RSS Feeds
|
US Edition
Babblebaby
|
Defamer
|
Gizmodo
|
Kotaku
|
Lifehacker
I picked up Skate on the cheap with some post-Christmas cash. Am absolutely loving it. Can't remember the last time skateboarding in a game was so much fun. So I'm looking forward to Skate 2!
I love Skate. I love it because it's about skating, and not about riding toilets with Jackass characters. Which, while we're on the subject, is the reason I stopped playing Tony Hawks.
When I first saw Skate It during a press event in San Francisco earlier this year I was enamoured. The idea of creating a fun, pick-up-and-play skater that uses the Wii Balance Board as a controller was sublime, I thought at the time. What game, besides maybe snowboarding, is a better fit for a balance board controller than a skating one? Then I got a chance to check it out at another event in Los Angeles. The controls were a bit tricky, but after playing around with them for a bit, I seemed to be getting the hang of it. Skate It quickly became one of my most anticipated Wii games for the holiday season. I needed something to do with that balance board tucked under the sofa and this seemed like the perfect fit.
We gave you an early look at Skate 2 a few weeks ago, now we look at the controls for Skate It. I am really excited to see how the Wii remote works as a skateboard. It sounds like they are going the same route SSX Blur took on the Wii. Expect it this holiday on Wii and Nintendo DS.
EA's "city-state" label structure can be a little tricky sometimes, in that I'll bet it's hard for them sometimes to pick what game goes under what label. For example, you'd probably guess that Skate might be an EA Sports label game, ad not an EA Games label game. EA Games global marketing VP Mike Quigley explains in a new interview with Gamasutra why you'd be wrong:
"That's a great question. Right now, again, that is driven by the fact that the game was made by Black Box, and the Black Box team is near the Need for Speed team, and those guys work together in Vancouver. That's just where we put it".
TrustyGamer has a point. Photorealism is a good thing, but can it really be an escape from reality -- especially for ostensibly lighthearted fare -- when the colour palette it draws on represents the depressing colour scheme of our own worlds? Increasingly, that seems to be the case in every title, including EA's Skate, which "look(s) like shots from a heroin game where you have to skate to get your next fix."
We may have a good idea what those Skate "extensions" are that EA Games president Frank Gibeau teased a couple months ago, as IGN reported earlier today that Skate It, a spin-off planned for the Nintendo DS and Wii, was in the works. Curiously, IGN has since pulled that report, hinting that either that information was wrong or not yet deemed fit to print by the powers that be.
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater? Bwah? Can't remember it. The pure joy of EA's Skate has wiped clean all memory of manual combo runs, ill-advised Jackass cameos and flying toilets. And not just for me, for a lot of people. So Activision and Neversoft are going back to the drawing board, and they're bringing Tony Hawk with them. The man, that is, who's working closely with the game's developers so they can bring "new thrills" to the stale, ageing series. They're calling it the "Tony Hawk Innovation Plan". Only this year's annual instalment in the series will tell if it makes a lick of difference.
Executive Suite: Tony Hawk leaps to top of financial empire [USA Today]
From the Duh Files comes news that EA plans to ship "extensions" to its financially successfully Skate and Burnout series, by way of EA Games prez Frank Gibeau. He also says that a proper Mass Effect sequel is already in the works. What those extension may be wasn't defined, GameSpot reports, but could easily mean proper sequels or handheld spin-offs. And while downloadable content most likely isn't out of the question, Skate producers have gone on record in the past saying the title wasn't built with DLC in mind.
Another Burnout wouldn't come as a shock to just about anyone, but it would appear that EA is not going to give up trying to unseat the current Madden of skateboarding, Tony Hawk. He told investors "these are the fights that EA knows how to win," which I'm sure has Activision execs losing control of their bowels in fear. You're welcome for the imagery.
New Burnout, Skate on the way [GameSpot]
Not everything went Activision's way last year. Tony Hawks Proving Ground, for example, looked rubbish compared to Skate, and sales reflected this, with EA's new series outselling Hawk's 2:1. Which when you consider the market for skate games didn't increase (the majority just opted for EA's better game) poses a problem for Activision. So they've sworn that the next Tony Hawk's will be innovative. Just like the last one was meant to be. And the one before. Ever hear about the boy who cried wolf, Acti? Ended up eaten by, well, a wolf. Food for thought.
