount of purchases in these online stores not realising how much they’ve actually spent. Then when the bill comes round. Due to any number of reasons……They take their own life……… sounds harsh I know, but that’s true reality, it happens. These company’s aren’t dealing with just dollar signs. There are real people on the other end of these unjust & overpriced transactions. Who knows. maybe, just maybe.. you have the power to stop or at least make people aware of what they are doing before it’s to late. #DontValueMoneyOverLife. - TECHNICAL ISSUES!
Pumping in a half pipe. in general, pumping any vert. Tried a plethora of different settings, low assist/high assist. Sometimes you can get a decent amount of air. Then “ok cool, imma start doing some flip tricks or some grab…..” ohhh, one Ollie and all my speed and air completely gone! barley get a truck over the coping, if I can even make it that far up the half/quaterpipe. Ollie’s & Ollie timming (vert/ramp takeoff) Ollie at the Top or bottom of the ramp. Makes no difference, you can’t get a board length above the coping half the time..or enough pop to clear a gap. myself & some friends have encountered quite a few times, the game simply not registering Ollie’s at all. Log out and log back into the server to (sometimes) fix the issue. Street skating on the other hand, a lot more fun and easy to flow ie. manny flip manny grind/gap. some Ollie height and timing issues for those really heigh ledges/rails & big gaps, though that could just be user error on my part. Back to the vert and mega ramps though. It seems unless dropping from an unrealistic height into a ramp/rollin, it feels like you can’t ever seem to get enough speed for hitting a gap, air a vert or bust a transfer. even if you can hit the gap/transfer, as soon as you go to do any kind of grab/flip, no-foot trick to start a sequence or sick line, your airtime and speed seems to vanish into thin air, resulting in your chin becoming a new feature to the buildings decor. Quite a consistent SoundFX issue where Sound completely cuts out. either all the SoundFX or just your own but can still hear other players. Not teleporting all members of the party into a challenge. Visual FX, players in your party becoming completely invisible. Throwdowns need to not rely on the set amount of players for instance. If you Set the player limit to 4-7-10 etc. but only 2-3 people sign up then a 10-30 second timer will start and the challenge begin. Different Throwdown modes, Instead of just high score ie. grind sequence, S.K.A.T.E!, 1UP, Death Races or bail/Hallofmeat challenges and ability to select Round length in 1min intervals up to 30mins. Amount of checkpoints in a race and custom placement of checkpoints 5-12-30 etc. - other issues such as unlocking new fast travel points. Have to log out of the server & log back in. Sometimes multiple times for the game to actually show where the new FT spots are to activate (If they appear at all). Then a few times having activated spots, only to find them deactivated when logging back into the server. Unlocking the same items in the store ie. same type of kicker/rail or ramp. Also not enough boards & components C’mon it’s a skating game. Give us twice as many boards to unlock as you think we want.
- very poor interactivity. inviting/invited to a party, takes 5 minutes to get into the party due to constant error codes. Or just unable to join for a number of reason. Ie. supposed party closed, player offline etc. Send one party invite and get spammed with 3-5 though only one was initially sent out. Game spams notifications of players comming online constantly. Once you are finally in a party with only 4 people(not enough party size) Game becomes very bugged and multiple times have had to wait for friends to log out/in only to be unable to rejoin the initial party, forcing you to make a whole new party and repeat step one again.
- ITS NOT ALL BAD.
ok, so I know I’ve left out some things on my mind. but knowing full well that probably no one will ever read this, I’ve decided to stop it there. what I will say is. The flick it system and actually landing “nollie trey flips” or “shovit360 flips”, aside from technical issues stated above, looks and feels really cool. Grabs, grinds and body flips etc. feel just like they should. Manny flip manny, super easy and way more fun than previous experiences. The map is decent enough. though it feels like it’s missing some less polished rugged DIY areas ie. the industrial area from previous maps the spillway or the observatory. The new preload spin feature is a bit irritating. can only seem to just land a clean 900 but it has to be over a huge ramp. Now I’m not saying you should be able to 1080 down a 4 stair. but if you can endless kickflip over a small hedge gap. then on a MEGA Ramp, you should be able to hit a 900+ and at least a double body flip if initiated correctly ie. harder/faster flicks= harder/faster spins. Though the slow clean flip does look cool, that’s all it is, just a single flip. Even when you learn how to lock in a pre spin. The dilemma of messing up your take-off trajectory to hit the pre spin Is imminent! Old system seemed way cleaner to execute. One stick=slow spin. two sticks=faster spin. Now I know that I’m not a code writer. so I don’t know how hard it is to make these things function. BUT it’s been done in previous games & you’ve had long enough to work out these kinks. I know I’ve missed some things and I get that this has been a bit of a rant but you asked for feedback, so I’ve given it. To anyone that’s made it this far thanks…. You’re a champion. I hope some of what I’ve said has made sense and touched issues that can’t be isolated to just myself. Over all, the game so far is a firm 5.5/10! Largely due to drowning in atrocious mega transactions & technical issues. Hoping early access is a learning curve and the game only gets better from here